Moving On

We had a really nice Christmas this year, like every year, even though it was a bit hectic. We started off the morning at my house, went to D's around noon time, and then went back to my house for dessert and to see the rest of my extended family. We were surrounded by family on both sides and enjoyed every minute of it!

I'll spare you the Christmas morning pictures. Dad is merciless with that camera and I don't want to make any enemies... But it's enough to say that we had an enjoyable morning at my house, opening our stockings on my parents' bed and then going downstairs to where the tree was and opening the rest of our gifts there.

Around noon, D and I headed over to his house where all this siblings were and where an early afternoon dinner was going to take place. Shortly after we got there, D and I opened our gifts and handed out the gifts we got for others. We got a lot of nice stuff...D started playing with his new iPod right away and I started fiddling around with my new digital camera. The next order of business was making dinner. All the girls made different sides to go with the ham. Everything was ready on time and boy did we eat!! We spent the rest of our time chatting and catching up with everyone.

Just after 6pm we arrived back at my parents' house to find it full of friends and family...and the table full of delicious-looking desserts. I love full houses! So we chatted some more...and ate some more...and thoroughly enjoyed our Christmas day!

On Christmas Eve, Dad and I did a little last minute shopping for Mom. He always waits until I get into town to go shopping for her and this year was no different. Not that he isn't a good present-picker-outer, but I think Mom is happy that I go with him...

By the time we got home, Grammy and Grandpa were there! Each year they go around to the grandkids' houses to hand out presents and they get a progressive dinner along the way! It's a Christmas Eve tradition they started when we stopped gathering at their house on Christmas morning. I loved going there on Christmas, ah the memories. Anyway, they had dinner with us and then we all exchanged gifts:

After G&G left, we headed over to David's house to visit with his family.

Ok, back to vacation updates...On Sunday after church (we're talking Christmas Eve Eve), Dad and Ryan met David's entire family over his parents' house for a family photo shoot. As you can probably tell, there was a dress code: black shirts and jeans. The cousins got to wear red shirts and jeans to add a little splash of color. All in all everything went really well. It actually didn't take as long as I thought it would and the pictures came out great. Obviously most of the time was spent getting the little girls to smile and pose, which didn't really work, but I guess that's to be expected. I won't bore you with all 183 pictures, so here are a few I like:

You didn't really think that I'd get too far into 2008 without mentioning that this is the year that David graduates from med school and starts his residency program, did you? He still has a few more interviews to go on and we won't know until March 20th (also known as Match Day) where we will be moving to on June 1st, but 2008 has finally arrived and I am completely psyched!!! I am planning on having a graduation party for David in the midst of both of my brothers' weddings, so I'm looking forward to that and trying not to think about packing up this apartment and moving. I'm not sure how many tickets we will be getting, but here is the graduation info:

Ok, let's see if I can remember way back to the beginning of our vacation. Hmm, where did I leave off? Oh, yes, D's birthday...his 28th to be exact. Our families made it such a nice day for him.

We began the morning at Dunkin' Donuts with a friend from church who was on her way to New Jersey for the holidays. We wanted to see her before she left, so we had some hot chocolate and muffins and a two-hour conversation. From there we went to this amazing Italian restuarant called Portafino's. It's authentic Italian food and it's one of my parents' favorite restaurants. We went here for D's bday last year:


We sat near the fireplace last year, but this year they were so busy we were glad to get a seat anywhere.

For dinner, we went over D's parents' house where we had cake and he opened more presents. It's fun celebrating birthdays...even at 28!

I'm starting a new tradition: Boxes as the favored means of packaging Christmas items. I was very happy with our Christmas boxing (not to be confused with Christmas wrapping) session this morning. D and I finally set aside time to get it done this morning and it only took half an hour. It was wonderful. These are the boxes I got:



I personally think they look better than wrapping paper. And once I showed them to some of the people who thought I was bah humbugging a part of the Christmas tradition, they readily admitted how pretty they all looked. So that's my new tradition I want to start. Not sure if it's going to catch on, but one can try!

I'm listening to Mom play "O Holy Night" on her piano right now and she is doing quite a good job! Yes, we are in CT safe and sound for the next two weeks...which are filling up rapidly with friend and family plans. Just how it should be this time of year.

It was snowing as we passed through north Jersey last night and how pretty it looked! Of course I wasn't doing the driving, so that's probably why it was so pretty. It wasn't too, too bad and I thought how nice it would be to have a light dusting for Christmas. We'll see, those weatherpeople are hardly reliable.

