Family Gratitude List for 2010

At breakfast this morning the four of us put our heads together to create an alphabet gratitude list of all the things we could think of that we were grateful for in 2010. This is our collaborative effort!

A - All go to the same school, Anna, Anders

B - Being together, Bella, Becky, Beth, blessing on the meal, butterflies

C - Chickens, Cathy Hunter, chicken timer, Cape Cod, computer games

D - Dragon roller coaster at the fair, Denise, design

E - Egg slicer

F - Fish Tank, the fair, friends

G - Goodbye to the honda!, gymnastics, grandma & grandpa, granola

H - Hazel, Hike up to Sterling Pond, our Home

I - Imaginary friends (Bingo, Eli, & Eggy), Italy

J - Judy

K - Klingers cookies, Kuba

L - Lea, love

M - Mor Mor & Mor Far, maple syrup, Maximo, Marc & Cheryl, mudroom, mastermind

N - New couch, NO more diapers!

O - Owen, Oscar, orange porch

P - Presents from Christmas, Puffy Head, pantry

Q - Queer weddings

R - Remote control car, Miss Radley, riding a bike without training wheels

S - Safal, sledding, Aunt Sandy, stories, seals, scooters

T - Taiko drumming, tops, playing "trap me"

U - Uncle Claes

V - Playing Veterinarian

W - Whale watching

X - eXperimenting

Y - Yogurt ---especially banilla

Z - Bronx Zoo

May 2011 be full of happiness, health, passion, creativity and...
big love. It's an amazing life!

Anders Friend from the Bhutan

We had a friend from Anders kindergarten's class over for dinner tonight. He and his family have been in the United States for less than 6 months and know very little English. The parents are from Bhutan, but have spent the past 20 years in Nepal. They immigrated just recently. Luckily, a local high school student came with them as the interpreter - even though she herself has only been in the states for the past three years. It was an amazing experience to have them as dinner guests. Anders was bedside himself with joy, and the family was so deeply grateful to be invited. Safal and Anders spent nearly the entire time playing with remote vehicles and trying hard to converse. It is so cool to watch your 5 year old trying to communicate with another 5 year old who is non-English speaking, but quick to learn!

It was a wonderful night.

We're Riding in a Wonderland of Snow!

We had a lovely sleigh ride through the woods today with Mor Mor and 2 fabulously beautiful chestnut colored horses, laden with jingle bells.

And Then Our very own Traditions....

Under, on, and around the Tree -

Tops....a basket full of a variety of tops to spin
Wind up toys...a basket full of assorted wind ups to play with
Christmas books...a basket full of children's christmas books to read
Birds nests...a bunch of birds nests collected over the years that fill our tree
Birds...a collection of feathered birds to adorn our tree branches
Christmas card...the best we can come up with of the boys each year
Finding and cutting our own Christmas tree

Julafton

Swedish Christmas Eve

Anna's family is Swedish American - both of her parents were born and raised in Sweden, and all of their relatives are still there. Her parents met here in the United States about 45 years ago and raised their family here. You can imagine the amount of influence and pride there is for everything to do with Sweden and Swedish traditions in our family.

Julafton (Christmas Eve) is the biggest.

If you read my blog, you will know that my family is Polish and I wrote about our Polish Christmas traditions last year. Anna and I have alternated celebrating Christmas with our families year after year. This year it is our Swedish celebration.

Like my parents, Anna's parents have celebrated the holiday the exact same way every single year of their lives, and so did their grandparents, and their great-grandparents, etc. We are passing these traditions on to Anders and Jakob and I am so happy that both of our families are so rich with ethnic customs.

Christmas actually begins on December 13 in Sweden, with Santa Lucia. Usually, the eldest girl in the family portrays St. Lucia, puts on a white robe in the morning and is allowed to wear a crown full of candles. She serves her parents Lucia buns and coffee. We haven't yet made this a big part of our celebration (we have 2 boys!) but we have attended some Santa Lucia parties in Vermont.

Also, it's typical to decorate the trees and homes in seasonal Swedish spirit with gingerbread cookies (otherwise known as pepparkakor), straw Christmas decorations, and flowers such as the Julstjärna (Poinsettia), red tulips, and red or white Amaryllis. Our tree and house have many Swedish ornaments sent to us from family in Sweden - but we've made it our own style by adding birds nests, birds, and little Polish ornaments as well. This year we also hung pepparkakor heart cookies at every window. Decorating is nearly as fun as the entire celebration for me!

