Christmas in Madrid!

Spain, Madrid, the Poethomas', we're all in full Christmas fever.  When we're not shopping we're eating, when we're not eating we're doing something Christmassy, looking at lights, setting up the nativity, listening to Christmas music, wrapping gifts and of course taking pictures.  During the last week we headed down to Madrid for the Christmas market.  The Plaza Mayor was filled with booths selling mostly pieces for nativity scenes.  They seriously go all out with multiple scenes, fountains with real water, hundreds of characters, animals, everything.  Sofia and Sara are no different, multiple nativities and a setup that's got forty or fifty of the little mud people.  I've included some pictures here to give an idea of just how serious the nativities are, but they don't really do justice to the size and scale of those found all over Madrid this time of year.  As always, 10 pictures and some foolish comments.

Here's the Plaza Mayor in Madrid.  Need something for Christmas?  This is the place.

This is just one part of the nativity scene, an entire town without a baby Jesus in it.

Jesus and the rest of the cast.  And a cow.

I took the wide angle lens Sara got me for my birthday out and I love the results.  It's not a great lens for everything, but for big spaces like this one, it's awesome.

The Plaza Mayor lit up at night.

Back at the house, here's Sara getting the fire ready for the Turkey we made last week.  

This is an experiment with Bokeh manipulation.  The stars in the back are the lights of the Christmas tree distorted with a piece of paper with a star cut in the center in front of the lens.

December 23rd is our legal anniversary as we got married last year in Tucson, Arizona.  Here's Sara and I as mud people celebrating one year of marriage.