Last few days before heading back South. December 24 - 28th

Christmas Day. We spent most of the day sticking Christmas back in the boxes. Tomorrow we will finish up and store the boxes downstairs or into the garage. It's very rainy all day and very ugly out, so staying inside isn't a problem. lol

My project is doing all the laundry for 3 guestrooms, help putting more decorations in boxes, and in between, bake an Eggnog Pound Cake for dessert. My contribution to Christmas Dinner at Darryl and Pat's. 

It definitely turned out and was tasty.

At 5:30 we headed next door for a delicious dinner and great visit. Dress code is suits and ties for dinner.

Darryl's turkey came out fantastic. They purchased a new induction range that even has a probe turkey setting and just stuffed it into the oven.

We were very thankful to be invited.

A lovely way to end our holiday celebrations for this year.

Tuesday morning we headed up to spend the day with Jason, Kristi and Amelia in Nanaimo. We sure are going to miss them all. We gave the kids all of our leftover food in the fridge so we are empty when we leave. Back home by 4 pm with a pizza ordered. lol 

 With all the torrential rain over the past few days the lake came up substantially. This is the picture from this morning. We still have a good 10 feet before there is any chance of flooding.

Coming up to our "second" beach.

When we arrived home Dec 5th, the water level is down low enough three feet of our "first" beach showed. Amazing how it came up 4 to 5 feet in 5 days or so. Then 13cm/5" of rain helping to melt 51cm/20" of snow pack doesn't help!!! Ray joked to everyone we came from 21C in Phoenix to 21" of snow at home.lol

Wednesday morning I did the last of the laundry out the door with the house put to bed by 10:15, heading to Victoria with a stop in Duncan first. Ray needed to pick up the last bit of meds before our flight south and some US cash from the bank. Fortunately for me our house cleaner will come tomorrow and clean up from all our Christmas guests, 4 1/2 bathroom and 4 bedrooms, not to mention Christmas glitter from all the decorations. :)

Arrived at the Sidney Waterfront Inn too early to check-in so we went to gas up the rental. Could not believe it, NO GAS AVAILABLE at the Chevron Station in town. We ended up driving another 2 kilometers to the CO-OP on the highway. The rental car needs to be dropped off with a full tank tomorrow morning early.

We checked in at 3 and then headed to the Rum Runner Pub for a well-deserved beer. 

Located right on the water, so a great view.

We're a little concerned that our flight at 6:05 am actually leaves from Victoria to Vancouver as Westjet's morning flight got cancelled due to "no gate available" to go to in Vancouver .... staffing issues. Hopefully that is resolved for tomorrow morning. The rest of today's flights did depart. Fingers crossed.