Family Heritage Christmas Traditions

Since we have been away from our family for a few years at Christmas time, I am always looking for traditions that I can do with my kids and that keep them connected to our family back home.  I love to research our ancestral lines and created a book listing holiday traditions of our maternal and paternal ancestors.  This year we highlighted my maternal lines so that took us to The Netherlands and Wales.

The Netherlands

On November 16th, three Saturdays before December 5th, we put our shoes on the fireplace for Sinterklass to fill with treats.  Each Saturday leading up the 5th, we repeated this fun.

December 5th is Christmas Eve in the Netherlands.  Families get together for a special dinner and hot chocolate.  After dinner, they find chocolate letters under the tree left by Sinterclass as well as anonymous gifts to each other.  We were lucky to have my mom in Enid for the December 5th festivities.

Wales

We did our best with the Welch traditions.  The families in Wales will stay up all night making taffy and wassail while awaiting a 3-6am sing along at the church Christmas morning.  We made the treats but did them during waking hours. Our wassail was tasty but our taffy was green mint goo.  I guess my Welch heritage does not mean I am an expert candy maker.

Merry Christmas from our ancestral heritage!

I am going to be a chauffeur for a long time

Every time we move, I stress about finding good opportunities for my kids.  Bear knows what she loves to do so I work hard to give her lessons that will increase her talents.  I feel so blessed that Enid, OK has given my kids the chance to grow, even in these four months since we arrived.

Bear is taking private cello lessons and is in orchestra at her middle school.  There is an excellent ballet studio in town, Dance Works of Enid.  They just completed an amazing performance of The Nutcracker with guest performers from Ballet West.

Bear was in the Chinese Tea duet and here she is pictured with the guest Ballet West performers

Middle School cello concert

Bub and Pants are not as set on what they want to do- they are bit more flexible and enjoy taking advantage of the opportunities that the community presents.  They joined Enid's Children Choir together and perform twice a year.  Pants is enjoying piano lessons and gymnastics and she LOVES her horseback riding lessons.  Bub is taking guitar lessons, basketball at the elementary, Safety Patrol for the elementary, and is in a Hip Hop class.  His favorite thing is to run with Josh.  When he enters seventh grade in a few years, he will be able to join a cross country or track team. 

Enid Children's Choir

What does all this mean for me?  I am going to be a chauffeur for three kiddos for many years to come!

Get Your Kicks on Route 66- Frontier Country, OK

We enjoyed our first Thanksgiving in Enid, OK.  We woke up to rain which dampened our annual Turner Turkey Trot.  Pants, Josh, and I braved the weather and enjoyed the trail by the fields behind our neighborhood.  We liked watching all the geese hanging out there.  

After we had our Thanksgiving lunch.  It was tasty and filled with our favorite recipes since I got to pick the menu.

Then we hit the road to chase adventure on Route 66, Frontier Country stretch of OK.  We visited the Cherokee Trading Post in Calumet, OK.  It was full of American Indian art, décor, and clothing.  Some of the pottery was amazing.  There was a lot to peruse.  

Next, we went to El Reno to see the massive Route 66 trademark.  El Reno really played up the Route 66 status with lots of cool murals and signage.  

Then we traveled to Oklahoma City where we saw the famous Gold Dome Building and the Milk Bottle Grocery, both on the historical registry.  We spent the night outside of OKC in an Air B and B. 

We hit to road the next morning to POPS in Arcadia, OK.  It is a gas station, restaurant, and convenience store.  There is a huge soda bottle in neon in front of the store and inside rows and rows of soda bottles categorized by color.  We each picked some unique sodas: Golden Ginger Beer, Rocky Mountain Root Beer, Chocolate Soda, Cotton Candy, Cream Soda, and Blue Cream Soda.  The kids also liked picking out of the penny candy bins.  

Our next spot was house decorated with miniatures of oddities found on Route 66.  

We stopped at the Seaba Station Motorcycle Museum which has been around since 1921.  It is filled with over 65 vintage motorcycles including a hydra motorcycle ridden in Captain America. 

