Digital Nativity

No free write today - just this really sweet video. Enjoy!

Back at it!

So, in the spirit of trying to get back into a disciplined blogging, I'm taking a page from Crimson Rambler and working towards a regular (maybe daily, but that's optimistic), short free write exercise.

It is the Advent season, or Almostchristmas, as it might be more aptly-named from a secular point of view. I love this time of year for a number of reasons, including the amazing Advent music that we get to sing at church, the process of turning our home into something festive and wonderful, the planning process for FOOD, etc. I don't even mind the shopping, though I was thinking in the mall yesterday that shopping might be more enjoyable if people could arrange their facial expressions to something other than MEAN and ANGRY.

We will be having our second-annual Edible Christmas at One-Oh-Six this year with the family and dear friends. We came up with this last year; as a replacement for running around buying presents for each other, we would run around and buy food and then eat it all together at the same table. We cook together, we clean up together... it's a grand old time. And we play Apples to Apples, the greatest game ever.

Did get Christmas shopping finished (or close to it) for the husband-unit yesterday and am pleased and excited about that!

Looking very much forward to our annual trip to the mountains after Christmas to sit still, play cribbage, eat and drink nice things and rest. In the meantime, there are concerts and carolling gigs and preparations and all of that kind of thing left to do!

Christmas in Review

We are enjoying our traditional boxing day celebration, which involves not leaving the house, watching our newest DVD of the previous season of The Office (a regular Christmas present), enjoying a nice bottle of wine and eating treats from Christmas Day.

Speaking of Christmas Day, it was also lovely. We had the family over for the afternoon and for dinner, we made rum balls, we played Wii, we laughed a lot... it was grand. Other highlights of the week included a fantastic cheese fondu dinner with good friends, a huge Christmas Eve choir, and lots of peace and quiet.

This entirely positive review of this year's Christmas season comes despite having been accused by a fellow member of our church choir of a myriad of things about 5 minutes before the late service, including being rude, insensitive, shoving her and ruining two Christmases in a row. Yup, I did all that, simply by virtue of having asked her to move over to make room for a guest singer. Awesome.

Merry Christmas!

We have made the rum ball dough, which we'll roll into balls and coat tomorrow afternoon all together as a family.

The cranberry sauce is beginning to think about boiling on the stove.

Handel's Messiah is on the stereo.

There are mysterious parcels wrapped and under the tree.

The snow is deep.

The cats can't believe their luck that we have been home all day.

It's Christmas.

Blessings to you!

Trader Tuesdays: On Stuffing

So, it might seem odd to write a post about stuffing AFTER Christmas, but I got curious while I was making my stuffing on Christmas Day about how other people make it. I know that there are quite possibly thousands of different ways to make stuffing. Here's mine, taught to me by MU.

Ingredients (quantities are all rough):

About 8-10 slices of bread, with crusts removed, cut into 1-inch squares
2 stalks of celery, chopped
1 apple, chopped
3/4 cup of raisins
1 cup of frozen corn
minced garlic, to taste
salt
pepper
savory (lots!) (This is the part of my stuffing recipe that comes from WH's side of the family. It's an excellent addition!)
Sometimes I put a dash of a hot spice too... whatever is on hand.
1 egg

I put all the ingredients together roughly in that order, ending with the egg, which acts as the binding agent for the whole thing. Then I stuff it all in the bird and into the oven the whole works go!

This stuffing is pretty wet in its consistency, but the flavours are so complementary and you get good texture from the celery and apple. YUM!

So, now, I want to hear from you! What's your recipe? Do you stuff the bird, or cook your stuffing separately? If it's the latter, for how long? Do you add unique ingredients that you don't mind sharing?

Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas Review

We've had a lovely holiday here at chez The Wee House. Wonderful things to eat and drink, lovely things under the three, lots of games and laughter and fun. And we have spent the last couple of days watching seasons 3 and 4 of The Office, which were a gift to WH. And WH pulled off the surprise of the season and bought me diamond earrings and a diamond pendant. I'm very happy amongst all my sparkles.

