This Was Christmas

I had such a nice Christmas because I decided to stay home. I didn't let the allure of town and shopping and movie theatres and restaurants draw me away from my front door. While others dashed to town on busy roads, I stayed home and did weaving :)
On Christmas Day I burnt all the Advent candles down to nubbins.

We invited two gentlemen for Christmas dinner and they enjoyed themselves. Meet Dave and Joe. Adam's wearing his apron.

I don't often set a fine table, but I made the effort ... cloth napkins too! Peter dug out my red Christmas chargers from the attic.

Adam was in fine cooking form that day! He started with the most delicious, soft cinnamon rolls with a cream cheese glaze. I ate these two. Then I sent all leftover rolls to a friend's house with Peter and Julia. We didn't need those sitting around tempting us!

Adam bought a very fine roast, which is a rare extravagance for us. He cooked it to a perfect temperature. We also had: Yorkshire pudding (made popover-size), small red potatoes with butter and parsley, mashed sweet potatoes, green bean casserole (with homemade fried onions because he forgot to buy them, which was a blessing!), dinner rolls, roasted carrots and turnips. There were horseradish sauce and olives on the table, with all manner of little nibbles and sweets.

Dinner was at 4:00, but at noon he offered us a place of roasted turkey, cheeses, and crackers.
Adam made a chiffon spice cake for dessert. Oh my -- lighter than air!
Each doggie got a bone. They were quiet on the back porch.

Anna's been doing lots of cross-stitch while I've been weaving. We're quite a pair!

She was given a friend's embroidery floss stash, and is having so much fun discovering cross stitching. I saved a Christmas cross stitch magazine from years ago (1989 or '90) that I"d made one stocking from. She's started on a second stocking; there are six stocking patterns in the book. She looked it up online. You can still buy copies of that magazine; they cost $20. My original copy cost me $2.95. It's a really good one from Better Homes and Gardens.

That's my latest weaving from last night. It's called Art Weaving (I think). It's done by capturing the yarn strand on the right (some silver/sequined yarn on the bottom section, and some pale blue yarn on the top section), and drawing it through the weft part-way with the dark blue yarn. It's quite fun and creative because you produce the shape as you go, according to your own whim. Here's the youtube link I watched for it:

He calls it a clasped-weft method, and also shows how to do simple inclusions.  He makes it look so easy, but I had to practice quite a few times before I mastered this technique.
It was a peaceful Christmas. Anna, Peter, and Julia were here, which was lovely, and we got to talk with Philip and Kara, who traveled to her folks in Illinois. It was a peaceful Christmas for me. Our church's Lessons and Carols Service was particularly lovely this year. After the hubbub of music and performance earlier in the month, it was so nice to be off work, done with commitments, and just be home. I hope your Christmas was wonderful too. Now I must click "publish" before I'm utterly distracted with more fun weaving videos on youtube!