Merry Christmas!!

We hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas, a Happy New Year, and all your wishes come true for 2008.

I've been tagged - Male Edition

Since my DW was tagged, and I don't have any TMI stories to share right now, I figured I would tag myself and join in the fun.

Christmas Meme

1. Egg nog or Hot Chocolate?
Egg nog. I hunt for different varieties for just drinking and then premium for the Christmas morning special: Egg nog, rum and sometimes cinnamon. Mmmm.

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree?
Who is this Santa person? We wrap everything and then try to save the paper for next year; usually is a lost cause.

3. Coloured lights on tree/house or white?
Very few plain white lights look good to me. I like the colours, I like the blinking and I like the ones that have random patterns.

4. Do you hang mistletoe?
Nope. But bring some cheerleaders into the neighbourhood and that might change.

5. When do you put your decorations up?
When my wife says to.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish?
I also love baked ham. I love turkey with real cranberry jelly. I love the Trini dishes my wife has gotten so good at making.

7. Favorite Holiday memory as a child.
Having family friends Parang at our house, three o'clock in the morning. Walking into the smell of fresh bread and sweetbread and other baking my mother did while we were out at midnight mass. Waking in the morning, opening gifts, eating breakfast with everyone, eggnog all day, and on and on.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa?
When I realized that the guy in the red suit kept changing each time I saw him.

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas eve?
As a child, we used to get to open one gift before bed. Everything else waited until we woke up Christmas morning. It was quite a time. Now, we do it all on Christmas day.

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree?
I like a full tree. Something on every branch basically. Blinking things, things that makes sound, spray snow, the works!

11. Snow! Love it or dread it?
I love snow, hate the extreme cold and wind chill.

12. Can you ice skate?
I can watch it on TV without gagging but my incredible sh*tty sense of balance keeps me off skates and the children safe.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift?
I am a do or die Toronto Maple Leafs hockey fan. Since Pam and I got together, she has know that Saturday night is called HNIC (Hockey Night in Canada) night in our house. She has heard me saying "Dougie" this and "Dougie" that as No. 93 Doug Gilmour is my favourite player of all time. So, she sneakily goes off and buys me a rather expensive, authentic Gilmour jersey for Christmas about three years ago. I was speechless and I cried as it was the single most significant gift that anyone has ever given to me because I had not asked for it, did not expect it and it was something that means so much to me. I am tearing up now just thinking of the day. Next.

14. What is the most important thing about the Holidays for you?
Family. Food. Drink. But mainly family (and friends).

15. What is your favorite Holiday dessert?
Don't really have one but I love creme brulee, which Pam makes exceptionally well.

16. What is your favorite Holiday tradition?
Going Paranging early Christmas morning. To explain quickly, it means going from house to house of family and friends, waking them up, to share some food and drink and best wishes for the season. I will try to find a link that explains it better.

17. What tops your tree?
An angel. It has been in my family for over 30 years.

18. Which do you prefer giving or receiving?
Both :)

19. What is your favorite Christmas song?
Nat King Cole - A Christmas Song. If this does not play in my house, it is not Christmas. Lots of other classics from Bing Crosby and others plus some more contemporary favourites from Destiny's Child, Barenaked Ladies, Mariah Carey, Boys To Men, Sounds of Blackness and others.

20. Candy Canes! Yuck or Yum?
Yum. Big ones that take a week to finish.


So, I'll tag:
Famine
Wizdom
Spiff

I've been tagged

I've been tagged by Daisy. Since I met and married V. I've come to love celebrating Christmas with him and his family, although I do celebrate Channukah with my family (a bit). I'll answer the questions as best I can. :)


Christmas Meme

1. Egg nog or Hot Chocolate?
Hot Chocolate, with marshmallows. Can't stand the taste or texture of egg nog.

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree?
I don't know. Doesn't he bring them wrapped? ;) (Personally, I wrap.)

3. Coloured lights on tree/house or white?
Both. We've got coloured lights some of which are static and others flash. V. likes the movement. We've only got one string of static coloured lights up on the house, only because we've just not had the time but I like those white icicle lights.

4. Do you hang mistletoe?
Nope.

5. When do you put your decorations up?
The lights outside never come down. The tree goes up when we get around to it, on occasion as late as the 23rd. This year it was up on the 8th as we were hosting a Christmas poker potluck.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish?
I love baked ham.

