I had a very nice Thanksgiving with my family. My brother Dean's family and my mother and I drove up to Glendale (north Phoenix, about 50 minutes from my house) to my niece Heather's house. We got to meet her recently-arrived foster daughters. We had turkey with all the trimmings. I got to play some card games and our favorite board game "Settlers of Cazan" as well.
I feel very busy, with so much to do to get ready for Christmas. And there are so many activities during December at church. I'm singing in the transition choir at Valley Unitarian Universalist Church again, and am really enjoying that. It's a small choir that sings to people who are dying. But we also sing to people who are sick, and at nursing homes, etc., and practiced today with bells, which is a first for me. Fun!! I've re-joined the church choir, and am enjoying that very much as well. I'm going to be singing some duets at our Christmas program. There are other concerts as well - my niece and nephew have their Christmas concerts, and my niece Heather and I are going to the Phoenix Symphony's presentation of the Messiah. I may even manage a Messiah Sing-Along in here somewhere.
I haven't managed to get to my goal of walking every day yet, like I'd planned to do when I got back to Mesa. But I have taken some wonderful walks. One afternoon I spent walking around the ponds at one of my favorite places - the Water Ranch in Gilbert, AZ [photo on left]. I saw so many birds there, including several kinds of doves, a green heron, a couple of snowy egrets chasing and fighting with each other, European starlings
[photo at right], lots of coots, lots of geese, lots of mallards, a juvenile pied-billed grebe (with stripes!, black-necked stilts, lots of long-billed dowitchers, and several kinds of hummingbirds (there are at least twelve different kinds of hummingbirds in Arizona!) - several of these were new birds for me. It was an afternoon that was replenishing and soothing to my soul. [photo of Anna's Hummingbird above]
I've found time to do a little geneology work, though not a lot, mostly just trying to get organized, and figure out what I have. I did find my father's mother's father's family information, which was exciting! Up till now, his family has been a blank page.
This evening as I was walking along the Tempe Canal Path, another favorite, not far from my place, as the sun set, I couldn't help snapping a couple pictures. :-)
The weather has been wonderful - a little cooler when I first got here, but in the 70s this week. I love it!
And I love being back in the valley, with the mountains on the horizon. I miss the mountains when I'm not here, and I feel like they welcome me back home.
