Saturday Afternoon

This boy deserved to do something besides work on the house yesterday. So we packed up and drove up the canyon to mess around in the beautiful light. It was high Christmas-card-photo-shootin' season and there were all kinds of groups in all kinds of attire taking pictures.

So we took some too. This year we just have to try, try, try.

Maddie is showing off the hat that I knit from the Harry Potter Knits book that I checked out of the library. We've been having too much fun with it. I guess that this is modeled after a hat Ron is wearing when they eat magic animal crackers in the fourth? movie.

And here is the payment the kids demand for giving us smiles. They want to take crazy pictures, and lots of them. But crazy or no, those blue eyes and pink cheeks cry out for the camera.

And I had to post this one just for the pudge. He was so happy even with an ear infection. I'm going to have to keep a close watch on this one lest he turn out not hearing for months on end like Sebastian.

It was much better than spending the day indoors. At night, we went on another laterne umzug around the neighborhood, singing all of the appalling lyrics to songs that school-aged children know (the ones about blowing up the school, attacking the teachers, and scatological references). We did the real thing when we were in Berlin, but I didn't know then what it was for. It is for St. Martin's day. He was a frenchman, and when they called him to be bishop, he hid in a haystack. The townsfolk went out with lanterns to find him in the dark, and the geese gave away his hiding place. Rob says "Here is a saint I can really get behind!" Now they celebrate November 11 by having a goose dinner and then walking in the dark with lanterns singing about St. Martin.