Another Christmas Gone

It's funny but Christmas and Weddings are very much alike, generally people spend to much money on them and wonder why they did. The second thing is there is so much build up to it and then poof it's over. With that in mind and all the things that have happened in the last year, we decided to make it small and quiet. So for the first time in a very long time we did not have an open house on Christmas eve, we just had the four of us at dinner. It was quiet, it was relaxed and it was really nice to just hang with our children and enjoy the night. Christmas day has always been a little more low key in our house as Christmas eve was always the big night - so, just a couple of gifts under the tree (now that the kids are grown, they have very small lists) and a lovely breakfast cooked by Michael. Jessie cleaned the kitchen for me Christmas eve as part of my gift from her, Michael helped in that he loaded the dishwasher, but made it clear he would not be hand washing anything. It was pretty funny actually. For me the big gift was going to bed with a dirty kitchen and waking up to it magically clean. I can not go to bed knowing the dishes aren't getting done, drives me crazy. Funny thing is I don't think it used to bother me but it does now.

Today is Oretta's 81st birthday, so we wish her a wonderful day and wish that we were there with her. It's also, St. Stephen's day here in the Republic and Boxing Day in all the British locations. So a little history, St. Stephen was the first Martyr of the christian church and was martyrd on either December 26 or 27, his feast day is the 26th in the Western (Roman Catholic) Church and the 27th in the Eastern (Orthodox Catholic) Church. Traditionally, a box was placed in church on Christmas day and then gifts or money were put in it for the poor. Also, in the great houses, the staff always had to work christmas day, but would be given the next day off to celebrate their christmas with their families. In Ireland, St. Stephens day was celebrated with another tradition of "Wren Hunting". Boy's known as wren boys would go out on the 26th and hunt and kill a wren, then go around to houses with the wren on a pole singing for money. They killed the wren by stoning it to death which is how St. Stephen was killed.

Another interesting story we were told about Christmas in Ireland is about Christmas Eve Mass. Were were lamenting the fact that mass was only at 9:00 for the vigil, there was a polish mass offered at midnight, but not at our church. Our freinds told us it was because people would go to the pubs and show up at mass at the last second drunk, so the church decided to only offer the 9:00pm Vigil mass on Christmas eve and now everybody goes to the pub following Church.

Shannon Airport is closed on Christmas day so its lovely for us because we never have a worry of Adrian having to work on Christmas while we are here.

All in all a very nice and simple christmas that made us as happy as it made us sad. We miss everybody at home and were really glad to talk to all the family, but happy our children were here with us.

Till next time :) we posted a few pics on Flickr.

It's Christmas Time

First thing I want to say is I apologize because we did not send out cards this year. It just never seemed to work out. It has been some time since I last updated, but we have not been doing any traveling and have just been spending quiet time at home.

Jessie came home last Saturday and we are very excited to have her here. As many of you already know, Jessie has been accepted to Richmond American International University in London. This means she will be staying on this side of the world. Another thing that makes us very happy, because she will be close to us and we will be able to see here on more weekends and school breaks. Of course that assumes she will be willing to take time out of her busy schedule for us (jk, I know she will).

Michael won't arrive home until the 22nd, so we wait as patiently as possible for him. He will be staying through the 12th of January so that is pretty wonderful in our minds.

We miss everybody at home a great deal and think of you all quite often, but especially at Christmas. We have definately been blessed with the life we have been granted. We wish everyone a very happy season and a very succesful new year.

Keep well!