Dec 28 A lovely Christmas - again

It was good to feel up to inviting friends for Christmas dinner again. Mary & Mark with their Oz pal Andrew (Ursula's son), and Raul & Elvira joined us. I cooked up duck breasts, Mary did a magnificent Pavlova, and Raul a great cheese board so it was easy for us. I counted 50 glasses as Ted washed them next morning so I guess we had some good wines too. After dinner we all (yes, even Raul) had a rousing game of Mexican Train. Boxing Day we invited our new neighbours and kids (Ella5 and Jayden 10 for drinks) and have sealed a new friendship there. They love to come visit the parrot. We hope to see Julie and Dan, the family that just moved out, over the holidays too.

Christmas Eve was a return to the Rodas-Reyes family, this time at son Sean and Krista's invitation for a sumptuous feast and many wines. At about midnight I pulled the plug and we came home, but the hispanic party continued on to the wee hours. It was great to spend the time with 3-year-old Maya, who certainly "got" Santa this year.
Left: Sheila, Melissa, Elvira, Krista. Right: Sean, Raul, Ted, Patrick.
We love being part of the extended family to so many wonderful families and are blessed with the new generation coming along too.
On Christmas Day, Justin & Michelle paid us a brief visit before going to dinner with Michelle's family so we had a visit with Cohen on his first Christmas.

Dec 2-17 Aaaah the tropical breezes

We had a great trip to Hawaii, returning for the umteenth time to Kona on the Big Island. We didn't cover much ground this time, just hung out on our lanai, took a boat trip out to skin dive with 100-150 dolphins. We enjoyed shopping at the farmers market for local produce, all the local fish and seafood with a Japanese twist. Nearly every day we donned masks and snorkels and went skin diving with the fish, turtles and dolphins in the many good bays south of Kona. We had one day of rain, but it was still 75 so not too difficult to take. It was sad to return to winter but good to be back for the holidays.