Christmas rituals - christmas cards

My mum used to sit down at the folding green baize card table a few weeks before Christmas and line up the cards, stamp books and her address books, ready to send our christmas wishes across the globe.
With her good fountain pen in her hand she selected each card carefully, wrote a personal letter to each recipiant, and addressed the envelope in flowing copperplate. The pile of addressed envelopes grew, as she methodically worked her way through the Australian and New Zealand friends and relatives, then the european ones. even the UK addresses were tackled geographically, London, Lytham and Manchester first, and finally the local mail. There was a regular trip to the letter box to get the cards off before the post deadlines for 2nd class mail was missed, and a flurry of last minute activity as the local cards were hand delivered en route to christmas parties and carol concerts.
She had a ritual which was hard to beat, although over the years I have done my best, through changing times. Sometimes I think her way was the best way.
I begin with good intentions, I buy my cards early. I have my list of addresses on the computer and review it each year to add new, take off old, and generally trim it into manageable propotions. I've just checked the folder marked xmas on my hard drive, and the lists go back to 1999 - I was always a good administrator.
So why are my cards still sitting on the table waiting to be sent?
It starts with printing the labels. Its never been easy, we used to use Avery labels, and do a mail merge in word, and I remember being close to tears as I battled to get the merge to merge, and the printer to print. then John said, "use MS Outlook - it prints the labels automatically!"
But only if you have the addresses in the address list in outlook. for two years, I battled with the program, making sure that each address was complete and the postal code in England was in a different field to the zip code in America, or the post code in the netherlands. Bill Gates may run a global company, but the techies in the design department don't understand that different countries have different address requirements!
We still used to print out the labels, until last year when John got a dymo label writer for his stamps and we can now use that instead. Last year it made things a lot simpler, and it would have been the same this year, except that I forgot that bit of the system, and spent a fruitless afternoon trying to print to the wrong periferal!
I finally got my labels so on thursday I cleared the table and set out my cards. Before I began, I quickly made an apple crumble and put it in the oven to bake, so I had a nice homey smell going one in the room as I wrote my cards. There was a peaceful hush as I worked my way through the addresses, and added little notes to the cards, just like my mum used to do!
An aside here, I used to send a newsletter around because we lived aboard and it was fun to put together a summary of the year, since I have started blogging I don't do that any more, as I figure that people who are interested get to know a lot about what we are doing when they read the blog, and if they are not interested in the blog, they won't be interested in a news summary either!
Anyway to get back to thursday afternoon. By the time the crumble was baked, the cards were well on the way to being finished, and I was pleased as punch. I was late, but not too late, and these cards would not be arriving after new year!
I just needed the stamps from the computerised stamp system in John's office. I worked out how many I needed, and went to print them out, only to find the stamp program was not cooperating with the label printer since I printed the address labels. beaten by technology again, I waited for John the technical wizard to come home and sort things out.
Today the cards were ready and stamped, and then the snow started. Even if I get them into the post box, the postman is not going to pick up until Sunday night!

An Attitude of Gratitude!

Its minus 2 Celsius outside, and a cosy 20 degrees inside as I write this. Three years ago we installed central heating - the first time in my adult life that I have lived with central heating, and I still feel blessed every morning when I wake up to a warm house.
It has snowed again overnight, a fresh powder over the existing layer. The early morning light is grey and sounds are muffled. My small aging car is sitting under a white blanket which I will have to brush off before I use it later to go to the riding school. I've had a bit of trouble with my Renault Twingo this week, as it does not handle the icy car park, or the unpaved 500 meters of track along the dike to the stables. I still find it amazing that I have a car, after so many years of using public transport; but I am even more grateful for the fact that if I decide my little car cannot make the journey today; I can borrow John's Land Rover, with 4 wheel drive, and go in that!





Yesterday the temperature never went above minus 4 Celsius all day, and at the stables the water pipes were frozen. I am so grateful for everyone there, who cared for our pony enough to bring her water, so she had plenty to drink before we got there, and for knowing that she is warm and dry in her stall, with people watching over her.
I'm behind with my preparations for Christmas, but on Friday we finally brought home the Christmas tree; I wanted to wait so that Jolanda could decorate it with me, but as we came home, lots of her friends were snowballing in the street, so she went off to join in; I am so grateful she has good friends in the neighbourhood.
Creating a festive feel in the living room is sometimes difficult when big boxes of computer components arrive, and take up so much space, but I'm grateful John's business is doing well, and I am also grateful he works from home, we see so much more of each other that way.
I could go on like this all day, I'm grateful for the pretty shops in our village that provided much of my Christmas present shopping within a couple of hours yesterday; I'm also grateful for the internet, which will helped me finish off buying gifts for England today. I'm grateful for my family who have been much more organised than I have, and sent presents in good time for Christmas morning.
It does not take much to generate an attitude of gratitude, but I do believe in counting blessings, we have so much to be grateful for; Happy Christmas!

T'was the night before Christmas

There's nothing like a real tree!
Here's our effort for this year, and despite the bare patch half way up the trunk, where the branches are missing, and the fact that the truck is not straight (compensated neatly by our unique sloping floor as discussed in the previous post) it looks lovely. The presents are stacked under it and the room is lit by candlelight.
We wish everyone a very happy Christmas, and we will be thinking of you as we open the presents you have all sent tomorrow morning

Of Sint, suprises and chocolate fountains!

