Category: Christmas

Looking Ahead

A week ago, I was panicking that I was behind on getting out Christmas cards, getting presents purchased, and feeling like Christmas was coming too fast.

Fast forward to this week- my cards are mailed, all but three presents are purchased and sent, and other than not having an oven to start baking, I’m feeling pretty good about where I’m at in terms of being ready for Christmas.

I’m headed to Eugene tomorrow to sell books at an Authors and Artists event that is in conjunction with a large Holiday Market at the Lane County Fairgrounds. The event is Saturday from 10 – 5. I only have 4ft of space on a table so I had to be creative with the books I am taking and how to set up.

I’m thinking about downsizing when I do events where I’m not using my book trailer. It is a lot of work hauling so many (65) print books into and out of buildings, not to mention the boxing up and putting in the vehicle. I have half a dozen western romance books that are rarely purchased. I’m thinking they will start staying home when I’m having to pack so many books into a venue.

Fireplace in our new house.

Also, looking ahead, I’m hoping to stay focused on writing my usual four books in 2026, even though we are moving to another town by the end of March. The first quarter will be a struggle, but I need to get the next Gabriel Hawke book written then. I don’t know the title yet, and I’m still trying to determine how much of an event that is happening that draws Hawke into the middle of a missing woman and child will be in the book, or be the prologue, and then the book jumps forward in time. In other words, I’m still stewing and brewing the book as I listen to Merry Merry Merry Murder being narrated by Ann M. Thompson, and I prepare for Christmas.

If you missed out on the specials I told you about last month, they are still going on until the end of the month.

I have Christmas specials going on for the month of December. You can download an ebook or audiobook bundle of Double Duplicity, Murder of Ravens, and Poker Face for FREE! Here are the bookfunnel links to get all three:

Mystery audiobook bundle https://books.bookfunnel.com/Holidayaudiobundle​

Mystery ebook bundle https://books.bookfunnel.com/holidayebookbundle​

I also have FREE first in series ebooks for these, only at my author website:

Mayan Moon holiday sale – https://www.patyjager.net/product-category/isabella-mumphrey-adventure-ebook/​

Spirit of the Mountain sale – https://www.patyjager.net/product-category/native-american-spirit-trilogy-ebook/​

Marshal in Petticoats – https://www.patyjager.net/product-category/halsey-brothers-series-ebook/​

I’m giving/gifting these books to readers with the hope you find using my website easy and will purchase books in the future from my website as it takes out the middle man. And usually my books are available in ebook and audiobook here before they are available at other vendors.

Do you have your tree up? Do you have outside lights? And are your cards all sent? Let me know if you are moving along with your holiday celebrations.

Sharing is Caring- Carmen Peone’s Christmas Wishes

Today I’m sharing with you my friend Carmen Peone’s newest release, and if you read all the way to the end, an event I’m participating in.

Christmas Wishes

If you’ve read the other books in the Seven Tine Ranch Romance, this story is about Mandie and finally finding a man who’ll stay put. 
And be the father to Mandie’s daughter, Nona. 

This story came about at the request of a reader who wanted to know more about the ranch cook! “She needs her own story.”

I agreed and wrote Christmas Wishes. 

Being a sucker for December/Christmas brides, I knew this story had to be told. 

One dream wedding. Two uncertain futures. A season of decisions that could change everything….


Mandie Sellars is a single mom and ranch cook with a dream: to become Seven Tine Ranch’s event planner. She grabs her chance when a last-minute Christmas Eve wedding is booked. There’s just one problem . . . she’s planning her own wedding at the same time.

Hudson Piccolo is a dissatisfied small-town lawyer who has finally been offered his dream job—on the other side of the state. But accepting it would mean uprooting Mandie and her daughter just as life seems to be falling into place.

