the tradition of little boy & tiger wishes
Grab your favorite warm beverage (I suggest hot chocolate with marshmallows), cuddle up to your favorite snuggler, and enjoy the Bleeding Espresso tradition of Christmas Eve by Bill Watterson:
If you’re having trouble reading the text, go here.
It’s almost time!
What do you have planned for Christmas Eve?
22 Beans of Wisdom to “the tradition of little boy & tiger wishes”
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
Calabria Guidebook
Recipes
We are spending Christmas Eve at my brother-in-laws. There are supposed to be about 18 of us there including our daughter, son and his bride. The hit of the evening will be my wife’s 2 year old great niece. Our niece is a few years older than you and our daughter. My wife’s nephew’s and his wife will be with his wife’s family. Thus, will not be seeing the three great nephews. My wife’s family is not Italian so the only thing Italian i expect will be some wine!
Merry Christmas to you and P!!!
Ooh fun! Christmas is always more fun with kiddies around. Enjoy Gil, and auguri!
i’m spending Christmas eve at my aunt’s house. i think we will go to a late night mass, go home, eat, and exchange gifts. i’m trying not to miss my family and my country too much this holiday season and focus instead on the blessings that i’ve received this past year and the people that are there for me now. its not easy but its also not as hard as it used to be. thanks for asking. and for sharing this story.
merry christmas to you and P!
odessa’s last blog post..a year ago today
I hear you Odessa…and it sounds like you’re doing well, focusing on the positives. Auguri!
Merry Christmas to you and P.
I might attend Christmas Eve service at one the 1600 churches in Rome. 🙂
I was actually thinking about going to Mass this year too…a shame we’re not closer!
Oops…that should be ” at one OF the”
Didn’t even notice that…I love how our mind fills in words sometimes (when they’re the right words, of course) 😉
I will be relaxing at home and preparing a salad and cupcakes to take to my brother’s for Christmas day.
I wish you and your family a wonderful Christmas and a new year full of joy, love and good health.
🙂
Sounds lovely Awedree! Auguri!
We are not doing a lot at all. Just me and the husband. My sons are not coming this year, staying at home with their children. Unfortunately I don’t have a big enough house for them all to stay.
Will see them on Jan 2nd.
Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year,
anne’s last blog post..Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!
Have a wonderfully relaxing holiday Anne…sometimes the quiet is kind of nice 🙂
don’t know what happened there???
It is meant to say, Merry Christmas and a very Happy New year, hope you have a wonderful time, and see you in the New Year.
anne’s last blog post..Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!
Gotcha Anne, and thank you 🙂
I have accepted an invitation to go eat fishy things I don’t like tonight. What can I say. Expats don’t get invited to family gatherings all that often, yanno? I got carried away.
Judith in Umbria’s last blog post..This is the TEST database
Hah, you’ve caught the holiday spirit! I’m sure you’ll make a bella figura with the fish…at least with your cats. Bring a big purse aka kitty bag 😉
Stopped by to wish you a very special Christmas and an even better New Year, Sally.
casalba’s last blog post..Buon Natale
Thanks Sally! Same to you and yours!
I’m making a spicy seafood pasta-our tradition- and hopefully drinking champagne at some point in the evening! Buon Natale and thank you for a wonderful year of your blog!
YUM! Sounds fabulous Janie, and thank you for coming to see me 🙂
I thought I had – or at least had seen – all the Calvin and Hobbes but this one is a charmer. As you know I’ve linked to it. Buono natale e tanti auguri.
Baci di Roma
Willym
Willym’s last blog post..Christmasy Things – Sharing III
Willym I remember cutting this out of a newspaper *many* years ago; have no idea where it is, but I do have a book with it in back in the States…someday I’ll have it here too 🙂 Auguri!
Oh, I love that Calvin and Hobbes poem.
We have been snowed in for a more than a week now; I measured the snow in my yard and it’s ten inches, and my car is up to its bumpers in snow and ice, so we’ve postponed Christmas until after the New Year. My plan for today is to (try to) walk up to the grocery store and pick up some staples. It should be exciting, especially all the falling down.
flurrious’s last blog post..And So It Is Festivus
Oh wow. I like snowstorms, but *not* being snowed in for a week! Gah! So will you have Chinese on Christmas after all? Hmm…….
Merry Christmas, Michelle!
