Sights of Christmas

Spark sleeping in front of our Christmas tree
Part of the wreath I made last year

Our pretty ornaments

An oddly rotated pie that Abby-la and I made

My delicious vanilla-scented candle

Meow hugging Abby's Christmas tree. We're not sure why.

Apologies, NaNoWriMo, Carols, Thanksgiving, Elvish, and Otherwise Misscelaneous Greetings

First of all, an apology. I have somewhat abandoned my blog of late and undoubtably people have ceased to check it. So sorry! Life has been hectic here in Cambodia and I've barely had time for, well, anything. But now Christmas break has come around and I have...well...not much more time, but at least some.

I'll begin at the end of November. I won NaNoWriMo. It was not easy. Not easy at all. Yet somehow I managed to struggle through and finish with 50,033 words. Last year NaNo was so easy for me, but this year I really had to push to get it done... I was very happy to have won again, though. I had a wonderful time writing with friends in various homes and cafes, and I made at least three more NaNo recruits this year! I'm very pleased with NaNo this year. Can't wait til next November....
Also, I'm thinking of launching a Cambodia NaNoWriDay. In other words, National Novel Writing Day. One Day. 50,000 words. My friends all think I've lost my mind (or at least what was left of it).

I really didn't have time to type up a Thanksgiving post, so I'll give you a bit of a recap. I had two Thanksgivings, one with my youthgroup and one at my house with 37 or so friends and family.
Youthgroup first: We crammed into Christina's little apartment, baked, baked, and baked (which included mashing about fifty potatoes with a fork), ate lots of heavenly food, and overall had a spectacular time.
My Thanksgiving: 37 people, 10 pies, 2 turkeys, need I say more? It was wonderful. I ate until I felt like I couldn't move. I read the Thanksgiving proclamation and got a bit of stage fright (I hate it when that happens), and spent the rest of day hanging out with friends and eating leftovers. It was very much a multi-national Thanksgiving. We had Americans (obviously), Kiwis, Canadians, Brits, Mexicans, and Cambodians. We might have had more nationalities, but if so, I have forgotten them.

After Thanksgiving I caved in and decorated my room for Christmas. I have bells, candles, angels, and a little mini Christmas tree that looks simply adorable next to Tollers' cage. A few days later we decorated our family tree, which is huge, beautiful, and highly erratic. By now the rest of our downstairs is decorated, complete with wreaths, tinsel, stockings, a red table cloth, candles, and other decorations. It definitely looks Christmassy. Since then we have baked hundreds of cookies. We've made sugar cookie cutouts, gingerbread men, date swirls, Russian tea cakes, molasses sugar cookies, peanut blossoms, peanut-chocolate cookies, and quite possibly something else I forgot. I'm not quite done yet.
Youthgroup had a lovely Christmas party. It was quite a small group since it was the night of the Click 5 concert (which was something between a disaster and fantastic, from what I've heard). We still had a wonderful time eating pizza, having a more or less odd gift exchange, playing games, talking, and overall just goofing off. Cross Culture had a Christmas Worship Service last Friday which was great, although we had a few problems with the powerpoint.
Tonight Cross Culture is joining with a few other people to go Christmas caroling! Abby will arrive soon to help me bake cookies for us to eat afterwards. It should be fun.

A few weeks ago we had our annual Christmas Craft Fair...It was much fun. Four hours straight of shopping.

Speaking of shopping, I finished both my shopping and wrapping yesterday. I'm ready for Christmas!

School ended Friday, but I have to work ahead on my TPS work (English and Science) so that I don't get behind while on my mission's trip to Thailand. I did some Chemistry reading today and may do some later...maybe not. I don't really mind having a bit of work over the holidays.

Speaking of holidays, Christmas involves presents and my amazing friend Meow gave me an extremely cool Klutz bracelet making kit. Naturally, I had to do something in Elvish, so I am now wearing a bracelet with the Lord's Prayer in Elvish on it. Here's the Lord's Prayer in Quenya, but I printed it out in the proper font when I actually did the bracelet.


Attolma i menelessie, nai airitainiéva esselya.
Our Father who is in heaven, be it that will be hallowed thy name.
Nai ardalya tuluva. Be it that thy kingdom will come.
Nai írelya tyarniéva mardesse ve menelesse.
Be it that thy desire will be done on earth as in heaven.
Anta men síre ilyaurea mastalma.
Give (to) us today daily our bread.
Ar avanta men raikalmar ve avantalme raikatyarolmain.
And forgive (for) us our wrongs as we forgive (for) our wrong-doers.
Ar nai útukuvalye me mailenna
And be it that thou will not lead us into overmastering desire
ná fainu me ulkallo. Amen.
but release us from evil. Amen.

Not a perfect translation, but still pretty cool, no?

I'm getting so excited--Christmas is right around the corner!

Well, I'm off to mix up some cookie dough.

Isusarad 'Elir! (Merry Christmas)

~Manwathiel