Dec 12, 2020

Candy Cane Lane

Snow was in the forecast for this past Friday and tonight .  So rather than wait until Friday to visit Candy Cane Lane we headed out early on Thursday evening. We did enjoy a few skiffs of snow during the day on Friday but nothing stuck to the roads.  However Thursday turned out to be a perfect evening to visit Candy Cane Lane. We arrived about 5PM before things got too busy. Colin parked the Jeep and we walked all over the place.  Families were there with their kids in strollers and others with their dogs. By 6PM is was busier, yet every time I stopped to take a photo with my iPhone, drivers simply stopped and waited for me to finish. I was bowled over by the courtesy. I wished that I had a pocketful of candy canes to hand out as a thank you.

So many lights!

This was yet another first for us.

I had an aha moment, of course, Candy Cane Lane.

 

Of course, candy canes everywhere.

This was special to me. They had two bottles of sanitizer and a bowl full of Christmas candy for those who wanted to have one.

At various points along the way, they had bins for those who wished to donate to the food bank.

The path between the candy canes led to a ferris wheel filled with penguins going around and around.

The car was possibly a Nissan sports car. Great job on the decor in this yard.

Hey that is Santa in the drivers seat!

What a fun outing. Loving all these firsts.

One of my mini displays. The hanging ornament is glass with gold decor.

Our glass  balls from Murano ( Venice ) Italy. So very festive.

Are you sending out Christmas cards this year?

 

 

 

 

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Dec 11, 2020

A fun day with another first

This past Wednesday was a crazy busy day from leather coat repairs, returns at one store and new xmas purchases at another, hair cuts, special run to Safeway downtown to pick up stuffing and eggnog and finally Costco.  And the big first we did. A full non stop nine hour day 😕  But hopefully we only have one or two very small local runs left to do before Christmas.

A first for us was to go Christmas light touring. Colin wanted to check out Kettle Valley.

This is not a formal publicized tour. We just went there and drove around looking at all the wonderful displays of Christmas spirit.

Colin had brought our medium size Canon travel camera but he really needed his Nikon set up and tripod.

So I pulled out my cell phone ( iPhone 6 ) and figured it out.  Much better. I love Christmas lights and my big treat is walking though the RV park .  Sometimes times there are only 9 units with lights. No worries, I go back and forth a few times. So this was a huge treat for both of us.

Lovely decorations on so many homes. Many are simply using white lights which while pretty do not stand out as Christmasy.

You can see which type of lights we prefer.

It is 4:35 and pitch dark as I work on this post. We have to keep looking at the clock to confirm the real time. Just now I thought it was 7PM and time to start dinner.

We usually get up about 8AM ( but then we only go to bed at about midnight ). We were quite surprised to see a blanket of snow on the lake. There were light flurries most of the day. Pretty to watch.

This looked like a runway across the lake.

We did hear the geese arrive and were fortunate to see them do their ballet landings.

With no warning, they were off.

You can barely make out the snow falling. What I want you to see is how the lake is once again unthawing. Who knows what tomorrow is going to bring.

A few of my grandmothers ornaments.

The star was a gift from a long ago friend, I have five of these, all unique.

No idea why the raccoons, I guess they were cute, 33 Christmases ago.

Z

About 38 years ago I used to be crafty. This was one of my first cross stitch ornaments.

So enjoying our light flurries today.

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Dec 10, 2020

Eagles and our lake

This is not about the eagles we have here on our lake but about another lake here in Kelowna.

Yesterday morning we woke to a frozen lake. How can it reverse itself so quickly?

This eagle photo was sent to me by a blog reader whom I thank very much.

Her words were “Had to share – perhaps taken on your lake? This once in a lifetime photo was taken by Ernie Serediak in Kelowna, B.C. on November 29, 2020”. What a fantastic shot and yes once in a lifetime.

I looked up the photographers name and there nothing further written about that photo. However it did lead me to discover another photo he took.

That wasn’t the first great eagle photo that Ernie had taken. Talk about being in the right place at the right time.

We often see our eagles flying back and forth and just watch them soar past. They are stunning and so majestic.

And then this morning we saw that our lake was starting to unthaw again. It will be an interesting winter.

We aren’t exactly quarantined as we can still go out for essential reasons and for groceries. At least we are together. No visitors inside nor outside until January 8th.

 

 

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Dec 08, 2020

More first to us happenings

On Monday November 30th the lake was still liquid.  It must have been very cold because on Tuesday, December 1st it was frozen. Not a drop of water to be seen.

There were a lot of geese out there on the ice.

The next morning I looked out to see tiny black specs. I had trouble with the binoculars and thought that perhaps some of the tiny diving ducks might be frozen to the ice. They did not move. Colin finally came home, checked it out and informed me that that they were not ducks but goose droppings 😳 Blog reader Jim ( & Barb ) had made a comment on a post and then I replied to that and he replied again. I have to thank him for setting me straight on ice, ducks and geese. Maybe you will learn something as well.

Once again Jim thanks for explaining the que pasa of it all to me.

The next morning Colin took these three shots with his camera. The birds were quite far out. As you can see the geese are walking around on the ice.  We saw them land. They simply came straight down like a helicopter and had a soft landing.

There was a good deal of preening and just relaxing on the ice.

Perhaps this one was looking for a sip of water. Eventually after a few hours they started to fly away in small groups. They just stood up and started to quickly flap their wings and within seconds they went straight up.

We have had a week of blue sky and cooler temperatures. It was cloudy Sunday night and yesterday morning ( Monday ) I was surprised to see this line on the lake. It was a crack in the ice. I took these photos from inside hence the reflections.  I haven’t left the house since Sunday afternoon.

The lake appeared to unthaw just a bit.

By the end of Monday there was much more water. The lake was still frozen closer to shore.

Today the lake was mostly unthawed. We never expected that to happen and so quickly. We kept watching but haven’t seen any geese nor ducks since Sunday before dark. You would think that now that the ice was almost gone that they would be here swimming about.

I still shake my head at the lake freezing and then thawing from Monday to Monday. So many firsts for us this winter including decorating for Christmas.

Decorating the tree came back slowly. It took me a few minutes to realize that the lights went on first. Then I did the bead garland.

Colin likes to put the ornaments up.

Long time readers will remember that I always hung these together over the visor. They are still together but have a new look thanks to Colin.

 

 

 

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Dec 07, 2020

Wish we were able to do time travel

Our November 2020 calendar page. Marrakesh in June of 2019.

This was taken on the Isla this last Saturday night.

And shortly thereafter the same night. So fortunate to have a friend that shares.

I would be happy to be in either place right now. Actually my heart would rather be in Mexico. The sunset shots brought me to tears. I can’t believe that we are missing this.

 

 

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