Another puzzle

Finished this hard to do puzzle of NYC. A gift to Anne. I have one more to do (one from Mike) and then NO MORE!

The End!

We're ending the year on the best of all notes --

Ack had his last chemo treatment on Friday, 12/30. Today he spent a restful day and feels pretty good.  (I did pick-up curling and threw some nice stones.) Tonight, we're doing our classic stay-at-home New Year's Eve--Casablanca and a puzzle--though with less champagne than usual.

A happy end to 2011.

Thumbs up from Ack and Dr. Julie Chang

Ack's nurse Nadeige (? can't quite remember her unusual French name) awarded him sparkling grape juice at the end of the yucky hard-not-to-puke treatment.

The celebration continued at home. A "That was easy" talking button gift from Meg and delicious Gail Ambroius chocolates from Margaret.

LOTR Christmas!

We took our family's crazy Lord-of-the-Rings-Christmas-tradition a bit farther this year.  On Christmas morning, after singing "Happy Birthday" to baby Jesus in the creche, opening gifts, playing with new gizmos, and calling distant family, we turned to a gingerbread project: creating buildings or scenes from LOTR.  Two days before we'd gathered ingredients for frosting and decorations. The night before we'd each designed the size and shape of the gingerbread for our construction and baked it. Then on Christmas our construction began.  Stressful!  Exciting!  Disappointing!  Lengthy!  Cooperative!  Glorious! All this and more but primarily it was fun, fun, fun. 

Anne's Bag End of the Shire. All agreed it was the prettiest.

Erin's Rohan with horses galore

Alana's Battle of Helm's Deep with orcs attacking. Notice the horses coming down the ramp on the right.

Ack's tower and castle Minas Morgul, a fortress of Mordor. Yes, it's leaning a little but hey, there have been horrific battles there.

Al's Gondor

Al's meticulously aligned construction pieces

Just like in LOTR, it all ended with a terrible struggle for the one ring!

Christmas tree - from backyard to living room

We wanted to take down a increasingly large pine tree in the back yard to make way for a larger garden. We (Ack and Tom Achtor) cut it down and now the top of the tree is our Christmas tree. The lights are on, but we are waiting to add other decorations when Erin, Alana and Al come visit. Merry Christmas! Here are three pictures of the current project.

17 Minutes of the Lunar Eclipse

6:50 am

So glad our house faces west! We could stay inside to watch and not have to brave the 9 degree temperature outside.

6:52 am

6:55 am

6:59 am

7:04 am

7:07 am

San Fran

The ceiling painted in Native design at Mission Delores, a church built before the Declaration of Independence was signed.

I didn't take many photos, only the one above. I was having too good a time.  I love that city!

Photo by Lin Chambers of Ack and Margaret at her AGU poster presentation. They gave a paper together too.

Photo by Margaret of me at Mel's Diner, a great breakfast spot.

Photo by a busboy at Sam's, a dockside restaurant in Tiburon that had delicious crabcakes and smooth mimosas. We were lucky enough to have sunny, 60s, no fog days. Old friend Dave Meyer treated us to exploring some of the Marin Headlands. Great to see him again after 25 years.

Erin's Here!

It's a week now that Erin's been home visiting.  Al joined us on Thursday. They'll stay 'til Sunday.

Erin, Margaret and Anne had dinner at Sardine on Tuesday. Meg came by later. Ack should have been curling but instead was home sick. He felt better by the Big Day.

Erin (see above the A) at the 219th daily noon Solidarity Sing-Along in the Capitol on Wednesday.

We saw the glorious new Muppet movie on Wed night with Ellen, Carrie and their Thanksgiving guests. Go see it!

Al and his folks were with us for Thanksgiving. Here's the puzzle a bunch of us (mostly Al) did  that day.