Our Christmas was quite,....

although we all received such special gifts. Cortney has longed
for a metal detector for months and shared this with her Grandparents so....,
she was blessed with a wonderful detector, with all the bells, beeps and tones
guaranteed to assist you in finding a treasure. The ground is frozen, so outside
the searches are limited to simply marking the "spot", until Spring thaw arrives.
Inside she has come across many interesting finds, in walls under the wood floor,
of course which she'll just have to imagine what the treasure could possibly be...
because we aren't tearing apart walls or tearing up the wood floor, nope, sorry!

Mike was surprised with his gift from Cortney,an all wooden canteen, lined
with paraffin wax, so yes it is usable. He was glad she'd gotten it for him.

Here's a close up shot, it is really a work of art! Mike of course tried it out

and with exception for a small leak, it works great. We'll add some more

melted paraffin to catch the area that was leaking, as well as add

another good coating inside.

Jon, Bobbi and Jaymz arrived around 7:30pm on Christmas eve. Jaymz

already looked tired and was ready to unwrap presents, rather than eat.

Cortney got him two new sweats outfits. We picked up two of the blanket

sleepers( we called them woollies) with football stuff on them, Jaymz is

a big football fan. Then of course he had to have a toy, so we spied a

Magnadoodle, tough enough in design to withstand a 3-4 yr. old boy.

In the photo below he is learning how to erase the picture he drew.

Darn flash, didn't go off but it's still a cute picture of Jon and Jaymz

looking at his new PJ's.( you can click the photos to make larger)

Cortney's gift from us, an IPOD. I'm NOT technologically minded so....

I take her word for it that it can hold up to 2,000 songs, take videos,

can tune into radio stations, etc.... Hers isn't the fancy touch IPOD, it's

called "Nano" It's so small I'm afraid to even touch it! I am amazed at

how far we've come in inventing small items that do four times+ the job

the older versions. On Jan 7, 2010 we're going to DSL Internet,

breaking free of dial up Internet, YEAH! In our area this has just

become available and the introductory offer for 1 yr., is only $4 more

than we pay for dial up. My gift from Cortney was this beautiful necklace she made, using wire

wrap techniques she learned in beading class. It's beautiful and can be

worn with just about any color clothes, as it has multi colored beads

(see below)

She and Mike also pulled a sneaky, a year or so ago I lost one of my

small diamonds from my wedding ring, anyway they managed to sneak

it out the a jewelry store to be repaired as well as replace the missing

diamond. I'll be glad to have my ring back on my finger, it's still being

repaired, but should be finished by the New Year.

Added to all of this Cortney gifted us with a portfolio of her best drawings

and the most heart felt letter to her Dad and I. Needless to say it is

one of our cherished keepsakes.

There were also stocking stuffers and several DVD's as gifts, for

everyone to enjoy!

Now bring on 2010, I'm getting my Spring Cleaning list ready! One thing

about having a wood stove, the walls and ceilings NEED to be scrubbed!

We also have touch up painting, full room painting and other odds and ends

projects to focus on. Then the end of January we'll be butchering pigs,

rendering lard, making sausage( three types). Move ahead to beginning of

March it will be time to get seeds started! WOW! we don't have much

time to get it all finished, time truly does fly when you get older! Now

you see how we came up with our farm's name!*wink*

Blessings to you and yours, for this New Year coming at us like a freight

train! One things for sure it's bound to be an interesting year!