Yule Pig

In Scandinavia there's a Christmas tradition that involves hiding an almond in a bowl of rice mush. All of the children get a bowl of the warm breakfast meal, and the one who finds the almond in his/her bowl wins! The prize is a marzipan pig. Marzipan is almonds ground up to make a paste, then sweetened to make a treat.

So last year and again this year we bought some marzipan at IKEA and I made a pig. This is the 2012 edition. I'm not sure anyone will be brave enough to eat it, but he does look kind of cute.

Nate's Big San Francisco Adventures

Several years ago, before Rob Fisher and Pam got serious about each other, Rob came to visit us in California. Because he had never been there before, we took him to SF for a fun day, and showed him all the strange and wonderful things there. We called it Rob's Big San Francisco Adventure.

So when Nate came to visit us this weekend, we did the same for him. It was pretty dicey as we left YC. The forecast was 100% chance of rain with winds up to 17 mph. 

But it turned out to be one of the this year's "Four Christmas Miracles." A seen above, the weather was clear and warm all morning. We took a bunch of great photos (which was good, because it turned cloudy and we got a little rain later when we were at Pier 39).

Below is one of the best photos of the day. Cute couple. and the breakers in the background, framed by the Golden Gate Bridge with the Marin headlands in the distance. It was a great morning!

While David, Kim, and Nate were taking a long long on a short pier, getting visited by a huge pelican, Mom and I checked out the old fort built in the 1850's to protect the entrance to SF Bay. Below you can see three shots of one of the canon ports (there were dozens of them, on three different levels - and more canons on top). You can see the ocean though the last one.

 

And below is the prettiest girl on the trip, standing in front of the light house on top of the fort. It was fun to see, but it was so windy and cold out there on the point (and we were getting hungry) that we left and drove to Pier 39 to get something to eat.

It was a really fun day. We got clam chowder bowls at the Pier, and walked out to see the ships. What a blast!

A Legend Passes

Dave Brubeck, one of the great jazz musicians of our time, died last Wednesday at the age of 92. Most musicians and non-musicians alike knew him for his wildly popular "Take Five" which was an unassuming, but complex mainstream jazz tune. He was an innovator and a classicist at the same time. 

He was a native of Northern California (Concord), and grew up playing music in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada where his Dad owned a ranch. He almost followed that line of work himself, but the pull of music kept him from it.

I love his music, and also loved hearing about his life and philosophy about people and music. He was one of the rare people who supported black musicians completely, even during the turmoil of the civil rights movement in the 60's. He refused to have his band stay in hotels that refused to accept "colored" people.

I've had a few opportunities to see and briefly meet a few major jazz musicians, like Woody Herman. I didn't meet Brubeck, but I spent the better part of a day with his drummer, Joe Morello once when I was in college. It was a great opportunity, and he spoke some of Brubeck, and the great man that he was.

Well, we all pass on sometime, and I think Dave had a good life. You might want to listen to some of his music at: http://www.davebrubeck.com/live/. Click on Listen.

Dat You, Santy Claus?

Mom and I sat down this evening after a hard day's work (well, she worked hard, I took the day off and did stuff that didn't need doing) and watched some Christmas movies. We started with Elf, and ended up with The Magoo Christmas Carol. Loads of fun!

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So as I was looking through some old photos I came across these two.

Maybe I've already posted them, they're good enough for a rerun. (I love the hat over the eyes.)

The man under the hat, of course, is HG, as you see below. 

Catch the Christmas Spirit.

First Cutting

Today was the last sunny day before several days of rain, so I thought I better mow the new lawn - for the first time. This photo actually makes it look better than it really does, but still, it's a big improvement over the past.

And one more set of photos from Trevor and Michelle's visit. When I was a kid, the best toy in the world was a big ol' empty refrigerator box. After using it for a fort until it was falling apart, we could then cut it up and use the pieces to slide down the levee (which always had long grass growing on the sides). Like sledding down a hill in the parts of the country where it snows, only you could do this nearly year round

So I took our empty fireplace and microwave boxes and built a little tunnel/fort for the kids to play in. They probably would have played in it more if there wasn't the draw of the trampoline. But they had fun enough.

The Train Museum

The Butchart Family (as presently constituted) in front of the giant Christmas Tree in Old Sacramento. We drove down there this morning to see the Train Museum, and the weather was beautiful.

The light was in the wrong place (okay, I was in the wrong place) so the sun created havoc with this shot. But it has some important people in it, so I included it anyway.

This is probably my favorite photo of the day - the three kids all holding hands and walking down the boardwalk along the river in Old Sac. It was actually a staged shot, but the girls were holding hands of their own accord, and Michelle asked Atticus to join them (which he did). How can anybody say they have cuter grand kids than we have? The rain coats were absolutely unnecessary. By the time the museum opened at 10:00, the sun was so warm everyone had stripped down to their T-shirts.

Inside the museum, Elizabeth got fussy and camera shy, but I managed to get a couple of poor quality photos of her and Jane (in the blue) as they sat in the engineer's seat on one of the MASSIVE trains.

And of course, the day became spectacular when we stopped at McDonalds for lunch. Atticus downed copious quantities of McNuggets, and the girls did their share too. After the main course, we had warm chocolate chip cookies - which Lizzie mostly got in her mouth.

Mom bought a Family pass that's good for a year, so everyone needs to plan on getting down there with us sometime during the next year (you too, Kim and David).

More Good Stuff On Christmas

Here's a link to one of the new Church websites on celebration of Christmas. It has downloadable Tabernacle Choir music, video clips, and a link to the Church's Bible Video site. It' a good place to send people who want to celebrate Christ's life with us. Click the link below.

Christmas Joy