We had a wonderfully relaxed Christmas here at home in Virginia. Although we would have loved to have spent it with family, it was nice not having to travel this holiday season! On Friday night, we attended a party that we were invited to at a house on our street. It was nice to be invited in to the "neighborhood party" of some of the original homeowners on our street. There was a ton of great food and everyone was extremely nice and friendly to us. It was nice to feel welcome in the new neighborhood!
On Christmas Eve, we opened the presents sent to us from our families in Vermont. We got some great movies from the LaGranges and the Tobins, as well as some games, books, maple syrup and other wonderful presents. Karen also got a warm and snuggly "cozy" blanket/throw from my parents. After we opened the presents, we drove over to the Festival of Lights at Bull Run. It is a 2.5 mile drive through holiday light display with over 60,000 lights. We really enjoyed it, although it would have been a tad bit more special had there been snow on the ground! Sometime during the evening, Delaney asked me if Santa was real, or whether I was Santa. After pausing for a few moments wondering how I should address this astute but ill-timed question, I told her that Christmas Eve was not a good time to ask such questions. She informed me that a boy in her school told her that we (the parents) were really Santa Claus. After a few minutes of fumbling around and not directly answering the question, she proclaimed that she firmly believed in Santa Claus. Ben agreed, although, I suspect that he wants us to think he really believes….but is probably quite skeptical. We eventually got the kids settled into bed (albeit very late) so that we could put the presents under the tree.
On Christmas morning, Delaney was first to sound the alarm that Santa had arrived and eaten the cookies (yum!). She had also left him a bag of change that she had accumulated, but Santa left a note politely informing her that Santa didn’t need money and that she should save it to buy something special for herself. This likely sealed the deal on another 12 months of belief in Santa. After gathering around the tree and opening stockings, we piled into the presents. Karen got me a great Sony Dream Machine clock/CD/radio for the bedroom, a really nice sweater with zippered collar, a new wallet and money clip and many other great presents. I bought Karen a Tassimo Hot Beverage System for making coffee, capuccino, hot chocolate, etc. She had seen one at a friend’s house and thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread. It makes individual drinks in 60 seconds using "T-discs" that contain the material to be brewed. Each T-disc has a barcode on it that the machine reads as it prepares the drink to the exacting specifications for the perfect cup, every time. I have to admit that I was skeptical, but I am now convinced that this is one cool gadget! I also bought her a nice robe, slippers and warm pajamas, as well as a nice Liz Claiborne sweater with a sherpa neckliner and a ton of new Kitchen-Aid kitchen utensils among other things. I also bought Karen and Delaney each a Yoga Mat and inflatable balancing balls to feed their interest in Yoga. Ben and Delaney got a lot of new toys, board games, PC games and music CDs.
I bought Ben an "Axis and Allies" board game where you play out the D-Day scenario with alternating series of moves and battles that are conducted with rolls of the die. It is part strategy/skill and part luck (roll of the die). We are still in the midst of our first game which we are playing out over several days. He is the playing the Axis and I am playing the Allies. We are currently steeped in pitched battle for control of Caen. We are also amassing troops outside of St Lo. I have not yet made a play for the third city of Cherbourg. Unfortunately, Ben has amassed a huge tank force within the city of Caen, and I will be lucky to survive the battle. If I lose Caen, I will be hard pressed to recover and win the war. He has been doing very well with almost no coaching from dear old dad.
I have also spent a fair amount of time during the holidays doing Genealogy research. I was able to locate an ancestor of the Brandstrup family from Denmark and have been in contact with him via e-mail. We have traded Genealogy information that has benefitted us both. I was able to tear down a brick wall in his research by providing the descendants of my great grandparents Herbert and Mary (Brandstrup) Nathan. I was able to pull in a long line of Brandstrup history with over 600 individuals dating back to the 1600s! I have still been trying to break through the brick wall I have hit with respect to my great grandfather Jacob Klein’s genealogy. I have confirmed that he was born in Jan 1868 in Hungary and immigrated to the US in 1882, where he married Jessie Jacobs and had 4 children (Bernard, Joseph, Louis and Jules (my grandfather)). Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find anything else out. I did conduct a search of the 1869 Hungarian census and turned up 3 Jacob Kleins that were born in 1869, but haven’t been able to connect any other dots to see if one of these is indeed my great grandfather. I will keep searching! I did stumble upon a new Genealogy website called GenCircles that apperas to be pretty good for doing research (in addition to Ancestry.com which has been a huge resource for me). GenCircles is free and has a smart matching tool that goes out and identifies possible matches to your Genealogy after you upload your genealogy files. The smartmatching takes 24-72 hours, so I will let you know if it has any success in a day or two…..although I did do a couple of manual searches and found that there is a LOT of info on this website/database.
itz pretty cool!
