Merry Christmas!

Or, as the Germans say, frohe Weihnachten.

I am sure I have tons to write, but I won't. I do, however, have a couple of big things.

Big thing one. B opened a gift from a colleague today. She got paint pens. I could see that as soon as she opened them. Apparently, they are scented. From what I can tell, that translates into lip gloss. I come into the living room after saying that I will be in to translate to find my wife and my son with painted lips. That's right. They looked at these huge paint pen looking things with the word Herlitz on them and decided that needed to test them ON THEIR LIPS! The German word happened to be the name of one of the biggest notebook makers here in Germany. They happen to make my favorite notebooks. It was a sad day in the Dalzell household. Of course, you wouldn't have known that by the way I was laughing.

Thing number two. Germans apparently celebrate Christmas on the 24th. Oh cultural differences. My landlord's mom gave us a bag of presents this morning. So, we had to whip out the presents we had planned for them. See, Sarah is a bit of a stained glass fiend. See said examples. She can make some stuff. She has a dozen or so stars (that I don't have uploaded) laying around for the taking. So we got together a handful of large and small stars together with some Christmas cookies (as we had already planned) and delivered them. Then, late afternoon, the doorbell rings. I am expecting my landlord. Who do I find? No one. I mean the walk is empty, and no one is to be found in the driveway. We look at the tag, and it is from the neighbors that we never talk to. I bought the husband a nice bottle of bourbon the last time I was in the U.S., but that is about all the communication we have had. They bought both of the kids presents, and they bought us a bottle of mulled wine. So we had to crank out another little packet of stained glass and cookies. We are done, however. Now we are going to get the kids to bed and wrap up Christmas.

Oh, we also popped popcorn on the stove today (that is typical in Germany) so we could string some popcorn for the tree. By we, I mean Sarah and B. Aiden and I just looked on. Yeah, we suck. But thanks to B and Mom, we have some nice popcorn strands on the tree.

For what it is worth, stovetop popcorn ROCKS! It takes less time than in the microwave, and it is really tasty. It also entertains the hell out of the kids.

Yum Yum.

Also, frohe Wiehnachten und einen guten Rutsch ins neue Jahr.