Banana-Leaf – een nieuw ontdekte natuurlijk materiaal. In veel culturen is dit materiaal een belangrijk onderdeel van het dagelijkse leven…

Basisscholen en gemeenten mogen vanaf komend schooljaar gaan experimenteren met het uitbreiden van de leertijden…

Okay, the grape salad was a big hit! It was a new dish and delicious. Thank you, Tori, from the Lloyds.

I love Christmas….every part of it. But when Christmas Day ends, I am exhausted. One of my gifts from the children is a 26 inch computer screen….they were hoping it would help me see better….and, you know, I believe it does, a little. In any event, I love it…and I’m grateful for their thoughtfulness. Now, all I need are some more Russ Taff pictures.

BTW-BTW- I think you should write a blog on the C’mas program.

BTW-BTW-BTW-WE hit a DEER on the way home from the christmas program!!! SO SCARY!

My baking hasn’t been started yet since 25 y/o stove died. New one arrived while I was at work today… Can’t wait to make those sauerkraut balls. Those first…. then the cookies!! ( I just now jumped back into the work force this week after being a stay at home mom /babysitter to teachers for the last 18 years!! We’ll see what gets accomplished as I adjust)

Some traditions we have are watching the Best of the Andy Williams Christmas special together while eating chicken parmesan ( My 13 y/o insists that we eat this every year during the show- a tradition that snuck in the back door LOL) , we always watch the Muppet Family christmas by tree light along with all of the fun traditional holiday specials ( even my college age son), of course getting together with family if all of us have off of work. Our family gag gift exchange is the most fun of all – heck with the regular presents :o)!!

Welcome Jess!

I saw one white Christmas – everyone in the house was sick but me. And that’s only because I had the flu 2 days prior to Christmas. So I don’t think my family cares to see another white Christmas LOL.

My younger son, Mark, put a timer on my Christmas tree and it sparkles almost day and night as it sits perched ontop the round table in the sunroom, with packages piled all around the table. The oh-so-fat tree is chock-full of two shades of red balls and white lights. I wasn’t too keen on having the lights on during the day, but now I’m glad Mark talked me into it because it really does give it a Christmas spirit around here.

The mantle is full of pine branches and tall red candles in class globes. A wreath hangs from the center. There are five manger scenes of assorted size and description here and there….with the larger being an all-white one that sits year-round on the dining room sideboard, with minature holly wreaths and tall red candles in glass globes on the opposite end. It is in the middle of this where the Christmas desserts go: the always red velvet cake as Jesus’ Birthday Cake and this year a strawberry cheese cake.

A Christmas green tablecloth covers the long dining room table, with placesettings of red dinner plates and clear goblets and napkins with one Christmas tree. This year instead of a large holly and pine centerpiece, there is a thick row of pine covering the bottoms of seven tall red candles in glass globes. Pine and holly and wreaths are everywhere. Dinner will be a buffet, which will be set up on the kitchen counter where a cute little santa and his Mrs. are jitterbugging in front of, yep you guessed it, tall red candles…but this time not in the glass globes.

Outside there is a lighted up Christmas tree at one window and a lighted up snowman at the other window. With the venetian blinds pulled all the way up, they are almost as much decoration for inside as for the outside.

My baking is done and in the freezer along with a couple other dishes. Shopping is done and wrapped. Christmas music has been playing for days and days….with my Russ Taff Christmas cd right on top. (Tori, next year Russ really must make another Christmas cd…what a crooner that boy is!)

That’s it……be careful what you ask for, Tori.

Merry Christmas everyone! I have so enjoyed sharing Tori’s blog wth y’all this year….and I look forward to being here with you next year….and with Tori, our fearless leader. Love you, Tori.

The ornaments with the pictures of the girls are too precious. I love them! I love your tree! It is gorgeous. Makes me miss all my Christmas stuff that is still in the attic. I put some stuff up but nothing like i usually do. I usually have Christmas in every room of the house. Next year, it is all coming back out!

Everyone have a wonderful holidy season! Merry Christmas!

Welcome Jess

We had company for 4 days last week–my parents e-mailed 3 1/2 weeks ago that they might be coming this way–then could not be pinned down as to an actual arrival/departure date. (Don’t ask–this is the usual holiday chaos that is part of my DNA.) So that threw us into a tailspin.I finally decided I would just get done everything I could and not worry about the rest.

