25 Days of Christmas, Day 25

After lunch and exchanging gifts, my family played a couple of games, including Kismet. This is the same set we played when I was a kid. (I think it was made in 1973...) It's seen a lot of use!

25 Days of Christmas, Day 24

...Dirty Santa at my maternal grandparents' house...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 23

...pretzels dipped in almond bark...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 22

We went into our little town this night to get a pizza and take a walk through the tiny park the city decorated with Christmas lights. These two oaks wrapped up together in blue lights were my favorite part of the display.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 21

...glass teardrop ornament on our tree...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 20

Looks like someone has a little Christmas wrapping paper addiction, hm?

But in my defense, some of these rolls are almost used up, and all were bought at after-Christmas sale price, so it's not as bad as it looks.  (g)

25 Days of Christmas, Day 19

These are chewy peppermints (sold as "Christmas Nougats"). We're on our second bag of them for the season. They taste like Christmas.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 18

On Saturday, Donald made this year's Lucia "cats" (or buns). The initial samples were promising, but I think further testing is required. ;o) Hey, somebody has to do it!

25 Days of Christmas, Day 17

...playing around after a game of Scrabble...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 16

...a pretty Christmas card from one of Donald's aunts...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 15

Tangled light-trails. This is another fine example of, "Oh, I haven't taken a photo yet today, and it's already dark"-style photography. (g) Well, that, and I'm (easily) amused by swirly lights...

25 Days of Christmas, Day 14

I am relieved to have some of my Christmas shopping done. There's more yet to be done, but at least it's a start!

25 Days of Christmas, Day 13

I'm having a hard time remembering to take my photos before it gets dark, which is part of the reason I've been taking so many Christmas tree light photos. (g) Today, however, I remembered before the sunlight was completely gone.

This is part of our nativity scene. The blondish-looking hair seems a little unlikely, but it's the thought that counts ;o)-- and the figures do serve as a reminder of the true meaning of Christmas.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 12

Hey, look! It's the ubiquitous "reflection in the Christmas tree ornament" shot! ;o) With guest stars Donald and Trixie!

There are a couple more in this series in my Flickr photostream.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 11

Playing around with wobbling the camera on extended exposures... and enjoying the cozily lighted Christmas tree.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 10

The tree is finally fully decorated!

25 Days of Christmas, Day 9

We've been having some very frosty mornings lately (along with the unseasonably cold weather).

Frost-edged red (Japanese maple) leaves. Looks like December to me!

(I didn't feel like leaving the warm couch to edit and upload this last night.  Oops. ;o))

25 Days of Christmas, Day 8

What could it be?

I've been trying something a little different with crochet, lately. I'm not quite sure how I feel about this (seasonally appropriate) crochet project (because there are so many chains! and picots! and slip stitches!), but it's interesting to try something new.

25 Days of Christmas, Day 7

I'm aiming to take the world record for slowest decoration of a Christmas tree, anywhere, ever. ;o)

The ornaments (and the tree-topper) are all that are missing, at this point. That's supposed to be the fun part, right?

25 Days of Christmas, Day 6

The garland went on the tree today. (Yes, we're really dragging this out, aren't we?) It's actually not the garland in the photo, but I thought this one was more photogenic and Christmassy.

(I need to get out of this bokeh habit for this particular challenge. I like bokeh, but it's not the most interesting thing to look at day after day, and at this point, it's really just me being lazy...)

25 Days of Christmas, Day 5

Stars, still and shooting... (Courtesy of a spare string of Christmas lights and a piece of construction paper with a star shape cut out of the middle of it.)

25 Days of Christmas, Day 4

Our tree is up and filled with Christmas lights!

I've been looking forward to having the Christmas tree lights to play with since I learned the trick for making (non-circular) shaped bokeh. (Yes, this means you'll probably be seeing more of this kind of thing-- but I'll use some shapes other than hearts, next time.)

There are three or four (can't remember which) exposures layered in this photo, and Donald showed me a new trick for easily layering these light photos-- the "screen" setting. Everything except the black portion of a layer is made visible. Very useful!

25 Days of Christmas, Day 3

Tonight, my parents hosted a family game night. All three of us sisters were there, as well as the two sons-in-law. Yummy grilled hamburgers and sausage dogs were on the menu-- and then we played some Catch Phrase and Phase 10. It was a lot of fun! (And it gave me a good chance to snap a photo of my parents' Christmas yard decor. Bonus! ;o))

Technical jabber: This is a layered image. The main layer is the house and lights in the yard. The secondary layer is a tangle of light trails (made by setting the camera for a longer exposure and moving it in circles while pointed at a lighted Christmas tree). Then there are a couple layers of colors (dark red, gold) that I fiddled around with to get the tone I wanted. (I'm sure there are other ways to get a similar effect, but I was apparently in a layers mood tonight.)

25 Days of Christmas, Day 2

Still no tree, but we're headed in the right direction. (We moved the TV over to make room for it, so maybe tomorrow!) While we're waiting for our tree, a little candlelight (especially glowing through red glass) really helps put the warmth of the holidays into a room.

25 Days of Christmas: Day 1

Isn't it beautiful?! Doesn't it fill your heart with Christmas cheer?! ;o)

I still haven't put up our Christmas tree yet, so this is how most of our decorations look right now, stowed away in the game and general "stuff" closet. (Maybe I'll start unpacking it tomorrow... This Christmas photo challenge may be just the spur to action that I need!)

Now, try not to be jealous of my elegant storage system. ;o) The Dirt Devil-- our first vacuum as a married couple (awwww)-- has since been replaced by my wonderful bagless vacuum... and the fondue box... is kind of mysterious, since we definitely don't have that fondue pot... (I'm pretty sure someone used it when wrapping a gift for one of us, however-many years ago.) Oh, and then there's Amazon. (Of course.)

(A couple of our board games also sneaked into the shot. Haven't played Catan in a while...)

New Month, New Challenge

Hey, I managed to complete the Month of Gratitude Challenge!  (Er, well, after a fashion.  I didn't post a photo a day, but I took at least one every day, and eventually got them all posted before the end of November.)

Now I'm thinking of setting a personal challenge for myself for (most of) December.  I've seen similar group challenges on Flickr, but at this point, I'm going solo--  that is, not posting it to any group pool.

25 Days of Christmas
--The challenge, should I choose to accept it ;o), is to take (at least) one seasonally-themed, Christmasy, wintery photo a day (and post it here, as well as on Flickr), from December 1st to December 25th. 

And... that's pretty much it.  I'll try to post a photo every day, but, well, you've seen how that goes... So long as I'm at least taking a photo a day, I'll be satisfied. 

Anyone who cares to follow suit-- or link to one of your favorite holiday-themed photos-- is welcome to do so!