Jingle In The Junction

Last night was the opening evening for Jingle in the Junction in my former place of residence, West Des Moines. We lived near the town's original downtown area which is lovingly referred to as Valley Junction, its name before becoming West Des Moines.
Oh, the number one memory of the Holiday Season's opening night!

Granddaughter, Alyssa, was between four and five years old. She, her mother, Shelly, my daughter, Kari, and I were planning our attack strategy for taking in as much of the evening's offerings as possible. There was Santa, of course, carriage rides, specials in all the shops, and we each had our own agenda. As we debated how to proceed, Alyssa pronounced her opinion: "We can do it all!" "Yes", we agreed, "We are women, we can do it all."

Alyssa's daughter, Lily, is now about the same age and I can definitely hear her saying the same thing!








With the holiday season and tree trimming in mind, here's something weird I just noticed a few days ago:

I don't know if these little fir trees were originally planted with the idea of being decorated during the yuletide, but most of the homes around here have one in front. In the last couple of years, some of them have died, which is what I thought it looked like this one was going to do. Then I noticed an entirely different looking limb sticking out. What is going on?

Unrelated to the holiday, but something else that happened last evening as I was perusing Facebook - one of the pages that I have liked is our local library. On a regular basis they feature two or three articles/pictures that appeared in the local paper fifty years ago. In order to see the entire piece you have to click on them individually to open them up. I hardly ever do that because I don't know most of the people. But last night I did click on one about a former Crestonian helping orphans in Thailand. I was curious to see if it was anyone I knew.

It wasn't. But to my surprise there was a picture of my husband in uniform. Bud had graduated from basic combat training at Fort Campbell, KY with an expert firing rating on the M-14 rifle. This was years before we were a couple, so it was nice to see something from his past.

The 1st of December and the grass is still green and no snow as yet. Even this squirrel is wondering when the white stuff is coming.