Merry Christmas! Finished at last

First of all a very Merry Christmas to all of my blogging friends as well as my friends and family who read my blog. I hope you all had a most enjoyable Christmas. I'm a little late with my wishes but we've been going non-stop here to get the house in order for the holidays. As of last weekend our renovations are finally complete! The painters cleared out the last of their stuff on Saturday evening and then the giant cleanup began. Because this is Bob's busiest time of year as a church organist and with me working right up until Christmas, we could only clean house during the evenings. The entire house was filthy. Trust me you don't want to know just how bad it was. As of now, the living room, dining room and kitchen are back in order with the exception of a few minor details. The bedrooms and rec room where we've been storing everything still remain to be cleaned up but that will take place in the new year. I've still got boxes of dishes and items from my dry sink and curio cabinet to unpack as well as a good portion of my food stuffs. We finished cleaning on Dec. 24th and since my boys are not celebrating with us until later in the week we spent Christmas Day wrapping gifts and putting up the tree. Talk about last minute! I haven't even had any time in which to write my Christmas cards. In any case here is how things now look as I sit and write this post. I think you might even be able to spot Clarisse in one of these. Hint - check out the love seat in the living room.

Speaking of Clarisse, I know now just how much fur she sheds on any given day. Hardwood floors show things which carpeting did not.

This is her first Christmas with us and since we weren't sure just how she would react to the tree, we decided to put up an artificial one. We were afraid that she might knock over the tree, spilling water on the new floors. However she hasn't shown any interest in it with one exception. She has taken to sleeping under it just as all our previous cats have. It's her new sleeping spot. She's not used to the coldness of the new floors and the tree skirt is a nice comfy place to settle on.

My oldest son Jeff will arrive this coming Monday with his girls for our Christmas. Daniel will also be joining us for the week after visiting at his Dad's place. Jeff is only able to spend two days with us because we share the visit with his father. Following Jeff's return, Chris lands in from Toronto on New Year's eve. He will spend New Year's Day at his Dad's and then return home for a dinner and gift exchange with us on the weekend before returning to Toronto late Sunday. This was the first time that he wasn't home with us at Christmas. Because he works retail, he only had the 25th off which wasn't enough time to get home and back for work on Boxing Day. I worried about him being alone but one of the girls in his neighbourhood when he lived in Ottawa is actually from the Toronto area and she invited him to spend the holiday with her family in Acton. Judy, if you're reading this, he was in Georgetown in your neck of the woods on Christmas eve, checking out the lights. I guess there's one particular house that's pretty spectacular.

I'm so tuckered out from all the cleanup this past week that I've decided not to cook a huge Christmas meal. Instead I purchased some stuffed turkey breast from M&M meats along with some of their lovely desserts. When Chris arrives we will do an Italian meal since he's vegetarian. I'm hoping to do a little baking tomorrow afternoon so that Grandma has cookies in the house for Oceanne and Summer's arrival. I have to return to work on the 29th and it's my turn to work on New Year's Day so we will visit with friends that evening.

I'm looking forward to being able to sit down this evening and stitch. Yayy! I can't wait! I wanted to show you the kitty stitched ornaments that I purchased at our church's bazaar.

Aren't they cute? I had no idea that some of the ladies do stitching but they tell me that they limit it to items like these because their eyesight is so poor now. I also have a new ornament on our tree this year to add to my Jim Shore collection. I love this one!

One other thing that has been a highlight for us this past month was the Olympic Torch run which passed through Cornwall.

The winter Olympics are being held this coming Feb. in Vancouver, British Columbia.

A good friend of ours, Ann Jardin-Alexander, was carrying the torch during this portion of the run. Ann is a former Olympic medal winner having won 2 bronze medals for relay swimming in the 1976 Olympics in Montreal. I couldn't get the day off work to see her but luck had it that her run was taking place during my lunch hour. I drove downtown where I met Bob and it was only 5 minutes later that she passed by us. It was so awesome to see! To think that the flame has come all the way from Greece and already crossed through Eastern Canada on its way to its final destination. Ann stopped by at our place later in the afternoon and brought her torch with her so that we could have a look at it. I was surprised that it wasn't at all heavy.

Now I'm off to finally pick up my stitching after weeks of doing next to nothing on my pieces. With any luck I'll have some significant progress pics for my next post. I hope you are all having a very safe and happy holiday.