A New Year...a New Start !

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Fist post of the year, yeah !!

I havent blogged in ages !! But December was such a busy month. I will tell you all about it... Go and grab a cup of tea/coffee..this is gonna be long.

Craftywise...the last crafty thing I made was a birthday card for a lady who works for a project in Zambia where they help to build schools for children:



Then, I had decided to give myself a break till the New Year, so I havent made a single thing ever since. But I have ideas :o)

I absolutely dislike Christmas in Ireland...mainly because the days are short, cold and boring. Back in Costa Rica, Christmas mean long school holidays, and the beggining of the dry (and very sunny) season; So for this year, I started planning activities to keep us going, something to look forward to and make these days more bearable. It was all gonna start with a Christmas Play called "The Magic Christmas Tree" at the Dunamaise Theater in Co Laois, on December 14th. We were looking forward to this. But on December 13th, a cold Sunday...as we were getting ready to go to the swimming pool, as every Sunday morning...the door bell rang, and of course, my first thought was that it was my Father in Law, dropping in to see the girls...he usually dropped in on Sunday mornings....but no...it was the Guards (Police). I thought they were looking for information on a robbery or something like that....but they asked if they could come in, which I felt it was unusual...once they were in, and as we were facing each other, waiting for them to talk...I will never forget those first words, one of them turned to my husband and said "Im afraid I have bad news, your Dad was found dead on the side of the road"...... OMG, I can't describe the feeling !! our hearts jumped inside, our heads were thinking "he got the wrong house", and maybe the guard felt a bit the same, cos one of them kept repeating Father in Law's name, James, and his address !! He then proceeded to explain a bit further....Father in Law, Jimmy, as he was commonly known by everybody...had gone to work that morning...he didnt work on Sundays, but because it was Christmas trees season, he worked on that day. He worked 48 years for Coillte. He wasnt feeling well, had pain chests, and decided to go home mid morning...he was a very stubborn man ! his brother & co-worker wanted to bring him home in his car, but Jimmy declined, he was going home on his motorbike. Over half way on the road, he must had felt that there was something wrong, he stopped the motorbike and dropped dead on the side of the road. Somebody passing by, probably very soon, saw him and rang the ambulance and guards. Jimmy was brought to the nearest hospital and CPR was performed, unsucessfully, he must had suffered a massive heart attack !! He was young, only 63...but to be honest, he didnt look after himself at all. "He was a simple man, who lived a simple life".

He had a beautiful farewell funeral...all his grandchildren: Zoe, Marie Claire, Melanie, Kim, Julianna & Lucas took a very active role at the funeral, as innapropiate as it may sound, yes,it was a beautiful and comforting ceremony.

Jimmy and I didnt get along well all the time, we probably had many cultural clashes along the way...but during these 11 and half years I got to meet him, he earned all my respect and care, and I believe I earned his too...He was a loving and caring Grandfather....and for that alone, I will be eternally thankful....Jimmy, you'll be missed...



We didnt make the Christmas play...but we went to see Miley Cyrus in concert...the girls, specially my eldest, were looking forward to this concert since May or so !! We were in two minds...we had just said goodbye to grandad...was it appropiate to go to the concert or not??? well, the last time we saw Jimmy, my hubbie had rang him to please come and mind the girls for half an hour, I was going to my Yoga class and Hubbie was stuck late in the train coming from Dublin. Jimmy always helped us out in situations like these. Well, the half hour Jimmy was here, was made to watch Hannah Montana !! so knowing him, he would had said "Bring those girls to that concert!!" so off we went. I took some pics with my phone, I still have to download (havent done it before, need hubbie's help).

After Miley's concert, it was the girls Play at school....this year the school got 2 drama teachers to help them out, and it showed, it was brilliant !! Here are some pics, not good pics, we were sitting at the very back :o(




We went to see Santa...at the Clanard Court Hotel, it has been so far the best Santa experience ever !! It was a 3 hour tour !! First, the girls went into the Elves Workshop, they decorated their own Christmas tree bauble, while they were wating for their bauble to dry, they got their faces painted. We then proceeded to visit the elves....we saw them at work, wrapping the presents to give to Santa, saw their bedrooms, and Lazy bones was there sleeping...we all had to shout to wake him up and send him to work !!! Then we went into Mrs Claus kitchen, and then her bedroom, she was there and we got a pic with her. The girls spotted Santa's "Nice & Naughty" lists on his desk, and rapidly grabbed a pen and made sure their names were on the "Nice" list. After, we went for a story, a lovely lady sat the children on logs in in a pretend forest and told them a nice Christmas story. The children then wrote and posted their presents list, we then added something that our youngest had forgotten to write down on her "other" list...LOL !! Then we had a lovely cup of hot chocolate with mashmellows...getting us a bit warm to then go on a road trip to visti Santa's farm...were we saw some turkeys, cows, goats, and raindeers...they are in trainning raindeers !!! We were brought back to the hotel after. We then visited Santa, who was lovely and took his time with the girls....and to finish the whole experience, we got a lovely family photo, Im usually not impressed by these, but I was this year ! beautiful pic, thiking on using it for next year's Christmas cards :o)


With lovely Santa


These are the raindeers Rudolf is trainning at the moment, they have to practice their landing a bit better :O)


Making Mince Pies at Mrs Claus kitchen


"Nice & Naughty" Lists


With Mrs Claus, isnt she lovely?

For our Christmas treat, and I mean only Hubbie and me :o) we have visited Ikea 3 times !!! hehehehe....kinda of addicted at this stage, but our house is looking soooo much better !!!!!!!!!!

Ikea Visits:







My crafty corner...before and after Ikea :o)








Ever since....we have bought 2 more Expedit units, smaller ones (they added about 1/2 more storage space, yipeeee) 2 tables, 4 chairs, 4 stools, 1 standing lamp, 2 picture frames, several children's arts & crafts items, I steel stand with baskets I stool (so I can reach the top of our clothes press) & several towels. Hubby has been over the moon putting together all these pieces of furniture, his "Lego" as he calls them :o)

Well, and we ended the year going to Disney On Ice, Princesses Wishes...it was lovely...we all enjoyed it soooo much !!




Hubbie & me, self portrait :o)

MC and her Popcorn

J with a lovely food dye mustache !! hehehe

I yet have to think on my New Year's resolution word...my last year's was "Believe".

TFL

Kiki x

PS: Hubbie is doing ok...he has a loving wife & kids who have been there to comfort him when has needed us the most. He has made himself very active lately, maybe that's his way to deal with his grieving I suppose.