As much as we go out to the cabin, I rarely get time to meander through Langley.  I didn’t too much today, either, as Kyla adores shopping for about 30 minutes, and then is stick-a-fork-in-me-and-take-me-home-to-my-happy-place done.  But Langley is even more adorable at Christmastime, enough so that now the Victorian Clipper makes trips from Seattle to the Village-by-the-Sea so tourists can enjoy a day of shopping and meandering in the same place we can drive to in 4 minutes. 

Kyla, Piper, and her BFF, Abby, all joined me for a bit of Christmas shopping on 1st and 2nd street (2nd has Sweet Mona’s and 1st has Chocolate Flower Farm and Star Store).  The girls were quite darling, and a nice break from Whiney Wesley!

I found someone to kiss underneath the bough!

Merry Christmas, Langley!  You put extra roses in our cheeks!

We had a choice of getting them at the Cookie Party with all the other guests, or a few hours in morning, just our bunch.  So we chose to get them all to ourselves, and went to Emily and Matt’s for brunch.  The kids scattered quickly and eventually came back with a salamander and presumably, her eggs.  Quite the find!

I wear a lot of hats.  I have 6 separate email accounts, but many, many more roles and titles.  I’ve been our school’s NSD Foundation ambassador for maybe 5 years now, helping teacher submit grants applications and recruiting potential donors.  Usually I’m also on the grant selection committee (after ghost writing a few of the grants on the table), but this round of grants was being determined during a week that I ran our Scholastic Book Fair, Camp Read-A-Lot, and Math Team.  I have no pictures of those, but here I am delivering “You Won” messages to our school’s recipients, which takes pretty much no effort.  But I have the pix that say otherwise!

This time, we measured.  We measured floor to ceiling and made allowances for the star on top and the stand below.  We measured out in the field (notice the telescoping measuring stick Kyla is holding), and there were still 4 Needs talking a certain Daddy Need out of too tall a tree!

 

Wesley was jazzed about every tree.

Piper’s “smile” gives away her feelings about this tree. 

She had another in mind.

Wesley had his own jackknife to help saw the part that split when Mama was too busy taking pictures to hold the tree. (Yeah, I have to own that one. But cute pic of Pipes above, yes?)

And hours and hours later, we have a beautiful tree lighting up our home.  Oh, I love this part!

I would probably be all sappy in this post if I wasn’t actually writing it a month later and am way past temporary “insapity”.  But I enjoyed our quiet Thanksgiving puzzling out Piper and this puzzle.

Love this bunch!

(I think this is the 2nd selfie in our life for Mom and I!)

The Minecraft sword really adds a festive touch, yes?

This might be one of my favorite nights of the year.  No expectations, no school/work the next four days, and maybe a little bit of readiness for National Swear Day.  After a day of work AND coaching Math Team, I was definitely in my footie jams by 5pm.  Thanks for loving me anyway, Dwayne!

It’s  so  nice to be at the cabin with less chores to do!  My goal this time was to put the outside lights up at the cabin.  I wish I had remembered to take pictures, because the pergola and gardens looked good decked with Christmas lights!
The kids talked me into a late afternoon jaunt down to the beach; that is a killer walk!

Earlier that day, Dwayne and I took a lovely walk down to Sandy Point, where we got confounded by a high tide—too high to walk the beach (uh, there was no beach, a problem with winter tides!).  But the sky was blue, the eagle’s head was white, and the picture of it too small to be picked up by the camera.

The kids didn’t have to talk me into the Teardrop swing; I did that all on my own. I had been thinking about it since seeing it this summer at the local Ace hardware store. In the fall, it was on clearance.  In November, it was at the “Please Take It” price and I succumbed. It has already paid for itself and spring hasn’t even come.

The winner’s spoils!

Two days ago, Piper got this in the mail.

Yesterday, two identical boxes full of books arrived at the school, one for her, and one for her teacher.

Today, the geckos came!

It was a 5th grade highlight, I think we can agree.  Yay, Art Gecko!

I have fond memories of college days (um, 22+ years ago) of Saturdays biking the trail from my apartment to Larrabee State Park, and I was determined we’d do it as a family this time.

The ride was gorgeous, and maybe about 12 miles roundtrip.  The kids impressed me.  Wesley kept the lead the entire time and no one complained too much (even if, ahem, she didn’t enjoy it much).  We made it the whole way,

Really!  Kissing bridges and waterfalls and autumn leaves and gorgeous pathways.

Getting to Larrabee early afternoon gave us time to enjoy the view, clamor among rocks, and have a snack.

Bellingham, you rock!  We roll.