Christmas 2009

Once again, we had a great Christmas this year. Colin woke up Christmas morning feeling much better and even managed to eat a great big Christmas lunch, after 2 days of fever and eating practically nothing. So right away, Mommy got her Christmas wish. Santa Claus managed to find us in Turin at the Nonni's house, and brought lots of good toys as well.

Colin received a couple of Lego-like construction toys, one is an assault chopper (which we are still working on) and the other is a motorcycle. He also received a 7-in-1 game set, with chess, checkers, backgammon, and a whole bunch of other games I've never even heard of. He also received a flying "bug" as you can see in the photo, which of course we had to test right away that morning outside.


Lucia had a princess Christmas, as Santa brought a Cinderella dress, a princess chalk board, and even "make-up", and she sat down right away to test out the goods.

Santa also left some "tattoos" in our stockings, which we were eager to try out with our Italian cousins. Check out the body art on Colin (one leg has a whale, and the other a lion - which by the way, has still not washed off over a week later), Giorgio has a row of turtles up his leg and an elephant on his arms, Lucia has some flowers on cheeks and butterflies on her hands, and Benedetta has a giraffe on her leg and a horse on her arm.

The main attraction of Christmas in Italy, at least for the adults who received nothing but coal in their stockings, is the traditional Christmas lunch. In Piedmont, the typical pasta is agnolotti, which is like ravioli stuffed with lamb or other meat. My mother-in-law makes it by hand every year, with a vegetarian version of ricotta and spinach for me, and it is always delicious. Of course, there are lots of starters and a second course, finishing up with panettone, or Italian Christmas cake.

We spent the afternoon with the cousins - the children happily played with their new toys, while the adults tried to digest the massive amounts of food they had eaten.

Snow Day

Tuesday was supposed to be the kids' last day of school before the holidays, or rather the last HALF DAY of school, as they were supposed to be excused at noon, and then we were planning on visiting Daddy at his office and having lunch with him. Mother Nature had other plans, and on Monday, she decided to let loose with a snow storm that left about a foot and a half of snow on the ground before it stopped on Tuesday morning. It was already getting bad Monday afternoon, it took me close to an hour and a half to pick up the 2 kids from school and get back home again. I called Marco around 3:30pm and told him he should leave work immediately because it was getting bad. Of course he didn't listen, and when I called again right before 5:00pm, saying that I was just getting home from picking the kids up from school, he took me a little more seriously. Still, he didn't get home until 9:30pm! The next day was obviously a vacation day, and we pulled out all of the snow gear and had some fun in the snow.

Christmas activities

The last week has been full of activities leading up to Christmas. Last Wednesday, Colin basketball class did a Christmas program, where they showed off their mad skillz to a very-impressed crowd of moms and dads. They basically ran around the court, dribbling, or at least doing a fairly good imitation of such, and attempted a few baskets, with Christmas music playing in the background. Colin is getting pretty good at dribbling, but since the basket is basically at standard height, making a basket is a pretty rare event.

The following evening was Colin's 7th birthday party. We held the party at a place called Giocolandia, which is basically an enormous play area for kids. It is every parent's worst nightmare and every kid's dream. A couple of kids from Colin's class have had their birthday parties there this year, and Colin couldn't imagine doing his birthday anywhere else. It went fairly well, although at a certain stage a couple of boys started fighting and another boy ended up in tears in an unrelated incident. Colin spent most of the time with his eye on the table of presents, asking when he could start opening them. I was a little worse for wear after a very hectic week of work and trying to get gifts for Christmas and birthday ready, and I told Colin right away that we would do a different kind of birthday party next year, maybe just a slumber party for a couple of his friends!

The kid with his arms around Colin in the photo is his best buddy, Davide. The cake in front of him is a special cake they provide as part of the birthday package. It is basically a sweet bread with Nutella spread inside in the shape of a number 7. Kids go nuts for it.

