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Merry Christmas!

Our Christmas Eve Traditions

Christmas Eve is approaching quick-  Our feast I have no doubt will come together, though I am a tad nervous that I have not, and will not start making the pierogies until tomorrow.  Maria, you had asked what we included in our Polish feast, so I thought I'd share our evening here. 

I've had the same  meal Christmas eve for as long as I remember.  Even in the first  3 years of our marriage when we lived in Philadelphia far from my parents, we had the meal.  During those years we had our dinner at my aunts house in north eastern PA.  She is my mom's sister and so the meal was even more Polish than my mom usually did, since my dad and I were kinda picky eaters and there were things we just would not eat.

Ours differs from the traditional wigila in a variety of ways, but  it has the basic skeleton of the traditional one. We start our meal by sharing opłatki.  In the last 3 years we have had no less than 20 people at this meal.  One year we had 31.  We do a formal sit down meal with tablecloths and nice plates.  The sharing of the  oplatek is on the verge of chaos- but it is great fun and a great opportunity to be sure and wish everyone  a Merry Christmas.  Once  that is done we usually say grace and thank everyone for joining us.  We then pass around a bowl filled with garlic cloves and a bowl of honey.  This has a variety of meaning- Honey is  symbolic of the sweetness of life, and garlic of the bitterness, we also say that the garlic is for good health and the honey happiness in the new year.   There are some (my dad) who refuse to do that part- but most everyone else braves the garlic.  The honey really cuts it.  The novice will make the mistake of picking the smallest clove- every real garlic freak  connoisseur knows those are the  most potent.  I do cut up some large ones to help those who are wusses feel they can't handle the pain. Anyhow, I digress.  After the honey bit, we load up our plates with tons of food.  Our meal typically consists of the following:

• pierogies, filled with super cheesy mashed potatoes, boiled then smothered in butter and onions (all homemade- the process starts tonight and finishes Thursday!)
• fried fish- usually red snapper (we do this too- the whole dredge,dip -bread thing)
• fried shrimp (because as a kid I wouldn't eat fish- still don't)
• green beans
• sauerkraut and mushrooms
• and in the last few years we've blended Ben's heritage and grandmama makes green chile and homemade tortillas (like this)
• Ben's mom usually makes some sort of dessert- A trifle, or maybe her brownies. 

We start cocktailing around 4, have dinner by 6 and once everyone is stuffed to completeness, the kids  and my side of the family exchange gifts.  Most of Ben's family leaves after dessert- we spend Christmas day with them and do our gift exchange at that time. 

When I was a kid the most painful part of  this day was waiting for dinner to end, my thoughts on opening presents.  My mom drove my sister and  me nuts because she would eat "just one more bite".  Now I am  my mom and the part I don't want to end is the sharing of the meal, and savoring each and every bite.  I love that I get to pass this tradition on to my kids- not the painful waiting part- but just the whole thing.  As a kid ours was small, usually just the 4 of us.  Now it is 17 to as many as we can have.  We love this night so much, we try to think of anyone we know that might want to join us.  I want to add the tradition of leaving an empty place setting -both symbolic of leaving a spot open for Jesus and for wayward visitors. 

So that's it-  Our Christmas Eve.  Christmas Day is it's own beast- with it's own traditions forming.  It too is a wonderfully beautiful day, lots of food, lots of family, lots of love. 

I love this time of year!

 

Noelle & Christina

I hope you both have a great day!!!

Morning Run

I've been really trying to take back my health lately.  I have committed to working out- no excuses.  So this morning I went to go to the gym only to find a group of men hanging out front- waiting for it to open.  It was 7:20 and it should have opened at 7am. I have a short window  of opportunity so I went home, picked up a dog and a phone and drove down the street to the beach. 

Oh my God what a beautiful sight.  The skis were gray with a hint of storm, the islands were slightly visible.  The surf, wow, the surf was amazing.  The tide had just peaked I think because the tide line was sooooo high.  There were some houses that had maybe 30 yards of soft sand in front.  Way too close for comfort for me for sure!

