Upon arriving home from our 18-day trip to the states, we were ready to decorate our home with Christmas decorations.
It wasn't a chore at all...in fact, it was a great week-long activity as we transitioned from being home in the U.S. to being home here in Poland.
The above picture is of our front porch. I have had the tin of red flowers since early October (I'm not sure what type of flower they are, but I have seen these all over Poland) and I have just learned they continue to grow very well throughout the entire winter!
Mark has always done an excellent job arranging the lights on our Christmas trees..some years we have had tiny colored lights and others years just white. We brought our tree and lights from the U.S., and plugged the lights into a transformer. We also bought a small fire extinguisher just in case....but thankfully we have not had to use it!
This year Mark also helped with decorating the tree after he put the lights up.
We have a acquired a few new ornaments this year...one of our favorites...the small Texas boot...given to us by our dear friends Brian and Diana. They wanted to make sure they knew we would be remembered and for us not to forget where we came from...we LOVE it! And if wasn't meaningful enough, the box had a sticker on it that said Made in Poland.
Almost finished decorating. Ultimately Jackie is the tree-decoration artist.
Last Saturday morning we had a Christmas brunch with 5 of Mark's co-workers. Mark is taking the picture...though he should have really been in this picture.
Clockwise from the left are: Grzegorz (Poland), Brandon (Houston), Agnieszka (Poland), Me :), Claire (Scotland) and Arkadiusz from (Poland) - a diverse and good group.
Mark and I enjoyed hosting these great workers from Marathon....I personally appreciate all of the help they have and are giving to Mark. We had great food, wonderful conversations, they enjoyed touring our home and even heard their boss (Mark) play a beautiful Christmas piece on the piano!
After our guests left in the afternoon, we decided to take a trip to IKEA..they have two here in Warsaw and since we have a car now, we decided to go and see if we could find one of my little Christmas wishes...a coffee table.
Mark and I found a very simple one...since it was so large and heavy, he insisted on not wrapping it and wanted to put it together that very evening...and look what an outstanding job he did!
On Sunday, I invited the two young single adults ladies who are my visiting teachers (from church) to our home for dinner. We brought them home from church and while the chicken tortilla soup was simmering, I put them to work for their first experience in making an apple crisp. We had a great meal and wonderful conversations together. I learn so much when I am with great Polish people!
Here are pictures of Christmas throughout our home...it has been fun to decorate and see our home look, feel, and smell like Christmas... even though we are so far away from what is familiar.
Christmas for us was really our trip to Hawaii with our children...we will have a few gifts to unwrap this year and look forward to our simple Christmas together.
I keep reminders scattered around our home about the things I like and enjoy...
I'm so glad we brought our Christmas decorations with us to Poland....though I didn't put them all out...I'm glad for what we have.
Though far from home, friends, family and all that is familiar to us...We are reminded that we have much to be happy and grateful for...we can be "merry" here in Poland during this Christmas time.
I think we have "Christmas" scattered throughout our home...at least in the places we frequent the most.
I even figured out how to add garland to this different stairway...and though I have 4 levels, I opted to only put the garland from the 2nd to the 3rd floor.
My sister Rebecca created this beautiful Christmas quilt for us a few years ago. We have always loved it but have never had any great place to hang it...well I found a spot here in Poland...on one of our stair rails leading up to our 2nd floor/bedroom level! We love it!
My mom gave us the cute little snow couple in the picture above...I found a great spot for it in one of our windowsills...I love that when I see so many decorations I can easily be reminded of friends and
family...which makes being so far away not as hard.
One of Mark's coworkers gave us a large Christmas ornament that had been hand painted in Poland...I found a great place to display it in our front window.
We woke up to a snowy landscape this morning!
The last snow we experienced close to Christmas was on Christmas Eve in Houston in 2004...
that was the first time Mark and I had Christmas without our children Melissa and Jamie, as they were away serving church missions in California and Peru....we and all of Houston were quite excited about the snow we received that afternoon and evening...
The snow is quite pretty here...but the excitement is not the same...maybe it is because we know it will be here for many many days, weeks and months ahead. I have never experienced a White Christmas...so maybe this will be the year!
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