With conflicting dreams, and a wedding countdown ticking, can their love survive the season?

https://carmenpeone.com/books/christmas-wishes/

https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Wishes-Seven-Ranch-Romance-ebook/dp/B0FVTK5F5P

Book Trailer

Read the first chapter:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1blVgyDrSn8KuJha3D2fkjzKFqT-C6qZl/view?usp=sharing

Book Club Kit Link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/13rKyDhvt2Hca2IpOHvoTs-PfDGPFUdrW/view?usp=sharing

Carmen Peone is an award-winning author of Young Adult and Inspirational Western Romance. With the love of history and the Western woman’s lifestyle, she weaves healing, hope, and horses into her stories, with a thread of romance. She lives with her husband in Northeast Washington on the Colville Confederated Indian Reservation.

https://carmenpeone.com/

There could be a bundle of holiday gifts coming your way! 

I’m joining eleven other fabulous, award-winning, and best-selling mystery authors for a 12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS STORY GIVEAWAY.

Here’s how it will work: 

For eleven days starting December 1st, you’ll receive a link for a completely free holiday story–no newsletter signups necessary. (except for mine, so you have access to the links to the stories) Then, on the 12th day, you’ll get a bundle of extra goodies to celebrate the season!

Sound like fun?

If you want to make sure not to miss any of the stories and bonuses, you need to sign up for my monthly newsletter so I can send you the links to the stories every day for 12 days. If, after that, you no longer wish to be on my list, just unsubscribe at any time. The link to sign up to be on the list for the 12 Days of Christmas and 12 Free Christmas mysteries, click here: 12 Days Giveaway

Always Moving Forward

This is the last week of October. Only two more months left in 2025. This year has whooshed by like a freight train. Fast and hauling all kinds of things.

I have been busy with book events, family events, and life events. All of those things have whisked the days by in a blur. And the rest of the year will be almost as fast and furious!

I have an event in Bruneau, Idaho, November 7th-9th. I’ll be selling my books in a booth with my daughter who will be selling fudge. It’s called Bruneau Cowboy Christmas. I love their tagline: Best shopping and day drinking in the West! Which is what we’re hoping will give us lots of sales. 🙂

My daughter and I taped out the size of the booth on my living room floor and we set up the booth so we will know what we need to do when we get there. I also have all my books in totes, marked “put out”, “under table” and “in vehicle.” I hope to sell so much that I’ll need more books that will be in my vehicle. 😉

After that, we’ll have a lovely family Thanksgiving, and then I have two events back-to-back in December. A 4-H Christmas Bazaar, December 5th & 6th in Baker City, Oregon, and then the 2025 Authors and Artists Fair in Eugene, Oregon, December 15th.

When those two weekends are over, then it’s hanging out with family through the holidays and gearing up to start a new year of writing.

We will also be moving to Baker City in the coming year. We have slowly been taking things to the house we purchased there. So there will always be something to do, whether it is writing, editing, publishing, marketing, or boxing things up.

At the moment, I have two Gabriel Hawke novels, one Spotted Pony Casino mystery, and one Cuddle Farm Mystery book scheduled to write and release in 2026. I’ve been thinking about the next three books I’ll be writing and doing some research. I always have a couple of books brewing in my head while I’m writing one.

So stay tuned to this blog to find out what the next book will be and what I might have learned to write it.

Today and tomorrow are the last two days you can get the first book in the Shandra Higheagle Mystery series, Double Duplicity for FREE as an audiobook. You can download it from my website. https://www.patyjager.net/product/double-duplicity-audiobook/

Check out my website while you’re there and see that the prices for the audiobooks on my website are more reasonable than those of other vendors, and once you download the free audiobook, it will make any audiobook you order later the same process you go through at other audiobook vendors. Same with the ebook sales on my website. And if you want a print book with an autograph, you can purchase it from my website. Check it all out here: https://www.patyjager.net/

Ryjks Museum, Anna Frank House, and Volendam

Cousin Wanda picked us up for a day in Amsterdam. She dropped us off near the Rijks Museum and we walked across the park in front of the beautiful building that houses the museum. I enjoy looking at art, it jogs my creative side and makes me come up with stories to go with pieces that catch my eye. 

Ryjks Museum

The museum was huge with lots of great art and collections to wander through. My 16-year-old granddaughter wanted to know why they always painted the women half-dressed in the old paintings. I couldn’t give her a definite answer because I’m not sure, but she was happy that they looked like real people and not models.

