As I am writing this, Pete, dressed for the not so great outdoors, is loading up the buckets with water and is getting ready to put them in the sled and then take them down to the horses. He will then clean up after the four footed critters.

Me, I am going to write this dispatch and then do the dishes. Then we are going to do something that we do just a few times a year, which is watch a video.

I had an amazing day – and am now writing about it. I fretted about pulling this one off, a visit from the Butte Elementary school students. They appeared, as scheduled, en masse, in the former banquet room of the historic Eagle Hotel at noon. I had prepared yesterday by getting things ready – arranging and rearranging furniture, and putting out books.

My plan was to show the children the village and the tree, then read them the snow globe book, then have them make snow globe ornaments. They’d then eat lunch. Then, Santa would appear.

All went as planned – if we had a bigger space I would not have had to move chairs around as much. I was glad that we had the small chairs and the little children’s desks that a few people had found at Bishop’s Attic II Thrift Store. Some children sat at these when I read The Snow Globe, others sat on their parent’s laps.

I showed the children the Christmas Village before I read the Snow Globe. The children, being children, liked this. I am not sure when I read The Snow Globe if the children understood the story, that is, which is that there was a big family and a snow globe family. But they did enjoy talking about winter and blizzards and sledding, something that we all have not been able to do this winter. I also included some shake up activities.

If I was to improve on this, I’d put a bit more energy into getting a real Snow Globe and passing it around and having them shake it.

The snow globe ornaments – a good idea in that they were able to color in paper ornaments. But they did not have a lot of room and the shape, round, invited them to simply color and not draw a picture.

Santa Claus came and passed out the books that I’d wrapped. This worked well; although, it might have been a good idea to have the names on the recycled (newspaper) giftwrapped books.

Skye, the math tutor, brought in cookies. Being a math tutor, he said that he had 38 cookies. And this is how many cookies got eaten. Way fun.

I did have assistance, from Pam, who is a regular volunteer, and from three other volunteers, one of whom is six, and the other, I think, 13, and their mother.

And after everyone left, volunteers appeared and cleaned books. Then Cathy, the artist in residence, appeared and we made signage for tomorrow’s event – we’ll be passing out books prior to the parade.

So much to reflect upon. The project now does seem to have its own momentum.

Next: 340. 12/19/25: Two Days Until the Solstice