Crystal Kaleidoscope

This dappled willow in the winter months has no leaves but it is just as beautiful in the winter with its pink branches as it is when it has it beautiful dappled pink and white leaves. When the ice came and added its crystals to its branches it became alive with a Kaleidoscope of colors! A real night time wonder!

Ice Queen

Frozen Bird bath in the front garden, guarded by an Ice Queen!

Merry Christmas from our house to yours ( o :

Jengibre opening her Christmas stocking at Mindi's house. It was a great! Got tons of great pictures too. I posted pictures of Jengibre's Christmas ... If you want to see the rest of the pictures of Mindi, Chris, Indiana's and my Christmas Eve, you need to go to her site listed on the right side bar under Indiana. Mindi and I agreed when we both started our Blogs. She would post , THE FAMILY ... Photos and I would do flowers, pets, nature and so forth. That is why you never find pictures of my family on my Blog, Mindi has the exclusive rights to those postings. And she does a great job, too!
I got a picture of Jengibre opening the squirrel house I bought her from, The Chocolate Dog (Bosco's) Blog site (on my right side bar), but it was a blur . She loved it. And was tearing those toy squirrels out of their house right and left, LOL! A great toy for her. Opening her stocking is a little blurry too, because she is motion the whole time rooting in her Christmas stocking to find the toys and goodies. We should have used the movie camera, but I didn't think of it until I got home.

MyKia still healing

Christmas Eve, MyKia is still healing from his attack from a mean cat and Akasha is still giving comfort and aid. Her love for him is so sweet.

From my Garden at Christmas

I can almost hear the sleigh bells when I look at this photo of my garden. No snow here but the frost gives that snowy Christmas feeling. I thought it would make a perfect Christmas card to all my family and friends this year! I hope you get a little tingle of Christmas when you see it especially Conner and all of you that told me you are late with that good feeling of Christmas in the air!

These feeders feed many of our bird friends throughout the winter season filled with peanuts, sunflower seeds and millet seeds!
Everywhere else in the garden they get suet blocks. Please don't forget to feed our feathered friends this Christmas season!

MyKia's Boo Boo

MyKia had a run in with another cat that didn't have much of a Christmas spirit at all. He bit into MyKia's upper side pretty bad. It swelled up to the size of a baseball 3 days ago and I had to lance it. I am glad I confined ourselves to the bathroom when I did it because at least a cup of the vilest toxins I had ever seen or smelled poured out of the wound. Afterwards, I cut all the hair from around his wound & cleaned it out with warm water & peroxide. Then I made a poultice with a cream with antibiotics in it. Now I am giving him oral antibiotics and then baby Bayer aspirin for the pain. Today is the first day he was actually up and wanting to go outside.
Akasha never once left his side. They are so attached to each other, I have never seen that kind of love in any of my pets for each other. Not since PyWakkete and AbaSara, two chocolate Siamese I had years ago. PyWakkette mourned her for month's when she passed away before he did.
Be assured that MyKia is well onto the road to recovery.

Jengibre, in the snow

Jengibre enjoying the snow?

Akasha's Christmas Gifts

Akasha checking out her Christmas gifts. A little catnip, gets her every time!
All my posts will be short, I am just posting pictures of our Christmas spirit to add to yours. Because I know this is a busy time for us all, (that celebrate Christmas) with family, friends and all the many things that need to be done before Christmas!

Christmas Elf riding in Santa's Sleigh

MyKia, Helping Santa deliver his presents, holding on for dear life!
Damn it Rudolph, slow this sleigh down!!! LOL

Little Snow Drop!

I love the snow, and we do not get it very often in Albany (a part of the Willamette Valley in Oregon). This snow was two years ago and we had it for almost a whole week! A real treat for us. I envy the snowy states and my friend Hasse's Sweden! Anyone of you that has some snowy pictures to post on their Blog let me know I would love to come visit and see them.

Ride along on Jengibre's Christmas lights ride!

