December Blurbs

Early December, I enjoyed a “Monday Funday” with my girlfriend down in the heart of San Diego = Seaport Village

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Lunch at the Fish Market

And the hubs and I enjoyed a lovely dinner date with this couple last weekend. Love spending time with friends…

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The hubs and I enjoyed a beautiful Christmas program – Weeks ago.

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We enjoyed the view and music from our front row balcony seats. After the program, we had a lovely time at our neighbors party.

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“At Christmas I no more desire a rose than wish a snow in May’s new-fangled mirth; But like of each thing that in season grows.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour Lost

“Shakespeare may not desire a rose in December, but he didn’t live in San Diego” – From the diary of the previous owner of our home.

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A December rose is a wonderful treat. And these roses are left for our enjoyment from the previous owners.

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A beautiful night sky – I was admiring the sky one evening while out cleaning my paint brushes and roller. Go me! I finally finished painting the last hallway a few weeks ago.

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December 19th = the hubs last day of work thru 1/6/2014!

The babies are happy. Although we think we lost one to that egret, as we only count 9 of the original big guys. But they are happy and loving life – Image shot a week or so ago.

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Last Friday, the hubs took me Christmas shopping in LA. I thought we were going to do some shopping in the Fashion District. But that was just a little “white lie” as the hubs had other plans. Plans to surprise me with diamond earrings. And surprise me, he did.

I told him I really didn’t need anything for Christmas. However, I did tell him I could use socks (mine have holes the size of quarters), a sweater and new hiking shoes.

But this is what the hubs thought I needed and what I got to unwrap Christmas morning.

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Arriving to Christmas Dinner at The Hotel Del.

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Carving the turkey

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Sand in my toes after dinner, was just what I needed.

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Sandcastles

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A Sandcastle for Christmas.

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The view – looking out to Point Loma.

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Ice Skating – It was fun to watch…

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Remembering Christmas Past – The silver ornament revealed a hidden surprise on Christmas morning, 1998. I said yes! And we’ve lived happily ever after.

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This Christmas – A day we – enjoyed sandcastles, time together on the beach, Christmas Dinner at Hotel Del, the afternoon and evening with friends, more presents, a bonfire, roasting marshmallows and visiting into the night.

Feeling Blessed and enjoying these days with the hubs.

Blessings – Debbie

Family Days in Florida

This post is going to be a bag of family images during the week stay in FL. I still have so many images to process. But for now, I’m ready to get a few out there.

A few of the things we did that week = had the famous roast beef sunday dinner at mom and dad’s, with the family. I got to play with my nieces hair, did their nails, got plenty of rest, played poker, played backgammon, enjoyed a nice river dinner out with my little brother and his wife (my big bro was not in town as early as we were for this), enjoyed Cold Stone, went to Bass Pro with the family, enjoyed pumpkin pie every day from Thanksgiving – December 1st, purchased fudge, went to visit my grandma, aunt and uncle + cousins, enjoyed lunch with my aunt + uncle + their family + my mom = a total of 11 of us family members, had dinner with friends, went shopping with mom, I’m a heavy on the olives kinda gal and had all of the olives on my Thanksgiving plate disappear from a certain brother :), helped mom with Thanksgiving preparations, enjoyed a dinner out with just my parents, enjoyed watching my parents get surprised by one of the twins (she said she was not able to come as she’s in the middle of exams following Thanksgiving = she lives in Washington), having her there made our family complete, I got to take amazing pix of everyone, enjoyed a big family dinner with everyone at my little bro’s (guy on the far right of the first image in this post), met quite a few of my nieces and nephew’s friends, visited my parents church and enjoyed listening to our nephew play the piano and sing during service, talked to my nephew about coming out to Cali, to take his Sr pix this year and much much more.

Meet the family

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My two siblings + parents. My older bro on left, he’s a year older than me and my baby bro on right, he’s a year and 1/2 younger than me. Feeling blessed to be right smack dab in the middle.

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Pop and me

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I love how he just cracks me up!

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My niece all the way from Washington State.

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And her twin sis in Florida.

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And their baby bro – He’s the senior who mentioned coming out to So Cal for me to take his senior pix in the spring.

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My nephew from North Carolina

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And his little brother from North Carolina – This guy is also a senior this year. And he’s also the nephew who plays the piano and sings.

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While enjoying the cool of the evening with friends, aunt Deb (that would be me) told the girls to “work it ~ work it” I just love the result!

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Our three nephews – There is never a dull moment with the fam. As you can see, the proof is in the pudding.

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My nephew and his buddy – Boy’s certainly know how to work it too!

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When friends arrive late one evening – Hot chocolate + a bon fire in the backyard, made for the best way to spend the time with friends.

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Here we have pops enjoying the cool evening hours as I was out shooting the grandkids. It is then when they brought my attention to grandpa. As this shot begged to be taken.

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I don’t know where the funny bone genes came from, but I think you are looking at two possible candidates.

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There are a lot more images to share from our Florida travels. But I’ll leave you with our Thanksgiving dinner picture, gathered ’round. I love my family and so thankful we could all be together. Even if my little bro took all my olives. 😉

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Blessings – Debbie

Happy Thanksgiving

Apparently that is how far behind I am on the blog. And I say it’s time to do a little catching up, before this gets out of hand.

The Sunday before Thanksgiving, (November 23rd) the hubs and I were off to spend Thanksgiving with the family in Florida.

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What we did to pass the time on the long flight from coast to coast.

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And I was thinking how cool it was going to be to see the folks that evening.

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A little layover with a latte in Atlanta = Perfection!

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All set for our sunset flight, down to south Florida.

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It’s taxi to the runway time.

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And we flew into the sunset.

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One of my favorite shots of the day was the sunset + contrail from a jet plane.

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All images and collages (documenting our little trip) were created with my cell and collage apps on the cell phone. I can’t express the amount of fun it was creating images = the time went by so fast.

The end of the first day.

Blessings – Debbie