Have Yourself…

Every Christmas Eve since I can remember is spent at my Papa and Grandma’s house. I look forward to the night all year. The coziness of being in the house with all the family, eating good food in between games of pool and ping-pong, and just generally being peaceful and relaxed for a couple hours. When the night came to the close as the little ones pretended not to be sleepy, I’d hug everyone and gather my presents before climbing into the backseat of my parents car. Buckled up and refusing to let go of my bag of goodies, I’d lean my head back and watch the night sky, refusing to look away in case Rudolph’s nose appeared among the stars. And it always does.

In recent years, I like to come home and check noradsanta.org while listening to Judy Garland sing “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” a few times before curling up in bed and trying to fall asleep so Santa can stop by. Hell yeah I still wait for Santa. In fact, I’m going to sleep by the tree cuddled up with the pooches so I can try and sneak a peek at him. It’s very fitting that “Meet Me In St. Louis” is on.

If anyone is reading this, I sincerely hope you enjoy yourself for the next two weeks. Leave the tree up an extra week, read a book, watch movies, doodle on a sketch pad; we all deserve some time to forget about the bullshit. Take some days to forget about the economy, don’t fret about unemployment, just enjoy that you are breathing and step outside to look for Rudolph’s nose. And listen to this song. Have yourself a very merry Christmas.

Oh please, let it snow

I am so happy to have my homeland covered in snow. We didn’t see any snow on Christmas last year, and this year it’s supposed to be freezing rain, but I am happy with seeing steady snowfall the week leading up to Christmas. Seeing the snow come down and cover the lawn and the streets while wrapping presents or driving to the mall makes the daily activites all the more festive. I’m crossing my fingers for snow over the weekend, but I am perfectly happy with what I am seeing in the meantime.

Is anyone listening to Celtic Woman? They’re on PBS every night and at some point in the evening they make their way into my family’s living room. I loooove Celtic music and these girls are so nice to listen to when I’m cooking, playing with the dogs, or just hanging around the house. They have a bunch of videos on Youtube, check them out if you haven’t already, the music is really beautiful. Also, I found a playlist from ‘07 with some good covers. Click on the link at the end of the post to see it and be sure to download ‘em. :] Jack’s Mannequin and The Killers are my two favorites.

I’m also sticking with the vegan thing and am looking up some recipes to make for Christmas. Hershey Kiss cookies are one of my favorites and I was extremely excited to find a vegan recipe for them, since the kisses are made with milk. I I haven’t made them yet, but they look delicious. I’m surprised how many recipes still taste amazing when they’re made to be vegan friendly, especially in terms of baking. When I try to cook, it doesn’t generally work out, but I’ve got the hang of it and made my first batch of successful cookies (vegan chocolate chip with peanut butter and banana.) I also want to add mac and “cheese” along with bumbleberry pie to the Christmas menu. I also watched Paula Deen make some kickass mashed potatoes so I gotta vegan-ize that for sure.

Hm, maybe I should post recipes and my cooking ventures on here. I feel like this blog needs a direction; I want to blog about topics other than what I should or shouldn’t be doing with my life, such as my acting and writing. It’s a personal blog, and I’d still like to write about things I think about during my extensive sessions of self-analysis, but lately I feel weird writing about myself and thoughts. Narcissism twisted with lameness are emotions that come to mind. Is lameness an emotion? I have a blog started about this thought so we’ll see how it goes, but in the meantime Merry, Merry Christmas!

Hollywood loses another brilliant soul