Life: Idiotropic

8 December - went to our local produce/seasonal stand to get out Christmas tree. We've gotten one there every year. They just got a shipment from the Saurland the day before, so they were still unloading huge fat trees from the truck. I pointed to the tallest fattest one I could find and a tiny man probably half the trees height unbundled it for me. It was a Christmas moment. My eyes got big like a kid in a NY toy store and the woman who runs the place gasped, "traumbaum!" Dream tree. Yep. It was. After she and I oohed and aahed about how traumy my baum was, the sapling sized man bundled it again and helped it into my van. Kirk helped it into the stand and by midnight all the lights were on and twinkly. Now it really feels like Christmas.

Keeping Tree from being a Fire Hazard within the Week Solution (yet to be properly tested)
Full container of warm water
1/2 can 7-up
1 T. bleach
1 T. vinegar

9 December - I put up Christmas decorations... my new German Christmas elves and my Polish nativity set... among other things. The girls came home from school and we played Christmas music and decorated the tree (once they had all their homework done... that took a while). Now I have a thick girdle of ornaments just at that median height of my three youngest. The tree is pretty now!






10 December - My English Conversation group came to my house this morning to make gingerbread. It was a cookie factory. I had balls of dough out and each lady rolled and cookie cuttered that dough until it was done and I had pan after pan in and out of my oven. We probably made over 100 cookies. As one pan cooled, they'd decorate them. I had frosting and sprinkles and red hots out. The cookies got pretty colorful and we all had a lot of fun.





11 December - Luci's class went on the Santa Train at school. I went to take pictures of all 4 classes that did the train ride and got to hang out a bit with my girls. It was fun. Elise rode twice. This was also the first night of the Wizard of Oz panto that Arianna and Tiara were in. Kirk took Luci and Elise to see the play. I went to our IWC Spanish night to celebrate a Spanish Christmas. We had tapas and paella. The Tres Reyes brought gifts to us (as part of our gifts exchange), and at the recorded "strike of midnight" we ate 12 grapes - one grape with each dong of the bell - a New Year's tradition in Spain. Felt especially good to be there soaking it up... thinking that my next Christmas will be in Spain.

12-14 December was consumed with 5 performances of the Panto, one Christmas pageant, and a pathetic attempt at a batch of sugar cookies... still looking for the perfect recipe. So, it was almost Christmasy every day and those couple days that weren't specifically spent decorating or baking, I was surrounded by red and green kids... so I figure that counts towards my 25 days of Christmas goal.