Monday Morning Musings

I have been tagged by my buddy Pea to do a 12 Christmas Things About Me Hoopla! This should be fun!

1. List 12 random things about yourself that have to do with Christmas.2. Please refer to it as a ‘hoopla’ and not the dreaded ‘m’-word…3. You have to tag specific people when you’re done. No “if you’re reading this, consider yourself tagged” stuff is allowed…then nobody ends up actually doing it. The number of people who you tag is really up to you — but the more, the merrier to get this ‘hoopla’ circulating through the blogosphere.4. Please try and do it as quickly as possible. The Christmas season will be over before we know it! Let’s involve as many people as possible!5. Please give Andrea some link-love as the “Hoopla-Creator!

1. As with many of you when we were children Christmas Eve I just couldn't get to sleep in anticipation of the Christmas festivities the next morning! My parents would finally have to 'put their foot down' and tell us to stay in bed until at least 6 AM!!

2. That was the longest night but well worth the wait! We'd always have a stocking with an orange in the toe and hard candy and small gifts. We had our stocking first and then opened our gifts.

3. We always opened one gift Christmas Eve and we usually picked the biggest one!

4. I used to be teased by my family as I would take the tree down Christmas night and put everything away to get the house back in order! I'm much more laid back now and keep the trees up till New Years usually.

5. I have always liked to have the movie Christmas Vacation on while decorating the tree ever since it came out which was quite a number of years ago now.

6. I don't like the movie It's A Wonderful Life and don't really know why, just can't get into it.

7. We always have wassail Christmas Eve along with other goodies. The smell of the wassail simmering on the stove just makes my mouth water. I have a great recipe and I guess I should post it.

8. Before all the malls came along downtown was beautiful at Christmastime. They really decorated and had carolers singing. It was magical when it was snowing at night with the street lights giving off their soft yellow glow. I always tried to do my shopping at night.

9. When we were kids we used to go with my father down to my grandfather's farm and get a tree or Dad would bring one home from where he was working in the woods. They weren't perfectly shaped like they are now. The dog always drank the tree stand water!

10. One year I surprised my sister by flying my parents home from Florida and putting them in a great big box. My sister had been over that afternoon helping me decorate my tree and I called her and said that the cat had knocked the tree over (big lie!) and could she help me get it back together. She came right over and there was the big box and I said go ahead open it and out popped my parents and my sister burst into tears she was so happy!

11. Now days we have a big get together with our family and DIL's family on Christmas Eve. Everyone brings goodies to eat before we open gifts. The wassail is simmering and sometimes I have carols playing but with such a big crowd you can't always hear them! We are a rather noisy bunch!

12. Christmas morning we go over to Son and DIL's house early to watch T and D open their gifts there. I get the turkey in before we leave so when we come home the house smells wonderful. The rest of our crowd arrives about 11 and we eat about 12:30 and visit until about 3 or 4 then everyone goes home. It's a busy day and I love it! If Christmas falls on Sunday we go to church first and then everyone meets at our house after.

Here it is Monday. We had a huge storm on yesterday. It was glorious! Everything was cancelled as the roads were a mess. Even church was cancelled which I hate especially this time of year with all of the Christmas festivities. So what does one do when everything is cancelled?????? You go snowmobiling! Son called and said that he and T & D would be over shortly and for me to get ready. Well getting ready for me is having to register my snowmobile..........online no less and then my printer wouldn't work for some unknown reason so Son had to send it to Hubby's printer and we finally were able to go.
T went with me as she is older then D and can ride behind me in her nicely heated seat and heated handle grips with a back rest to hold her in place. It was just BEAUTIFUL out with the snow coming down rather briskly at times. On the woods trails it was warm but out in the open fields it was really windy and cold. We didn't stay out too long as I had worn the wrong gloves and T was getting cold too.Soooooooooo we headed home thinking about the hot cocoa and pumpkin bread that was awaiting us. One part of the trail is a bit slanted so I always feel like I am riding on the side of a hill, which I don't like until the trails are a bit better. We were going really slow, maybe about 3 mph and wouldn't you know it one of my skis slipped off the trail into the soft snow. It was just steep enough that we just slowly tipped over...........

I climbed out from under the machine and T wasn't making a peep which scared me just about out of my wits as you can well imagine. I felt sick thinking that she might be hurt. I turned to her and she finally spoke and said that her leg was under the machine and she couldn't get out. Talk about all kinds of scenarios, broken bones, hospital, air lifting out of the trail, they all went through my head in one fleeting second.

I looked up and Son was running towards us and he pushed the machine up enough so that I could get her out and she was fine, the soft snow had cushioned her leg. She decided she would ride with Daddy the rest of the way home! (can't say as I blame her!) Well D had to ride with me but he didn't seem to mind, nice to be young. We were only about 15 minutes from home and made it the rest of the way without incident. Needless to say I won't take that particular trail EVER again! I am just so thankful that she is fine. I would have never forgiven myself if she had gotten hurt. I asked her if she would ever ride with me again and she said 'Sure Grammie'! My heart melted.

Wassail Recipe

6 cups of apple cider or juice

1 cinnamon stick

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

3 Tablespoons lemon juice

1/4 cup honey

1 large can unsweetened pineapple juice

Bring to boil first two ingredients and simmer for 5 minutes covered.

Add rest of the ingredients stirring to mix and heat.

At this point you can serve it but it is much better to make it the day before and reheat.

Serve hot. (I always double this for a group of 20 or more.)