I hope that you all had wonderful holidays!

Well, here we are...

... on Christmas Eve. I'm at work for a little more than a half day before heading home to get ready for the church run tonight. I'll assist WH with the music for the early family service - turning pages and whatnot - and get music ready for guest singers at the late service, and then we're all hands on deck at 11pm for the biggie. That baby is comin', and we have some celebrating to do!

I hope that wherever you are, this Christmas is a warm and loving one, with peace and goodwill and turkey (or tofurkey, if that's your thing). That you are close to those you love, either physically or in spirit. That you have a chance to sing. Or be sung to. And if nothing else, you laugh.

Gingerbread House

Our project this evening!

This 'n' That

Other than two performances of Messiah that went really, really well, we didn't do a whole lot this weekend! Let's see...

• I got a grant application all but finished, which is great... just a couple of little details to finish up.
  
• I made Chocolate Crinkles from the Company's Coming Cookies book... so yummy.
• We went to the Church Choir Christmas Party, which is always a wonderful time, with lots of terrific food and SINGING!
• We played Cribbage and Sorry.
• I finished all my Christmas shopping on Saturday morning and came home and got everything wrapped that needed wrapping.
  
• We slept in.

And that about covers it! It's so nice to be finished with the choral commitments, and to know that we're both actually going to be home on a weeknight, for once. Hurray!

Friday Five: To Do!

From the Revgals, today, a Friday Five about the last five days before Christmas!

There are only five full days before Christmas Day, and whether you use them for shopping, wrapping, preaching, worshiping, singing or traveling or even wishing the whole darn thing were over last Tuesday, there's a good chance they will be busy ones.

So let's make this easy, if we can: tell us five things you need to accomplish before Christmas Eve.

1. Shopping - I have just a few things left to get... something for The Boy (my nephew), one more thing for WH, and a couple of stocking stuffers for him. Then I'm done!

2. A little bit of house cleaning in preparation for Christmas dinner and a house guest that will be staying with us after Christmas until the New Year.

3. We still have a gingerbread house that we are planning to decorate. I think that will happen this weekend.

4. I have some business things to take care for Chamber Choir, namely, I have a grant application that needs finishing, and another one that needs starting.

5. Sing two concerts of Messiah, starting tonight!

A Christmas Story

So, one of the things that I bought my husband for Christmas this year is a pair of gloves. And the reason I bought him a pair of gloves is that the only hand-warmers he has are very large heavy-duty mittens, which are great in the cold, but don't afford a lot of flexibility for finicky things like getting your keys into your car, changing the radio station in the car, etc. So I thought (rightly or wrongly... possibly both) that what he needed was a nice pair of thinsulate gloves that he could wear whenever the big mittens were too cumbersome. I wrapped them yesterday and tucked them away with the rest of his Christmas presents.

Cue the following conversation in the car on the way to choir practice last night:

WH: I don't know what's more annoying... wearing these mittens or just having cold hands.
Chorus: Oh yes?
WH: But at least they're not gloves. I HATE GLOVES.
Chorus: What? You hate gloves?
WH: Yes, I HATE GLOVES. I hate having my fingers separated, and I can never find gloves that fit... I HATE GLOVES.
(long awkward silence)
Chorus: Well... I guess I'll just take them back then.
WH: Take what back?
Chorus: The gloves I bought you for Christmas.
WH: Ha ha... wait. Are you serious?
Chorus: Yes.
WH: Oh. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... I bet I'll like them!

(much hilarity ensues)

Cue the following conversation on the way home from choir practice when we stopped to put gas in WH's car. If you've never pumped gas when it's -25, it's a miserable task.

WH: Boy it's cold out here.
Chorus: Do you have your mittens?
WH: Yes. I sure wish I had gloves though. (sheepish grin)

A Christmas Meme

I got this Christmas meme from I'm Still Me. Let me know in the comments if you play!

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Both... I use gift bags for presents that have lots of different little things in them, and wrap for bigger things.

