Sunday, December 29, 2013

Hope you all had a...

holly, jolly Christmas!!!!

Okay, okay...I know that Christmas has come and gone and that we are now well into the swing of Boxing Day/Week.

Hmmm... Boxing Week....(does that seem as weird to you as it does to me? How did one day become a week?!?! And when did it become about getting more for ourselves and not about giving to others?!?!)

...but I am at my own house for the first time in days, with my own computer and my photos saved on the hard drive, so I want to post a few Christmas-y things.

My Christmas was quite lovely really.


As many of you know, we are now living in two houses. We spend time at our house and, are also simultaneously, living with my Mum. My daughter says it is kind of like divorced families where the kids go back and forth between houses but, in our case, it is the adults who go back and forth!!! (Well, we sleep there the most, but the good egg does sleep there at least 2 nights a week. Thank you!)


My good egg and I did up our Christmas tree a few days before the big day. It used to be that we would put lots of basic ornaments on it but now that she is 17, we mostly put her ornaments on! I started buying an ornament (or 2) a year for her when she was born. Each ornament signifies something about her life over the previous year. She now has a very large shoe box filled with ornaments about her life. She pulls them all out and organizes them chronologically and we enjoy a trip down memory lane as she puts each one on the tree. It is something I look forward to doing with her each year (her dad is a wee bit Scroogey and doesn't do the tree with us!)

Some of her ornaments are childhood memories of favourite shows. While others are of things like taking skating lessons or learning how to play the violin. One is of a woman singing and symbolizes the years she spent in choir. This year we added two new ornaments to the tree. Both from Disneyworld this past summer.  One day she will want to take the box of memories away with her to put on her own tree and I am not so sure that I am going to be able to let her!
                                    
So, as is our tradition, we spent Christmas Eve in our own home. Our little family of three has a tradition of eating a picnic in front of the Christmas tree and then opening all of our gifts to each other afterwards. The menu never varies. Shrimp cocktail, crackers, cheeses and pate. Simple and easy. Oh, and wine...can't forget the wine!

 This year, we had a real fireplace for the first time...ever! It was really, really lovely to sit and enjoy a glass of wine (a red given to me by one of the parents in my class AND my first sip in 10 days as I finally, finally finished the second round of penicillin for my now gone strep throat!) and open the gifts my hubby and daughter had gotten for me.




One of my favourite gifts  is the Pandora charm my good egg got for me. It is this one...

http://www.pandora.net/en-us/explore/products/charms#!790950EN27/theme/~60

and has matching hearts that go together to make a bigger heart. On one heart it says mother. On the other it says daughter. I love it!!!! The thing I love about the Pandora charm bracelets is how each charm acts as a visual reminder of something or someone near and dear to me. I can look down on my wrist and literally count my blessings.

Then we headed back to my Mum's house and slept there. We had a lazy morning with my sister and brother (with their children) coming over around 2pm for an afternoon of gifts and family time. Then off my brother went to continue with his Christmas and the 6 of us left had a turkey dinner. I let myself eat wheat (how could I turn down my sister's homemade stuffing?!?!) and, unfortunately, suffered for it. Oh well. Live and learn, right? I have not been very good about being gluten free over the last week or so and, boy howdy, can I ever tell! It is back on the straight and narrow for me!

Mum did very well over the holidays, all things considered. This was the third Christmas without Dad here in person. Plus, she had her 83rd birthday two days after Christmas. When you add the stress of the holidays to all the moving out, moving in and cleaning that has been going on around her house the last two weeks, I am amazed that she has held up as well as she has. There were a few tears here and there but, overall, I think that she enjoyed the time spent with family.

I know it is very hard for her to get up and continue on each day knowing my father is no longer with us physically. I just wish that she could feel him all around us the way that I do. He is here as much as he ever was, just in a different way. I know because I see signs of him all the time.

And on that note, I am going to say a belated Merry Christmas to all. I hope that your loved ones were with you as mine were with me (both in person and in spirit!)


Cheers!



Saturday, December 28, 2013

Through the Eyes of a Child

You see an ordinary empty seaweed container...




But the kids see...

A bird house...


Another bird house...

A box for an ornament...

And a person or two...


How cool are the lovelies in my class who thought these up?!?!

Ms. Hughes

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Monday, December 2, 2013

Currently....December

Yay! It's that time again!

Farley is hosting the Currently linky party over at her blog, Oh' Boy Fourth Grade.

So, without further ado, here's mine....


listening... so I went on iTunes to find songs for Hanukkah and ended up with a whole lot more!!! Now have a playlist on my phone to listen to over the holiday season. And some really cute songs to sing for Hanukkah. The Latke song by Debbie Freidman is my favourite. Check it out!


loving...well, if you have been reading the blog lately, you'll know that I not only had a cold at Halloween (that lingered and lingered and lingered) but then a flu last week AND strep throat on top of it all! Today was day 1 back at it after sleeping for 8 days. Geez, they were chatty!

thinking...there was a time a few years ago when my daughter refused to attend school - any school- for over a month. Needless to say, back then I was just hoping she would get out of bed, go to class and (with a lot of praying) graduate from high school! But, once she hit grade 11 she really blossomed. She is now not only talking about going to university but just got accepted to her #2 choice, York University (in Toronto). I am so proud of her for pulling up her bootstraps and working hard to meet this goal. But, I'd be lying if I didn't say that I wish she was going to be closer. 3,000 miles seems awfully faaaaaaar away!

wanting...pretty self explanatory. Have you looked at the cost of university lately? Her first year is going to run close to $25,000 by the time we are done paying tuition, residence, food plan, flights to and from and daily allowance. Yikes! Cross your fingers that she gets some of the scholarships she'll be applying for in the coming weeks.

needing...okay, so I know I'm not really behind if I'm not done on December 2 but I have this thing about being finished my Christmas stuff as much as possible before the end of November. With being sick and all, that timeline is slightly shifted. Maybe I could mix them in with writing report cards? One report card, one Christmas card, one report card, one Christmas card....

favourite tradition....hands down it is Christmas Eve. We turn off the lights, turn on the tree (this year we'll have a fire, too, as our new place has a wonderful working fireplace - unlike the other years when we would play the fireplace screen on Shaw cable!!!!) and have a picnic on the floor. We started this the year that my good egg was born. The menu is pretty consistent. Finger food and appies and wine (don't forget the wine!) We have shrimp cocktail (this one is a MUST DO for our daughter!), cheese and crackers, olives and other appies. After eating, we open all of our presents to each other. Then we watch a Christmas movie. Often The Sound of Music - though I'm not really sure why this is a Christmas movie. I just know that ever since I was a little girl, it has played on tv around Christmas time and I strongly associate it with the holiday season. It is the one time at Christmas that is just the 3 of us. After that, it is all extended family time, friend time, busy, busy, busy.

And there you go...my December Currently...what are you doing these days?

Cheers!

Ms. Hughes