My first Christmas party of the season happened on Saturday when I went for a festive lunch with the T-4s at Maxime’s Restaurant. My regular blog readers know the T in T-4s stands for teachers. I have been getting together regularly for over a decade with three former teaching colleagues who are also dear friends.
We started off our party with festive Christmas cocktails. They definitely put us into the holiday spirit. We hadn’t been together since the beginning of October so there was non-stop visiting over lunch as we caught up on one another’s lives.
Gift-giving was next. We exchanged so many lovely presents.
My friend Glenys had purchased these beautiful wooden angels for us. All proceeds from their sale went to a soup kitchen for needy folks.
Glenys also gave us calendars with artwork by famous female artists like Georgia O Keefe and Emily Carr.
My friend Esther had baked delicious peppernuts for us.
The peppernuts came with novel tea bags. Each tea bag had a tag with a quote by a famous novelist.
Debbie had purchased these soft and cosy cowls for us from a local craftsperson.
The cowls will be just perfect for keeping warm on cold Manitoba days.
Debbie also made these gorgeous cards for each of us.
I gave my friends a copy of Lynda Barry’s book Making Comics. I worked my way through Lynda’s lively and thought-provoking drawing course of self-discovery during the pandemic. I also gave my friends a set of drawing pencils. I hope they will enjoy experimenting with the assignments in the book as much as I did.
The T-4s have had many wonderful Christmas parties together in the past.
We made Christmas centrepieces at our 2014 party.
Here we are at our first Christmas together as a special group in 2011 just after I had moved back to Canada from Hong Kong.
Here we are at our 2016 Christmas party.
The festive table at our 2019 Christmas get-together.
This was last year’s party!
2015 saw us at Maxime’s for Christmas just like we were this year. A lot has happened to all of us since then happy things, sad things, challenging things, exciting things and it has meant so much to have friends to share and process all those life moments with. How blessed I am to have friends like the T-4s.
Other posts……….
What Next? 
Pingback: Gezellig | What Next?