Holiday Cheer!

Baby, it's COLD outside! School is out for the rest of the year, and we have been housebound for two days now, after a well-intended but quickly aborted attempt to remain outside for the 10 minutes it would have taken to add on a few candy cane lights to the driveway. The kids stood outside for about 3 minutes and then marched their triple layered, hat-wearing, glove-toting little bodies into the laundry room, from which they announced they were not coming back out again.
Hence, we played school with every single stuffed animal they own:
(btw, those that were "fighting" are lined up near the couch... Um..guys? How often does this happen in real school??)

Then we did an awesome craft:
(btw, you may think of it as an inconsistency, but I see it as sheer artistic genius: note that all four seasons happily coexist in this friendly village-on-the-lake)

And all this, in the happiest holiday-est mood. Merry Christmas to all!

Angels we have heard on high...

Vasco's enthusiasm is... well.. divine :)

'Tis the season to be.. tipsy?

While no doubt it is the season to be the kind of tipsy one associated with bucketfulls of spiked cider, gallons of mulled wine and various warm merry beverages that leave you.. well.. tipsy, it is a different kind of tipsy that we are talking about here.

Sat. Dec 6: 10am. We set out on a mission to purchase the first live christmas tree since the kids were born. Ready for the fabulous smell of real pine trees, we head out: the kids are entirely not sure whether we have finally lost our minds when we assure them that we will bring back the christmas tree strapped to the top of our car. Convinced that the whole world has indeed gone mad, they sipped hot chocolate while the helpful people at the tree lot did exactly as we promised: strapped the tree to the roof of the car.
Once home, millions of pine needles sloughing off as we dragged the tree in, we dusted out the old tree stand and plopped the tree in. Vacuumed 4 pounds of needles. A frenzy of decorating later and half a vacuum bag more of tree needles, and we had a presentable tree.
It even snowed briefly at dinnertime, to finish creating the perfect "I'm dreaming of a white christmas" atmosphere. Books were read under the tree, a christmas carol thrown in for good measure, and happy kids were sent to bed. Happier adults stirred up something called a Hot Russian Christmas with an extra shot of vodka for good measure and settled down downstairs in front of a lovely roaring first fire of the season to watch a silly movie. Spirits flowed and spirits were high, and as Mike was trying to poke at the fire to put it out, I climb happily upstairs to find this:
Atwinkling still, it was indeed a sight to see.. I took a picture and brought it for Mike to see, handing him the camera as I said I hoped he had a sense of humor.

A few sawed branches later.....

.. and a concoction of weights, props, and counterweights, the tree is up again, 7 extra pounds of needles have been vacuumed up, crushed ornaments replaced, water mopped up, and merriment restored!

Happy Holidays!

Ahoy, Pilgrims!

Work, work, work, work... mostly the reason for the lack of updates. But biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression aside, on Friday evening, Nov 21, I updated projection #321 and shut down the computer, turned on the out-of-office reply, and packed 6 days of clothes for 4 people into a suitcase in a half (thank you very much!). Sunny Caribbean here we come! And it was sunny! And it was warm!! And everyone loved the "big boat"! This is a Thanksgiving tradition we can definitely get used to.
We were thankful for being there together (all 17 of us), for the sun, for the outstanding service on the ship, for bunk beds, for the mint chocolates on the pillow every night, for the children's program, for the endless refills of ice cream (as Justine set a personal if not world record on dropping her ice cream every single time within 2 minutes of getting it), for the dolphin we got to play with in Cozumel, for the immense jacuzzis, for the spectacular afternoon on a beach in Costa Maya where the water glistened, the seven kids constructed some sort of aqueduct on the beach, and the adults drank beer. Did I mention the warm sun?