We're in the dark days before Christmas and besides being short, the days are gloomy and foggy and often rainy as well.
The late afternoon hours are usually the best when the weather clears a little and we can even see the sun set behind the coastal hills in the distance ...

                                   

Our local TV-weather-guy mentioned something the other day that I didn't know about: we're at that time in the season that although the days are still getting shorter, it's not getting dark any earlier anymore, that's at it's max, but still getting light later in the mornings until the winter-solstice on the 21st. Huh, interesting ..

To brighten up the doom and gloom (although I am totally OK with that but James could use some 'cheer' during these dark days) we looked for some fun holiday-events to attend.
And since every respectable town in America goes all out for this season we always find lots to choose from.

                                               

       
First up, last Sunday morning: The yearly Handmade Holiday Bazaar at the Yamhill Valley Heritage Center.
Entry was free with a shelf-stable food donation to benefit the YCAP Food Bank, so we brought 2 cans of soup and slowly made our way through the 2 large halls filled with over 50 boots of local artisans.



There was and enormous variety of all kind of holiday knick-knacks, all kind of woodworks, jewelry, pottery, knittings, quilts and many more.
We never buy much at events like this because we have no place to put anything anywhere but of course James fell for some brownies/blondies, he's a Hess, you never pass up any goodies to eat!

Of course there was a Santa!

After a quick bite to eat (yes, more food ..) we drove into McMinnville to our beloved Gallery Theater to see another matinee performance, this time we saw 'Chitty chitty Bang Bang'.

This adorable and ambitious “steampunk”-styled musical, based on the 1968 film (featuring Dick van Dyke and Sally-Ann Howes) of the same name with screenplay by Roald Dahl, tells the story of Caractacus Potts, a down-on-his-luck inventor who turns a broken-down Grand Prix car into a fancy vehicle for his children, and then goes off on a magical fantasy adventure.

As usual the show was a total feast of song, dance, ingenious decor and fabulous costumes!
Songs like 'Teamwork' (makes the dream work) and the Bombie Samba' and of course the title-song 'Oh hey, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang I love you', will be hard to get out of our heads for a while.
Another winner for the Gallery Theater!

Than, on Thursday, it was time for a visit to the Delphian (Scientology!) School here in town for their Winter Festival:
 

This exclusive, international boarding school is build on top of a hill above Sheridan and, although highly visible, is normally not open for the public.
I've been intrigued by it since arriving in Sheridan and have been waiting for a chance to have a look around, which is only possible during performances of their theater group or famous coir.

Unfortunately this night's performance was at 6.30 and it was already dark when we drove up the long driveway to the top of the hill from where you have a wonderful view over the valley .. during the day. This is the front entrance:

We walked around the entrance hall which housed the art bazaar for a while, admiring  various art forms made by the students ..

After which we were herded into the chapel for the main event, the singing performances of all the school choirs, of which they have no less than 6!



A wide variety of songs were sang, 'Carol of the Bells', 'Jingle bell rock', 'God rest ye merry gentlemen', and 'Here comes Santa Claus' to name a few.

One of the real treats was hearing the Varsity Choir singing 'The first Noel' and 'Jubilate Deo' .. so beautiful!
And the guest performance of the McMinnville Community Choir singing the traditional Nigerian Carol 'Betelehemu' was equally awesome!

Silent night was a sing-along song for which we all were given a little candlelight service candle which of course created a beautiful, festive, Christmas atmosphere

(Just to prove we were there .. that's us there on the left towards the bottom .. James in the striped sweater and me with the long hair and my butterfly clasp). See?

        


And to finish off this week of festivities we drove to Sheridan last night for their Christmas Lights Parade (no holiday without a parade!).
                                                             

Fortunately there was a lull in the weather and it was nearly dry for a change.
Anticipating lots of traffic we parked on main street and walked over the bridge to Bridge street where we waited under the awning of the corner cafe where we would be dry .. just in case:

       

We didn't have to wait long before the first cars arrived:

                     

But unfortunately, after maybe about 10 cars, the show was over!
No horses, no marching band, no entertainers ... in contrast to last year's awesome parade in Willamina, this one was an absolute dud!

I took some pics but really .. it looks better than it was.

At least the police car sounded it's siren and flashed it's lights and candies were thrown for the kids, but the whole event was over in 20 minutes.
Oh well, it can't all be perfect and it was somewhat Christmas-sy .. but we'll scratch that one of our list for next year!

Here's some candy we (I) grabbed (those Crunches are good!):

And that about sums up this week. I think we definitely did our best to get 'into the spirit'!
Christmas is coming and we're ready!

This coming week we'll be out of town for a couple of days.
Just like last year James will be golfing in Bandon with some of his golfing-buddies from Newberg and since they had a cancellation he asked if I wanted to come with him.
Since I can do with a change of scenery and Bandon is a very cute village on the beautiful Oregon coast, I decided to take him up on his offer.

I won't be golfing but I'm looking forward to some nice walks on the beach.

Fingers crossed it won't be raining too much!

