@Patsy Faye , Sometimes I do wonder where my brain is hiding. Now I just have to figure out if I can make two lines in my signature. I do hope you are well soon. Santa should bring you that this year, you know, good health. I think you do a great job staying your chipper self. @Denise Happyfeet , I too look for @Ike Willis first thing, he is always like a shot of cheer, and a great way to start the day. Oh, and can my destination be Tom Selleck too? I just want to stare, no touching, I promise! Denise, "slickery", definition please, but I do agree it looks yummy. This humanoid would like to try so many of the different goodies @Terry Page shows us. @Bobby Cole is another man that is also a very good cook. My Michael was better at appreciating food, and I did my best to avoid his "cooking", if you could call throwing all the leftovers he could find in the icebox together and dumping Louisiana hot sauce on top cooking. @Terry Page I know I could Google it, but I'm trying to wrap packages today, sooo yeah, that's my excuse, but why is your Christmas a week earlier than ours? Oh, and please tell Lisa I like the way she dressed up for your Christmas day. By the way who made your crowns? @Babs Hunt, I hope you have a good Christmas week. Do you get to Skype or FaceTime with your grandbabies on Christmas day. I hope so, it makes the distance bearable.
It's 9:30 am here we overslept so just waking up with coffee, it's still dark and 1c just above freezing, nothing much planned though Lisa has several errands to run. Have a good Monday everyone.... The reason we have our Christmas early @Ina I. Wonder is because I leave for home in the UK on Friday 23rd, so we always celebrate on the weekend before I leave. The Russian Christmas day is on the 7th January, by the old Orthodox calendar. The 25th December is a normal working day, in fact the New Year is celebrated much more than Christmas day which is not so important here.
The Christmas Cracker The hats/crowns come out of the Christmas Crackers @Ina I. Wonder which are traditional in the UK Christmas crackers are a traditional Christmas favorite in the UK. They were first made in about 1845-1850 by a London sweet maker called Tom Smith. He had seen the French 'bon bon' sweets (almonds wrapped in pretty paper). He came back to London and tried selling sweets like that in England and also included a small motto or riddle in with the sweet. But they didn't sell very well. However, one night, while he was sitting in front of his log fire, he became very interested by the sparks and cracks coming from the fire. Suddenly, he thought what a fun idea it would be, if his sweets and toys could be opened with a crack when their fancy wrappers were pulled in half. Crackers were originally called 'cosaques' and were thought to be named after the 'Cossack' soldiers who had a reputation for riding on their horses and firing guns into the air! When Tom died, his expanding cracker business was taken over by his three sons, Tom, Walter and Henry. Walter introduced the hats into crackers and he also traveled around the world looking for new ideas for gifts to put in the crackers. The company built up a big range of 'themed' crackers. There were ones for bachelors and spinsters (single men and women), where the gifts were things like false teeth and wedding rings! There were also crackers for Suffragettes (women who campaigned to get women the vote), war heroes and even Charlie Chaplain! Crackers were also made for special occasions like Coronations. The British Royal Family still has special crackers made for them today! Very expensive crackers were made such as the 'Millionaire's Crackers' which contained a solid silver box with a piece of gold and silver jewerly inside it! The Christmas Crackers that are used today are short cardboard tubes wrapped in colorful paper. There is normally a Cracker next to each plate on the Christmas dinner table. When the crackers are pulled - with a bang! - a colorful party hat, a toy or gift and a festive joke falls out! The party hats look like crowns and it is thought that they symbolise the crowns that might have been worn by the Wise Men.
Thank you @Terry Page - enjoyed reading about the crackers Thank you @Ina I. Wonder - much appreciated x
@Ina I. Wonder Yes, I Skype sometimes with my Family in Texas...but right now that is not very much fun as our two year old granddaughter loves to play with the keys on the computer while we're talking and "accidently" disconnects us quite often. I don't have FaceTime since my cell is just a basis talk phone. But for Christmas Eve since we will be with our other children and grandkids...they have both these forms of communication so I'm sure we will all be Skypeing and FaceTiming with the ones in Texas! We were blessed to have those in Texas here with us for the first two weeks of December...so I feel in my heart that we had some "Christmas" time with them.
Good Morning Everyone! Gosh it's hard to believe the day before yesterday it was almost 80 degrees and this morning it is 33 degrees with a wind chill of 21 degrees. It feels even colder at our home since our cozy Acadiana cottage is up on blocks and hasn't been updated to help keep the cold out. You can feel the cold coming up through the floorboards. I am thinking about adding a nice area rug in our livingroom to help insulate the floor there. I think that would help some. I love our cottage but it's cold in the wintertime and I don't like turning the heating system up high either. Oh to be young again and not have the cold bother these old bones of mine! It's going to be a good day even with the cold because I'm alive, I'm loved, I have everything I need...I am blessed. And I hope all of you are blessed this fine cold morning too!
Mornin'. Here high atop the third floor, back apartment, I look out on an ally that is still frozen at -1 degrees that feels like -13, factoring in that evil thing called "wind chill". I began my school career in 1945. We never heard of "wind chill". Schools were open and on time, and we were expected to be there. If we wanted to play outside, we did. What the heck happened to kids? Today is the day the electoral college does their voting, despite all the threats of violence should they not vote the way the left wishes. Think about it. Had Hillary won, those are the kind of people that would be in power over America. The kind that beat others for wearing a Trump hat or with a Trump bumper sticker. Yesterday there was some posts about Tom Selleck. I have a Tom Selleck story. My real last name sounds much like Selleck but is spelled much different. When my youngest son was 7 years old, he told his teacher and classmates that Tom Selleck was an uncle with our last name, and that Tom changed his last name after he became famous, so we wouldn't be bothered by his fans. Maybe I'll change my name to "Selleck". My name is simple enough to pronounce, as it is. Yet, Few strangers can. I speak clearly when asked my name. But, near every time, it will be repeated back to me in some other way. I'll repeat my name, they'll say it differently, but still wrong. I just want to slap the snot out of them so bad. Well, I better check my liberal traps. In a few short hours we'll see how the vote turns out, and the libs are getting frantic. Keep your powder dry.
Why @Ike Willis we all grew up and are on the senioronly.club Forum now! So Tom Selleck was your Uncle...now that you mention that I can definitely see how you resemble him. He got the acting genes and you got the writing ones. Love your stories Ike. And as much as I like Tom Selleck and think he's a hunk...here's my favorite hunk(besides my Honey of course) Sam Elliott is the hunk with the looks and the voice!
Good morning! Chilly here too, at least in the morning....but it will rise to 61 but I'm heading to Illinois today and there it's COLD! Had a fun night with my daughter, sil and oldest grandsons. Dinner was good and Candy Cane Lane was fun! I had sand dabs and salad. Sand dabs are the best fish ever, although you don't see them in stores their popular in the restaurants here....think they're caught in Monterey Bay but not sure. If you don't like fish, this is the one for you...it's sooo mild. I love fish so that's not ever a problem but these are awesome. I'm all ready to head to the airport around 8:00 am....I'm preTSA approved which helps....sometimes. If all goes well and I make my connection in Dallas I should land in St. Louis at 8:00 p.m. If not...who knows? @Babs Hunt ....cute pic!! The grandbaby, not Maxine.
@Babs Hunt - what a smashing picture of the baby with Santa ! Ike - kids wanna be inside now on their puters - sad that is Well .............. . Xx
I have to agree @Patsy Faye....that Santa looks real and my granddaughter took a precious picture with him.
Are you going anywhere near New Baden, Illinois? That's where I was born...but I've never seen my place of birth except as a newborn.