scandals, virgins, birds and bees...Merry Christmas!

I attended the Peace Mennonite Church Christmas pageant this evening, and it really got me thinking...all these kids are participating in this story and discussing Mary's scandalous pregnancy onstage...how many of them understand exactly what the nature of the scandal is? How many of them went home from rehearsal this month and said, "Mommy, what does it matter that she wasn't married? What does a husband have to do with having a baby anyway? What's a virgin?"

The virgin birth must be a great conversation starter for many a parent looking to educate their children in the manner of birds and bees!

this post has nothing to do with Christmas

I was reading a news report on the death of Oscar Peterson, and there is a brief quote by Hazel McCallion, the mayor of Mississauga. Once again, I found myself exclaiming, "Oh my goodness, she's STILL the mayor of Mississauga?!?!"

Hazel McCallion is on of those people who really has no great significance in my life, but who shows up as this random blip on my radar from time to time. She piques my interest. To sum it up in a nutshell, she is 86 years old and has been the mayor of Mississauga since four years before I was born. Apparently she doesn't really need to campaign anymore, as in her most recent election (her 11th for mayor) she got 91% of the vote.

Upon reading her Wikipedia article today, I learned that she is also a devout Christian and that she has never been labeled a feminist. I think the next time someone asks me who I would have coffee with if I could pick anyone in the world, I will pick her.

houston, we have a problem

I believe my tear ducts have undergone some sort of growth spurt. Or something. Over the past few years, I have noticed myself getting choked up at movies more and more frequently. My crying-at-movies reached an all-time low (high?) while watching Elf this week. That's right, I shed a few tears in a Will Ferrell movie because all the Christmas spirit got to me.

classic snow art

If they're too small to read, just click on them.

think about it

parties and family do's...yup, it's December!

I had a really good weekend...not this most recent weekend but the one before. I've been meaning to post about it, but I've been waiting for my friend to send me pictures, but that hasn't happened yet so I'm going to post about it anyway.

First of all, I had a phone call from a really good friend, and we had some good girl talk about ex-boyfriends and moving on. I don't have a lot of girly friends out here, so it was especially fun for me to chat with her.

Then I made a simple lemon loaf to bring to Aaron's aunt and uncle's Christmas family thing. I got a couple of very flattering compliments about it, which made me feel super-good and very accepted by the in-laws! It was fun.

And finally, I spent about 6 hours on Sunday at a friend's house, experimenting with chocolate. We were trying to make our own liqueur-filled chocolates, and it took a lot of experimentation and sampling! Word to the wise: Caramel Bailey's + dark chocolate = TO DIE FOR. Finally, we made a big batch of hazelnut truffles, and I got my hands COVERED in chocolate and I got to lick them off and wash it down with another shot of Caramel Bailey's. There are pictures, hopefully I'll get to post them soon.

rats & rainbows

Hello everyone! I have finally had a few days that are worth mentioning on this blog!

Sam and Annemarie visited us last weekend, and we did the usual pilgrimage to pay homage to the Swedish furniture gods. Since Aaron and I weren't interested in buying anything, we amused ourselves by hiding stuffed beavers, hedgehogs, and hippos throughout the various furniture displays. My favourite was the hippo that we squashed into a kitchen garbage bin that was labeled "look inside"...he practically jumped out of the bin when you opened it!

So, after a few good laughs, we figured we were finished, so we went downstairs into the huge kitchenwares section to find Sam and Annemarie. But lo and behold! Right at the bottom of the stairs was a huge bin of plush rats, just the perfect size for putting into jars and such! So we gathered up an armful and got busy. My favourites were the rat in the wineglass, the three rats in glass cannisters (they looked like mimes trying to get out of their glass boxes) and the rat that we shoved into a vase that had a very narrow neck but was quite large and round below the neck. I'm sure nobody will ever get it out! Oh, and perhaps my favourite of all was the rat that we flattened in the middle of a stack of clear glass mixing bowls. Pancake rat! My tummy hurt from laughing.

On a different note: There have been several fantastic rainbows in the past few days. It has something to do with clouds getting bunched up against the mountains, but when the sun gets low enough over the ocean to peek under the clouds, everything just lights up like crazy! It's very beautiful, and it makes people on the street smile and comment to one another and take pictures.