The Voller Holidays

We had a lovely holiday season! Our first as 4 instead of 3! (yep, we count the dog in that number.) The best thing about the season? We committed to going nowhere and just staying together for 5 WHOLE days! But first, the beginning of December! This is how it went!

We had J's mom's side Christmas party here, which went great! Here the Sheneman bro's and their others, as well as Mike's kids Rissa and Charlie.



We had J's bookclub party here, which was CRAZY! We had a Steve's good friend, Vince, over for a few days from Boston. We all got in the car one day and went to Lake Michigan when he was here. He had never seen it! It was FRIGID, so Celia and I stayed in the car while the boys played on the beach. I mean COLD!! We take walks everyday, but this kind of cold -- no way!





Then around came the 22nd and for the first time we celebrated Solstice. We wouldn't call ourselves Pagen or anything, but we were fascinated by this very ancient celebration of the seasons, which our family is becoming very much apart of as our Year of Local Food kicks off. Interestingly enough, many Solstice rituals are the same as the Christmas rituals and therefore we were already doing and didn't know! Go figure. So having the tree already and a yule log was accomplished. But I still did some special baking and read to Steve why this last day of darkness before the sun started to rise in the sky again was so important to ancient people. It was very nice!




And then came Christmas morning. We were so excited to video Celia's first Christmas I made Steve tape me coming down the stairs carrying Celia (as we used to do as kids) and then video Celia holding a 2007 sign... another Sheneman tradtion from when the only sound of home movies made was a flickering of the film. Then business commenced! Celia loved eating the wrapping paper more than anything. Yet, she was very grateful for 2 soft books (loads of chewing fun!), a little wooden wagon with wooden blocks and a soft teether made of organic cotton (we are now officially scared of any other product's toxicity as I'm sure all parents are!).



Steve opened a few gifts (an I-pod!), Elle opened a bone, and J opened a spice rack, books and few other fun items too. Her Muck Boots are on the way soon :)



After lazing in front of thefire with White Christmas in the background, J set to making their Christmas Dinner. Her first big, and all from scratch dinner. Here we are kneading the bread for our Sage Rolls.



The dinner of Beef Tenderloin, mashed potatoes cakes with leeks and ledin cheese, corn, rolls, and bread pudding was beautiful and thankfully soooooo tasty. After all the hard work, it better be... hahaha!



And the best gift of all!? Celia began, for no known reason, to sleep 5-6 hours in a row.... FINALLY!! We were just coming off of an every 2-3 hour wake up to eat for 1 1/2 months and we're about as fried as an egg on the stove for 4 days. This little bib, a gift from our friends the Brokas, turned out to be the best part of the holiday season!