zouzounaki | Entries tagged with holidays

Snurched from just about everyone on my flist:

1 Hot chocolate or Egg nog? Hot chocolate for everyday, egg nog for celebrations.

2 Does Santa wrap the presents or just set them under the tree? Wrap 'em! And he works hard too! ;-)

3 Coloured or white lights on tree/house? I like a combination. Colored on the tree, and mixed on the house.

4 Do you hang mistletoe? Used to but haven't done in years.

5 When do you put your decorations up? As soon as I feel like it, which is usually the first week of December. we used to wait until exactly two weeks before Christmas Eve to get a tree, but we have a fake one now, so we get that up on Thanksgiving.

6 What is your favourite Holiday dish? Duck! Mmm mmmm!

7 Favourite Holiday memory as a child? Going to church on Christmas Eve, to the wonderful St. John's Church in Oyster Bay, New York, gazing up at the gorgeous Tiffany's donated stained glass windows, and afterwards, driving around in the car with my dad to see Christmas lights while my mom got the presents ready.

8 When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? 8 years-old, my Jewish best friend told me.

9 Do you open gifts on Christmas Eve? Yes, the brunt of 'em. It started before I was born, because my parents couldn't stand being woken up at four in the morning! We still get some candy and one or two smaller presents in our stockings on Christmas morning.

10 How do you decorate your Christmas tree? Lights, ornaments, garland. Used to use lots and lots of tinsel when we had a real tree, but no more.

11 Snow! Love it or dread it? LOVE it!

12 Can you ice skate? Er, depends on the level of skill one has to have to officially say yes or no!

13 Do you remember your favourite gift? Yes! My sister, without me knowing, wrote to my favorite author of all time; he sent her a booklet with a little message written for me and a letter. She put it in a book and gave it to me and, at first, I'm thinking, what's so special about this? And then i opened the front cover...

And my Barbie dream house!

14 What is the most important thing about the Holidays for you? Being with family.

15 What is your favourite Holiday dessert? Pumpkin pie.

16 What is your favourite Holiday tradition? Hors d'oeuvres for dinner on Christmas Eve while we watch Christmas specials.

17 What tops your tree? An angel my parents got their first year together.

18 Which do you prefer: giving or receiving? Both, of course!

19 What is your favourite Christmas song? Used to be Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, which I find now to be crushingly depressing since my parents passed on. Silver Bells now because it reminds me of New York.

20 Candy canes! Yuck or yummy? Yummy!

21 Favourite Christmas movie? Probably A Christmas Story. I was really young when my dad got a copy of it before it was for sale; my Aunt Shirley (not an actual relation but a family friend) owned the rights to Red Rider, so she sent us one and I watched it with my dad nonstop for years until other people began discvering it!

Peace, Ghani

1. What are you most thankful for?

Family.

And, on a completely shallow note, my icon!

2. Think back one year, have the things you are thankful for changed?

For the better I think, as last year I was just so happy that we could move on from the awful situation we'd been stuck in for a year. We were in a new place, starting new lives. Now, I'm just thankful for every minute of that new life that we get to share together!

3. What did you feast on yesterday?

Typical: Turkey, cornbread stuffing, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie. Standard but gooood!

4. This time of year is filled with parties, gifts, friends, and family, what are you looking forward to the most?

That marvelous feeling of everything being *right* in the world, if only just for a little while; 'the peace of Christmas Day', as John Denver sang.

5. (insert December holiday here) is coming up, what if anything do you want for it?

To know that I'll be spending many more with my sister.

Peace, Ghani