In Holland it is, of course, known that Sint comes on 5th December, but I do not apologise for this lateness of the post - there are reasons!
We had our first family sint party this year, After 20 odd years here I felt we could finally do the occasion justice, and invited my mother and father as well as my sister, husband and new daughter Sascha to celebrate with us. I wanted them to experience a true Sint festival, and there were two extra reasons for the family gathering. Mam's birthday is on December 4, and its a special event to be able to celebrate it properly, also Mam and Dad would have the opportunity to meet their new granddaughter, as Sascha's passport has still not come through and she cannot travel to the UK.
So how did it all go?
We had a lovely time!

Mam and Dad were delayed 10 hours by snow at Newcastle Airport and did not really arrive in time for Mam's birthday meal, but their taxi drew up as we finished eating, which meant we were all able to kiss and cundle and introduce Sascha, before they were fed and then we all had a lovely piece of birthday cake (with candles of course) and Mam got all her presents.
We took them round to their appartment, and they were able to recover from the journey overnight.

Next morning Jolanda went off early to school, because Sint was coming! Its always a big event at this school, and I watch it from my house with amazement are he arrives each year in a different form of transport.

Over the years he's arrived in boats, vintage cars, coach and horses, Harley Davidson motor bike - you name it he's done it, so I could not think how he would get there this year. We got a clue when I saw some balloons rising above the garden wall further along the street, and yes, this year he came in a "hoog werker"! (what is the name of one of thise things in English?)
Once he came over the wall, and walked into the school, that was our excitment done until our party in the evening, so we had a restful sort of day, finishing off the shopping and sorting out the house.
When Jolanda was home, the real business of the day started! We had our presents ready and hidden in their suprise parcels, and we made an extra parcel for Sascha of an enormous pesent with a bow and balloons, which had a smaller and still smaller present inside (russian doll style!).
We set up the present table, and put each present under a black bin liner so no one could guess before we started who had what.
It was round about this time that Man and Dad realised that they had not grasped the concept of Sint, and started to feel very embarrassed!
No matter, we carried on, and had a lovely night! there are no real food rules for Sint, which always throws me, so I decided to do a dutch style buffet, and brought out the new chocolate fountain as a suprise! I am getting the hang of getting the chocolate flowing, however, in our unique sloping floored living room (our 200 year old house built on bogland has settled comfortably over time!) the chocolate fountain resembles a chocolate waterfall.

The strategy is to stand downhill of the chocolate, and make sure there are no small children under your arm, as you reach out with a marchmallow or strawberry, as there is a tendency for the chocolate to drop onto their hair!
After that, we got down to the present part of the night, and everyone was really happy with their suprises, poems, and presents! All in all a prefect evening, with loads of love and laughter.

And the reason for the lateness of the post? most of the photos were on Penny's camera, and she mislaid her handbag on the way home to Berlin. She has it back now, but I still have very few photos, and I may add more later!

Tweede Kerstdag

Its traditional to go out for a breath of fresh air on Boxing day, to walk off the excesses of the day before and feel as if the holiday was not totally wasted by us being totally wasted!

My family were dressed and ready to go by 1.15 p.m. - a personal record, and we set of for the coast, in full sunshine and full of hope for the easy trip ahead.

First problem: Satnav was not working, but no matter, I know the way!

Second problem: left hand indicator was not working, no matter, just a new bulb needed, as a fuse was out!

Third problem: the Alkmaar Ring....... Its beaten us more times than we care to remember, and this time was no exception. We wanted to go west, but only ring north was open - so no problem, we go round east and north and we will get to the coast in the end!

25km later and there was a glimmer of hope that we would be able to turn west - but we were much further up the coast than our original plan. No problem - we could go to Schoorl!

We joined the other hundreds of cars similarly diverted, and sat in the traffic for another 20 mins.

Tempers were beginning to fray, to say the least, as we finally made it into Schoorl Centrum, found a car park and paid the parking with John muttering we would need LPG before we tried to go back home.

We walked the 100meters into the centrum to be confronted with the main atraction - A HILL.

Only in Holland would you make a hill into an attraction - cafes clustered at the bottom of the 51meter high sand duin, their teraces were full of parents watching offspring struggle up the incline, and abandoned grandparents stood lonely at the bottom as the rest of the family streaked ahead.

We braved the slope, and it was a challenge after years on the flat, but I was not about to be outdone by buxom blonde amsterdammers in high heeled boots and leather trousers, or four year olds little girls powering up it pushing pink babyborn buggies, so, stopping frequently to admire the view, we reached the top, and had a lovely walk in the dunes and pine woods beyond.

We reached a popular outlook point and glimsed the sea in the distance, but any vague idea we had of actually reaching the beach was nonsense; A map of the area would have been essential, as well as emergency rations, and one of those tents Ray Mears seems to be able to knock up in an instant in any sort of terrain!

We felt quite proud of ourselves, as we found our way back though Schoorl and found the car. It was a relief that we found the satnav worked now, and set it to guide us to a garage selling LPG and through the maze of Alkmaar. The first objective was sucessful, but the Alkmaar ring defeated even TomTom, and we ended up in a garden centre Car Park.....