2. Real tree or Artificial? Well, you see, that is the question, isn't it? In fact, it's going to be a real tree again this year.

3. When do you put up the tree? When I was growing up, the tree never went up until December 24th, but WH has talked me into an earlier timeline. The tree will go up this weekend, I think.

4. When do you take the tree down? Again, when I was growing up, the tree stayed up for 12 days and then came down on January 5th or 6th. We will probably take the tree down in the first week of January, in plenty of time to vacuum up all the pine needles before we both have to go back to work.

5. Do you like eggnog? I like it in small quantities.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? I know that I got many lovely gifts as a child, but the one that stands out most clearly in my memory is the year that my parents bought me a new 'big girl' bed. Secretly, I think the new bed was a ploy to keep me from climbing into their bed in the middle of the night (I kicked), and... it worked!

7. Hardest person to buy for? I find it difficult to buy for children, because I'm not always comfortable with what toys and games are appropriate for what ages. I rely heavily on the recommended ages!

8. Easiest person to buy for? WH is never too difficult because he's usually pretty good about giving hints about what he wants.

9. Do you have a nativity scene? Not yet... we don't really have room for one in the wee house that wouldn't be tormented by the cats. When we get a bigger house, I'd like to get one of the beautiful Aboriginal nativity scenes from South America.

10. Mail or email Christmas cards? Neither this year... I just ran out of time. But usually Mail.

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? A friend of mine in high school bought me a star fish one year. A real one (dead, though). It would have been neat, except that it smelled atrocious. Like dead fish, appropriately.

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? A Christmas Story

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Usually not until December... sigh.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? I'm sure that I have, but I can't think of a specific example at this point.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? White chocolate brittle with candy cane chunks in it.

16. Lights on the tree? Absolutely! This is WH's job... he's very good at it!

17. Favorite Christmas song? Once in Royal David's City

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? This year we're staying home. We've sort of alternated back and forth between Prairie City and Big City in the East where WH's family lives, but travel at Christmas is tricky because of WH's church responsibilities.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer's? Heavens, no. Well, probably, but only if given time, and a pen and paper.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Star. Ours is fibre-optic.

21. Open presents Christmas Eve or morning? We used to open one present on Christmas Eve and then the rest on Christmas Day. Fundamentally, Christmas present opening happens on the 25th

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? White elephant gift exchanges and atrociously bad pop versions of traditional Christmas carols.

23. Favorite ornament theme or color? WH and I buy each other an ornament every year... the tackier the better!

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? I like the traditional fare - turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, gravy... you know...

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? Oh, peace and goodwill and all of that excellent stuff. And also an iPod dock.

26. What do you like most about Christmas? I enjoy the undeniable spirit of the season. And also the Church Choir Christmas Party.

Status Update

On Christmas Plans:

• The decision about the tree has not yet been made, but we're going shopping this afternoon just to look.
  
• Plans for family dinner are pretty much secure. We will do appetizers and presents in the afternoon at our place while the turkey roasts, and then we'll march the food across the alley to MB's house to eat it, because he has the bigger dining room table. We have bought the bird; we just need odds and ends of ingredients to finish it off.
  
• House cleaning and decorating is on the list for this weekend, as we're having friends over for dinner on Sunday night and would like to have the house all gussied up in time for them.
  
• Shopping... aie aie aie. I've got a few things, but I'm nowhere near done. Oh well.
  
• The Gingerbread house kit has been purchased but we haven't put it together yet.
  

In other news, we did actually get our paint touch-ups done last weekend, a project that we've been NOT doing for the better part of two years. Hurray! This is the first on a list of a projects we want to get done around the house before we put the house on the market. We have more painting to do, in the bathroom and the basement, and some new lino that needs to be put down on the stairs and in the bathroom. I think that we will also replace the sink in the bathroom with a slightly bigger model.

And so it goes!

The Tannenbaum Quandry

Sounds like the title of the next Bond movie...