I enjoyed many of the landscapes, especially those by Johan H. Weissenbruch. We grabbed a snack in an out-of-the-way alcove before meeting with Wanda outside the museum.

From here we walked through Amsterdam to the Anna Frank House.

We stopped at a few shops along the way. Rietta went into a Lego store looking for a gift for her brother who likes Legos and then into a rubber duck store so she could get her brother’s girlfriend a rubber duck dressed in a Dutch outfit.

The Anna Frank House is now surrounded by a large glass building. First, you get a headset that when you enter a room either starts playing information that pertains to what you are looking at or you can punch in the number that is placed on the wall to start the dialog.  All the information was interesting and kept my attention.

After you go through the information leading up to the war the self-guided tour takes you through the house where Anna and her family hid. Photos weren’t allowed.

The Anna Frank Museum is a reminder to always be watchful for those who wish to take over or treat others as less than human. It doesn’t matter their religion, race, or culture, every person is a human being. 

We finished our day by going to an Italian Restaurant. There is something about foreign food in foreign countries that makes other cultures’ food not taste the same.  Angie, Rietta, and I all commented on it after having Chinese and Italian food in Holland. Neither one tasted the same as what you get in America.  I don’t know if it’s because the country you are in puts their own cultural spin on the foods or what.

I couldn’t get over the bicycles stacked everywhere. This was a parking area for them.

No matter what food we ate we enjoyed most of it and were thankful to be able to make this trip.

The following day Janneke and Cor took us to Volendam. It’s an old fishing village that is now a tourist attraction. We walked along the streets and shops, purchasing mementos and taking in the sites.

We had lunch at the Flying Dutchman Restaurant.

Waling around we saw sailing ships and fishing boats. Angie encounter this stoic woman of the sea and took up a pose next to her.

Rietta, Angie, and I dressed up in historical Volendam clothing and had our photo taken.

The day was fun and we learned more about Dutch culture.

Afterward, we took boxes with the souvenirs we’d purchased and Rietta’s 52 bags of hagelslag (real chocolate sprinkles) to the post office.

It was less expensive for my daughter to have Rietta purchase and ship the hagelslag than for her to buy it in the United States.  I’m sure her kids were happy to see that box arrive!

That was the end of our visit to Holland. we had a wonderful time and it was fun connecting with my husband’s family again after not seeing them for awhile.

Merry Christmas or Holiday that you celebrate this time of year!

That Week Between

We had a wonderful Christmas! Hubby and I bought a new mattress, the old one was OLD! It had dips no matter which side you turned it on. Now we are getting used to a mattress with no dips. I like the bed, but it is taking some getting used to. They make them so many different ways these days. This one arrived rolled up in a box. Hubby had a hard time getting his head around the fact your bed was in that small box. It was heavy which convinced him.

I enjoyed setting up a table and my books at two local craft bazaars during December. I like being able to visit with the readers and make a connection with them.

As always, my favorite part of the whole season is going out in the woods and walking in snow to find the perfect Christmas tree. I love the hiking, the fresh air, and the fun attitude of nearly everyone involved. For some reason husbands think we should cut down the first tree that catches our eyes. My daughter and I have the opinion we need to see more than one to make a decision. And sometimes we do end up going back to the first one. 😉

Getting the sleds out to ride up to the trees.

The whole adventure wouldn’t be any fun if you exited your vehicle walked a short distance into the trees and picked one. It’s the hunt for the perfect one that makes the event thrilling and fun. Also, the sledding or sliding down an incline and the hot chocolate and cookies afterwards.

This week in between Christmas and New Years is a hurry up and finish projects and get things ready for the coming year. I have a book I’m trying to finish but it won’t be done by the time the ball drops at midnight on New Year’s Eve. It will take the first week into January 2024 to get it ready to go off to critique partners and beta readers. 

I have my writing and personal goals all mapped out.

2024 goals

Professional

Publish The Pinch (book 5 in Spotted Pony Casino Mystery) write and publish Book #6 

Write and publish Gabriel Hawke books #12 & #13

Write short story for Windtree Press anthology – 3,000-8,000 words

Get the last Shandra Higheagle book, Vanishing Dreams, in audiobook

Get Hawke books into audiobook box sets.

