Saturday, January 3, 2009

Merry Christmas, 2008, at The Woods’ Home and Catalina Island



Many, happy days ago, five Christmas “Bunnies” met at Chez Woods, and later at Catalina Island to share a lot of feasting and enjoying family with two sibs, two husbands, and one Handsome Giant Son.

The six days of joy were “headed up” by the Christmas Head Gear (above) brought to somewhat mirror the “noses” of yester-year which, in fact, also, brought smiles and comments from all who saw us.

Our first big adventure opened up for us at the Long Beach Yacht Club when the two Woods and one Handsome Giant Son set up a grand celebration for the 79th year of Dick Blide happily being here on Earth. Penelope must have presented one cookie per year!



Then, Christmas Eve Day found us accompanying son, Nicholas to his favorite church, and favorite pastor since high school days. The music gifted us this evening was professional in its beauty and fed our souls most of the one-hour delightful service. We guess over 500 appreciative people attended.

The next day, beautiful walks took place, ending in a brightly decorated mall-type place where we tried to “fit in” with our (twins’) head gear.


Christmas Day Brunch hosted by the Woods, found us in beautiful surroundings with many cheered people sharing the fabulous (too much) food and sparkling environs.


And finally, gifts were exchanged with the first being the announcement of three days at a darling condo at Catalina Island for the Blides from and with the Woods! Wow! Further gifts for the Woods were opened, including one from Michael Mouse who didn’t even know it (Fred discovered many friends in the Rice U. book of years ago).


But wait! There’s more!

An adorable and cozy condo awaited our arrival by Ferry (below). . .accompanied by a darling gas-run scooter-type open air vehicle able to seat all five of us at a time! Nicholas and Frederick did most of the enjoying of said scooter; Patti and Penny feared the open air part and jumped right off as soon as possible. They walked.


The following three days were stuffed almost as much as we, with great eating, hiking, and watching all the beauty of Catalina Island. . .especially the sunshine, (almost new to the Blides) fun eating places (one of them insisted we throw all peanut shells on the floor) and gorgeous buildings with surprises of wild buffalo almost close enough to touch.




Finally, it must be reported that Big Woody almost walked our buns off, and Dick found a hat big enough. Finally,






the giant Pelican, made it clear, he hated to see us leave. . .