Finally we’ve seen the end of 2007. Done. Over with. Finis. I was not sorry to see the Year 2007 fade into the waning din of the fireworks our neighbors were setting off. It was not a good year for us. Too much sadness, upheaval, and grief.

Sorry I’ve been so boring lately, but really I’ve had nothing important to say. Day after day goes by without much consequence. Pretty pathetic, really, but at least it’s non-cataclysmic. All the words and thoughts I’ve had pent up inside me seemed to have dissipated over the holidays. ho hum. But I won’t sit here and apologize for my boring-at-the-moment life. I"ve got a New Year to look forward to. A fresh start.

I refuse to make any resolutions at the beginning of this year because I don’t keep them. Neither will I make lists of things I should do, because I won’t do them. Why make them only to break them? That’s just setting myself up for failure. Instead I will just look ahead with a positive attitude and hope things fall into place behind me. Like getting all my ducks in a row. How does that sound? Not quite like a resolution; more like forming my future by focusing in on what I want.

With that in mind I see the following things in my future:

Rick and I on a beach in Cancun two weeks from now, maybe exploring a few Mayan ruins, enjoying a well-deserved vacation.

Happiness.

There. That should about do it for now. My inner crystal ball can’t see any farther than the next several months.

If you’ve made resolutions for the New Year, here’s wishing you success! Let’s all embrace the light of the New Year 2008!

Happy New Year to all my blogger friends out there! Here is a slo-mo movie of our champagne toast. Please raise your glasses and join us! Good riddance to 2007; may 2008 bring better fortune to us all!

Today Rick wanted to attempt a Bûche de Noel for Christmas dessert tomorrow. Here are the steps involved.

1.
Make certain you have enough kitchen helpers.

2.
Roll up the still warm cake in sugared parchment. Let cool.

3.
Don’t forget to clean the beaters in between usage.

4.
Spread the cooled cake with buttercream frosting.

5.
Roll up the frosted cake.

6.
Cut one piece off the edge of the cake and position on the top to form a branch for your log.

7.
Frost, make meringue mushrooms, and decorate.

Eat and enjoy. (If you can bear to cut into your masterpiece, that is!)

Today as I watch the rain fall outside my window on a bleak and dreary day, another non-White Christmas looms in my future. I thought it was a good time to re-post my blog entry from last year. So, here it is!

The sun is shining
The grass is green
The orange and palm trees sway.
I’ve never seen such a day
In Beverly Hills LA.
But it’s December the 24th
And I am longing to be up North.

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas
With every Christmas card I write.
May your days be merry and bright.
And may all your Christmases be white.

Irving Berlin penned the lyrics to White Christmas in 1942 while living in L.A. and missing his family in the Northeast. What most people aren’t familiar with is the long-forgotten first stanza of this famous song [see above] where he laments about being where the grass is green and palm trees sway. He could only dream and reminisce what it used to be like.

So, I blame it on Irving Berlin. If it weren’t for White Christmas, we might never have gotten it into our heads that we needed snow at Christmas in order for it to be a ‘perfect’ Christmas.  Is this where the notion that it should be snowing at Christmas comes from? What about all those Christmas movies where it magically starts to snow on Christmas? What about all the commercials on television during this time of year—isn’t it always snowing? Somehow snow on Christmas has become the ideal, and if you don’t have any you feel cheated.

Really, he ruined it for me. I’ve always expected snow for the holidays. When it didn’t come, it just didn’t seem like Christmas. I grew up in upstate New York where snow was usually plentiful by Christmas. When we moved to Florida in my teen years it seemed very strange indeed not to have any chance of it. On to Colorado, where in the earlier years there was very often snow on the ground for Christmas. But not always. I think the best Christmas-y weather and feelings as an adult came when we lived in Germany for two years back in 1983-85. It was cold, snowy, and walking through the Kriskindlmarkts sipping on glüwein to keep warm always put me in the mood.

I’ve always had this little dream vision in my head about taking a sleigh ride through crisp, frosty air and pulling up to a house brightly lit from within, complete with a roaring fire. Maybe I’ve combined several Christmas songs into my dream. I found the graphic above in my stash of clip art [I added the words] which pretty much is my vision of what it should be like.

One year Rick and I did manage to stay at a lovely inn in Aspen for my birthday [which comes a mere three days after the big event] where there was a lot of snow and we even went for a sleigh ride. But the sleigh was more like a wagon on runners and many other people shared the ride with us. It was close, the closest I have come to living out that dream, but not it.

As I sit in my study typing this entry, we have a gray and bleak day outside my window. It’s been raining; not snowing. The temperature stands in the high 40s and is not going to be dropping anytime soon to allow those gorgeous ice crystals to form and drop to earth. It’s very much looking like we’ll be having a non-White Christmas this year. Again.  ~ Sigh~  Over the years I’ve resigned myself to the fact that the ‘perfect’ White Christmas will only ever exist in one place: in my imagination. Down deep inside I know that snow does not make a Christmas, yet every year I keep watching the weather forecasts and the sky. Hoping. Waiting.

Mr. Berlin, it’s all your fault.