Anyhow, both WH and I grew up in homes where real Christmas trees were a staple of the holiday experience. When my brothers and I were very young, our father used to take us out into the bush to cut down our tree. As we got older, and that errand became more difficult to manage, we would get our tree from one of the local tree farm sales lots, or from Big Chain Grocery Store, or from Colourful University's forestry students, or wherever was most convenient. What was important was that the tree was always real. (We did have one year when we took the whole tree thing in an entirely different direction, but that's a story for another day. So is the story of the year that MU and I stole the Christmas tree...)

In the three Christmases that WH and I have spent together, we have put up a real tree, much to the great delight of our cats, and much to the distress of WH's allergies. We would never have considered an artificial tree; it just ran against every idea either of us have of what Christmas should look like in our home.

But a number of things have come to light in the last couple of years:

• WH's parents, and his sister and brother-in-law, made the switch to artificial.
  
• Middle Brother made the switch to artificial.
  
• Friends of ours bought an aritifical tree this year that looks FANTASTIC (and very real!) at a really reasonable price.
  
• I got more than normally annoyed at how many pine needles I was still finding all over the house in July and August.
  

So now we are in a quandry in our little wee house. I think that we both still feel emotionally pulled towards the real tree and what it meant for us growing up. And we are both aware of the environmental reasons why real trees are desirable. And having allergies didn't stop us from getting cats...

But you know, I just have this feeling that we're going to make the switch. Maybe, when we're in a bigger house and have children, we'll switch back, and maybe we won't. We'll have to see how this first year goes...

I think that we both know that real or fake isn't actually that important, and didn't actually play as big a role in our childhood Christmas traditions as we think that it did. And we'll inevitably discover that our Christmas is as wonderful and memorable with an artificial tree.

But isn't it funny the things that you hold on to?

In which Chorus Shops

With all deference to Black Friday (which doesn't really happen up here in Canada) and Buy Nothing Day (which does, but I always seem to need to buy something on that day, so I buy nothing on other days to compensate), WH and I are going shopping this evening.

On the list:

• New pants for WH because since September 1st, he has lost 25 pounds!
• A pair of boots, with fuzzy lining for me, something that will go with pants and skirts.
• Perhaps a new pair of boots for WH that he can wear to shovel the sidewalks.
  
• Something to send back to WH's hometown for his best friend's new baby boy.
  
• Maybe some groceries if we feel up to it.
  

I've started thinking a little bit about Christmas plans this week and what needs to get done in the next little while. I'd like to get a package together and sent off to WH's parents and sister's family in the next couple of weeks to make sure it gets there for the 25th. And I guess I need to make some plans for baking. I think that it would be a lot of fun to do a gingerbread house this year, but I'll have to see how much energy we have. Also on the baking list is, of course, rum balls, and a couple of kinds of cookies that I made last year that were fantastic, and probably some new ones as well.

And we'll try to find some time to invite some friends over during the holiday season when schedules are a little bit more relaxed and people might have more time.

I have to say, that despite how busy November has been, I feel like I have more energy going into the holiday season than I did at this time last year. We'll see if it lasts!

Merry Christmas Everybody!

Well, it's 11:00am on Christmas Eve, and WH and I are still in our pajamas. We've had breakfast in bed, watched one entire disc from season 2 of The Office, cleaned the kitchen, pushed the laundry, and now we're sittin'. So far, a great day. Mama Cat and Baby Cat have done a lot of sleeping. The idea is to have as restful a day as possible in preparation for a long night tonight at the church!

Last night was Christmas dinner with my family, shared between our house and my brother's, which is just across the alley. We cooked the turkey and had appetizers here, and then marched the turkey across to their house for dinner. It was a delightful evening all around! We'll have just my mom and eldest brother for a quiet roast beef dinner on Christmas Day.

I wish you all peace and happiness this Christmas season.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Laryngitis on a Monday Morning

So Friday morning I woke up with a little bit of a sore throat. I stayed home from work,hoping to get a head-start on feeling better by taking a rest day. Saturday showed no real change - still sore, but not serious. Sunday, I woke up with barely any voice at all, and today is worse. So much for my cunning recovery plan. A little laryngitis, anyone? So I'm at work today, trying to catch up from things I missed on Friday, but I'm not feeling very good about it.