D is at an interview all day today, so I'm hanging with Mom. I guess we're meeting Dad for breakfast then going over to Nick's house to do some cleaning before the inspectors arrive. And a whole long list that Mom is now telling me...fun Christmas stuff though so it should be fun.

And then D's mom is saving us seats at the HCA Christmas Concert tonight! We're never in town to see it anymore, but they are always so well done so I'm excited about seeing it again. I love all these festivities!!!!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Here's what we made the parents for Christmas...shhhhh!

Cinnamon-Applesauce Ornaments

3/4 c. cinnamon
1 tbsp. allspice
2 tbsp. cloves
1 tbsp. nutmeg
1 c. applesauce
***You can use just cinnamon and applesauce, instead of the other spices. Be sure to add an extra 4 tablespoons of cinnamon if you don't use the other spices.***

Mix dry ingredients. Add applesauce a little at a time. Mixture should have consistency of playdough. If too dry, add 1-2 tablespoons applesauce. If too sticky, sprinkle with ground cinnamon. Knead mixture into a ball. Roll 1/4 inch thick on ungreased surface. Cut with cookie cutters. Use a straw to make a hole in top of ornament for ribbon. Let dry at room temperature for a few days or bake at 200 degrees for 30-40 minutes and then let dry completely. Tie with ribbon. Yield 2 dozen.

My classroom smelled sooooo yummy for days!

I finally saw David on Friday night after his being away for the entire week and was greeted with a very nice, very tasty dinner from Trader Joe's (our favorite food store). I think he was trying to make up for worrying me so much the day before when he was stuck in the middle of that blizzard. The fare was Mexican, my favorite, so he did a good job. After dinner we snuggled up to watch part 1 of Tin Man. Since we don't have cable, D found this site called hulu.com where you can watch certain episodes of many shows that were or are on both network and cable television. He's been wanting to see the Tin Man mini series and while I wasn't too thrilled about it myself, I was thrilled to have him home, so I agreed to watch it. And I was hooked. He wouldn't let me watch parts 2 and 3 (they're each an hour and a half long) until Saturday and Sunday respectively. I liked how they expanded on the Wizard of Oz and gave you a sort of behind-the-scenes look at what was going on. I didn't like Oz, which was why I thought I wouldn't like Tin Man, but this series is much more interesting!!

On Saturday, I left D playing with my brother's Rubik's cube for a few hours while I went to a Christmas party at my boss's house. It was nice hanging out with people outside of work, but of course we talked about work stuff, which was almost painful to do on a weekend. The day got better, though, when D and I finished up some Christmas shopping, got some coffee/hot chocolate, and drove around looking at Christmas decorations. We even saw a life-sized Santa on a swing, which was odd and scary.

We came back and watched Tin Man Part 2, which was even better than part 1, to round out the evening. Oh and I bought D a birthday present while we were out. Actually I was going to get them for him anyway, but his bday happens to be coming up:

Caribou Coffee Granola Bars
While at Hartford Hospital, D told me about this great coffee they served called Caribou Coffee. I looked for it at the store, but it was a bit pricey so I didn't get it. Then, as fate would have it (and because I'm the Box Top Coordinator), I got a free sample of a Caribou Coffee granola bar in the mail. I wasn't going to try it because coffee isn't my thing, but I was hungry so that won me over. I knew D would love it because it totally tasted like coffee. There are a lot of different flavors...D chose Vanilla Latte (and promptly gave me the Box Top from the box). Well, now you have the entire story behind D's one and only birthday gift from me...and since it's his birthday week, I told him he could have them starting on Sunday. :)

Wow, sorry to leave you hanging since Saturday. I could have sworn I just posted a few days ago. D had a problem figuring out the first Christmas song picture, too. If you counted all the "25"s on the calendar, you would get 12, therefore the song is The Twelve Days of Christmas. The second one, which I had a problem with, is Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow. So there ya go.

D's round of interviewing is over, but he is still in CT thanks to a rather nasty winter storm making an appearance over the state. It's just rain here in my part of PA, but it took him 6.5 hours to drive what would normally take 2 hours. Needless to say, he'll be there an extra night. I am so incredibly thankful for his safe traveling through all that snow!

