We had a quiet but very nice Christmas

Late Christmas Eve, Will’s grandson, Drew, arrived after a long drive from Minneapolis, a five-hour drive on some not-so-nice roads at times. We sat up and visited, probably too late, but we couldn’t help it.

This morning, we got up, got the wood fires stoked, and while Will and Drew got caught up, I started making Christmas dinner. As I’m doing that again on Saturday for my side of the family, I chose a roasting chicken, stuffed with wild rice dressing, garlic mashed potatoes, the traditional green bean casserole (mine has bacon too), fresh bread, candied carrots, and sweet corn, all from the garden, of course.

Then there were pies, two Hopi Pale Grey squash pumpkin pies and a lemon meringue. We tried not to eat too much dinner, saving room for pies, but that didn’t work, as usual.

We were surprised by seeing two wolves out on the beaver pond’s ice. First was a big male, who spent quite a while out there, finally lying down and watching the house as I’d let the dogs out. He was keeping an eye on them. But they never saw him. When I called them in, he decided there were people around and trotted off into the woods. Later, a female came out and sniffed around the old beaver lodge and edge of the pond, finally going back into the woods on the far side of the pond. Very cool! What a Christmas present. — Jackie