Put audiobooks up direct to Kobo. Add more books to my bookfunnel account to do more cross-promotions with other audiobook authors.

Put up YouTube videos of me reading short stories and audio of my books with photo galleries.

Personal

Continue walking 5 days a week

Watch my carb and fat intake

Traveling

Keep up my personal blog

Do more horseback riding

I don’t make resolutions I make goals. That way I can tick them off the list as I accomplish them. And resolutions are more a change of lifestyle which isn’t a challenge so much as a mindset where I am a bit competitive and prefer to accomplish a specific goal.

Are you a resolutions maker or a goal maker? And why?

Audiobooks news and Christmas Delights

It’s the last month of the year and I’m having my biggest blowout sale of audiobooks I’ve had all year. (Mostly because I finally found out how to promote and move audiobooks.) Thank you, Rebecca Hefner!

I have three audiobooks on sale right now!

Murder of Ravens, book 1 in the Gabriel Hawke novels is only $0.99 on Chirp.

The ancient art of tracking is his greatest strength…

And his biggest weakness.

Fish and Wildlife State Trooper Gabriel Hawke believes he’s chasing poachers.

However, he comes upon a wildlife biologist standing over a body that is wearing a wolf tracking collar.

He uses master tracker skills taught to him by his Nez Perce grandfather to follow clues on the mountain. Paper trails and the whisper of rumors in the rural community where he works, draws Hawke to a conclusion that he finds bitter.

Arresting his brother-in-law ended his marriage, could solving this murder ruin a friendship?

Universal buy link for ebook, print, and audio: https://www.books2read.com/u/bxZwMP

And Double Duplicity, book 1 in my Shandra Higheagle Mystery series if available at Spotify for only $0.99!

Dreams…Visions…Murder
On the eve of the biggest art event at Huckleberry Mountain Resort, potter Shandra Higheagle finds herself in the middle of a murder investigation. She’s ruled out as a suspect, but now it’s up to her to prove the friend she witnessed fleeing the scene was just as innocent. With help from her recently deceased Nez Perce grandmother, Shandra becomes more confused than ever but just as determined to discover the truth. While Shandra is hesitant to trust her dreams, Detective Ryan Greer believes in them and believes in her.
Can the pair uncover enough clues for Ryan to make an arrest before one of them becomes the next victim?

Universal book link for ebook, print, and audio: https://www.books2read.com/u/bww90b

Or if you would like to listen to the first 3 books in the Shandra Higeagle mystery series, you can purchase them for $2.99 at Barnes and Noble Nook.

Double Duplicity

Potter Shandra Higheagle’s deceased Nez Perce grandmother visits her dreams, revealing clues that help Shandra uncover not only one murder but two.

Tarnished Remains

Digging up Crazy Lil’s past takes Shandra Higheagle down a road of greed, miscommunication, and deceit.

Deadly Aim

The dead body of an illicit neighbor and an old necklace sends potter Shandra Higheagle on a chase to find a murderer.

Universal buy link for ebook, print or audiobook: books2read.com/u/m2ELO3

If you happen to be a Kobo member, I have partnered with the authors at Indie Audiobook Deals for a MASSIVE year-end giveaway. Five entrants will win a $50 Kobo gift card! Kobo is the premier site to listen to fantastic audiobooks.🎧

We’re picking FIVE winners so make sure to complete all of the extra entries to enhance your chances of winning. Good luck and wishing you a happy holiday season!

Enter here: https://kingsumo.com/g/pt4ez1/win-1-of-5-kobo-50-gift-cards

And if that isn’t enough to get you giddy about goodies for yourself and others this holiday, I have a recipe for you.

I like to make caramel corn every year for gifts for family and friends. If you want the crunchy caramel layer on the popcorn to be thick, double the caramel recipe but use the amount of popcorn the recipe calls for.

Caramel Corn

15 cups popped corn

1 cup brown sugar packed

½ cup butter or margarine

¼ cup light corn syrup

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon baking soda

Heat oven to 200˚. Divide popped corn between 2 ungreased 13” x 9” baking pans. (I use 1 roasting pan because the higher sides make it easier to stir.) In a saucepan, heat sugar, butter, corn syrup, and salt, stirring occasionally, until bubbly around the edges of the pan. Continue cooking over medium heat for 5 minutes.