 

We had a frosty start of December with several early mornings seeing temperatures of 28-30F!
The white, frozen fields, together with clear blue skies made for pretty pictures:

The leaves of my geranium were edged in a sugary-white coating and all other plants and leaves were frozen stiff and crispy.

As you can see in the pic it was minus 2 Celsius one morning.
Funny enough I've only just recently discovered our indoor/outdoor thermometer can be changed from Fahrenheit to Celsius by pushing one of the little buttons twice.
Duhhh .. so much easier than taking 32 of the Fahrenheit, halving the outcome and than adding one degree!

The water puddles on my walk were all frozen, it reminded me of one of my favorite winter-sports to do when I was a child .. skating!

                                                         

Our pond didn't even have the thinnest layer of ice on it though, which I bet these ducks were very happy about.

 

Yes, since the pond filled back up during the rains of late, the first ducks have returned!
Besides a large flock of Mallards this little female Bufflehead showed up as well:

   

I love watching her dive below the surface again and again hunting for small water-insects. She stays under for scary long times, sometime up to 12 seconds!

                         

Thursday, the 5th, of course we had to celebrate 'Sinterklaas' again as we do each year.
I'd watched him arrive in Holland on the dutch TV channel on the 16 of November:

   

As I've explained in previous years the dutch celebrate his birthday (which is on the 6th) on the evening before with the giving of gifts and eating lots of sickening sweet candies and pastries.
I baked Banketstaaf-jes (almondpaste in puff-pastry) and instead of my usual Speculaas I tried my hand at Taai-taai (a sort of gingerbread with lots of honey and aniseed) this year which was surprisingly easy to do and very tasty!

 

As usual we didn't bother with the gift giving. We have everything we want and if not we buy it so we really don't see the point.
I do try to sing some of the traditional children's songs that evening but it gets harder every year to remember them ..

And of course I also made a start in decorating for the season:

                                                                       

The wreath is hung, a little tree sits on the patio table and the outside lights are up:

Let the holidays begin!

 

Lets see, what else? Oh yeah, we started a different health regime. Getting sort of head-start on our New Year's resolution if you will ..
We usually only eat fruit for breakfast these days (we're less active than we used to be) but sometimes that was a little on the light side for me. It made me shaky on my walks so I needed something 'more'.

Besides that I think we could also do with a little more veggies.

So here's what we do know .. we have a smoothy!

We have a banana (half each) with fruit and (almond) milk, oats, nuts and maybe some avocado or spinach .. whatever tickles my fancy (or what needs to be eaten) and I use a hand-blender to blend it all together.

Eh, voila! Healthy and delicious and a lot heftier than 'just' fruit!

OK, there you have it. It's December and life is cozy and festive and peaceful (and cold). 
Yup, life is good!

Yes, there it was again .. Thanksgiving Day!
And yes, as always, so much to be thankful for! Our health, our home, our jobs, our friends, our family .. each other!
We're lucky, and we know it ..

Our usual traditions were observed. We watched the Macy Parade:



While drinking coffee with a BIG piece of apple-cranberry pie!
I don't know why but while I make this every year for thanksgiving and we always love it this one tasted exceptionally delicious this year!

   


Of course we had to see who won the Purina National Dog Show which turned out to be Vito, the first pug ever to win best in this show!

And I'll have to say it again, despite Vito's cuteness, it's so sad to see dogs with such an unnatural and unhealthy anatomy win and get so much publicity.
Short-nosed dogs, also known as brachycephalic dogs, can have a number of health problems such as breathing problems, eye and nose problems, and skin and ear conditions to name just a few.

In Holland it is illegal  to breed dogs in the red zone, where the snout is shorter than one third the length of the skull and they are now working on a law to ban ownership of flat faced dogs and other pets with other 'harmful external characteristics' (folded ears, shortened legs, all cropping) as well.
I agree with their statement: “The message must be clear: purchasing these animals is irresponsible, results in serious harm to welfare, and will soon no longer be allowed.”

Moving on shall we .. more food was consumed:

                                                 

To keep it 'simple' (James' words) I'd bought turkey thighs, which were a quick roast in the oven, and I had boxed stuffing, a pouch of (sweet) mashed potatoes, a package of turkey gravy, a can of cranberries and frozen green beans for the casserole (made with a can of mushroom soup of course).

               

Let me tell you though, it's still quite an undertaking to get everything ready and hot at the same time.
Still not simple enough for me .. next year we go out for dinner! (although I say that every year, but you know ... no leftovers!)

So, Thanksgiving is over and, as we saw at the end of the parade, the 'Big Guy' is back in town once again, and we know what that means ... decorating for Christmas!
I made a start by taking down all the Fall-stuff:

It seems that it gets to be more every year ... funny how that works when you go to the Dollar store and are tempted by all their cute little nick-knacks. I mean, only $1.25, how can you not?
Next year I need a new straw-man for outside because the ground squirrels took the one I had completely apart (for their nest?) and one day they even disappeared under the RV with his whole bottom halve, legs and stand included!

We haven't seen any for a couple of weeks now and when I googled this I found that they actually go underground in late Fall, close off their tunnels and hibernate for the winter.

