Christmas pics

Rose is excited to find out that she received a free trip to the groomers. Not.

Pat is all smiles, because Santa gave her two Tab Benoit CD's!

Mr. Bojangles, showing off his new bone.

Why is Claire smiling? The book is about food.

Ooooh! A box of Lotus tasty waffles and cookies from Belgium!

Claire is eager to go back to college, so she can use her new Pulse pen.

Pat is all smiles when I surprised her with the watch she requested.

I am sporting a new Robert Graham shirt and reading a new north woods canoeing adventure book. Life is good.

Christmas eatings

For Christmas Eve, Pat and Claire prepared the traditional Christian feast of seven fishes (sans six). Mussels maketh the Friedrichsens.

For Christmas morning breakfast, Claire created homemade biscuits and gravy. The biscuits were magnificently fluffy and buttery. The Italian sausage and mushroom gravy was life changing.

One of my presents from Claire was her world famous Gooey Rolls, known for their thick, dripping carmel magnificence.

Pat and Claire raised the bar for a traditional Christmas dinner. The menu included braised Patchwork pork chops in apples, onions and ginger; double cranberry chutney; garlic mashed potatoes; chestnut, sage and apple dressing; green bean casserole; and a bottle of White Alice chardonnay.

I gained eight pounds. It was a delicious Christmas.

Biscotti

It's biscotti time! These are almond orange. For the health food fanatic, there are a couple hundred new quadruple chocolate biscotti cookies in our kitchen. Come and get 'em!

Walkin'

Claire and I visited our Christmas tree dude today. He was like, you show up this late in the Christmas tree season and you are lucky to have a choice of Charlie Brown trees. 72 acres of tree ranch and we had a choice of three trees. We picked Mr. Lopsided Brown Dwarf. Then instead of going home, we drove on to Little Dixie Lake and went walkin', walkin' in a winter wonderland. It was grey and snowy and wet and cold and awesome...a good walk. Note the snow flakes in these iPhone shots.

Macaroons

Macaroons in the morning, macaroons in the evening, macaroons at supper time. Claire finished finals, moved home and commandeered our kitchen. Five flavors of macaroons today: chocolate, egg nog, mint, orange and raspberry. With any luck, she won't take a baking break for a couple weeks.

Solstice celebration

May you use this winter solstice and holiday season to reflect and be thankful for your family, friends and many blessings, and prayerful for cultural acceptance, global peace and environmental care.

Here are some highlights of our 2009.

• Kenny and T.J. brought youthful exuberance from Korea.
• We checked 25 years of matrimonial bliss off our todo list.
• Goldie Hawn gave me a hug!
• Pat fulfilled her lifelong quest to eat Gnu sausage.
• We survived a 17-day, 3800 kilometer, 8 European country vacation.
• Claire moved home.
• Claire moved out.
• Suki molted big time.
• Pat and I explored the Golden Horn.
• Mizuho visited farmland.

Wishing you and your family a fabulous second decade this 21st century!