It has been such a long time since I have visited…that I am ashamed of myself. Congratulations…to you and P! I love your new name and I love how happy you are! Bleeding Espresso is absolutely amazing…as I am chugging it down, when I know I should sip. Trying to catch up on the many, many months in just one serving is not only impossible…it dizzying! I just have to state, that you are only more special as a human being, than you are as a writer. Unfortunately, that little bit of sunshine is also your Christmas present…so I hope you liked it! Seriously, I couldn’t mean it any more than I do. I will be having Christmas Eve dinner at my Mom’s…where we will have no meat…but some beer-battered Canadian walleye that I specifically catch for the Christmas Eve feast, during my visits to their summer spot in Ontario. Other features on the menu will include home/church basement made pierogies, meatless baked ziti (my Italian addition to the menu about 20 years ago), kielbasi, and the traditional passing of the Polish wafer (oplatek). Afterwards, Donna and I will attend midnight mass at the Church where we were married 9 years and 6 days ago…where I will vividly recall, as I always do…the many Midnight Masses attended in my teens at St. Paul’s in Atlas…where afterwards, we would stop by a friend’s house and be careful not to wake up a certain little girl…who most certainly had sugar plums dancing in her head! 🙂 May you, P and the pooches have a wonderful Christmas. I look forward to catching up on everything real soon. Love, JT
I hope you’re happy that you made me cry. Your Christmas Eve sounds so special and lovely and I’m not jealous of the kielbasa and pierogies at all. OK, maybe a little. Or a lot. I miss them so! Please pass along my best wishes to mom, Donna, and the rest of the family, and happy anniversary!
I love Calvin & Hobbes, what a great poem!
We’re in PA tonight with my in-laws and down to MD tomorrow with my family. Can’t wait to celebrate Sofia’s 2nd Christmas!!!
Have a very wonderful Natale and I look forward to reading more from your blog in the new year!
Enjoy! I’m sure Sofia is going to have a ball!
Merry Christmas Michelle!
We are going to a friends house for their annual Christmas Eve Pizza Party. We make our own pizza.
It’s lots of pizza, friends, goodies, beverages – It will be fun! After, we all go over to my parents and have quality family time. We’ll be lucky to go to bed before midnight.
Ooh what a great tradition! Hope you enjoyed! What am I saying? *Of course* you enjoyed…there was homemade pizza!
I got off work a little bit ago . . . I can officially report that the LAST of the one million books I wrapped for customers was a duo of Tom Friedman’s Flat Hot and Crowded and some fancy-schmancy Sherlock Holmes thing. Marco’s working the dinner shift tonight so we will celebrate tomorrow. During his afternoon break he bought all the fixings for our Christmas Day dinner . . . our first together with the two of us in ‘our’ home. He went to the market to buy scallops, bought Baltic salmon, I don’t know what all. I got a few things for his stocking but it is a very low-key Christmas for us.
Hope you and P have/had a lovely day.
Thanks for all the joy and interest you bring into our lives with your writing.
Kim B.’s last blog post..Out of Pocket
Super low-key here too, like always. I used to be disappointed a bit, but I’m enjoying it more every year now. We don’t go crazy on gifts *at all* and we have nice quiet dinners, just the two of us on Christmas Eve and just us and P’s parents on Christmas Day. Very nice 🙂
I Love Calvin and Hobbes! Such a sweet cartoon.
My husband and I took naps today so we’d be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed enough to start opening our gifts at 12:01 AM. He’s relatively new to Christmas, and therefore acts like a 2 year old. It’s great fun. Add to that some champagne, and what could be better?
I hope Santa brought you lots of toys,
Kate
shiborigirl’s last blog post..TKO – I’m Down For The Count…
Oh that’s so fun Kate! Santa was good to me this year, thank you…I finally got a new phone 🙂
By now Santa has visited you and I will be making my journey in the pouring rain to my daughter’s Godmother’s house!
I wish you all the best for very Merry Christmas – Buon Natale and Happy New!
From my family to yours
Lucy, Todd and Marina
xo
lucy’s last blog post..
Thanks so much Lucy! Hope it’s a great one for you and yours 🙂
I hope you had a lovely Christmas, Michelle. What a sweet C and H cartoon!
jen of a2eatwrite’s last blog post..What’s Cooking Wednesday (early): A Jew Does the Cookie Thing
Glad you enjoyed Jen, and I hope you and yours had a great time too 🙂
I love little boy and tiger tradition. It’s my first Christmas abroad and feeling a little blue and out of sorts, your site is comforting in so many ways. I love the year end meme and plan to participate and I thought you should know that I have the Sex and City film on my computer and for whatever reason, if I feel lonely in my new French city, I watch it. I practically have the entire movie memorized. Don’t tell anyone, please. I don’t admit very often how much I love Sex and the City, but I do : )
I love House too. These are possibly my two most favorite : ) shows ever. And now with Calvin & Hobbes and all the delicious scrumptious succulent recipes….I’m a fan for life : )
Happy Holidays to you.
Ruthann’s last blog post..Its Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas
Oh I’m happy to bring a little comfort to an expat’s holiday…I know how you feel being out of sorts away from home for the holidays, so I’m happy that you stopped by and will return. I look forward to checking out your place more in depth as well 🙂
Christmas Eve I got to welcome my brother and his wife back from three months in Holland. Had lunch with Papa and Grandma Linda and then Mike and Abby headed out to church. Maya was way too tired to make it through the service. Tucked both kids and Michael into bed and then played Santa before going to bed myself. It was pretty much perfect.
Shan’s last blog post..year end
Aw sounds so lovely Shan! Glad you had such a great celebration 🙂
Calvin & Hobbes really do have the best approach to life! I wonder what their philosophy regarding 2009 will be?
I miss them so!