Christmas Eve Morning....

Do you feel the pressure? Last night instead of finishing up my crochet projects I went to my son's house to deliver the ham & turkey my hubby purchased for our Christmas day meal (which my son will prepare and we will all enjoy at his house)... but once we arrived there we were invited to go with them to see the "Festival of Lights" (light display done in Albany, NY for charity) ... we've done this with them the last 2 years so this makes our third venture to "see the lights" and of course how could I say no to Kyla & Kami who both asked us to go with them???

So today's agenda includes all of the crocheting that I had planned on finishing lastnight along with the pies I planned on making for tomorrow, laundry, and now I have an idea for the Caron Naturally Baby contest ... the one I just read about which was supposed to be over but they extended the deadline so now I have until January 31, 2009 to purchase & make a baby blanket to help support Project Linus & possibly win the contest. Ummm well maybe the scarf pattern won't be available for a while. I do see potential in turning this simple scarf pattern into a larger project, say ... ummm, like a baby afghan.

Maybe I'll escape all the pressure (oh did I fail to say we have to go babysit for a part of the day and still accomplish everything listed above??) with some memories of Venice. Ahh yes I remember it well. We landed in Venice & were met at the airport, where we waited while our entire group was gathered together, with our large piece of luggage taken care of we were responsible for our carry on luggage. We walked (about 10 minutes) to the dock and caught a boat to our hotel. About 30 minutes later we arrived at our hotel ... very nice digs by the way! The only complaint is that I'm really out of shape and therefore much heavier in weight, body shape than I should be and the shower was a teeny tiny corner thing that I just (and I mean JUST) fit into and out of with a bit of care. We had the rest of the day to relax go explore as we wished until dinner when we would have an orientation meeting and then walk to a restuarant nearby. Everything was delightful. And the information was very interesting in that it was a way to get to understand most of the paper work we were sent in advance & most people read but did not really "read" ~ you know how your excitement can keep you from really processing the information you are looking at ~ like you know what they were telling you but oh did you know that? Was that in the paperwork?? Really? Oh I guess I didn't see that when I was reading it all earlier.

Anyway I loved it all and enjoyed it all and would do it all again in heartbeat. Well with a few minor adjustments of course but I'd still do it all again.

Here is a quick view of one side "street" canal of Venice & below that is a picture taken just outside the local restaurant we ate at for our first dinner in Venice as a group. The food was yummy.

I'll leave you with this as I go and prepare pies before the day gets away from me!!! Oh wait I'll throw in a wash load first then prepare pies. (Thank God they are easy pies!!) Pumpkin (the canned pumpkin where you add two ingredients mix together & bake in an unbaked pie shell and the other is a bit more time consuming but easy none the less ... Chocolate pudding pie. Cooked pudding is the only kind for me so I will be stirring a lot for about half an hour!!! But it is so worth it in the end.

Wishing you all a great day (oh rats I just remembered not a single gift is wrapped yet.... the list keeps growing!!!) and of course a very Merry Christmas tomorrow, Frog free projects too!!!