Well, I say, good riddance! Of course they'll be back in the Spring ..

It's getting a lot colder now, daytime highs are in the mid 40s and the nights are dipping into the high 30s.
While I was working on this blog the other day I heard some knocking on the window in front of me which turned out to be a Red-breasted Sapsucker:

                                                    

He reminded me of a dutch children's song 'Roodborstje tikt tegen 't raam'
It's a short song that's very popular and it tells the story of a little red robin tapping on the window and asking to be let in the house - because he finds it waaay to cold outside!
It sure seemed like he was saying 'let me in, I'm cold', but I doubt it. They're fine here in the NW during the winter.
I bet he was after insects that hide in the ridges of the window frame ...

The days are so much shorter now, only about 10 hours of visible light and the sun starts to set around 4.30 already!

 The light is beautiful around that time ..

                       

                       

One more day and we're in December. Time keeps on flying!

Another rainy week has passed. So far October has had almost 8 inches, at least according to the Salem Weather History site.
That's our rain gauge above when it was filled all the way to the tippity-top on Friday.
It's hard to see but it's completely full!



And that was after I'd emptied it last week in between showers when it was up to 5.5 inches and the week before that when it reached 3.5!
So, according to our gauge and my calculations we're up to 17 inches!

I guess we're somewhere in the middle which means a good foot has fallen. The (upper) pond I look at from the RV has risen to it's max and has started to overflow in the one below.
Fortunately we don't have to worry about flooding!

                             

                            

Although it is normal for October to be a rainy month, the excessive rain of the last week was caused by A so-called 'bomb cyclone', which is a rapidly intensifying extra-tropical cyclone, followed by another 'atmospheric river' like we had earlier this year.
Besides a lot of rain we also had high winds, up to 45 miles/hour, which means all trees are now mostly bare:

                             

Attempting to lighten the mood a little I brought some color into the house by bringing home this small Christmas Cacti from the grocery store.

Apparently these 'Christmas' cacti are actually 'Thanksgiving' cacti, and flowering in November. 
There is indeed a true Christmas-cactus but nowadays they’re not popular with greenhouse growers so you'll almost always and up with the Thanksgiving one.
Best way to keep them apart, besides the different blooming time, are the toothed segments of the Thanksgiving versus the smooth ones of the Christmas one.

My little plant is full of buds, I hope they'll all bloom! One has already started, isn't it spectacular?                                    

                                                      

Due to the weather it was another quiet week, mostly spent indoors, doing a lot of puzzling and reading and I also took some time familiarizing myself with my new phone.
I was so happy to finally be able to download a few apps I always wanted but was never able to download since my old phone didn't have enough space .. or something like that (I'm just so not computer-savvy).

I'm talking about the Merlin ID app, the Map-my-walk app and a plant app, they're in the middle row here:

Despite the rain I went for some of my normal, fairly short walks:

          

Map-my-walk shows for instance how far I walked, how long it took me, my steps and calories used and even the elevation gain.
How cool is that?

And this is the Merlin app:

   

 

Despite the rain it identified quite a lot of birds.
I didn't know we had the Golden-crowned Sparrow around but apparently we do, and now I know, I'll be on the look-out for them!

As you can see on the right it also identified Pine Siskins, which was not that difficult since every now and than we're beseeched by a large flock:

These little exceptionally streaky, small-billed finches flock to thistle or nyjer feeders and other small seeds.
They love to cling to the ends of conifer branches, even upside down, to feed at cones and will do the seem at the fine mesh of feeders:



They're feisty little buggers and you often hear their insistent twitters while quarreling over who gets the best spots on the feeders, even before you see them.

     

I love watching them, they're so entertaining!

The river is always a good spot to see birds and although I totally forgot to turn on my 'app' I came across this Heron the other day.
I actually see him almost every time I go down there but he's very shy and will fly away as soon as he sees me (which is way before I notice him).
This time he let me take his picture:
                                                                
                                                                       

The river is much higher at the moment and very fast flowing but I guess he's confident that he's fast enough to catch something:  

Like I said, it's been a quiet week so other than some food-pics I don't think I have much else to show for.
This was a delicious soup, a curry chicken with lentils.
As usual I'm not sure how I made it .. a little bit of this and a little bit of that .. but wow, soooo good!

                                                                                

And James left me a rather funny note the other day when I went for a walk, before he went to the office:

Since he works from home we often have coffee together these days and although we try not to go overboard with sugar and cookies he obviously wanted some that morning!
'Kookja' is his phonetic attempt to write the dutch word 'koekje' which means 'cookie'.
Close, but no cigar .. but I knew what he meant.

That day we had a small 'koekje' but, as usual, I made something bigger for the weekend:

                                                             

I've been binge-watching reruns of  several years of the 'Holiday Baking Championship' and got inspired to bake a (my first) 'roll'.
A pumpkin-roll (with pecans) to be precise and I was quite happy with the result!

            

Only 6 days to Thanksgiving, can you believe it? Next weekend I'll be decorating for Christmas!