Our December

 We have had a full December! It started with Ellen baking cookies for the Guilford Bazaar - as I mentioned in my last post. Then on Saturday 12/5 it was our River Singers Concert in Grafton in the White Church.

The White Church in Grafton, VT

 It was a great concert and if you want to see a bit of it, go to YouTube and search River Singers Cup Song, posted by Ray Sebold. If you look closely, you'll get a glimpse of both Ellen and myself.
         
The next week started with Ellen making fruitcake and I read Truman Capote's A Christmas Memory - another tradition. At the end of the week was a concert by the South Hadley Children's Choir in a church in So. Hadley (next to Mt. Holyoke College), which had Brendon Tolles singing in it - Brendon is Ellen's grandnephew. The choir sang very well, and it was not the usual repertoire - a very nice concert.

Brendon is second from the left

 A few days later was our favorite concert of the year -  Noel Sing We Clear, which is four men who have sung British folk music for the season for 40 years! Tony Barrand, Fred Breunig and Andy Davis, three of the four, are in the Guilford Church. The fourth, John Roberts, lives in Albany, NY.
This concert is a real community event which fills the Latchis Theater. This year might have been their final concert, so it was very emotional.

Noel Sing We Clear

The following Thursday (12/18) we drove down to Chestnut Hill, MA to the Church of the Redeemer to a Lessons and Carols service - a church where Betsey, Rob and Katie all sang in the choir for several years. I love this service. Eliza Bergh and Calvin Farwell came with us.

On 12/20 Ellen went to her sister's home for a Solstice Party - women only.

Then we came to Christmas week. I led the choir at Dummerston on Christmas Eve:

Dummerston Church Choir

Then we met Ellen's brother Jim and his wife Mary at our house, had a bit to eat and we went to the Guilford Church midnight service (choir rehearsal starts at 9:30pm):

Silent Night at the Guilford Church

Christmas Day was at Katie and Savanna's house in Shutesbury, where the Baker/Tolles clan all gathered. We had gift exchange, sang carols, did MadLibs, played Fictionary Dictionary  and had a wonderful meal featuring tourtiere -  a tradition from Savanna's family.

Ellen and Jerry helping themselves on Christmas Day

The day after Christmas we had a lovely day with John and Cynthia -more gifts, good food and good talk.

The next day Mimi and Tamar came to our house to make gingerbread houses with Ellen.

Mimi's gingerbread house

Tamar's doghouse

 Then on Sunday we went to the annual Christmas Revels in Cambridge, MA at Sanders Theater:

Sanders Theater at Harvard University

Before the Revels  (your not supposed to take photos of the show but I sneaked one before it started)

This year I made two paper collages as gifts to Betsey and Rob, and John and Cynthia - Christmas fantasy representations of each of their houses:

Christmas at the Shay's in Boulder, CO

Christmas at Cynthia and John's house in Westminster West, VT

Overshadowing everything this Christmas was the distressing news that Betsey has a brain tumor. It was discovered after she fell at home, hit her head very hard, was afraid she might have a concussion, and had a CAT scan, which showed a lesion and led to an MRI and other tests. We don't know yet the biopsy results but it is cancer and will probably require a course of radiation and chemotherapy. She is very positive and determined to fight it with all she's got, and has found a fine neuro-oncology surgeon at the Anschutz Medical Campus outside Denver. We'll be spending some time with her in January. Please hold her in your thoughts and prayers!

Katie and Betsey