Merry Christmas All

Merry Christmas to all! It has been a great holiday season for me because this is the first time in 41 years that I was able to stay put for the entire holiday period from Thanksgiving through Christmas and will be able to do so right up through New Years day!  No stress about trying to get things prepared, shopping, etc. So a little background first. Shortly after we built this house back in 2005, my wife bought four "Alpine Firs" at one of the local nurseries.  They were expensive but she wanted something that wouldn't get too big and fat that she could plant relatively close to the house. Turned out they weren't actually Alpine Firs, they were common Douglas firs, probably dug up from the local mountains and sold for a huge profit by the nursery (the one we will never go back to!) They were/are getting huge! Way too close to the house! So two years ago I cut the first one down and we used it as our Christmas tree. Turned out to be the nicest tree we ever had! So we cut the second one down last year and it was even prettier. This year is the third one we cut down. It was 25 feet tall! We took the top 8 feet for our Christmas tree and it turned out just as nice as the first two.

We have one left for next year that is about 16 feet now. This has actually worked out so well I wish I had been planting Douglas firs every year so we cold continue to get our own trees for Christmas.

The next thing I was excited about was to see the reaction from my oldest daughter when she saw the "Organic Steampunk" lamp I built for her. Three years ago she went traipsing through the brush to retrieve birch and alder tree sheds to make a clothes rack for her younger sister. One of them she expressed and interest in for a lamp "some day". I kept it in my shop. Later on she started liking steampunk decor, so I turned this Alder snag into a steampunk lamp, a melding of nature and industry.

Thankfully she loved it. Whew!

Now comes the awesome part. Both my girls came up with the same thoughtful gift idea for dear old dad. Nautical themed decanters with glasses. Fortunately they are enough different that they compliment rather than duplicate. I set them up in my hobby room along with the popcorn air popper I also received from one of the girls.

Well another year has almost passed. I was not a very prolific mini builder this year. Perhaps 2020 will be more productive. Cheers to all and again Merry Christmas!

Update December 26th: My wife gifted me a desk top lift for my hobby desk so I can stand up to work occasionally. I had to reorganize before I could make room to mount it. It works great!