A Christmas Story Christmas

This morning Jingle Bell got the basic theme of the day down with a little bit of "A Christmas Story" to share.  In fact, as you can see, there as a copy of the movie "A Christmas Story Christmas" there under the tree, which none of us have seen yet, but it would be great to catch up with Ralphie later on.  In the meantime, there's the elf and Snowflake getting that major award, and you have to be careful, it's FRAGILE.  Must be Italian!

We did have KidPak this morning, and it was a nice service, also one with that same Ralphie flavor though.  Our friend Jeremiah just wanted a Red Ryder BB-Gun, and had to learn a few other things along the way about gratitude and what the real meaning of Christmas is.

It was fun and sweet, and just a pleasant morning together.  We had the lights down low for this part to show it was nighttime, but at the same time we were really wanting to show those Christmas lights too.  The stage is decorated nicely.

We dropped by the grocery store on the way home, picking up a few things like a rotisserie chicken and we definitely have enough peppermint candy cane ice cream to last until Christmas now.  I think.  Maddie goes through that fairly quickly!  It's a flavor only available at Publix, and part of their Christmas flavor series.  We like the egg nog flavor too, which we've gotten this year as well. 

Anyway, we got home and we ate together, and soon after that, Maddie and I were off to see the new Miyazaki movie, "The Boy and the Heron."  

I wanted Maddie to be able to see a Miyazaki movie in the theaters when it opened, and the artist conveniently came out of retirement to release another visually amazing movie for us to see.  If we were ranking this one, it would go somewhere in the middle, which isn't to say it was bad at all.  It's the type of movie that you just go into with zero expectations in regards to story, and you just enter a world of fantasy just as lost and filled with wonder or even fear as the main characters do, and that's certainly the case here.  The moments of quiet and the landscapes are just so filled with tranquility, and of course you're waiting for the fantastic to appear.  And it does, and it does not disappoint.  The theater had a more people seated in it than the usual movie, and this may be because it was the first English version of the day, but it also is because the movie was the number one release of the weekend, a first for Miyazaki.  Glad to see that.

We got home, and Mom had a menorah set up on the table, as we're in the midst of Hanukkah.  We've always been curious about the Feast of Dedication, something mentioned in the New Testament in John 10:22.  We watched a video about the history of Hanukkah, and Mom even had chocolate coins and a dreidel.  Because we're in the midst of the holiday, we got caught up with four candles lit, plus the server candle.  We learned a good bit about the reason for celebrating tonight, lit the candles in the correct order, and then we played a new game:  Dreidel.  Mom got a few of those, and the three of us learned to spin that dreidel and essentially play for chocolate coins.  In the end, Maddie crushed us.  Mom had the best spins in perhaps Jewish history, and we all learned that Gimmel is not a dwarf from "Lord of the Rings," but in fact the best thing you can get from spinning that dreidel.  "Shin" is not.  "Nun" is ironic, because when you spin this, you get "none."  Anyway, it was fun.  We had the candles lit there and were playing for a good bit, because this sort of game could go on forever and ever.  But Maddie was clearly experiencing favor.

Our day closed out with a first-time viewing of another movie, "A Christmas Story Christmas."  We heard about this one last year, and finally got around to watching it.  It's a sweet nostalgic visit with family at Christmas time - "family" being the cast from the original movie, reunited after so many years.  All the kids were grown up, and it was great to see them again.  It was great to see all the familiar places too - we really enjoyed this movie.

Tonight we closed things up with reading, and after that some prayers and sleep.  It was a full day.  But here we are, heading into another tech week.  Time to get a good night's rest!