christmas is coming

 it's still november, but it's the first day of advent. we cleaned the apartment when we came home, and set up our advent wreath and nature table.

"we light one candle shining bright, upon this holy advent night, fill our hearts with loving might, lead us to christmas day's brilliant light."

 "the first light of advent is the light of stones, light that lives in seashells, in crystals and in bones." we also sang "people look east" together after having a simple dinner of german pancakes. (korrina had some lentil soup since she's been feeling a bit under the weather).

 an envelope had arrived from morgana with birthday gifts for korrina and chanda.

 the material is a headband from the fitness center where morgana teaches her dance classes.

chanda received a german translation of romeo and juliet.

friday after thanksgiving

 a view of the snow outside the window . .

 chanda worked on her pentacle while i read a little from the fifth harry potter book.

 then we went to the apartment to do some cleaning and fixing up . . chanda and i wiped out drawers . .

 jason sponged down the cabinets . .  and then chanda lined them all with shelf paper . .

 the cleaning crew (adam had loaded all the furniture in with my sister the weekend before).

 rubbing scratch color over the wooden furniture. my sister's friend is moving to washington and gave us beautiful dressers and pictures for the apartment. every time my mom would ask where a piece of furniture came from, we would yell "from cora!"

 they have a nice view of the woods beside the complex.

 the moon was shining beautifully when we finally left to go home to my sister's place and make dinner (chanda was "starving" and getting rather cranky, and my nephews and brother-in-law came to rescue us as they couldn't imagine what we were doing at the apartment for so many hours). (i believe eva has a similar picture from thanksgiving night).

 we made all new batches of apples and raisins and sweet potatoes to make up for what we had eaten the day before.

 stirring the apples and raisins . . 

we ate a second thanksgiving meal as my sister had plenty of turkey.

 greg in his favorite reading nook.

 toby wanting to go downstairs where all the action was at the pool table.

here's another pic of chanda getting her sturbridge dress ready.

thanksgiving after dinner pics

 for thanksgiving dinner we had sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, apples and raisins, cranberries and stuffing.

  skyping with morgana . . 

 dessert was pumpkin pie, pecan pie, key lime pie, and a special norwegian pound cake (which was devoured quickly).

 cleaning up and getting tea and coffee ready . . 

 i'd like to try making the norwegian cake, whose tastiness comes from the cardamom that is added.

 celebrating birthdays . . 

playing pit . .

a cold day at sturbridge

greg took these at sturbridge today. it only got up to 25 degrees which is rather cold for the weekend after thanksgiving. chanda bundled up with tights and legwarmers and three sweaters under her long dress. they gave her a quilted bonnet and a long cloak. she loved the cloak and said it made her feel like she was in harry potter, and she was a bit miffed that greg didn't get a pic of her in it.

she had lots of good food to eat: turkey, mince meat (leftover turkey and ham, cabbage and stuffing, carrots and some potatoes), pumpkin pie, marlborough pudding (a custard like cake with eggs, cream, apples, sugar, and lemon rind), turkey pie (a pot pie), mince meat pie (sweeter than mince meat with lamb, raisins and dried apricots), turnip sauce (basically mashed potatoes with mashed up turnips, butter and cream, salt and kitchen pepper-a mix of different spices-not really a sauce but called a sauce), pounded cheese (cheese pounded with different spices) and white bread. she says it was a delicious feast and they all ate a lot. it's now after six and she just got home and says she is still full! she also says there were no visitors until noon, and then there were more than she expected. sturbridge also hosts a thanksgiving meal that people pay for, and chanda says it is very popular.

getting ready for sturbridge

thanksgiving

packing morgana's box and a myriad of other things

today was the final day for getting morgana's box together. it's been sitting on the window seat for over a month, stuck in "i don't want to spend the money to send this package overseas" limbo. it was rescued by stefan, who is traveling to austria on saturday, and offered to take it in an empty suitcase. i believe once he dumps the box with morgana, he will be filling the suitcase with ski equipment and then returning home. a fair exchange!

 chanda and i made a run to the chocolate bar for chocolate gifts to spread throughout the box, as if it needed any extra filler . . ! along the way we ran past the newly erected christmas tree stand, which smelled wonderfully piney.

 picking out the goodies . . 

 it was a rainy and slushy day. a noreaster was blowing through but we didn't get much snow on this side of the river.

after packing up the box and watching greg leave with it to bring to stefan at his office (i can't believe it's finally on it's way) i met janet at chocolate bar for a hot chocolate . .

since it was so crowded in the cafe, we took them back to her house and sat and knitted on our projects for awhile.

janet's been studying fibonacci numbers with her two youngest boys and enjoyed showing me the spiral in her brussel sprout plant . . it starts small but gets bigger and bigger as it spirals out.

back at home i began making creamed celery; my contribution to tomorrow's thanksgiving meal at my sister's house.

 who is this consulting her phone amidst a busy countertop of cooking utensils and food?

ahhh! it's morgana . . busy very late at night in austria, making pumpkin pie for her american thanksgiving meal tomorrow. good luck, morgana! i look forward to hearing about it when we skype. (it looks as if she has also put together an apple pie, and i see a nice looking hand mixer.)