The Stockings Were Hung...

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care

In hopes that our cute grandson Jackson soon would be there...

and he will be--on Sunday night.

We got the Christmas tree decorated today and even have a few presents wrapped...1 for Emily, 1 for Baby Grayson, and 2 for Jackson so far. We will do most of our shopping in Albuquerque when we are there next weekend for the State School Board Meeting (Grampa gets to go to meetings and Nana Jo gets to shop!) Here's how everything is looking. Can you see our beautiful red pear tree outside the window?

Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

We had a peaceful Thanksgiving today--just the two of us being thankful for our family, our home, and our lives in general. Rather than fix the traditional dinner, we had our homemade lobster bisque for lunch in front of the fireplace after Ed returned from delivering Thanksgiving meals to some folks who could not get out and have very little. Then we put a big fat roasting hen on the rotisserie on the deck and let 'er spin

for the afternoon, basting her with a pomegranate reduction I made. We also created a new Creme Brulee--Pumpkin & eggnog with Amaretto. The chicken was fantastic, so can't wait to try out the dessert later tonight!!!While the bird was roasting, we unloaded our Christmas decorations

so we can decorate tomorrow afternoon and be ready

for Jackson when he gets here on Sunday evening. All in all, it's been a good day.

Bambi v. Big Red

We've been here in the mountains of NM almost 20 years now, so it had to happen. Last night coming home from Ruidoso, Big Red (Ed's Rendezvous) was hit (literally) by Bambi's brother! Fortunately, Big Red only lost a headlight and suffered some dents and scratches--far better than Bambi's brother who went to meet his maker. Here are the sad pictures. We didn't get one of the deer (which is just as well), but if you look really closely at the 2nd picture, you will notice a clump of deer hair :(

Visit by the Browns

Stephanie, Ken, and Emily came to visit us this weekend, so things were fun. Because the weather was so pleasant after several days of freezing cold last week, we enjoyed getting out. We took Emily to the Laughing Sheep pumpkin farm by Lincoln and bought a few pumpkins, both the carving kind and the pie kind. She seemed more intrigued by the raspberry vines and stakes than anything else.

After that we had to go to Ruidoso to have a sandwich wrap at Rivers Edge and a walk through mid-town. Steph and Ken went ahead of us to the train store, so we walked with Emily for about 2 blocks until we also got there. We were amazed that she walked the whole way, just stopping to window shop along the way just like a girl! They stayed until after lunch today to go to church with us. Emily enjoyed dancing to the music during the praise and worship service and then playing with the toys in the playroom. At one point she picked up a white teddy bear to play with, and I noticed that it was one of Meaghan's! It was one she got at Iowa State U. on an Odyssey of the Mind trip when she was in 6th grade. Emily seemed to enjoy having the "antique bear" slide down the slide! All in all, it was a good weekend.

The cheese is free, water's $1, but the oxygen'll cost ya 10 bucks!

No pictures again this time--just a funny story. This afternoon we went to Ruidoso just to mess around since it was such perfect weather. We ate lunch at a new fish 'n chips restaurant and then went to check out a new cheese and wine shop in midtown that is being managed by a former student of mine. The store is just getting started--don't have their wine license yet but will start selling/tasting the wines soon. In the meantime, they have an oxygen bar in the place where the wine bar will eventually be. If you'd ever told me there would be an oxygen bar in little ole Ruidoso, NM, I would have said you were crazy! The funniest thing is that while we were tasting the cheeses, an older tourist-type man came in and inquired about the oxygen bar--not because he wanted to stay young, fresh, and beautiful, but because he wanted to breathe and the 7200' elevation was killing him. He asked how much the water cost ($1 a bottle) and how much the oxygen cost ($10 for 10 minutes), so we laughed that the cheese we were eating was free!

Back to the Wortley Hotel

We made the drive to Lincoln after church today to eat at the Wortley Hotel. Forgot to take the camera so no pictures today. They are filming a movie of some sort in Lincoln so the town was full of folks, some watching and some acting and a lot working behind the sceens. We had heard that the Wortley had reopened with new owners, but knew nothing about the food.

The menu is limited to a dinner salad, a couple of burgers and a couple of enchilada plates. Jo had the Blue Cheese Burger and it came out piled with blue cheese which made her smile, served with chips and the normal toppings. Ed had the Red Chili Beef Enchiladas. There were two rolled enchiladas with red chili sauce and black beans and small fried pototoes. The enchiladas had lots of beef and covered with cheese, the red sauce tasted really good, but could have used more sauce. Raw onion and a few raw chopped fresh jalapenos and tomatoes garnished the top. Three chips on the plate was a little short for chips, but over all the meal was well prepared and hot. They automatically served lime with the tea so did not have to order lime for our tea.

The price was slightly higher than most places in the area, $8.50 for the burger and $9.50 for the enchiladas. We sat out on the porch and watched folks walking around town then the movie people started relocating their shoot so they were coming by with all the gear.

It has been a while since we were at the Wortley. Meaghan worked there for a while and we really liked to go there to eat till they changed cooks, then sold out and many owners since have let the place run down. The people who own it now are from Florida and the rooms were all booked up, don't know if that was the movie people or visitors. They said they would stay open till Thanksgiving then close for the winter. We'll go back and take some of the church crowd. It is another place to eat Sunday lunch especially since Alto Cafe is now closing on Sundays.

Walk to Defeat ALS, Lubbock, TX

Lots of Vinson and Holly family members gathered at Buddy Holly Park in Lubbock on Saturday morning to participate in the ALS Walk to Defeat ALS. The walk raised over $25,000 to go toward finding a cure for this disease that took Ed's dad in 2007. Our team name was "Granddad's Gang," and we all wore team t-shirts. We picked red since it is a fairly gender neutral color; unfortunately, several of the other teams also chose red, so you'll notice LOTS of red shirts in some of the pictures. Here are some of the highlights of our Saturday together honoring LaVern Vinson: Here are Meaghan and Jackson with their Granddad's Gang t-shirts on ready to head for the park. Just as I snapped the picture, Jackson did what his Daddy taught him!
The walk was at Buddy Holly Park which is part of the Canyon Lakes area. It was very pretty, but got rather warm before it was all over. Believe it or not, there were actually some hills (or maybe just inclines) we had to go up, so I guess Lubbock isn't totally flat after all!

Here are just a few of the Vinson/Holly family members gathering for the walk. The lady is front is Vi, Ed's mom. I think all the red shirts shown here are actually part of our team.

Jim and Ruby Barron--Ruby is LaVern's sister who also lives in Midland.

Emily and Jackson are holding hands getting ready for the walk. Emily started out in her stroller and was content to stay in it. Jackson started out walking but ended up in his stroller too.Here are just some of the walkers that stretched out over the walking path around the park. Most of the walkers did just that--walked--no hot-dog joggers on this adventure, thank goodness.After the walk everyone enjoyed just hanging out and having a chance to visit with each other. Here are Granddad's 4 great-grandchildren (Emily, Jackson, Kooper, and Ryleigh). The little one on the far right is Ed's cousin Ron Holly's granddaughter, Audrey.Jackson is being the helpful big cousin and showing Emily how to drink out of Nana Jo's water bottle. He told me that Emily got all wet, but it didn't seem to bother her.It can't be a Vinson family get-together without a meal, so we all headed to Rosa's after the walk.