С Новым Годом! Happy New Year!

 
Tonight the biggest celebration of the year starts. There will be endless fireworks for the next few days I imagine. Fireworks can be bought at practically every store and almost everybody sets off quite a big display of them on their own. I remember last year watching a bunch of young guys lighting some down by the playground at 3:30am? They had a few ones go off at the wrong time and in the wrong direction. There must be hundreds of injuries every New Year's. A big group of older ladies stood in a circle and kept taking turns lighting the fireworks they brought, of course they were drinking champagne and chocolate as they went. It is nice not having to drive somewhere to see the fireworks, we can just watch the ones that our neighbours will set off- hope they bought some good ones this year!:) 

New Year's Decorations

 
 
 
 
The first tree is outside of the Church of Our Savior, the 2nd at Red Square, the third is in front of the Bolshoi theatre and the last one (with the orange) is at the mall where I buy groceries (and where we get McDonald's:) The santa guys were playing jingle bells and all the classics that we know. There are trees like the first three everywhere, they are really big but not really decorated too fancy, but i think they look really great at night. When I was at Red Square I could see that it would be amazing there at night as all the buildings had white lights lining them. Tonight there will be a huge concert there- they were setting up the stage when I was there, right next to St. Basil's. There was a skating rink which you can see sort of in the 2nd picture, but it is up high so unless you pay to get in you can't watch the skaters- too bad, I was planning on watching some of the older ones twirl around, some of the older men here are amazing skaters. 

A ride on the sled

 
 
 
We've got a good amount of snow now, and it looks like we will get more snow everyday for the next week or so. Emma and Josiah have colds (david too) so just Huddy and I ventured out today. Huddy had lots of fun, probably nice for him to be the only kid for a change, we could go whatever direction he desired. It really looks nice outside now. Getting to look like Christmas! Everyone is busy buying vodka, beer and champagne getting ready for New Year's Eve. They have their little granny carts that they are pulling behind them full of booze and the occasional cake and chocolates. New Year's is their most celebrated and biggest holiday of the year. Jan.1st is when they have the tree and presents- christmas trees are called New Year's Trees here. We are going over to celebrate with our Irish friends on Jan. 1st- we might even set off some fireworks. It is too dangerous for kids to be out on the street New Year's Eve so we decided to do it the next night. 

More colour ones....

 
 
 
 
Andy knows who the first guy is... If you are wondering what anything/who anyone is just leave a question and I'll figure it out if I don't already know. 

more black and white ones

 
 
 
 
remember you can click on them to enlarge them, more to come soon 

My First Holiday Walk

 
 
 
 
Today, I went out walking around in the center of Moscow by myself. I really enjoyed just wandering around, not having to worry about the time or the kids. All I needed to know is that when it got dark out it would be time to head home for supper. I would have walked around really fast but the sidewalks were pure ice so I had to go slow but I still managed to see quite a few new buildings and other sights. While I was on the metro I noticed some tourists trying to figure out when to get off, they really were glad that I was there to help them translate some things. I also enjoyed listening to an american guy with his russian girl, they couldn't understand much of what the other was saying, lots of hand movements and acting things out. I like going downtown and seeing the things that tourists see, Moscow is beautiful...sometimes I forget:) Anyway, here are some of the pictures I took today. 

 
 
 
  

My 3 favorite men...

 
Today really felt like our first holiday, we have no plans at all until Jan. 15th. What will we do? The kids are enjoying having Daddy home and so am I. I had a real nap today (something I never do) so I imagine I'll be up late tonight but that is ok with me:) We have a few ideas of things we would like to do, David wants to have the Banya treatment again and a haircut, I want to roam the streets of Moscow seeing things I've never seen before and the kids probably would like to get to the zoo or something like that. I have heard there is a skating rink this year at Red Square. Maybe we will spend one day all together, then the next day David can go out alone and then the next day I will go out alone, we could rotate like that or something. Our language teacher is away otherwise we would probably continue with our language studies. We will start back with the studying and culture outings etc. one week before our teacher returns but we won't have class to go to. We don't really mind having nothing to do though:) We have a little more snow now but still nothing impressive, I'm still hoping for a huge dump. There are fireworks going off every night already getting ready for the New Year Celebrations. Even though it is dark in the late afternoon, people always seem to set off their fireworks late at night when we are finally in bed. I don't mind the noise of the fireworks so much, but it is the car alarms that go off because of the booms that drive us crazy. We better have naps on the 31st because I'm sure we won't sleep to well that night! 

flying cat

 
 
 
3 more of tishka's favorite activities. He loves to sleep, usually he tries to get in a good rest when the boys are sleeping:), he too doesn't like wallpaper and has started ripping it off in places that are too high for me to reach. Tishka sits on top of the door very often (I guess it is also a place to get away from Huddy the tail puller) and to get down he just flies, sometimes onto the bed but sometimes straight onto the ground. 

Huddy still loves the bath

 
 
 
 
Huddy has always loved taking baths. The cat likes it when Huddy takes a bath cause it gives him a chance to relax too. Huddy and Tishka (the cat) have a real love/hate kinda thing going on. They can't leave eachother alone. Most of the time they are fighting (huddy has a few scratches like the one on his face:) and Tishka has a sore tail) but sometimes you'll find them enjoying eachother. Huddy had gotten a fork from the kitchen and was putting the kitty food on the fork and trying to feed it to Tishka. They both tried hard to make it work but it always fell on the ground. Tishka just would eat it and then Huddy would get him another one on the fork. It was pretty sweet. We are trying to teach Huddy to leave the cat alone but he just can't stop. Maybe he will get bored of sitting on the poor cat eventually. 

Yummy House!

 
 
 
Today we had a light lunch and then ate the house for dessert. We stopped when Huddy's tummy looked like it couldn't fit any more cookie in it:) 

Two of Emma's Gifts

 
Emma got one more Narnia DVD- she has the Silver Chair and now the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (and she has the newer one too). She is a Narnia Nerd. She can't believe I haven't read them all and can't understand why I don't want to sit and listen to her Narnia Cd's with her all day long. If you ask her about any of the characters she will tell you their complete history and how they all fit together etc. David got her this DVD and as you can see even some turkish delight to eat with it! How Perfect! She can't wait till she can read all the Narnia books by herself... 

Christmas Eve Service

 
 
 
I didn't take any pics of the Christmas Eve service on Sunday (except these ones of the boys playing in the nursery) but I did take a video of a Christmas Drama that I will put on sometime soon. It was a great service.... Unfortunately it slipped my mind that I had brought my camera until the carols were over- it was great singing. I really like it when the song is in Russian but is a song I know in English- then I can sing out and only have to concentrate on the words. I am just making some more christmas foods as we are off to celebrate Christmas with our moscow team. There are only 3 couples here now so that means we have to make more than one thing if we are to have a complete meal. I am bringing an appetizer, salad, cranberry sauce, green beany thing and a dessert as well. Oh, and a drink too. I am enjoying the cooking though- trying 3 new recipes, pretty risky! Better get back to it...Happy Boxing Day!