What I like about this time of year is that it motivates people to send cards and hopefully tell us what is going on with them. I don't even mind those form letters, although I have to say we used to get one every year from a family and their letter was full of references to little inside jokes that were over our head, so it was more frustrating than informative.

I have in the past sent out Christmas cards in July just because I wanted to get in touch with some of my friends. I don't know what they thought about it, didn't much care.

We don't do a lot of decorating for the season, just get out our 3 foot fiber optic tree and a Santa cookie jar. Mr. Troutbend installed one of those rope lights on the stairway banister last year, and yes, it would look nice with an evergreen garland wrapped around it, and maybe some red bows here and there, but that's not going to happen. He likes the effect of it so much as a sort of night light, he leaves it there year-round now. Not saying he's lazy, but it certainly saves work.

The first few years we lived here he put lights along the house eaves outside, but then he stopped doing that and put one of those sloping candle lights in the upstairs front window. Now he doesn't even do that. Yes, I could step in and do all this myself, but in some ways it's not my house.

I've always wanted him to help me hang lights on one of my little cabins in Colorado and I'd wait for a snow storm and turn on the lights to take pictures. It's a shame that I waited because we may not turn on the electricity at those cabins because first we have to replace all of the electrical system in the one cabin due to flood damage, so now we can't do the lights. However, I am thinking of getting some solar panels to operate the motion sensor driveway lights over there, so maybe we can run them off of that system. Or maybe I can borrow a portable generator from somebody.

Years ago, my dad had us help him put luminarias - candles in brown paper lunch bags - along the highway. It was a fun project - sand in the bag, add a plumber's candle, set them out along the road and light them. The only problem is if the wind comes up: it can be very windy there in the winter.