Happy New Year-2008

Russians celebrate Christmas on the 6th & 7th of January according to the Orthodox calendar On these days there are special Orthodox services to mark the occasion, however this is not the big or main celebration of Russians for Christmas and New Years. New Years Eve is their main or big celebration, this is the time family and friends will get together, have a special meal and exchange presents. They will welcome in the New Year with champagne and then go outside and shoot off fireworks. Usually you will begin to see fire works from the time it get dark, but most come out after midnight and very often will continue till 3 or 4 in the morning. This is the night Russian party all night long with many not going to sleep till 9 or 10 the next morning. Here in Moscow many will go to different fireworks displays put on by the city, like the big one down on Red Square. This year we were with our friends for New Years Eve, had some nice food went out and shot some fire works, came home after midnight, went out with the kids and shot off some more fire works with all the other folks around our place that were out doing the same.

Daniel's youtube ambitions

Daniel keeps making these photos strips which he then wants me to make into a move strip and post on youtube! What do you think? (this is only a short sample)

Kids with a Camera

As I was up loading the photos from our camera to the computer, I saw a lot of picture on it that the kids had taken. They like to take the camera and go around the house taken snaps of just about anything, so I thought i would share a small selection of them with you.

Sonja in braids

Karina & Timothy

Gudrun and her boys

Who is spiderman?

Karina's stuffed animals arranged for her to take a photo of them!

Christmas is Over!

Christmas is come and gone and this year we have no photo to show you other then this one of our Christmas tree. We celebrate Christmas, first on the 24th this is the days we have our main Christmas dinner, usually roast duck with the usually potatoes, veggies and sauces. After dinner we open the presents under the tree (they were added after this photo was taken) then later have dessert and coffee. On the 25th we just took it easy the kids got to open some more presents, this year some of our packages from home arrived on the 25th. (it is not a holiday in Russia so the post office still works) On the 26th we had our co-workers over for a turkey dinner and later played some games together.

Christmas Party

At the ends of eah year those of us who are here in Moscow usually try to go out for a meal together, this is also the time we take our Russian workers for their office christmas party meal. This year as our kids were already on their christmas break from school, they got to come along. Can you tell what resturant we are in, we took our workers here last year and they really liked it and wanted to go back again.