Christmas Eve - WAITING

 I got a big kick out of the kids' idea of making room for all the gifts. 😂

 We have always decorated the tree on the 4th Sunday of Advent. This year we waited until Christmas Eve. We didn't like it. We'll go back to the 4th Sunday of Advent.  I probably spent so many years thinking how nice it would be and it was just a let down haha. Not quite sure what I expected. Maybe it's because we don't have real candles on our tree!😂

 I got sick of wrapping gifts so I just put out the new Lord of the Rings Chess set. If we didn't lose all the pieces so often we'd have a really large collection of unique chess games.

 The Most Important Reason for the Season. Our Lord Himself. This is a small baby size Christ. I fell in love with them when I was in Rome one year, many moons ago for Christmas.

 We are enjoying the nice weather, Celeborn took one of the horses for a ride.

 Impatiently being patient waiting for gifts which were multiplying. It's just a case of sheer numbers. Each person given each person gifts and outside gifts coming in, it adds up... just by sheer numbers.

 Samwise heading out to Belladonna's family celebration.

 So. Lutefisk. It's been talked about in Aragorn's family for as long as I've been around there (25 years) but I never saw it. It was a family myth it seemed. So this year Aragorn insisted I get Lutefisk.  I almost forgot as I had gotten some lovely seafood but with a last minute grocery run he reminded me.

 It meant boiling for a number of minutes of which I forget now. And then adding white sauce. The biggest disappointment is that it did NOT smell bad, and it tasted pretty good. Funny, we had planned on being extremely disappointed. I'm not saying we are making it every year, but it really wasn't bad at all. Actually it was kind of tasty.

 We had lobster tail bits, shrimp, Lutefisk, crablegs, salad and Celeborn's family's cookies.

 Oh and Eowyn's Peru Chowder which is AWESOME!

 Oh and some lovely cheeses from Costco.

 Getting gussied up for Midnight Mass

 HAHA!!! 😁

I guess this is an ornament that someone made last year out of a toilet paper tube and the outer-wrappings from St. Nicholas gold chocolate coins. My kids crack me up!

Belt Tests - 2 New Black Belts

 Tigers (3-7 year olds), White, Orange, and Yellow (7+)

 Gimme your best kicks!

 Weapon this cycle: sticks

 sitting like a master

 student of the month!!

 He's not heavy, he's my brother

 Marigold did an amazing job this exceptionally difficult cycle.! She rallied and learned the entire In Wah 1 form!

 Sparring

 Fit test, always a killer

after getting over 300 4 times, I only got 298 this time

Does that mean I get kicked out of the 300 club? :)

 I'm a blue belt and Marigold is a green belt.

 

 I challenged Marigold to work hard this cycle so she could belt test. She chose balloons for an incentive prize. :D

 My belt rail. 9 belts down, 7 to go until first degree black belt recommended

BLACK BELT CHALLENGE AND TEST 

 Eleanor's and Merry's Black Belt testing began with a 2-1/2 hour fit challenge which included:
150 jumping jacks, relay sprints, lunge punches, lunges, suicides (there should be a better name for those, but perhaps it is applicable), round kicks, wave masters kicks for about 20 minutes, forms, sheilds kicking, pad punches, sparring 8 rounds and a fit test. Phew!

 Then came the midterms and belt tests. Rosie was suppose to midterm however she was sick.

 Bowing in, sign of respect

 forms

 3 more rounds of sparring

 board breaks, smashed 'em!

 Merry was challenged to break a black board for his round kick.

 Mr. Moh getting on a chair to give Merry a hug. haha! Merry was also invited to join the Legacy program! That's the school's highest honor for students, instructor training.

 Both did awesome! So proud of you both!

 This makes 1 - 2nd degree black belt (Frodo), 3 - 1st degree black belts (Rosie, Eleanor, and Merry). With 3 more to test in the first half of 2020 (Pippin, Bilbo, and Poppy).

Incidentally, for those who have been entirely misinformed and think we are actually dangerous... we are not trained to attack. Kind of like speak when spoken to, kick when provoken to 😂

Videos

Merry smashing the boards!

At 15 he broke a black board with a round kick.

Eleanor's Black Belt, speech by Mr. Moh

Merry's Black Belt speech by Mr. Moh

wherein he is invited to the Legacy program!!