Holidays in Our House

I was raised Jewish and Eric Catholic, so now we do both.  I think we're confusing the neighbors.  Chanukah was early this year, and during the holiday I had both an electric menorah in the window and a real one indoors.

I figure putting a real menorah, with lit candles and all, in the window is just a recipe for disaster.  Chanukah's been over for a while, as it was early this year.  Our tradition is to get together with my family, this year at my sister's house, and have brisket sandwiches and latkes (potato pancakes), and exchange gifts.

Well, this week we finally got our Christmas tree.  I'd be happy to get it earlier, but Eric likes to wait.  Doesn't he know how impatient I am?  True to his "tradition," he got one that was too tall for the house, so he had to cut it down.

Doofy.

We started to decorate with our all-white lights, and then realized that we had higher ceilings in the new place, and so our tree this year is lots bigger than last year's tree.  The lights looked pathetic!  So off to the stores we went, and got some blue lights too.

They're all the same sort of LEDs, but the blue likes to glow a lot, not sure why.  Our ornaments were already primarily blue and silver themed, but with some "us" ones thrown in for good measure.

Like this fish for Eric, a scuba diver and keeper of fish, and this menorah for me.

This photo of us from our honeymoon in Ireland (at the Cliffs of Moher) and cool New Orleans fleur de lis (the gold, green, and purple hidden in the branches).

Santa on an alligator, also from New Orleans, and this blown glass.

And this great Fima clay pinecone we bought from Lesley Porter (and the cute squirrel that works so well with it) and this beautifully crocheted snowflake I won from LissaBee.

Plus, we've got our stockings out.

One of the things I love at this season is Secret Santa exchanges.  I organized one at the Handmade Artists Forum, and my Santa was Gina Dahl, of Dahlish.

She got me the best gift!

I started to teach myself to knit, you see, several years ago when I was in a show, playing a pregnant woman who needed to be knitting on stage.  Because I'd have to act while knitting, I only taught myself the knit stitch so I could get really good at it and make it a mechanical motion and not be distracted.  But I've really wanted to pick it up again.

So Gina got me a knitting kit, complete with incredibly soft yarn, knitting needles, instructions, and yarn needles (plus some chocolate and a knitted necklace she made me)!

I can't wait to start knitting my own slipper socks!