Monday, December 1, 2014

Festivities

Who's behind on her blogging? THIS girl. Let's dive right in.

It has been a very busy, very chilly couple of weeks. Today it is zero degrees outside and we are holing up here till warm temps come in tomorrow. It is pleasant though, with our Christmas tree up and a friendly snowman looking up at us from the courtyard. I had leftover turkey and stuffing and pecan pie for lunch. I have no complaints.

So this is what we've been up to lately:

Chris came to visit and we all went to Minneapolis for Family Night at the Midtown Global Market. As luck would have it, the Roe Family Singers were doing a show there that night, so we got tamales and good old-fashioned Appalachian music (they pronounced it "Ap-a-latch-an" like natives. Bravo!) They also did a group clogging lesson.
 We joined in a for a square dance or two.
The following day Riley and Joe had two birthday parties to go to, so Dave and Chris went thrifting for materials and spent hours making some really cool...Christmas secrets. Shhh.
If you follow me on Instagram, you've seen these pictures already - I had to poach them since my phone is being a jerk and not letting me download certain pictures. Take that, phone!

Thanksgiving!

Thankful, thankful! We got to spend Thanksgiving with about 30 of the Herrald clan in Rochester. It was 4 degrees out but our hearts were warm. A big meal and a fun crowd, football, pool, babies, and all the pumpkin pie you could want.

Photo creds to Don! New pajama creds to Suzette! Thank you!
St. Paul Tree Lighting/ Figure Skating/ Choo Choo Bob band/ European Christmas Market
A long title, but that place was hoppin'! From foot to foot, you know, to keep warm! It was fun though. We took the train because the babies love it. Joe screamed when we went through the tunnels and scared the whole bus.  Cracks us up.
 
Celebrity sighting!

 We have all our fingers today, thanks to these steaming cups of hot chocolate. Mmmm.
Once it got dark they had some Christmas carols and a performance from the cast of A Christmas Story before they lit the tree and set off the fireworks. St. Paul loves their Christmas. Brings to mind the Who's down in Whoville. Christmas in St. Paul isn't bought in a store. It is bought in an outdoor European Christmas market. Haha, I kid, I joke. The spirit of Christmas is alive and well here.

And, uh, the spirit of Thanksgiving too. I decided I wanted to do our own turkey, in addition to the giant one Pops served on Thanksgiving day, and a meal with all of my family's traditional dishes. We invited some friends over to make it a party, and Dave concocted a dubious turkey rub with crushed red pepper and sugar in it, among other things, which turned out to be, naturally, delicious! My pecan pie was awesome too.
 My turkey! And his turkey. haha "And then he, he himself, carved the roast beast!" (We read The Grinch too much around here.)

Our apartment is looking quite festive now. We put up our tree on Saturday but as soon as we got home from church on Sunday, Riley and Joe were back at it, rearranging ornaments just for fun.

They were wearing their aprons (to "help" with dinner) and with the bright winter light streaming in on them and the tree I was momentarily blown away by how quickly they are growing and how precious these moments are with our babies. They are so sweet, and it is a privilege to enter childhood's sacred, magical world with them.



“For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child Himself.”
-Charles Dickens

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