The traditional Swedish Christmas Eve dinner is a smörgåsbord, and includes a variety of foods. Preparation takes all day, includes nearly everyone, and begins with Anna's father carefully removing all the bones from a tin of Swedish anchovies for a particular recipe. The dinner always includes Julskinka (Christmas ham,) köttbullar(Swedish meatballs,) inlagd sill(pickled herring,) strömming (more herring,) Jansson's Tempation (shredded and baked potatoes with anchovies and heavy cream,) rödkalssallad (red cabbage salad,) potatis (boiled, dilled potatoes,) Rökt korv (smoked sausage,) prinskorv (fried sausage,) knäckebröd, a variety of cheeses - gouda, edam, jarlsburg, Vört Limpa (a rye based bread,) and sweets - finska pinnar, pepparkakor, havrekakor, kingla, and saffron bullar. Oh, and during the first course, which is the breads, crackers, cheeses and pickled fish, there is a toast with Aquavit and traditional Swedish drinking songs are sung. (I'll try to post a video of this!)

After dinner, a visit from the jultomten is expected - the Christmas gnome who comes bearing gifts with the Christmas goat. We exchange most presents this night (except a few from Santa in the morning) This is our way of merging the traditions in both of our families which celebrate on the eve of Christmas, so that the boys can still feel excited about a visit from Santa Claus.



For fun here are some Swedish words you just might like to know:
In Swedish you pronounce the J as a Y. Such as...GodYul...Yulafton, etc.
god jul - Merry Christmas!
julafton – Christmas eve, Dec 24.
julbock – traditional Christmas goat (made out of straw)
julbord – Christmas buffet
juldag – Christmas day
julgran – Christmas tree
julgransbelysning – Christmas tree lights
julklapp – Christmas present
julkort – Christmas card
jullov – Christmas (school) break
jultomte – Santa Claus
jultid – Christmas time

God Jul!

12 Christmas Moments

1 Swedish Flag


2 Boys unwrapping


3 Russian Stacking Dolls


4 Happy Children


5 Plates of Dessert


6 Chandelier Candles


7 Cookie Cutters


8 Clue Players


one 9 year old


10 pancakes frying


11 Family members


12 People dining

Happy Holidays and so much love to all of our friends and family!

Anders

Sometimes my boys just crack me up!
Plus, this outfit is to die for!

Anna's Cookies

Every year Anna bakes dozens and dozens of Swedish Pepparkakor - a very thin, very crispy gingerbread cookie. They are amazing to taste, but what is even more amazing to me is the process. Anna rolls the dough so thin you can see the wood grain of the table. The baking time is minuscule because of their thinness. The boys love them, both raw and baked. Ancient Swedish family secret!

Cookie Time!!

Love Letter to a Dog

Like I said in an earlier post, Anders fell in love with a little dog named Bella over Thanksgiving break. He got a sample of dog food from the feed store and sent it to his dog friend with the message - "I love Bella" inside.

Never Enough Sugar

Given a variety of decorating options, more is clearly better! Anders and Kuba were invited to a gingerbread house making party but Kuba was sick and couldn't make it. Anders made a house for Kuba as well, and he used the same decorating style with everything - Roccoco, don't you think?

Not One Egg Yet!

Here are our three hens, fully grown now, but not one egg yet!
We lost puffy head to a raccoon, gave the rooster away, and here are the remaining three ladies - Scaredy Cat, Freckles, and Eagle. Let's go ladies!

Themes or Series

Anders has been very excited about writing and drawing since he began kindergarten.
He seems to like to work in a series.
First it was houses,
then it was pumpkins;
his latest passion is hearts and all four of our names.
All I want for christmas this year is a framed piece of Anders handwriting...I have to say it really makes me happy!

Tree Creatures

Snow, but not much of it.
Well, if there's not enough for a snowman, how about a tree creature??

Recuperating

Kuba was home sick for two days, and this is what I saw after Anders got home and joined him on the couch.

'Tis the Season!

Yup, we've done it again folks! Another great hunt for the perfect tree has ended. We successfully and cooperatively chose the one on the car. Trust me, it's a good one! It's somewhere between beautiful and Charlie Brownish...just the way we like 'em!