Our last stop was in Stroud, OK where we saw an Alien Landing Yard oddity off the side of the road and went to eat at the Rock Café.  The owner of Rock Café inspired the character of Sally in Cars.  We had a great meal and friendly service.   What a fun adventure!  On our list next is the Green Country and Great Plains Country sections of the Mother Road.

Fall Break State Park Adventures

The kids were out of school for three days for Fall Break and since Enid is still a new place for us, we found lots of new adventures to take.  Josh picked up a State Park Passport at one of his newcomer’s briefings.  It has listed all the State parks in OK by region. We live in the Red Carpet region so we focused on our area first.  Each state park has a list of activities to complete while there and a sticker to collect for the passport.  As we accumulate visits to the parks, we can redeem up to nine tokens representing our adventures.  In three days, we traveled to four state parks.  Josh was even able to take two days of work off to join us.

            

We traveled to Roman Nose, named for a Cherokee Chief, and one of the seven original state parks.  We did a little hike to the dam of the lake.  Unfortunately, we did not time this visit well as the paddle boats and miniature golf were only open on weekends.  

The weather is beautiful now.  The humidity has decreased the days have been mild and sunny 

We went to Boiling Springs, took two lovely hikes, and enjoyed the gift shop.  We also saw the bubbling spring in the well which used to be a larger geyser at one time. 

We have not seen a lot of fall colors yet so this tree was a lovely sight

We went to Gloss Mountain and walked up the steep stairs to the top of the plateau for the view.  It was lovely, and vast, and flat.  The kids enjoyed looking for the scattered selenite that sparkles in the sun.  Sometimes when we would step onto the rock, it would sound hollow. 

Lastly, we traveled to Alabaster Caverns where we took a tour into the cave made of gypsum.  Gypsum caves do not have growing structures so we could run our hands over every surface.  We enjoyed seeing the domes in the ceiling of the cave made by the whirlpooling water.  The kids enjoyed seeing the bats in the cave starting their hibernation. 

No cameras allowed in the cave so you will just have to travel here to see for yourself!

Driving through OK sometimes feels like driving in rural Japan in that the two-lane roads meander through fields and farms and don’t feel like they are getting anywhere.  There are small towns along the way and scattered houses in the middle of what feels like nowhere.  We also noted the road signs pointing to CEMETERY.  We probably passed at least 10 of these signs.  We could never see the cemeteries from the highway, and we wondered how big they were, why there were so many in such remote areas, and what was of note about the cemeteries.  One day we will need to follow the signs to find out for ourselves. Another adventure to take!

Cultural Night: Estonia

Cultural Night- ESTONIA

Date: 10/21/19

Food: Rowan Berries (we used cranberries) and Apple Pork https://estoniancuisine.com/2019/09/23/rowan-berries-and-apple-pork-pihlaka-ounaliha/, Creamy Mushroom Puree Soup https://estoniancuisine.com/2019/10/10/creamy-mushroom-puree-soup-with-juniper-berries-seene-ja-kadakamarjapureesupp/, Kringel bread https://www.homecookingadventure.com/recipes/estonian-kringle-cinnamon-braid-bread, Estonian Potato Salad https://estonianfood.eu/en/content/estonian-potato-salad

Everybody loved the bread.  What could be wrong with carbs loaded with butter and cinnamon sugar?

No one was a big fan of the mushroom soup...

Flag and Geography: Coloring page https://www.crayola.com/free-coloring-pages/print/estonia-coloring-page/, World map, https://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/europe/ee.htm.  Estonia has more than 2,000 islands and 1.3 million people.  The capital is Tallinn which has been around for 800 years. It has many woods and bogs and more than half of the country is covered in forest.

Animals that live in Estonia: Bear, wolf, moose, deer, linx, badger, elk

Music: Patriotic music of Estonia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TSy44AXfxw

Language: The official language of Estonia is Estonian. https://www.loecsen.com/en/learn-estonian

Fairy Tale: The Young Man who would have his eyes opened https://fairytalez.com/the-young-man-who-would-have-his-eyes-opened/

Architecture:

Tallinn- Capital City

Famous People: Kerli, singer that we already like and did not know she was from Estonia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXMeZwO2qZ0 Music video for Walking on Air

Art: Art of Konrad Magi

Traditional Clothing of Estonia: