Christmas-time again

The last days have been gorgeous, sunny and almost warm. Yesterday we never lit the fire in the kitchen. Today is cooler with occasional sun, but mostly gray. We took advantage of a bright spell to go for a walk this afternoon and discovered that the Charente Libre had been delivered even though it's a holiday! After years of being used to not getting a Dutch paper on a holiday, this was a big surprise.

Christmas zoomed up fast this year, so we're only starting to get in the mood. For our yearly photo, we included Lydia, to her discomfort, since this may be the last year she's with us. Here she is looking to escape:

Yes, Ed's got a stovepipe coming out of his head. The splotches on the wall are possible colors for the living room.

Two of Kaye's sisters and a niece are arriving tomorrow for a visit. (The weather appears to be turning gray and window for their arrival.) We're busy cleaning up and making a place for them to lay their heads. We'll have our proper xmas dinner with them on Saturday. They'll go on to Paris for new years and a more exciting time in the city of lights.

Tonight we had a pair of pigeons for dinner. We've never had these before--one of those things we're glad we tried, but don't need to have again, we think. The rest of the dinner was quite nice though.