In other news, kindergarteners had a grand ol' time making these reindeer candy canes today (and, um, I had fun, too):


We've been doing quite a few crafts now that my mind has caught up and knows we are in the month of December. I was slightly panicked when I realized that there are only 4 more teaching days before I leave for a few weeks, so we have to get parent presents made, words to our Christmas song down pat, and a host of other holiday to-dos. But since I have the best class ever, it shouldn't be that hard to do.

I came down with the flu on Thursday, which is highly unusual. My body usually waits until April or May to get sick, but now it's actually the proper season to get sick. Being sick is no fun and being around me when I'm sick is even more not fun. Just ask David. Or don't because he'll tell you and I wouldn't want him to! Anyway, we stayed in Friday night and watched the very long, yet very good, Pirates of the Carribean 3 movie (A).

By Saturday, I was over the fever part of my sickness and felt well enough to go into the city to visit Macy's, formally Strawbridge's, formally Wanamaker's, because they put on this light show:

The holiday light show is a hallowed Philadelphia holiday tradition, delighting families since 1955 with thousands of colored lights, a “magic” Christmas tree and the sounds of the famous Grand Organ.

A perfect family outing, the Holiday Light Show and Organ Concert at Macy's is a Philadelphia tradition that dates back half a century. Come to the famous Center City store to watch snowflakes, ballerinas and reindeer float beyond the four-story-high velvet curtain of the Grand Court atrium.

The show features more than 100,000 lights combining to create fantastic holiday images. The light show is accompanied by wonderful music from the world-renowned Wanamaker Grand Organ.

Academy Award-winner Julie Andrews narrates this year's Holiday Light Show.

The past couple of years we always said we'd get there at some point, but it's right across the street from City Hall and parking is a huge pain, to put it mildly. So when D suggested we make a point of going this year, I was excited. I'm pretty sure my grandma (Dad's mom), who grew up in the City, and my dad have attended this show in years past. It plays every hour on the hour for about 10 minutes. I'm sure it was much more impressive years ago when colored, moving lights were something of a novelty. But it was nice to participate in a long-standing Philadelphia tradition that has some family connection. D insited on taking some video, here's Part 3. Parts 1 and 2 are on YouTube if you want the fun to continue:



We were sitting on the floor looking up four-stories at the lights, so that's the perspective the camera caught.

I heard there was a Dickens' village display on one of the floors, but our parking meter was running out of time so we had to hurriedly make our way back to the car. It would have been nice to see. But, D assures me, we will be going Christmas-light-looking this weekend. Our annual drink-hot-chocolate-and-drive-around-neighborhoods-gazing-intently-at-light-displays-trying-not-to-look-strange outing. And I look forward to it every year!

In other news, yay for Sara, she guessed all the Christmas picture songs correctly. Here are the last few that I liked, most of the other ones are too easy or not easily readable:

First things first:
Josh was right! The song pictured is O Christmas Tree. See all the "O"s making up the tree? And the holiday that Jingle Bells was originally from? Thanksgiving! I guess they had a lot more snow back then around Thanksgiving time. Or at least they did the year this song was written!

Here are a few more:

Last night we finally managed to pull out the Christmas decorations. I feel like I'm so behind on Christmas this year. Last year it couldn't come fast enough and this year it's almost here and I'm still back at Thanksgiving. I was telling Mom that I just pulled out my December folder for kindergarten and here it is almost the 7th day! I did take my class to see the Nutcracker Ballet on Monday (and then out to lunch, they were sooo cute and well-behaved!!!!), so that kind of threw the week off. In a good way.

So back to decorating. We blasted the Christmas music and torn into our two Christmas decoration boxes (that's double from when we were first married three years ago!). D was in charge of the tree, though somehow only the setup. I had to put the ornaments on. D was also in charge of stringing green lights around the outside of our patio door and stringing red lights around the railings. I was very appreciative because this was the scene outside:


And I was in charge of everything else. My favorite decoration spot is the TV area in the living room. D was even impressed with how the garland looked. I like it best when all the candles are lit, like so:


Finally, our mini-Christmas tree. We'll probably have to get a bigger one next year, but this has served us well. I hadn't realized how many ornaments I've gotten from the kids over the past few years, but they take up a good portion of the tree:


I think D's mom got us these last year for Christmas. I like how they stand out in the small tree:


The snowfall made it the perfect evening to decorate. I made D some hot cocoa while he was outside braving the cold. I felt like we should find the nearest hill and start sledding down it...just like when we were kids. But now we wait just two more weeks (exactly) and the real fun can begin!