Fiona's Box

Fiona is settling in so well in her new home.  Our hearts are happy.  The box we sent full of things she loves, including her bed, just arrived.  Now she has a few creature comforts from her past, and it makes us feel good to think that maybe these things will help her remember us.

On our end, we received the most wonderful Christmas Eve letter from Fiona's new family, perfectly geared to Abby and Reese and helping them through this transition.  We are so full of gratitude.

Dear Heather, Doug, Abby and Reese,  We are getting ready for our special Christmas Eve and we will be thinking of you tonight as we come together as a family.  We send our love across the world to you all; great big hugs all around and our sincerest wishes to you for a holiday filled with joy.

 We want to give you Fiona news as well.  First of all she is such a sweetheart.   We are enjoying your Fiona so much.  She has settled in well at our home and likes playing with Sara's little dog, Edwin.  She and Hoshi have to work out who is the boss dog;  there have been some grumbles and growls but we'll help them get past that.  Fiona thinks cats are fun to chase and we are working on that too.  Luckily, Fiona listens to Dave and he has been carefully controlling the cat situation.  Fiona sleeps so soundly that the cat walks around at night with ease. Fiona  is a wonder at catching tennis balls and rubber toys and she is so loving to the Harrison boys.  I can certainly see what good "trainers" Abby and Reese have been.  She absolutely is one terrific Labby girl.   

Dave loves her so much, and I can hear him sweet talking her as she sits by his side in the evening.  He's never done that with any of our other pets.  Toffee thinks Fiona is ok; they get along and though they will never be playmates, things are fine.  Toffee is so unlike a normal lab that we laugh at her as she watches Fiona chase a ball or splash in water.  Toffee has never played catch and is slightly afraid of water.  When we lived at our other house, Toffee liked to catch frogs but she did not like the water very much so she would wade out into the pond and then climb up into the large buckets that Dave used for his water plants.  It was quite a sight--a very big dog teetering on a bucket, trying not to fall as she barked at frogs.  Toffee has a lot to learn from Fiona.  

Thank you again for letting your dear dog live with us; she is just super.  She is eating well, sleeping well, taking her medication and has not had a seizure so far.  All is well and we feel blessed.  We will send pictures soon. 

Spectacle

Surely this strange procession through town last week was some sort of age-old, Haute-Savoie mountain Noel tradition.  Surely.

Nope, just a night out in Chamonix during ski season, something concocted and fabricated only recently.

Flippin' Cool

Awesome moves.  Awesome backdrop.

Merry Christmas

We spent Christmas Day on the slopes.  It's all new to us, both the skiing and being away from family on Christmas.  We had a beautiful day together, while also missing our loved ones.

Happy Holidays to all.  xoxo

Annecy

Annecy, France has to be the cutest little town EVER.  And it was all the cuter at Christmastime, complete with a traditional European Christmas market  This, of course, meant LOTS of vin chaud (hot wine) and gaufres, (a popular dessert waffle with everything on it from honey to sugar to nutella).

Most visitors to Annecy are there for its noteworthy lake and mountain sport activities as well as the incredible regional food (think Haute Savoie specialties like fondue, raceltte, tartiflette, and bilberry tarte) and splendid scenery (jagged, snowy mountains surrounding a a lake as turquoise as the Caribbean).

We were also there for all of these reasons, although I must confess that I found Annecy rather cool for other reasons too. Like, for instance, architecturally, it's a really well preserved medieval village.  And it was the refuge for the bishop of Geneva and other Catholics during Switzerland's Protestant Reformation in the 1530's (Annecy was part of Switzerland at the time, and wouldn't permanently become part of France until the 1860's after Napoleon). 

Boring, I know. 

Hmm, but not really.

Here's Doug and I doing the obligatory selfie in front of Annecy's most photographed scene:  the 12th century prison, Palais de l'Ile, on the Canal du Thiou:

Two important people in French history took up residence in Annecy:  the bishop, Francis de Sales and the philosopher, Jean Jacques Rousseau.  De Sales arrived in the early 1600's.  He intellectualized the town and contributed to the building of many of its important churches and monuments (still standing today), and was later beatified as the patron saint of writers and journalists, a bit of trivia of interest to me.  :-)

Rousseau, of course, is famous for being considered the father of the French Revolution, due to the widespread contemporary resonance of his Social Compact theory.  At one point, our family stood on the steps of Saint Pierre cathedral, a provisional cathedral for Francis de Sales, while looking out to the building where Rousseau attended choir school and and had music lessons one hundred years later.  It was a tranquil moment, considering a tranquil time in the life of Rousseau, who eventually went mad.

Abby and Reese on those steps:

At the Christmas market . . . we basically ate our way through town:

The most delicious brioche ever, in the cutest town ever.

Gaufres!

Poutine, a nod to our Quebecois friends.  Some of us liked it more than others:

A boat ride around Lac d'Annecy, beacause it's beautiful and there's a medieval chateau to view at every turn along the way:

A game of Rochambeau along the way:

Merry Christmas Eve

Après-Ski: Day 1

Let Her Roll!!

Let the holidays begin!  We dropped everything (and I mean everything) and headed out for the holidays.  The new house is stacked full of unopened boxes, which we'll deal with in the New Year.  We've set sail for Chamonix, France, our first time in the Alps.

We kicked things off, however, with a trip to the circus at the historic Royal Carre Theater where we had seen Emmy Lou Harris perform earlier this year.  It's the 30th anniversary of this circus in Amsterdam, and we arrived to lots of paparazzi for it's opening night.  Our pre-theater dinner was also at an Amsterdam institution, the restaurant Moeders.  Tough getting up the next morning for our flight, but well worth it.  Especially sharing it with good friends.

 Abby and Reese's moeder at Moeder's.