hungarian white christmas

it's officially the christmas season and kylie was excited to decorate with ty.  she got out some christmas treats, put on some nice music and opened up the decorations.  unfortunately ty has a different definition of christmas cheer.  several glass balls and a few family heirloom ornaments quickly fell victim to his version. the above picture is reminiscent of a similar basement disaster involving niko.

niko's is still better, but he had more material to work with.  and sharper teeth.

we finally got around to organizing zeke's room.  i am really happy with the result.  a few more pictures have to go up, and maybe a shelf, but its already a nice place to be.

on thursday i took my first trip up to mt baker this season.  none of my friends could make it midweek, but watching the forecast i had to get out.  it was incredible!  the hill claimed 8 inches of new snow, but at the top it was closer to 20.  there was one chute that i sessioned half the morning where the snow was up to my waist!  even though the chute was steep you had to keep your speed up or you would just sink in and stop.  no lift lines.  soft landings.  so fun.

the snow was falling thick and fast all day, filling everything back in.  here is the subaru at lunch time.  wow.  as i was hopping from mogul to mogul i was thinking that it is a privileged life when one can ski powder this light while sporting a tan.

finally i would like to tell you about zoltan and petra's christmas party.  they are our next door neighbours.  zoltan is hungarian and petra is german.  their party was attended by a mixture of hungarian canadians, german canadians, british canadians, and native canadians.  hungarians really know how to party.  zoltan makes his own wine and someone had smuggled in hungarian moonshine from the homeland.  they make cherry and plum and apricot schnaaps that taste delicious and make your face go numb.  somehow your glass never gets empty.

zoltan was giving us a tour of his wine cellar, dispensing his favoured varieties using a long blown glass carafe with a slim spout on one end and a mouthpiece on the other.  he would dip the spout in a vat of wine and suck the carafe full from the top.  just before the wine hit his mouth he smoothly transfered the carafe to his shoulder and carried it under his arm with a finger on the spout, lifting to fill any wine glass that came in reach.

as you can imagine, packing a bunch of hungarians in a wine cellar and distributing the fruits of his labours in such a manner, zoltan had quite a party going when he whipped back a curtain to reveal an entire wall of speakers.  he said, quite seriously, "when i make my wine, i like to listen to rammstein".  zoltan is of my parents' generation, and the picture of a hardworking immigrant, so kylie and i thought he must be referring to some german violin composer or something, but then he pressed play and the entire wall began pounding out hardcore german techno.  so awesome.

a really great mix of interesting people, from german seniors to british schoolkids.  delicious food, including hungarian goulash, cooked outside on a pot hung from a tripod, while the men drink wine and chat.  getting to know your neighbours can be really fun.  getting up early the next morning to go to work... less fun.