7. Favorite Holiday memory as a child.
Going to family friends who grew up with my Dad for Christmas day. Closest we ever got to celebrating Christmas.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa?
Never was an issue as a jewish kid. :)

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas eve?
V. and I sometimes give each other a gift as midnight strikes on the 25th.

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree?
Lights, bells, balls and tinsel garlands and V. has a drummer boy set which can either hang in the tree or set up underneath and plays a variety of christmas carols on bells.

11. Snow! Love it or dread it?
I love snow, hate the cold.

12. Can you ice skate?
Yes but haven't for years.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift?
I think it was the first Christmas V. and I celebrated and he surprised me with a Se.ga Dream.cast.

14. What is the most important thing about the Holidays for you?
Family

15. What is your favorite Holiday dessert?
Not a fan of dessert really. Usually too full by that time.

16. What is your favorite Holiday tradition?
Since I met V, it's making the traditional Trinidadian Christmas fare, like Black Cake, Sorrel and Ponch de Creme and often amazing friends who can't believe a white, Jewish girl can do this.

17. What tops your tree?
An angel.

18. Which do you prefer giving or receiving?
Both :)

19. What is your favorite Christmas song?
O Holy Night by Sounds of Blackness (from the Night Before Christmas album). This is one of my favourite Christmas albums. If you like Gospel, you have to hear it. This is the closest I can get to providing a sound bite - http://www.mp3.com/albums/56850/summary.html

20. Candy Canes! Yuck or Yum?
Yuck. Not really a fan of peppermint.


So, I'll tag:
Patti
Thrice
Baby Step
Gil
and Aurelia

CD17

Well, it's CD17 of a normal cycle. Not much is going on. V. is sick with this cold that seems to be primarily a cough. Normally not a big deal except that last Thursday he had such a violent bout of coughing, we ended up in Emerg because he'd pulled or torn a muscle in his rib cage. He's now got to deal with a great deal of pain if he coughs and is trying very hard a) not to cough and b) not to re-injure himself. And on top of that, we get 25cm of snow on Sunday. Being the kind of man that he is, he insists that he's not going to let me clear it myself. We've got a double driveway that is about 1.5 car lengths long. Thank goodness we have a snow blower otherwise I'd have shovelled out two paths on each side to fit the wheels of the cars. Needless to say, we've got a nice clear drive, and with the supposed mild weather we're supposed to be getting (at least Toronto), it is supposed to all melt by Christmas. However, we live just east of Toronto, so I'm not sure that applies to us. I'll post some snow pics later.


(Sorry for the really disjointed post. Life is quite boring as we move towards our FET.)

I'm home!

Finally, I'm home for good. Well, at least until January some time. I spent the last 7 days in Dal.las, which was nice from a weather perspective. However, my colleague who was doing the work down there with me was sick and being a man, doesn't know how to suck it up and do his share. Needless to say, I probably did about 80% of the work. However, I came home sick, again. Hopefully I can shake this quickly. We're hosting our annual Christmas Poker Potluck on Saturday (our turn this year) and I've got a few things to prep for that, as well as help V. get the house in order and the tree up. Then, next week is our annual Christmas Open House, so I've got to start baking and planning for that next.

I know V. already did, but I wanted to thank everyone for their kind words on my last post. It means a lot knowing that most of you can relate to the loss one feels. Since I've basically been working non-stop since mid way through the 2WW, I've not really had a chance to sit and be with V. I'm looking forward to finally being able to just snuggle up with him and watch tv or whatever.

We're planning on doing the FET in late January. We couldn't have done it this month because CD1 came while I was in Dal.las and I wouldn't have been able to get to the clinic on CD2. So, we've decided that we'll do it in late January. By my calculations, if my cycles stay their normal 28 days, I should get my next cycle at the end of this month, and then the January cycle should be in the 3rd week. I have one more business trip which is supposed to be in January and we want to wait until it's done with. I'm pushing for that trip to be the week of January 14th so I'm back well before I expect the next cycle. There shouldn't be a problem with that. And since that trip is in Calif.ornia, I'm hoping that V. can take some time and come on that one.

So, things are moving along. I've got enough to keep me busy until then.

If anyone would like to join us for the Open House, please let me know and I'll include you on the Evite.

Feliz Navidad!