Christmas morn

December is always such a busy time of year with the children's plays, parties, baking to do and the end-of-year happenings for work.  Of course, the blog is hard to keep up with with the holidays.  I have been planting quite a bit in the garden, though, but nothing is photo-worthy yet.

Christmas is Christmas, however, whether in LaMancha or not.  And, to this day, I still get up at the crack of dawn, just like when I was a kid.

The morning was frosty.

There were cinnamon rolls to be baked.

The Christmas tree was guarding a few surprises.

Wish I could share the smell of these baking!  

  

Merry Christmas to all, wherever you may be!

Karen

In a Vase on Monday - Giving Thanks

Like many Americans who live abroad, we are usually not able to celebrate Thanksgiving Day on the fourth Thursday of November as Abraham Lincoln would have it.  With school and work, it is hard to find the time, and here in LaMancha it is often hard to find a turkey!

This year, we celebrated Thanksgiving quite late - yesterday, to be exact.  Turkey with all it's trimmings - everything homemade and nothing out of a can, box or bag.  Here, there's no corner supermarket to pick up cranberry sauce or pre-packaged stuffing mix, and I envision it as a meal that would be very similar to that of our forefathers (and mothers!).  Heck, I even had to "hunt down" the bird!

My husband had knee surgery a few days ago, so this year's meal was quite informal (I figured that crutches and fine china were not a good mix).  For the centerpiece, I threw yet more roses into yet another old coffee pot, along with the ivy from the vase of 2 weeks ago.  It would seem that my vases are stuck in a rut.

In the kitchen, with apple pie and pumpkin bread

Abraham Darby gets darker and more orangey in the fall.

The Shepherdess may look delicate, but she's one tough cookie!

Hope you also enjoyed a Happy Thanksgiving!

Once again, I'm linking with Rambling In the Garden's In a Vase on Monday meme, where garden bloggers post photos of arrangements with flowers and greenery from their gardens.  Stop by!

Sunsets, toads and kestrels

With the shorter days of December, I never seem to have time to get out in the garden when it's daylight out.  We have had some rain, though, which is a good thing.

The pond out back is full again, and the tamarix are showing a little fall color...

... although the reservoir is still quite low.

The dampness in the garage attracted this enormous toad...

...that completely freaked me out because he did not hop but walked like a turtle instead.
I think this is what they call in Spanish a "running toad" or epidalea calamita.  I still call it freaky.

The cool, wet weather also brought a cernícalo, or kestrel, who comes to our porch at dusk to spend the night.    Sometimes, he also brings dinner (a bit of which you can see to the left of the beam). 

So cool!

The best part of cloudy, overcast days is that we get these unbelievable sunsets.