So… I am only putting up one tree this year,instead of the 2 or 3 I usually do. My main tree is almost entirely decorated with homemade items. We have several of those ‘kindergarten picture’ ornaments also, along with ornaments I cross-stitched and beaded candy canes I made with about a gazillion Girls Scout troops through the years. My most prized ornaments are the ones my grandmother made about 50 years ago that always hung on her trees. They are beaded and sequined wonders. I try to make a few new ones every year so my kids will get them when they have their own homes.I also have the snowflakes she crocheted on the tree.

My other 2 trees (that won’t make an appearance) are the ‘angel tree’
and the ‘sports tree’. I have some beautiful angel ornaments made of Battenburg lace and some made of sea shells.

My kitchen is covered in snowmen–snowmen garlands, cookie jars, candles,wreaths.

My den holds all kinds of Santas–Santas on birdhouses,rows of Santas,Santa throws on the couch,Santa pillows.

My husband just walks through the house and shakes his head.

We used to do the whole cookie making thing every Dec. 24th (to have cookies ready for Santa,ya know) BUT now with kids coming home from college at all different times–we’ll see. We’re still kind of making up new traditions as we go along.

Tori, the cookies are beautiful. I would never have the patience to do that. And it’s great that you can share that with the girls.

A very merry Christmas to the entire Taff family and all of your readers too.

Your tree is beautiful and I love that package waterer.

We have snow here in KC also and it was not fun driving yesterday. Streets are still a bit slick this morning, but not near what they were yesterday. It’s always fun to have snow at Christmas time, but I just wish it would stay off the streets and sidewalks.

Karen

As a graduate “summa bah humbug” from the Ebenezer Scrooge school of Christmas Cheer, I’ve grappled quite successfully with Christmas Past but am still unwrapping my Christmas Present. Therefore, if you don’t mind I’ll get back to you re family Christmas British style, when the ghostly finger of Christmas Yet To Come has finished pointing out the flaw in the apparently oxymoronic phrase “future traditions”. I will get round to it some day!

Ok, everybody? This is Jess, one of Charlotte’s best and coolest friends from school. They are great buddies and have been in each other’s class for years at St. Paul. Jess is an extremely talented artist and he’s also quite an actor– you should have seen the skit he and Charlotte (and their friends) did at the talent show! He also obviously has very sophisticated taste in reading material…

Jess? This is everybody. (And you’re right– isn’t that the best picture EVER of Char?!)

-Jess

Now I have to go lie down ’cause all that extreme cuteness ’bout did me in. Don’t ya just want to kiss those little cheeks again?

rockin’ robyn– how incredible that you have your sisters so close to you! That book sounds…um… festive.

emilythemom- Yep, Madi named her Nanno and it stuck. I wish I had known about the elf thing when the girls were little, I bet they would have loved that so much.

tammy–I’m so glad you got to see all that snow! I am a complete sucker for it, too. Nothing is more Christmas-y!

Tammy

And do your kids always call your mom Nanno? Thats what my kids call my mom!

Our Christmas traditions are going along swimmingly. I’ve tried to inject more ‘Christ’ into Christmas this year, and seem to have succeeded, somewhat. When I was growing up, my grandmother always made her three kings travel to the nativity scene over the Christmas season. I am trying to do the same with the boys and they are loving moving them everyday, when we can, um, find them.

We’re doing the ‘elf’ thing to, and the boys are super into it. Its where an elf moves every night somewhere in the house. Supposedly he’s reporting to Santa every night. Its a little nuts, to say the least, but the boys are all gaga over it. They think this elf is fantastic. I’ve created a monster.

I finally got my tree up and decorated last week-end. Well! quite a few years backed I stopped with the live tree “thing”. Although I really miss the pine smell drifting through the house. To save costs I bought a fake tree when I bought my house a few years back. Now, this year I gave up on something else… Oooh Tori my but your tree is so beautiful and the lights all look so perfect — I just don’t have that same talent. My lights always look like I just through them up there. Every year I struggle with putting lights on the tree, so this year I bought a “pre-lit” tree. (Am I totally getting lazier or what??)

Now that all my sisters have their places decorated for Christmas (I just got my house decorated this week…) in a few days we will plan to spend time at one-anothers house to see their decorations – see their Christmas tree’s and share in some holiday eating and holiday stories of Christmas’ past. Shhhhh!! They don’t know it yet but I’m going to read to them a storybook about Christmas in Lebanon county Pennsylvania -don’t ya know!!! I went to a book signing years back by the author of this book and have read it before to them —- they hate it!! hee hee…

I’m just trying to get my shopping completed between ice storms and then we lug all the gifts over to my brothers’ house to spend Christmas day there. Not one gift gets opened until we all gather at his house.