Friday night they had a special mass for the elementary and middle school kids at Colin's school. In typical Italian style, they said that it would start at 8:30, and that we should have the kids there at 8:15pm. Being American, I thought that meant that my kid should be there at 8:15, and he was, however, the mass didn't start until about 9:00pm and it was 11:00pm before we were back home again. This year went better than last, however, in the sense that Lucia at least managed to stay awake, and Colin wasn't nearly comatose with sleepiness at the end.

As an example of one of the many mysteries of children, my exhausted children fell into bed at 11:00pm, but were wide awake at 7:00am. I'm not sure how that works.

Saturday was Lucia's pre-school Christmas play and it had all the elements of a perfect pre-school Christmas play - Baby Jesus walked off stage crying for his mom, and one of the girls lost her skirt while dancing, although she wasn't at all bothered by this. Another kid, who Lucia regularly says is a trouble-maker, lived up to his reputation during the performance, much to the consternation of his teachers. Lucia's role was as a star, and it was the perfect role for my little girl, and she thoroughly enjoyed herself on stage, as you can see as she hams it up during her little dance.

Colin started attending weekly catechism classes this year, and on Sunday afternoon, all of the classes put on a nativity scene/play at the church. Colin was an angel, again a role that perfectly fits my son. Afterwards they had panettone (Italian Christmas cake) and a little party in the community center. We stayed for a while, but my kids were pretty exhausted after their busy week! But now we are definitely ready for some presents and vacation.

Today Colin celebrated Carnival and all the elementary school kids came in costume (I think I have in the past explained the whole Ambrosian calendar thing, Lent in the Milan area starts on Sunday). He went as the cutest Ferrari driver ever. He is on vacation for the rest of the week.


Lucia’s last day was supposed to be tomorrow, all the pre-school kids come in costume and there is a parade and a big party. Lucia was going to wear her princess dress from last year (what else?). However, as soon as she figured out that Colin was off school, she refused to go. I even offered to take her only for the parade and party in the afternoon, and still, no deal. She will absolutely not stand for the idea that Colin is home while she is not.


Here is Colin in his cool Ferrari driver outfit. I'm hoping that this does not presage what he is going to be like when he gets his license as a teenager!

Card shark

I recently taught the kids a couple of card games, and their favorite so far is War. Sunday evening we sat up on my bed, and they were completely stoked to learn a new game. The funny thing is, although it is a game of completely random chance, based on luck of the draw, and involving no strategic skills whatsoever, for some reason Lucia ALWAYS wins. It is pretty amazing. I figure that this is just another example of how much of a Manning/Blanchard she is. Colin, of course, is a clone of his father, and the Deons are just not a card family. Lucia, meanwhile, pulls Aces out of nowhere, and does the Manning/Blanchard blood running through her proud. Every time she wins, I imagine Grandma and Grandpa looking down on her and beaming with pleasure at my little girl. It is also kind of nice, because Colin is so into board games right now, and being just a bit older, is able to beat her most of the time. But Lucia has found her niche, and I am so looking forward to having her as my euchre partner in a few years.

In a related story, I have had a couple of people look at me in amazement when I shuffle the cards by doing that thing where you cut the deck in half, bend the halves in your hands and then sort of shuffle them together, bend them backwards, and shuffle them together again. 2 of my friends were like, "WOW! Where did you learn to do that?" And I was so puzzled, I thought everyone knew how to do that.

Batman and Barbie

I enjoy playtime with both of my kids. My mentioned previously, Colin is going through a board game stage, and so we play either Sorry or the Goose Game at least once a day. Lucia doesn't really like to play, but she likes to hold the cards and hand them out to the players, effectively controlling the flow of the game, which is consistent with her bossy personality.

Playtime with Lucia is a bit different. She enjoys make-believe, and likes to pretend that she is a princess (her favorites are Ariel and Belle). The downside is that whenever we play, I am basically instructed to follow her around, keep quiet, and not question her decisions. And I never get to be a princess. Her newest make-believe game is Batman and Barbie - guess who has to be Batman every time. I've tried requesting a change in characters - "Can I be a princess?" "No." "Can I at least be a girl?" "No." End of discussion. I try to contribute to the game by suggesting things that we can pretend, "How about we fly to the beach in my Batplane?" "N0." "Barbie, shouldn't we make the dolls some breakfast before we send them to school?" "No." Just do what she says and follow her around as we dance or skip from room to room. That is essentially playtime with my little gir.

