Depending on where you are in the world, dear reader, it may already be Christmas Eve, but for us here on the frozen Canadian prairie, there is a little time left in this day, the Fourth Sunday of Advent. Mrs. Padre and I observe a few traditions, including the lighting of Advent candles, Sunday by Sunday, and bringing home a real Christmas tree. Here you can see both glowing gently, and while it's frigid winter outside, here inside is warm and comfort. For that I'm grateful.
In another Christmas tradition, Mrs. Padre has commandeered the dining room table for her annual holiday jigsaw puzzle. Her mind is a subtle and precise thing, inclined to visual and word puzzles, whereas mine has all the patience of a Golden Retreiver with severe ADD. And yet she marvels that I have the patience to sit for hours with paints and miniatures. Somehow my mind can, as W.B. Yeats said, "like a long-legged fly upon the stream ... move upon silence". Today was a good painting day, finding the detail in big figures and getting the big picture in very small figures. Curt's Analogue Hobbies painting challenge has been a great incentive for me, and I am grateful for the creative aspects of our hobby.
I'm also grateful for the social aspects of this hobby. This year I travelled back to Ontario to game with dear and dearly missed friends in Ontario. I met a local circle of boardgamers in Medicine Hat and while I wish they were interested in miniatures gaming, they are good people. I've become close friends with a few people, via email and Facetime, that I've never met in person, and yet they are dear to me. I'm grateful for all of you from Madrid, Spain to Christ Church, NZ and everwhere in between, grateful for your interest in this blog, and grateful for what you offer in your blogs, for your creativity, inspiration, and good humour. Thanks for all your well wishes for my recent knee surgery, the offending limb is recovering nicely and I hope to be back to running before the New Year.
If you are secular, I wish you and yours a very happy holidays and all good things in the new year. If you are a person of faith, may God's blessing and peace be with you and those you love and pray for, now and ever more.
And now another tradition calls, the eggnog (light, low cal), which is really an excuse for a sharp shot of Lamb's Navy Rum (calories be damned). Cheers, Mike
Have a great Christmas and New year!!
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas, Mad Padre!
ReplyDeleteGreat post, Padre. Have you both, Mrs and Mr Padre, a great Christmas too and hope that 2013 comes full of goddies (both material and spiritual).
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas ans a happy new year!
ReplyDeleteCheers
Monty
Merry Christmas Padre!
ReplyDeleteMay you and Mrs Padre have a fabulous Christmas and a wonderful New Year!
ReplyDeleteI may be secular, but goddammit it is Xmas. So Merry Xmas to you too Padre.
ReplyDelete"..... But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round -- apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that -- as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!"......
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas to you and your family as well Mike. Have a good one!
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas, Padre Mike! God be with you! I'll be remembering you at the altar tonight.
ReplyDeleteMay the blessings of our lord be upon you MP and your family over the Christmas period. I wish you the very best wishes for 2013.
ReplyDeleteGod Bless,
Helen
Have a wonderful Christmas, Mike, Kay and all your family. Thank you for both of your wonderful blogs and we'll be thinking of you in a rainy St Albans this Christmas-time :)
ReplyDeleteA great post Mike and seasons greetings from downunder.
ReplyDeleteAll the best for 2013!
Model on!
Merry Christmas and best wishes for the New Year.
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas
ReplyDelete