Oh Christmas Tree and Burnt Chocolate

Suzy's been baking... some of her brownies overflowed the pan and dropped onto the oven "floor" so the house now smells like burnt chocolate.  Not the most pleasing thing, but it did get rid of the bacon smell from Sunday morning's breakfast...

Nice weekend with the boys.  My sister's three boys, David, Timothy, and Michael came over and we went up into the Santa Cruz mountains to a tree farm to get our Christmas tree.  A tradition that we'll continue as long as the boys want to keep doing it... David is now a freshman in high school, so we're expecting him to be finding other things more important to him soon.  But we savored the time with him this weekend.  And his brothers.  Things are a lot more sedate now that they are "older".  No pillow fights or wrestling-- just verbal disagreements, if any.  They really do get along quite well.  Michael and Timothy still play with the toys that we have, and that's nice to see.  They still have imaginations separate from the XBOX's and Play Stations of the world. 

David stringed the lights on the tree this year.  This is something I usually do, but I got him to do it.  He did a fine job.  Then all the boys took part in hanging the ornaments.  The tree really does look wonderful.  As that guy on the A-Team used to say, "I love it when a plan comes together."

Then today I met with an old friend from my high school days.  It had been about 15 years since I saw him last.  It was cool to sit and talk with him and show him my book.  He's an artist that works in Hollywood with set design and special effects.  He's done very well for himself and keeps very busy, so it was a treat to have him visit.  I hope to see him more often.  At least more often than every 15 years...

So it was nice to have him compliment my drawings in the book.  I had thought about asking him if he'd be interested in reworking them, making them better, working his magic with the story... but I had asked him awhile back if he'd like to work on it with me and he was unable to commit to it.  He's busy doing his business and my project just didn't ring his bell or anything at the time.  But he said that he liked how it turned out. 

So we're winding up the year...  and I've fallen behind on the journal jar entries.  I'll have to go like gangbusters to get those done by the end of this year.  So I'll give it a try, but I don't know if I can make it. 

For now, this will have to do.  I hope you enjoy our tree.  Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.