Boy Am I Sorry!

My son is crazy about board games. For a while there were only 2 in the house - "Candyland" and "Chutes and Ladders". He loved both of those games, we played them daily. All of the characters from "Chutes and Ladders" were falling apart, the cards from "Candyland" were worn out, and though Colin wanted to continue playing them daily, mom was clearly over them. I do have to say, though, that it was through "Chutes and Ladders" that Colin learned his numbers from 1-100, so there was definitely an upside.

While I was in the U.S. over the summer, I decided that the situation needed to be remedied, and at Aunt Julie's suggestion, decided to buy "Sorry!" to give to Colin as his birthday gift in December. But in the period between July and December, as we played countless "Chutes and Ladders" games, I was endlessly tempted to just break out the game early and end the insanity.

But I made it to his birthday, and he was very excited about his new game, because he had played the "Spiderman" version with his cousin Zane over the summer. In fact, I am happy to say that "Chutes and Ladders" and "Candyland" have been reassigned to the back of the cupboard. He also received another Italian board game for Christmas, "The Goose Game" (don't ask), but "Sorry!" is clearly his favorite. I can't even count the number of times we have played it since the middle of December. Sometimes we even play it more than once a day. On a red-letter day we even get a chance to play with Daddy, making it even more fun. It is a little complex for Lucia, she loses interest quickly, but she likes to hand out the cards to everyone else, and move the pieces. And Colin is really good at it - in the beginning I was taking it easy on him, but now he regularly kicks my butt. The children were supposed to start back on school on Wednesday, but both Wednesday and Thursday were snow days (we got about a foot and a half of snow, which in these parts, is unheard of) and what better way to spend a snow day than playing non-stop games of "Sorry"?

I have already decided that on the next trip to the US we are stocking up on SEVERAL board games. I have already scoped them out on Amazon.com. And I can't believe that I am actually thinking this, but I am sort of starting to miss "Chutes and Ladders".

Christmas photos

Nothing like a little duelling to commemorate the birth of Christ

Christmas photos

Giorgio and Colin taking a break from the non-stop playing

Christmas photos

Lucia and Benedetta playing dress up on Christmas Day with help from Alessandra

Christmas photos

Colin with his remote control helicopter

Christmas photos

Getting ready for Christmas Eve mass

Christmas photos

Lucia with her new sing along microphone (includes disco ball and lights!)

Happy New Year!

Here's wishing all our friends and family a wonderful, peaceful new year. We had a very nice little party at our house, with our friends Shanda, Marco and their son Noah (4 years), who are back in Italy visiting for the holidays, and Kathy, Nico and little Emanuele (10 months).

It is, needless to say, a bit of pressure having a professional chef over for dinner (Kathy attended the Culinary Institute of America), but she brought a wonderful roast turkey breast, Shanda brought a delicious dessert, and I prepared Artichoke Bruschetta for a starter, and then a Mushroom and Farro Torte for a main vegetarian dish, Creamy Baked Spicy Polenta (seriously yummy) for a side dish as well as a little salad. Then I made sure that I served dinner late and made plenty of drinks available in the meanwhile, so that by the time they ate, they were all drunk and starving, so nobody complained about the food!

We had entertainment from the kids as well. Shanda is a dancer, and Noah has inherited his mom's talent. That kid has some really good moves, and since Lucia, of course, loves dancing (especially flipping her hair around), they were a happy pair.

Emanuele made it an early night, his first New Year's Eve was apparently not enticing enough to keep him awake, but the other three all made it to midnight, just barely. Colin and Lucia were in bed by 12:30pm, completely exhausted, but Colin was thrilled that this was the latest he had ever stayed up in his life. When I told him that his Grandma had said that his 5 Lamaze cousins were all in bed by 8:30pm, he was so psyched that he had been allowed to stay up later, and maybe, for just a few minutes, Marco and I were cool parents.