My intended hard pack run turned into a semi soft sand run.  ouch!  But how glorious it was!  I left the leash off my shepard- so she could run free.  Though there is a leash law, the dog people of this beach are really great, and many of the folks who live in the little batch of houses come down with their dogs in the early morning to let them run free.  When my parents live in this area back BB (Before Ben)  I used to be part of the 6am dog club. 

Daisy and I ran the length of the block of houses and back, I'd say I ran about a mile and a half-  I'll have to clock it some time with my car.  I had forgotten my shuffle, but the music of the ocean was more than enough to motivate me.  The surf was thunderous- literally roaring as it crashed and churned.  Some of the sets were easily 10-12 feet.  Amazing I tell you.  If you've never stood on a stormy beach and listened to its song, well you've missed one of God's greatest hits.

Happy Love Thursday!

I love matching outfits- don't you?  I love how much they seem to love one another in this picture too- wouldn't it be nice if they always showed as much affection!! LOL!

You can find more images of love 
here or here.

Thank Goodness for Spell Check!

I can not- for the life of me, spell THEIR properly.  Every spell check I do flags it.  Mostly my errors are typos from going as fast as I can- but not their. I just can't seem to get it right. Sheesh.

Happy Birthday Sebastian!

The Importance of Math

This blog was created after an experience with customer sevice at Verizon.  There are transcripts of a conversation between a customer (blog owner) and customer service at Verizon along with links to audio as well as a few other shared experiences.  It seems that understanding that there is a difference between .002 cents and .002  dollars was very- very- very difficult.  Dang. I'm no math wiz- but really I got it after the first  clarification by the customer. 

In the Zone

We are in cookie baking high gear here.  It's really a weird thing though.  I love baking holiday cookies. this is the only time of the year that I really look forward to baking.  The rest of the year, well, mostly I just don't want the cookies around because I don't want to eat them- seeing as I have about 4 inches I need to loose around my belly.  So once a year is great- 80% of the cookies leave the house and go to others.  For the last 7 years or so I've given a plate or a box of cookies to just about everyone.  Last year I used cute , Christmassy Chinese take out style boxes.  I plan to do the same this year.  They hold about a dozen small to mid sized cookies-  plenty enough IMHO to have a sweet treat with out being overwhelming. 

Here's the thing though.  My big confession.  I do not. at all. like to bake with my children.  I know, I know- great learning opportunity,  math skills, reading skills, blah blah blah.  But it is not FUN.  It's just not.  Not for me anyhow.  It is stressful.  Don't do it you say- what???? But they love it.  and I love it.  Just not together with them, just me and 3 kids.  (I at least have the good sense to put the baby to sleep before even attempting this).  I think the problem lies with the age differences.  The gender differences.  the unbalanced teams-  one on three sucks.  I read a Love Thursday blog last week all about the joys of baking with kids.  Her kids.  3 boys no less.  Surely something must be wrong with me to dread this so. 

All that said, I still do it.  With a big smile- sometimes.  I give them their opportunity to amaze me with their enthusiasm- and they do.  They can hardly wait to pour in their cup of flour.  They cheer and yell and jump for joy at their success.  and they tell daddy with pride how they helped make that very cookie in his mouth.

My biggest hope is that it is going to get better each year.  That they will stop trying to get me to magically be everywhere in the kitchen at once.   And I really hope that they don't ever lose that enthusiasm.  Even when mine is waning. 

In the refrigerator I have two lumps of sugar cookie dough that I cheated on them with and made late last night .  I won't cheat them out of rolling  and cutting shapes though. and tomorrow well make more Oreo's.  And we still have Russian Teacakes to make,  and more chocolate chip cookies too.  We made gingerbread men, and I have the goods to make another batch- so maybe we will.

Tammy