Long time no blog. Was able to chat with our families on one Christmas or another and that was nice...and goodness knows I have a lot of pent up words...but I just want to wish you all a Joyful Holiday and a Happy New Year. We had all intentions of calling our friends and we just blew it...
I am holding on here. The internet was supposed to be hooked up on the weekend of our move, but they were no showers, so we had to wait until Tuesday. Then the laptop is having issues and won't maintain a charge with the battery so it just wasn't conducive to blogging, nor my exhaustion.
We took the kids to a "tacky lights tour" on a block in a neighboring neighborhood. We are not sure if they deem these 'Tacky Lights Tours" like ours in the U.S. or not...Anyway, we stumbled upon a pretty yum Italian Restaurant as we waited for darkness to fall, suffered thru an evening Muffin Meltdown (she is just exhausted and I think stressed from all the changes...I can't go there or I will be a sobbing mess...holding on by a thread here).
It doesn't look like Christmas here and our neighborhood doesn't have many outward signs of Christmas. I didn't even see the Christmas Beetle...Our little area is pretty un-illuminated. A house a few streets up has a few and a many "Santa Stop Here Signs". We got one of those. Viv picked the place to pitch it and the owners had left a door decoration...Thank you very much!
OUR TREE.
We went to get a tree...Our closest Kmart and Target were sold out of artificial trees and I had seen a tree stand not far away...We just missed the cub scout sale and the elf delivery service ( they put it up and pick it up, HELLO, great elfin' business idea!) I was going to pick one up with the kids one day but it was pouring here in Seattle-Sydney. Also, unless Christmas Tree Sales people took pity on my a**, how would I have gotten a tree loaded and tied to the top of my Ford Wagon rental with my little ones? When we finally got to the tree venue, there were two traditional looking live trees left and we picked the best of the two. They had some tiny blue spruces for $100...and a couple poinsettias. Since they are so poisonous and likely pricey I didn't even ask. I kind of like the Christmas hygrangeas! Just funny seeing people buying them for Christmas and not Easter. There is some little native flower they call the Christmas flower. Our Christmas hosts picked some from their back yard and just scattered them along the dining table. Ta Da! Pretty little flower.A little more details about the tree:
Fiber optic lights on our tree called "fairy lights". They are white and are kinda like lightning bugs on your tree. Sort of grows on you. Blink. Blink, But may have to give warning to anyone who is coming that may be epileptic. I think the fact that they are white make them a little less tacky than multicolor, but I am not having colour wars here. Because I have come to embrace the colored lights,too. Yet, my favorites are the blue ones. I have always liked them,and shall have them one day.
The tree skirt is really a skirt of mine scrunched up around the front of it, one of those long, flowy numbers that if you had the figure for it, you could double as a dress with a really cool leather belt...
Muffin colored a star yellow that we made from cardboard to top the tree. Voila, finishing touch!
It turned out better than I hoped. I just wish that I could, one year, have a chance to really decorate with all the ornaments given through the years, etc. It just feels so temporary all the time for me at Christmas. First in the little house because there was so little storage and stuff was in a unit and we just got new often...and then we finally had all the Christmas boxes together in the attic of the Pink House. But that was a temporary reunion. It's all in storage somewhere. Bahhumbug. They are just things.
CHRISTMAS EVE
Not much to report. The kids were both up late. The power was out for a while early evening and we stayed up late helping Santa...We had to put out all the hidden gifts from the kids grandparents etc. There is a mountain of cardboard packaging here. Earlier Muffin and I made gingerbread boy cookies from a package and used a glass as a rolling pin....They were thick, but not bad tasting and she got to eat some and leave one for Santa. Happiness.CHRISTMAS DAY ...and it's Baby's First Christmas and it's in Australia...
The Greenwich Ferry has a deal with ole St. Nick to come visit on the ferry boat from Sydney and deliver each child a gift. His arrival was set at 8 am. It's a neighbourhood exclusive and a pretty cool thing. We are not on the wharfside of Greenwich, therefore, we had to drive over...The realtor for our home informed us of this event and we had time to let Muffin open a few gifts and her stocking, and sweet baby boy to get some brekky and head on over to the wharf. Yeah, we were the only people with kids still in their Santy Jammies. Kids were dressed and some dressed up in "sundresses". I still think going out as soon as they wake up practically qualifies for public jammies. And they were themed. And my kids were adorable. I know...some of you are wondering and the answer is " NO" or better "HAAAAILLLL NO". I did not wear PAJAMAS with all those strangers, thanks be to God. Some of those ladies were all dressed already and had on lipstick. Really? Did they sleep? Get up at 4 am? Not watch their kids tear through their gifts? Yuppy-ville. How do people do it?
We have just enough time to get through the unwrapping madness and playing to get Huckleberry down for a wee nap and the rest of us ready to roll to Christmas lunch with the DeAngelis family. Felt a bit inadequate. Brought a bottle of red and white and a yummy bakery cake looking like a Yule log.
So, Christmas lunch with the DeAngelis family was wonderful except that baby boy had a fever and was a slug. He was pleasant but pretty much a noodle laying on us. I had packed the Panadol, but somehow in the confusion of bringing all our stuff in, that bag was misplaced until we walked out again. So we dosed the little guy for the ride home. He was also exhausted because I had to wake him to take him to the "party" as I called it to the eldest to entice her away from her Christmas Booty. Why so much stuff to take? Two kids, summer in Australia=bathing suits, sunscreen, hats, swimmy diapers, towels... in addition to everything else. They had a traditional meal with a turkey and lasagna since they are I-talians. Some people do a BBQ for Christmas. The luncheon was held at friend A's sisters home. They were fun loving, easy going, welcoming and just wonderful. Muffin went swimming on Christmas with their crew of cousins and held court at the kid table talking about that taboo subject she so loves to giggle about: "poop". We don't know why. You'd think she was really potty training.I just ignored her, figured she'd likely stop sooner if I didn't say anything than if I did. So she was dressed like an angel in her red satiny dress and had a potty mouth.
We also got to try PAVLOVA for the first time. It is scrumdeliumptious! We are so grateful they had us over. Each family brought gifts for the kids and that was just overwhelmingly sweet and generous.A & M gave us a huge welcoming basket to Australia. Lovely. They are so nice.
We missed our families greatly. Can't even go there. Just wasn't the same.
Now that wasn't so bad, I thought I'd be sobblogging so I have been taking forever to get this little postie done.
Hope you all had a wonderful holiday, celebrating however you do, and that Santa Claus was good to you. Goodness knows, he was good to our two!
XO
Valerie
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