Remove from heat; stir in the baking soda until foamy. Pour over popped corn, stirring until the corn is well coated. Bake 1 hour, stirring every fifteen minutes.  When cool it is ready to package up to gift.

Enjoy the audiobooks while you make the caramel corn or eat the caramel corn!

Finishing out November with gusto.

I’m back from the large Holiday Event in Portland, OR. I sold quite a few books and the other NIWA authors books we sold also did well. We sold more than in years past. The goal of the authors who work the booth is to try and sell a book from every author who paid to have their books in the event.

I have some fun photos I took at the event.

Carolers at the Portland Holiday Market.
Reindeer and an elf.
The authors working Friday at the event.

Back home we had Thanksgiving at our youngest daughter’s house. I only had to bring some frozen chocolate pies, homemade rolls, and a vegetable tray. I got off easy. 😉 We had a nice visit and delicious dinner before the youngest (4 year-old) granddaughter said, “You need to go. I have a very busy day tomorrow.” We laughed about that and eventually left. She was excited because the next day she was going to play with a girl cousin close to her age. At home she has 4 brothers and a teenage sister.

This week I’ve been playing catch up on all kinds of writerly things. I need to get back to writing on the current work in progress. I plan to hit it hard starting next week. This week we are hosting my mother-in-law who is an almost 90 year-old dynamo who believes we (she and I) should clean something in my house every morning. Then in the afternoon, I try to work on the business side of writing because it is hard to concentrate on writing when she is either watching TV or sitting at the table knitting.

I am multi-tasking on Friday and Saturday Dec. 1st and 2nd. I was at the conference in Vegas earlier in the month when I saw a call out for people to purchase tables at a craft bazaar for Dec. 1st and 2nd. I asked my daughter to get me a table. She did and now I have that bazaar to sell books at and I am participating in a Facebook Secret Santa party those same days. I’ll have to use my phones Hotspot and take my laptop to participate throughout the days at the Secret Santa Party. Here is the info about that event if you would like to join over 350 authors and have several chances to win prizes from the authors.

The Don’t-Miss-It Event of the Season.

Secret Santa Days!

Over 350 Secret Santa Authors will be gifting you books, gift cards, and swag! 

Join the fun here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DangerouslyDarkDarlings

Join the Facebook group to be able to participate in the event. I have a lot of fun stuff I’m giving away. I will give 5 people your choice of a FREE ebook, 2 people their choice of an autographed print book, and swag, and 1 person will receive 2 mugs, hot chocolate, a Christmas Tree ornament, playing cards, and homemade sugar cookies.

I’m also happy to say I have another short story in the Windtree Press 2023 Anthology, Whispers. My story, Whispers of the Past, tells about my character Dela Alvaro and her partner Heath Seaver investigating a cabin in the forest that she hopes will give her more clues to her heritage.

A whisper is a soft barely audible sound or resemblance of a sound. Perhaps a thought in one’s head, a flutter of leaves, a feather floating to the ground, or a wish. In this collection of ten stories and a poem the theme of “Whispers” is used in different ways.

From the poem Soul Whispers, from Dari LaRoche, you can conjure up the variety of whispers in the coming stories. This is followed by the Children’s story, Whispers in a Dream, by Susie Slanina, where Metro the dog visits outer space through a dream.

The tale of Friends and Neighbors by Pamela Cowan murmurs of unlikely alliances. In Whispers of the Halycon, author Dari LaRoche’s submission is a twist on a fairytale. Author Mary Vine’s characters, in Whisper Upon a Star, hide their feelings as they try to find a killer.

Her Zayka is a tale of a close bond between a young woman and the nanny she grew up with. Author R. Hockamin has a unique twist at the end. Of Wings and Whispers is a fantasy where author Diana McCollum takes the reader on an emotional ride as a fairy with a broken wing finds love.

Suspense and romance will keep you turning the pages of author Kimila Kay’s Whispering Willows. Author Melissa Yuan-Innes story, Bread and Ashtrays, is an intriguing tale of an empath who sees whispers of a man’s life.

