Christmas open house

Welcome to my home. I didn't take as many pictures as I thought I would, but this will give you a little glimpse of the open house that I had earlier in the month. As you can see, we folks in Florida who never see snow do enjoy snowmen. A friend that I worked with for many years made the reindeer and the snowmen, and I've enjoyed having them on my front porch over the years.
My table doesn't look too lavish from this viewpoint, but it was enjoyed by all...just plain old food, nothing fancy. Sarah had encouraged our having the open house, and when I asked her what she wanted to have to eat, she said "the same thing that we always had." Earlier when I mentioned about the open house in the blog, a missionary friend who had been at one many years ago, wrote and said how much she and her husband had enjoyed being in our home for the fellowship and the good food.
Peg is a friend of mine since grade school. We hadn't been together much since she had moved away from Bradenton. When her mother died, she inherited the house, and she and her husband moved back to Bradenton to live. We reconnected after Don died and enjoy doing things together. Her husband was so ill a couple of years ago with cancer and heart problems, but he seems to be doing well now. It amazes me to think what the body can endure and still survive.
Sarah (in the middle) enjoyed having some of her friends from high school come. Suzanne, the young woman on the left, graduated with Sarah, and they live next door to each other. Suzanne has a young son, Joshua, and Joshua has the same kindergarten teacher that Sarah had at Bradenton Christian. He finds that very hard to believe, but it's true. Grace, on the right, also graduated with Sarah, and she lives in Tampa where she teaches strings in the elementary school. She has a degree in vocal performance and does a lot of acting in the local theaters. Her favorite role was Maria in West Side Story.

I think we had around twenty guests in that evening. Plenty of food was left over, so I had some of my Sweet Adeline friends over the next evening to eat some of it up after we had gone to the movie.

It was a good weekend for visiting and enjoying time with friends...some whom I see regularly and some whom I hadn't had a chance to talk with for quite some time. I wish you could have been here.