Jengibre's ride through the Christmas lights that we have taken ever since she was a baby. This first ride is through the Pepsi Cola bottling plant's light show! I tried to get some good shots for you of the beauty of the lights while holding onto the tail of her Santa suit, so she didn't fall from the car window and keep her head out of all the shots so that you could see the lights. I hope you like the show. Go down through them all and comment on your favorites. I will dump the ones with no comments in a week or so.
Enjoy the show!

The Twelve Days of Christmas

Jengibre's favorite of the whole Light show ride is the twelve days of Christmas. Each day is lighted and sings the verse for that day, she always hangs out the window in fascination every year as we stop at each day, to let her hear each verse. It takes us a little while to get to the other end, ha, ha!

"The Twelve Days of Christmas" was written in England as one of the "Catechism Songs" to help secret young Roman Catholics learn the tenets of their faith. The poem was a memory aid for those unenlightened times when to be caught with anything in writing indicating adherence to the Roman Catholic faith could not only get you transported to a nasty place such as America, but also imprisoned, beheaded or hanged.

The song's gifts are hidden meanings to the teachings of the faith. The "true love" mentioned in the song doesn't refer to an earthly suitor, it refers to God. The "me" who receives the presents refers to every baptised person. The partridge in a pear tree is Jesus Christ and the two turtle doves are the old and new Testaments.

The other verses represent the following:

3 French Hens are Faith, Hope and Charity,

4 Calling Bird are The Four Gospels,

5 Golden Rings are the first five books of the Old Testament,

6 Geese A-Laying are the six days of creation,

7 Swans A-Swimming are the seven gifts of The Holy Spirit,

8 Maids A-Milking are the eight beatitudes,

9 Ladies Dancing are the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit,

10 Lords A-Leaping are the Ten Commandments,

11 Pipers Piping are the eleven faithful apostles,

12 Drummers Drumming are the twelve points of doctrine in the Apostle's Creed.
twelve days of Christmas.

Christmas Lights

Christmas Lights

Christmas Lights

Christmas Lights

Christmas Lights

Inside, my Christmas light display

Not room for a big Christmas tree, I wonder why, LOL!
The Christmas tree curtains also light up, they are beautiful when seen from outdoors.

Another view of our garden Christmas display

You can not tell because of the darkness of the image but Santa's sleigh is lodged on top of the arbor, with poor Santa hanging upside down from it. The reindeer are coming down from over the top of the arbor. There are gifts in the sleigh and falling from the arbor and scattered on the ground.
I had a couple little girls come knock on my door the other day. I did not know them and they looked to be about ten and twelve years old. And they said they just wanted to tell me that they thought our Christmas display was just awesome. That makes the extra time it takes to decorate worth all the extra time and effort!

Our little Christmas tree

The last couple years I have only put a small tree up, there is just not room in this house for a bigger one as in past years.

A part of the Christmas lights in the front garden

I am trying not to get behind as I did during the Thanksgiving season. But I am afraid that it is almost a losing battle! LOL! So much to do and so little time until Christmas to do it. I apologize if I haven't gotten to comment on many of my friends Blogs, I hope you will forgive me. I will try to make up for that after Christmas when things slow down somewhat. I do come by and check out what you all have been doing and what you have been posting but haven't had the time to comment, all I would have time to say anyway would be Hi, bye ... So I will wait.
This picture is of part of the Christmas display in our garden. I have many other Christmas photos to post but just as I haven't had much time for your Blog, I haven't for mine, either.
Please, be patient with me!!!! (:

Posted for Chen's, Ah Boy!

"Ah Boy", This is Jengibre's favorite "bear" blanket to sleep with. The one I warm in the drier for her, it makes her feel warm and cozy, like you feel with your favorite sleeping pillow.
I loved all the pictures of you on you mammas Blog "Ramblings"!
If anyone wants to see a black and tan brother to Jengibre ( named, Ah Boy) you will have to check out Ah Boy's pictures on "Chen's" Blog site "Ramblings"! He is a real charmer just like Jengibre!! You will see Chen's site listed in my right side bar. And Chen also put a link to Ah Boys pictures, under comments under one of Jengibres pictures posted here. I hope you will take the time, he is worth the look and Chen's Blog is worth the read!

Look out Rudolph!

The Santa suit further down, I made for Jengibre a few years ago, but the Frosty the snow man coat and this Reindeer coat, here, I made for Jen last year. Although the Santa suit is my favorite, the reindeer one is a close runner up. MinPins kind of elegantly prance(like a deer) when they walk and play, making Jen look like she is actually a miniature Reindeer!! I laugh and hug her tight every time she wears this because she is just too precious. When we walk down town near the Malls and shopping, people come out from every nook and cranny to see her. Around the beauty parlors women flock out to see her, with their hair only half done.
Donnie of-course loves this, when he has Jengibre with him and the women swarm out all over him, LOL, and I am shopping inside a store at the time. I told him to try it again later without Jengibre at his side and see what happens. That burst his bubble a little!!!!!

Frosty

Jengibre in her frosty the snow man Christmas outfit. She is watching the light twinke on the Christmas tree!

Jengibre and Santa

Jengibre with big singing Santa Clause. I made Jengibre this Santa suit a couple of years ago. Since then I have made her a frosty snow man w/ a carrot nose and a brown leather reindeer jacket with red antlers. I will post them too, during this month. I want to make her a couple more Christmas coats this year. Any ideas?!

Here is where I would like to add a touching story about a little girl from a poor family who loved attending Sunday school ... And the Philadelphia, Temple Baptist church. I hope you will take the time to read it!!
There were so many children and the Temple Babtist church was so small that sometimes this little girl could not get in.
The little girls name was Hattie May Wiatt. She lived near this Philadelphia church where the Sunday school was so crowded and and the Reverend told her that one day they would have buildings big enough to allow every one of God's children to attend who wanted to. Later Hattie May Wiatt became sick an died. Reverend Conwell was asked to arrange the funeral and the little girls Mother told the Reverend that Hattie May had been saving money to help build a bigger church and Hattie's mother gave the Reverend the purse in which Hattie May had saved 57 cents for the church. Reverend Conwell had Hattie May's 57 cents turned into 57 pennies, and told the congregation the story of little Hattie May and then the Reverend sold the pennies for a return of about 250 dollars. In addition, 54 of the original pennies were returned to Reverend Conwell and he later put them on display. This was in 1856 when 57 cents was no small savings for a little girl from a poor family! Some of the members of the church formed what was called the Wiatt Mite society which was dedicated to making Hattie May's 57 cents grow as much as possible and to buy the property for the Primary Department of the Sunday school. A house nearby was purchased with the 250 dollars that Hattie May's 57 cents had produced and the rest is history. The first classes of the Temple College, later Temple University, were held in that house. It was later sold to allow Temple College to move and the growth of the Temple along with the founding of the Good Samaritan Hospital (Now the Temple University Hospital) ... it all shows the power of a little girls unselfish dreams and her 57 cents!!!

I need Love too!

This Christmas season, Jengibre,
would like to dedicate this photo and the Poem below it, to all her Pit Bull friends that she has met
on this Blog (and to any and all the unloved and unwanted Pets in this world) Merry Christmas!
Maybe we can make a difference one day!!!!!!!!!

Emily looks through the plane window

Emily leaves France in more comfort than she arrived in. She flies back in Continental Airlines business class rather than the cargo container she arrived in.
The airline offered to fly Emily home from Paris after her story was heard around the world and after she cleared her month of quarantine.
A full fare ticket for Emily's seat would normally cost about $6,000.00 & the airline provided a company escort so that she wouldn't decide to see a little more of the world!
Looks to me like she is contemplating her next trip, LOL!