The sore throat aside, we got a lot of our Christmas preparation done this weekend. The tree went up and got decorated, we finished most of the baking (only one kind of cookie left to go), and WH is at the mall this morning, fighting the crowds and finishing his shopping. I only have a few things left to get. We need to think a little bit about one last grocery shop before the weekend, but other than that and the little bit of shopping left to do, we're in pretty good shape.

Last night was our annual Church Choir Christmas Party. It's my favourite party of the whole year. The same couple host every year, and they put on an absolutely scrumptious dinner for all choristers and their spouses. After dinner, there is rambunctious carol singing. The party is always a GREAT time. Three years ago, at this part, I had far too much to drink. So did Church Choir's conductor. We were both being driven home by a mutual friend, and on the ride home we held hands for the very first time. Two and a half years later, I married him.

Romantic, eh?

Christmas Preparation

Major concert commitments for December 2007. DONE.

Anything having to do with Christmas. STILL TO DO.

Sigh.

Off tonight to start the Christmas shopping experience after a long conversation with WH on the weekend about how, exactly, we wanted to get our preparations done. I think it's all workable, but my enthusiasm for the shopping part of it is minimal. Never mind, we have a plan, we have a list, we'll figure it out.

What I am enthusiastic about, and getting more so, is the baking. This is really the first year that I've had the kitchen facilities and my wits together enough to make some significant holiday baking happen. So it's gonna happen! As a shower gift, I received the Company's Coming exhaustive recipe book for COOKIES, and I've been inspired by all the possibilities. I've also, for the moment, certain that my cookies will look like the ones in the pictures of the book. This is a delusion that I'm enjoying, so NOBODY SPOIL IT!

I've also begun to make some plans for the post-concert New Years party that we're hosting for choir members. The trick with this party is that the choristers will be hungry, and will want to eat something of substance, so chips'n'dip ain't gonna cut it, at least not on their own. At the same shower mentioned above, I also got the Company's Coming COMPLETE Entertaining Book, so WH are working our way through that to pick good (and simple) and tasty things to prepare. As WH will be in rehearsal for much of the week before, and I will be at home, I'm feeling quite confident that we can put on a nice, elegant bash with lots of good food.

Now that I've logged all these plans on my blog, I feel like I've committed to them. We'll see how we do!

Friday Five

I'm stealing this Friday post from the webring RevGalBlogPals, because it gives me an opportunity to get all my venting about Christmas out of the way in one post, and then all I can talk about is happy holiday things from now on!

So the RevGals ask:

Please tell us your least favorite/most annoying seasonal....
1) dessert/cookie/family food
I don't like shortbread. THERE. I said it. THIS GIRL DOES NOT LIKE SHORTBREAD. I've never confessed that to anyone before... feels much better.

2) beverage (seasonal beer, eggnog w/ way too much egg and not enough nog, etc...)
I'm ok with egg-nog, but only in very small quantities.

3) tradition (church, family, other)
I'm going to have to agree with cheesehead on this one, and shake my fist at White Elephant gift exchanges. The last thing I need in my life (and my tiny house) right now, is another piece of ugly holiday crap. I like gift exchanges that involve nice things though... like wine.

4) decoration
Never been big on loose tinsel, but mostly because one always finds it in the litter box about a week later. Ew.

5) gift (received or given) One time, I got a starfish. A dead one. It smelled funny, but the girl who gave it to me thought it was really neat. It smelled bad.

BONUS: SONG/CD that makes you want to tell the elves where to stick it.
When I am Queen of the World, any person who wishes to write a choral re-arrangement of a classic Christmas carol, or a medley of Christmas carols, will have to have it approved first by moi. The implementation of this rule will be officially marked by the explosion of all recordings of "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth."

And another thing, WH and I were standing the supermarket the other day and noticed an advent calendar of sorts. Except it had Spiderman on it. And was counting down from December 1st until New Year's. Just sayin'.