holidays + hoopla: Christmas 2009! God Jul!

This was our second Christmas in Idaho with just the two of us. I had moments of sorrow thinking about our families and how I wished we were with them, but C'est la Vie!

We had a wonderful time together. We spent Christmas Eve with some great friends, Danny and Heather Hanline, watching "A Christmas Story", playing Carcassonne, popping our English poppers and wearing our crowns (thanks Heather), and eating eating eating. Later, Scott and I opened our Christmas Eve pajamas--a Larkins family tradition, put out milk and cookies for Santa, snuggled :) and went to bed.

In the morning, Scott was so happy to see that Santa came! We opened presents from our dear family, ate breakfast, played with our new "toys", went to see "Sherlock Holmes", came home, cooked our lovely Christmas dinner, ate, watched "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" (a gift from Scott), snuggled again, went to bed! Of course, that's the simplistic way of telling about our day. But we had lots of fun.

The day after Christmas we drove up to Targhee to go skiing again. I think Scott was more excited about that than Christmas. he was jumping up and down on the bed begging me to hurry so we could get on the road.

This time, I didn't fall once while skiing. But I did fall off the ski lift, jump off the ski lift, and get hit by the ski lift. SKI LIFT and I, apparently, are not friends. In fact, we're enemies. I don't know what I did to him. But he has it out for me. 

Needless to say, I was super embarrassed. Mostly, because a million people were watching me when these ski lift altercations occurred. Boy does SKI LIFT time his vengeance well. Scott said I could use his ski mask if I wanted to hide my face. I didn't.

Aside from that....I had a great Christmas.

One thing that made it so fun was incorporating my Scandinavian heritage into some of the decorations and traditions:
1.Red and white paper heart baskets on the tree. Santa brings them Christmas Eve filled with tiny oranges and candy.
2. A piece of tin nailed above the door to keep the Christmas trolls away.
3. Lots and lots of candles and light. Scandinavians believe that whatever the candlelight touches will be blessed in the new year.

There are many more I want to try...like actually making my own candles, baking cookies in the shape of fish, and celebrating St. Lucia's Day. Isn't ancestry and tradition wonderful! So many fun things to do.

I hope everyone's Christmas was filled with warmth, excitement and love! God Jul!