The characters in Whispers of the Past, by Paty Jager, are seeking a person whom they may or may not wish they’d never heard of. Ending this collection of titillating and thought-provoking stories is author Maggie Lynch’s Pax Reborn. This science fiction novella asks the question would the world be better with everyone content and equal?

Enjoy and savor each story. Every one of the stories will leave whispers of questions and coax a smile.

Whispers | Universal Book Links Help You Find Books at Your Favorite Store! (books2read.com)

Whispers – Windtree Press

My next post will be in December. I’m excited to finish, The Pinch, the next book in the Spotted Pony Casino Mystery series and to get ready for the coming year. One which I will have lots to tell you about next December. 😉

Fun Writing Things

Last month the 11th book in my Gabriel Hawke Mystery series released. It was a struggle to complete due to the complexity of the story. So far my beta readers and reviewers say I did a good job with a serious and triggering story.

Damning Firefly deals with a person of authority abusing his status and using it to sexually assault young women and teenagers. It went on for decades because no one would listen to the one person trying to stop him and the victims were ashamed or scared.

While Hawke is discovering all the sordid transgressions of the victim, he is still using his tracking and logic to find the real killer and save more lives.

Damning Firefly

A church fire.

An unconscious woman on Starvation Ridge.

Gabriel Hawke, fish and wildlife officer with the Oregon State Police, helps with a fire at the Lighted Path church before heading out to check turkey hunters. He discovers a car wedged between two trees and a woman with a head injury reeking of smoke. Is she the arsonist?

Hawke encounters the county midwife gloating over the burnt church and learns she and the victim in the car know one another.

Two seemingly separate events lead Hawke to a serial rapist and a county full of secrets. 

Universal buy link: https://books2read.com/u/bQeBDZ

And releasing November 1st is a novella to hopefully give all my Shandra Higheagle Mystery fans more closure on that series. I released book 16, Vanishing Dream, the last book in that series, two years ago and fans still ask me for more.

Because there has been so many asking for more, I wrote a Christmas novella that is set 10 years after Vanishing Dream.

Christmas Chaos

Check out a super-special Christmas surprise— a continuation of the Shandra Higheagle Mystery series. Ten years later the twins are at college but there’s trouble brewing.

Shandra Higheagle Greer is anxiously awaiting a visit from her twins as they head home from college for Christmas break. After a ten-year absence, her deceased grandmother is back in her dreams and the message seems clear. The twins are in trouble. After giving a young woman a ride to a nearby town, they have become suspects in her murder.

Even though he’s been removed from the case, Shandra and her husband, Weippe County Sheriff Ryan Greer, continue to investigate, determined to dig up proof that the twins had nothing to do with the homicide. Even if that means putting one of the twins in danger to uncover the truth.

I don’t have a pre-order link. If you want to know when it releases, you can follow me on this blog or sign up for my newsletter – https://bit.ly/2IhmWcm

Other fun stuff, I’ll be at an author promotion and marketing conference the second week of November and on November 10th I’ll be part of a 300 author book signing at the Horseshoe Casino in Vegas. There will be door prizes and raffles as well as authors selling and signing books. It is a big party all day long! What else would you expect from an event in Vegas! You can learn more here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ravevegasauthorsigning

And then! I’m home for 4 days and I’ll be at the Portland Holiday Market at the Portland Expo Center from Nov. 17th- 19th at the NIWA (Northwest Independent Writers Association) booth. I’ll have book bundles for gifts or for yourself and freebies. Stop in if you’re in the Portland, OR area.

As soon as I get all my Shandra Higheagle and Gabriel Hawke audiobooks uploaded in box sets, I’ll start writing The Pinch. The next book in the Spotted Pony Casino Mystery series. This is the book a friend and I went to the Oregon Coast to research. She kept telling everyone we were there for murder and mayhem! Which was kind of true. We talked to casino security guards, checked for security cameras, and skulked about hallways and places that I thought Dela, my character, might need to know about. It was a fun weekend.

Holiday Season is in Full Swing

What is your favorite thing this time or year?

