Three Whole Weeks

It's beginning to look a lot like...

Two Christmases and two New Years and twenty-one days of no school for Calvin.

More and more people in Ukraine are celebrating what they call "Catholic" (aka western) Christmas on the 25th of December. And they've been in the swing of celebrating the New Year on the 1st for a while now. But they also celebrate "old Christmas" (aka Russian/Ukrainian Orthodox) on the 7th of January and "old New Year" on the 14th. The kids get school off for all the days that include these dates, and David gets American national holidays and Ukrainian national holidays off as well.

It's one big party!

I have Christmas all wrapped up (only I wasn't able to find tags or bows anywhere) and the boys are thrilled that it looks like a white Christmas. (Virginia doesn't have those very often.)

Charlie has discovered the joy of boxes of chocolate (he stands below my chocolate stash hiding places and dances and points until we give him a piece), Henry enjoys pitching our plastic tree ornaments at the fireplace, and Calvin has been waking at the crack of dawn every morning, taking his blanket into the living room to rest by the twinkling Christmas tree until the rest of the house wakes up.

So far, so good. Although I'm not sure how it's going to be when all the joy of anticipation turns to waiting for school to resume. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Merry Christmas and Happy 2009 to you!