Monthly Archives: December 2021

Christmas Wish List 2021 1

Christmas Wish List 2021

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My completely unrealistic Christmas wish list:

  1. The pandemic ends. Everyone who can gets vaccinated and everyone masks and socially distances until there’s no more virus transmission and not enough hosts for mutations.

That’s it. That’s the list.

I am so tired of this pandemic.

Traveling in Tennessee this past week made me realize this pandemic is never truly going away. Maybe 2 out 10 people wore masks, social distancing doesn’t exist, and the number of derogatory comments I heard about masks and vaccines broke my faith in humanity.

Heath helped build my faith back up somewhat with a well-timed and well-intentioned pep talk. But still. Those were some dark days. Some of that darkness still lingers.

Thankfully, I also currently have 24-7 access to one of the best antidotes to faith-in-humanity destruction:

Christmas Wish List 2021 2

Fergus is, of course, the best Christmas gift ever. This tree is at my mom’s house.

That’s right! Fergus is back with me for the next two weeks. Thank goodness. I’m sure my heart will be brimming with light, love, and licks in no time.
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Merry Christmas to those who celebrate! To everyone else, warm winter wishes!!
Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 4

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!)

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Yesterday I made a Christmas wreath at the Great Mountain Forest’s wreath-making event. To my pleasant surprise, my wreath did not end up looking like a whale, as most of my art projects do.

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 5

My friend Shelley made the mermaid on the right. See my whale on the left.

In fact, what I made looks down right like a proper wreath — luscious greens of fir, pine, spruce, and mount laurel, berries, and some other plants I can’t remember right now.

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 6

THIS IS NOT MY WREATH! THESE ARE JUST THE LUSCIOUS GREENS.

I attended the morning session with a friend. Our plan was to get there an hour early and go for a quick hike before the 9:00am start time. Our part of the plan was a success; we did indeed get there early. The hiking part was thwarted because the trail we planned to hike was closed for hunting. Big signs said KEEP OUT, so we did. GMF commended us for that decision because if we had been shot, they could have also sued us.

Instead, we walked down the road, petted some horses, kept on going, and about half an hour later turned around and hiked back up the road. The return hike kicked my butt as we had to walk up approximately five hills (give or take a hill).

Once the wreath making got going, I found myself delighted with picking my greens, twisting the wire around the metal rim, and making sure the materials fanned out the way I wanted. I couldn’t believe how easy it was.

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Bonus: the barn smelled like a fragrant pine forest.

Here is my finished wreath:

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 8

Here are some of the other wreaths from that day:

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 9

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 10

I can’t wait for next year!

The only downside to wreath making was that I couldn’t bring Fergus (yes, I asked). I’ve been taking care of him for these last two weeks. I’ve probably taken hundreds of pictures and created several Canva graphics. This is my favorite one:

Although now that I think about it, I created this graphic, too, and it also doesn’t look like a whale. How exciting! Maybe my whale period is over. Time shall truly tell….

Festive Holiday Fun (and Fergus!) 11

My purple whale in the back; turtles made by elementary school students I was tutoring.