For me it’s doing things where I’m with family and friends. Last Saturday I set up a table of my books at a local Bazaar. My daughter who was selling her delicious fudge and gift boxes of pork from her Rural Roots Ranch Idaho Pasture Pigs had the table next to mine. We visited, met new to us people, and visited with people we knew. She sold out of all her fudge except for vanilla. She had cherry, chocolate, peanut butter, vanilla, lemon, and peppermint. She had repeat customers from the other bazaars she’d attended and garnered orders for her pork. I met some new readers. And love that I ran out of some first in series books, except, I could have sold more had I had them. It was a fun day.

We capped off the bazaar, which was part of the Holiday Jamboree going on in Burns, Oregon that day, with the Light Parade in the evening. Two of my grandchildren were on the 4-H float. They and their parents helped to set up the float and then the three little grandchildren, their mom and dad, and I went to stand on the street and wait for the parade. It was chilly but not too cold as we stood on the street, hot chocolate in hands, waiting.

Then on Monday, same daughter, her family, another granddaughter and one of her friends, and my husband and I went to higher ground to find trees for our Christmas trees. We have had more snow than usual for this time of year and we couldn’t drive as far up into the woods as we normally do.

My daughter and I are the ones who get excited about going into the woods to find trees. Both our husbands humor us, by going, but mine spent most of the time sitting in the pickup with some of the younger grandchildren while my daughter and I trudge through two feet and sometimes deeper snow looking at the trees. When we couldn’t find anything within walking distance of the vehicles, we hopped on the 4-wheeler they’d brought along. The 4-wheeler could get up the road, but our 4-wheel drive pickups couldn’t.

With two sleds tied on behind and grandsons whooping it up, we took off up the road. The spot we usually go, even the 4-wheeler couldn’t get up it. So we veered to the right on a road we could navigate. But all we were seeing were pine trees. We prefer fir because the needles are softer and there are more branches. More ornament footage. 😉 We found two trees that I liked and my daughter liked. We stopped and she and the older of the grandsons sledding behind us, walked up to the tree and discovered the battery-operated saw had a dead battery. We hopped back on the 4-wheeler and hurried back to the vehicles.

Everyone there was waiting for our return and groaned when they learned we had to go back. We took two batteries with us and a hand saw this time! I had spotted a tree on the way back down that was closer to the vehicles. We decided to get it, only once it was cut, it was too large for me, so my daughter decided it would be hers. We pulled it to the side of the road then drove on up, looking for a smaller tree for me.

We found one, cut it down and put it in one of the sleds with the younger grandson sitting on the tree inside the sled. Then we went down and did the same thing with the larger tree, the older grandson sitting on that bigger tree. We made our way back to the vehicles without a mishap.

And now the trees are up and looking cheery and bright. While I wasn’t fond of having a pine tree, I really like it now that I’m done decorating it and won’t be poked by the needles anymore.

Now it’s on to the baking!

Slack Week between Holidays

Daughter and son-in-law packing their Christmas tree we cut down.

This week between Christmas and the new year gives time to stop and reflect and look forward. While the days seem to be lost during this time, I think it’s because we give ourselves permission to think about so much that happened over the year and think about what is to come in the new year.

Reminiscing with family and friends over the holidays is a fun way to look back and remember good times. There is sometimes sadness mixed in with the good, thinking of people who are no longer here, but there is always the brightness of knowing we have another year to look forward to.

Christmas in SE Oregon was white and cold. I loved it! There is nothing like a white Christmas to make the day feel even more festive. The week following is cold. It makes taking care of the animals a little more difficult. Water troughs freeze, the animals are cold and need extra food.

After the chores are finished, it is comfy to sit at my computer with a heater under my desk or in front of my sewing machine while I work on quilts. There is always something to do inside, if the weather outside isn’t pleasant.

I have a hard time understanding people who say they are bored. As a kid I might have uttered it a time or two but as an adult, there is never time to be bored. I can always find something to do. In fact, I never have enough time to do everything I want to do.

What do you do during this week between Christmas and New Years? Do you work, take a vacation? Maybe just spend your time when you aren’t working watching movies or working on a hobby?