No. 31: A Winter Solstice Party

No. 31: Have a Solstice Party 

When I realized that we would be arriving back in Texas the same weekend as the winter solstice, I knew this was my chance to knock out No. 31:Have a winter solstice party.

With just a week before the solstice I frantically created an evite and sent it out, truthfully not knowing if ANYONE would be able to come.

My plan was to light up the house with candles to brighten up the one day of the year with the tiniest amount of daylight. O! And I also wanted to see my bunko group friends and others from the neighborhood. A very tiny little party that started out with 6 yeses, 6 maybes, and 6 nos with a few non responders.

 Candles...

and more candles.

We flew into Texas on Friday night late, stuffed ourselves with Tex Mex and called it a day.
Saturday was spent doing last minute kid Christmas shopping, decorating a tree and eating more Tex Mex.

Our pitiful little tree. 

Lights not working, only about a third of the ornaments on it.

But definitely better than last year's non-tree.

So Sunday I realized maybe I needed to get some wine and cheese for this wine and cheese solstice  party. A quick trip to the store got me fixed up.

Happily I had about 14 friends show along with a good group of Bunny's pals. 

There were candles and wine and champagne and candles and it was lovely. Just enough people to visit briefly with everyone. 

We did not dance around a solstice bush (is there even such a thing?), celebrate the longer days to come, mourn the short days just passed or anything of that nature.

Ok, possibly a little bowing to the Sun Gods. 

Or maybe the Wine gods...

Still. It was a party on the solstice and I'm counting it!!

An up close pic of the tree-

looks a little more festive. 

I'm big on icicles, snowflakes and not much else.

Christmas in Texas was great. Got to visit with tons of people, see the nieces and the grand nieces and grand nephews along with my brother and SIL and nephew Andrew. Breakfast on Christmas morning with my MIL, a day spent visiting with my parents. Had a great dinner with some high school girlfriends

Many thanks to Ellen for hosting all these 

beautiful women for dinner. 

Forty years after High School!

I'll be back in Texas next week when my mom has a bit of surgery. 

But now Bunny and I are back in Colorado where winter has decided to arrive with a purpose.
There's snow and cold! 

No. 54:  Go out to dinner by myself...

or what it really says on the list:

54. Go to dinner in Salida by myself, sit at the bar and be fearless 
rather than eating frozen pizza at the cabin alone

      Thursday night was Halloween. 

   

      There are exactly ZERO children anywhere near our cabin so I knew I wouldn't be having any cute trick or treaters.

      The girls had cheer leading practice and then went on their merry ways, leaving the mama (me) at home alone. 

      But I had heard that in town there would be a re-enactment of the zombie dance from Michael Jackson's Thriller being performed on F Street.  F Street is the "cool' street.  (Hmm...how dated does that sound? As my girls would put it: "F Street is life." )

      A zombie flash mob.  

      Sounded entertaining to me.

    

      So after being abandoned by my darling children, I bundled up and headed into town. 

    

      I swear I passed a couple of zombies driving a Subaru station wagon on the highway- but maybe I  

just had zombies on the brain. 

Anyway, I think you can agree that this was totally worth it. The fact that I am living in a place where

fun stuff like this occurs, well, it just blows me away.  

          

If for some reason you can't see this video, please click HERE.

      Afterwards, I was frozen.  Standing on a street corner in 40º weather with the wind blasting through would have been no problem if I had realized just how chilly and windy it was. But I was underdressed for standing around outside.   

      Also, I was hungry

   

      And so, No. 54. was accomplished. 

      I walked into one of my favorite restaurants, the Fritz, and settled my behind on a bar stool. 

The Fritz from the street.

      After ordering a beer and dinner, I chatted with the owner and then waited for my food.    

      A couple of people with their faces painted like "Day of the Dead" figures came in.

   

      A comment by the gentleman sitting a few stools over got me into a health care discussion.  
      While I think the Affordable Care Act is a good idea in concept, obviously it has not had a successful start up. This gentleman had definite/different opinions and while I devoured a yummy ham and provolone sandwich with the most delectable french fries ever, we weighed the pros and cons of health care as we know it.  
      Unfortunately we did not come up with any solutions to improve the Affordable Healthcare Act or health insurance in general. 

But dinner was wonderful and I was totally comfortable sitting at a bar chatting with a stranger.
      This could have been a challenge because I did not want to sit by myself at a table, eating and  staring into space or at my iPhone. But I also didn't want to come off as looking to be "picked up".


      So I guess the reason for my success was simple. I went someplace small, where I was comfortable and where I was familiar with the staff.


      Easy-peasy.

     One more challenge accomplished.