From Jenn X:
1.What is your favorite Christmas carol/song?
Today, it’s Es ist ein Ros entsprungen, as sung by the divine Chanticleer.
2.White lights or multicolored?
Neither. Candles (hush, I’ve never burned anything down).
3. Do you have a cut tree, live tree or an artificial tree?
Cut, but not yet. It can’t go up before the fourth Sunday in Advent.
4. Eggnog, mulled cider, or hot chocolate?
Cider.
5. Do you decorate your house with lights?
No, but I do put up pine garlands.
6. Do you write a Christmas letter?
Sometimes. Not in the bad years (who wants to read it?).
7. Do you like receiving Christmas letters/photos?
Yes, very much.
8. What is your favorite Christmas story/movie?
I’m partial to White Christmas.
9. Have you ever made a gingerbread house?
My mother made a huge one every year, usually in time for me to take to school for my birthday (December 20th). I’ve made maybe 5 as an adult. One year Eldest Son made about four in one night.
10. Poinsettias or holly?
Holly.
11. Do you display a nativity scene?
Yes, a Nigerian thornwood set, very small, very delicate.
12. Do you bake Christmas cookies?
Not usually, but I make something special every Sunday in Advent (this year so far: poppy seed cake, almond/marzipan cake, apple crisp).
13. Ham or turkey?
Pork roast.
14. In what languages can you wish someone a Merry Christmas (without cheating)?
Merry Christmas
Frohe Weihnachten
Feliz Navidad
Joyeux Noel
15. Do you know all the words to Jingle Bells?
Two verses.
16. Do you put presents under the tree?
Yes, and we argue about whether they should be opened Christmas Eve or Christmas morning.
17. How do you eat a candy cane?
I don’t.
18. What is your biggest holidays pet peeve?
Missing the last day of Christmas tree recycling because my tree must stay up until Heilige Drei Koenige.
19. What is your favorite Christmas tradition?
Lighting the candles, and sitting around eating Lebkuchen (which Fazia has just discovered) and drinking mulled wine.
20. What was the best present you ever got for Christmas?
Ummmm…I really don’t know. The presents seriously aren’t very important. I did get a lot of Mommy points last year by giving the kids (and my beloved) iPods.
Wow. You are ambitious! :-)
Marzipan and apple crisp! Can I come over to your house? I love plum kuchen but I don’t know of lebkuchen. Happy Birthday Katja!
Sure, the more the merrier!
Zwetschgenkuchen (plum cake) is also one of the greats. In the summer I haunt the produce section in order not to miss the one week (it seems) when Italian prune plums are in.