Eight hours, 49 minutes

That’s the day length on the shortest day of the year here in Hancock, Maine. It’s been around that yesterday, today, tomorrow. Then it starts increasing slowly.

A light show, in honor of the winter solstice:

At the very top of the photo, way up the hill, the toboggan track appears as a stretch of arches lit up in white and red. We rode the toboggan! This was quite a thrill since it got going really fast on the icy track. At the bottom of the photo is Le Petit Champlain, the shopping district in the lower city. It is beautifully lit with those big snowflakes and crowded with shoppers.

The photo below is a closeup view of the shopping street. I really love the contrast between the dusky gray roofs covered with snow and the brightly lit street below. We are standing at the top of a staircase called the “Breakneck Steps” – Le Casse-Cou. I imagine because you could risk breaking your neck if you fell on those steep stairs.

I cut down a tree from the edge of our driveway, trimmed its branches a little, and brought it inside. Then put up some lights. I’m not a huge fan of decorating a tree by myself, since it seems like an effort to put it up and then take it down. Maybe I’ll hang a few more decorations tomorrow. But mostly the lights are what I enjoy.

A friend gave me some blue lights that she didn’t want anymore, so I put them around this little tree in the yard. Some of them look white, and the tree looks a little pink. In real life, the lights look blue, beautiful and mysterious. I love this little outdoor tree. I’d like to take a few more photos of it, figure out if I can adjust the cell phone camera to represent more what it looks like.