Well, we’ve come through the holiday season just fine.  We had a fabulous “Martin Christmas” on January 3 at the Bruinsma’s in Belleville.  Not many photos this year because it’s just not the same without having the Stricklands home.  However, all of us in attendance had a great time, hosted once again by Joan, John, Matt, Jamie and Stacey with the rest of us enjoying their hospitality - Sharon, Rich, Trevene, Brooklyn, Jaxon, Skylar and Taylon, Lois, the Lynns, Kelly and Samantha, Shaun and of course, me.  Carol, Tim, Jacob, Jessica and Chloe are coming home from Three Hills, Alberta this summer (and we are all looking forward to their visit).  Those who weren’t able to make it - Jason, Krista, Don, Jenn, Lincoln and Wes.  And we missed them.  Lots of food, fun and reminiscing about our lives on the farm.  Great fun was had by all.

One thing is that we (Martin Girls) have decided that it’s time for another girls weekend so we will be planning a visit to New York (Lynn’s) sometime in 2009.  Probably in July when Carol can leave the kids with Tim and take a few days to visit that fabulous city.

Now, it’s back to work. 

Once again, wishing all our family and friends as safe and prosperous 2009!!!

And let’s keep in touch…

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

from

Gail, Don & Leo

NightinGail Photography

Processing Client Work and Writing E-mails

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our clients, friends, family and associates who have supported NightinGail Photography during our 2008 season.  We just want to let you know that we appreciate and value all of the trust that you have placed with us.

Every year at this time, we reflect on what has happened over the last year and are grateful for our blessings.  As part of our Christmas celebration, NightinGail Photography contributes to Sleeping Children Around The World along with our NoBS family, members and friends rally together to support SCAW - Sleeping Children Around The World. For more informaton, please visit http://www.scaw.org.

NightinGail has also been pleased to be associated with the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation (http://www.cbcf.org) and provided some portrait sessions for their on-line auction in October.  We strongly urge all of our friends to support this worthwhile cause in finding a cure for this disease.  Were you aware that men can also get breast cancer? 

As most of you know, it’s been a bit of a trying year with Don’s heart attack; however, we are very blessed to be in full recovery and with all things going as planned, he should be completely recovered by the end of January 2009.  His doctor has already reduced some of his medication and his latest stress test showed remarkable improvement.

The one good thing that has come out of this is that we have both embarked on an exercise and health regime of eating better and I am thrilled to say that we are walking 2 miles at least 4 times per week plus eating our meals on those little side-plates instead of the full-sized dinner ones.  We both feel better and healthier than we have in years.  I’m really excited to be able to be even more acrobatic at our 2009 weddings (hanging upside down out of trees is NOT an option).

Our daughter has moved closer to us and we are thrilled to be able to see our grandson even more often now that she is only a few minutes up the highway.  She is really enjoying her new job in Orillia and Lincoln is adapting nicely to his new home.  We are also thrilled to be expecting Wes home from Alberta later today.  He has been working out there for the last few months and Jenn and Lincoln are anxiously expecting his return.

Our son is still in Brockville.  He has had a very trying year with the workplace injury to his hand.  It is recovering but taking somewhat longer than was expected.  WCIB has been very helpful and he is looking at joining us for Christmas this year when all of the Martins get togther to celebrate our Christmas in January.  What’s really great is that now that most of us are on Facebook so we chat almost every day! 

Make sure that you become a “fan” of NightinGail Photography on Facebook.  We are also on Twitter.

As you may know, Don got the “car” of his dreams this past fall.. “Mean Yellow”.  He has always wanted a convertible and he was able to purchase a 2007 Solstice for “fun”.  That’s right - it’s yellow.  But we had a lot of fun driving and touring around during the fall while we had all of the great weather.

NightinGail is also in the process of changing our blog and portions of our site are still not quite ready so please bear with us.  Our main photography site www.nightingailphotography.com is also undergoing a face-lift in January so stay tuned for our new updated sites.  Our blog is now self-hosted at www.nightingailsales.com/blog  as is our on-line ordering and viewing galleries for our clients.

And for those of you who just want to play around… http://www.the-north-pole.com/ … there are some fun facts, games and recipes for the Christmas Season.