Christmas was great in our Katima-house. I was house manager with Rosie and Maddy and I really liked being in control of the food for this. I know some people don't like to have the responsibility of it hanging over their heads and having the knowledge that the screwed up Christmas dinner (if they do screw up that is), but I really like it. At the time I may be a bit cranky and irritated if their are a lot of people in the kitchen unnecesarily, but I have found that I really do like cooking for large numbers of people and I'm good at it too.
We decided to have fondue for Christmas Eve. We made it without wine or any alcohol of any kind using lemon juice as a subsitute. It tasted pretty good actually, though a little too lemony. Anyway, before we could start our dessert, Leonie, Marco and Niall of the Marathon group came to our place to switch our vans. It was fun to see them on Christmas Eve, but also a little weird I have to admit because they aren't part of my 'family'.
For Christmas morning we woke up at 10 am, even though we had agreed to get up at 9 as a compromise between the two warring factions who disagreed about the proper wake up time on Christmas day. One groups said as early as possible, the other thought as late as possible would be best...I thought 9 am was just fine. Anyway, we had a lot of presents to open. Boxes and boxes of gifts had been mailed to us everyday and it was high time their secrets were revealed! Also we had secret santa gifts and stockings to open up. It was a lot of fun opening secret santa's We had to guess who our person was first before we were allowed to open anything up. It turned out that Alyssanne was my secret santa and she bought me an exfoliating scrubby pad thing, a floating frog soap dish and some shower wash. My person for secret sant was Maddy and I bought her a shirt on a website called Threadless (they sell many cool t-shirts that are designed by users of the website). It was the perfect gift. She literally teared up when she saw it. that made me pretty happy.
After all the gifts were unwrapped, the presents admired and the paper cleaned up we headed to the kitchen to start cooking our Christmas feast. We had a smorgasbord of scones, potatoes and eggs to eat and everything was absolutely delicious.
After the food was eaten, which was about 1:30 pm, we cleaned up from breakfast and then relaxed for a while. Then we started in on Christmas dinner. Oh boy. Christmas Day dinner was funny. We had a mish-mash. Everything was Christmas themed (stuffing...ham...cranberry jelly) but it doesn't usually go into one Christmas dinner. Usually people don't eat ham and stuffing together, but we certainly did! I did a lot of delegating for this meal. I had people chopping here and stirring there. And everything came together at the end in a very odd (but delicious) way.
On Boxing Day we had an unexpected visit from both groups in our cluster. They were both on their way to Thunder Bay for an excursion and had to stop in at our place because they roads were really bad and snowy that day. They hung out until about 2-ish and then continued on their way. We had a schedule that day of hour long 1-on-1 sessions with Terri, but because of the impromptu group get-together we had to push them all back. I was able to have my session at about 3 pm. Terri and I talked for almost 2 hours. It was really nice to be able to get out of the house and talk without the entire group in the general vicinity. The walls in this house aren't all that thick. Even now, I am sitting on my bunkbed listening to music with the door closed and I can still hear Simon, Rosie and Alyssanne's voices murmuring from somewhere downstairs.
When I walked pulled up to the house at 5-ish Maddy was holding the phone and talking to my parents. They were in Marathon, about an hour away! It was so exciting when I heard that. I rushed up stairs to try and tidy up our bedroom as much as possible (unfortunatly it's always in a state of dissaray). Then I sat with Alyssanne on my bed and waited. She decided that she was going to go to the window and try to see if she could see the truck pull in. i had just finished describing the truck to her when she said, "Sara, there's a black truck in the drive way!".
I screamed and ran downstairs. Literally screamed. Then I opened the door and saw the truck for myself. I screamed again. I pulled on my boots and ran outside. Luckily, the weather had warmed up a lot so it was only 0 degrees out instead of the -20 I have become used to, because I didn't bother taking the time to put on a jacket. As I was ran to the truck my mom got out and ran to me. We met in the middle of the drive way and hugged like crazy. She was crying and we were hugging and then Lia and Dad got out of the truck and joined in the hug too. It makes my throat get tight and my eyes a little watery when I think about it. I really do believe that that was the best hug I've ever had.
My family stayed for about 4 days. In that time we opened gifts (thanks Zia Silvana, Nonna and everyone else!), made dinners and breakfasts together, played cards and talked. We also went on tours of Schreiber and Terrace Bay (guided by me of course) and also went out to Rossport , Red Rock (where the rock is really red), Nipigon and Thunder Bay. The day was so clear and beautiful. We had perfect weather for driving and sightseeing. I have to say, the stretch of highway that we drove is some of the most breathtaking in Canada.
Over two days we got to see a lot. Nipigon River which is the largest feeder into Lake Superior. And since Lake Superior drains into the rest of the great lakes, we really got to see the water that flows through all of the freat lakes. We also saw a small 'confectionary' that sold very little candy, but a lot of yarn, comics and fishing gear. It was a pretty crazy place actually. We also saw a lot of frozen, rushing water. It just looks so cool when water freezes in the middle of moving.
We drove out to the Silver Islets on our way to Thunder Bay. That was a really neat place. There were a bunch of dear out on the road eating the salt and being generally cute. When you get to the end of the road however, you have an unobstructed view of The Sleeping Giant which is a mountain range that looks like a man lying down. you can see the contours of his face really well which is really neat. I don't have any good pictures of it though which is unfortunate. Also at the end of the islets there is a colourful old mining town. The houses are now private cottages, but you can tell that most of them are the original houses the miners and their families would have lived in. It actually looks like one of those Nova Scotian fishing villages you see pictures of. They are all so tightly packed, brightly painted and sitting right beside the water. In the snow, nearly through the entire town we saw drunken, swaying boot prints. This person was VERY drunk. They were swaying all over the place and generally having a lot of trouble walking straight. It became a bit of a game for us to see just where the prints went though we lost track of them on the plowed road.
We saw ice climbers right off the highway, and right next to them was the famous Terry Fox monument. It is very impressive. It looks out off a rock face right next to the highway and it's just so powerful. We drove up the road and went to take pictures and sign the guest book.
A cool moment was when I saw that some people from the Marathon group had also been to the monument and signed the book as well.
When we were in Thunder Bay itself we didn't get to do much stuff. It was late when we pulled in so we decided to go and eat at the famous Hoito. The Hoito is a Finnish restaurant that is famous for it's good food and cheap prices. It was first opened for the Finnish mione workers in town who were able to find affordable housing, but not affordable food. The prices are amazing and the food is delicious. I've never had Finnish food before now, but I have to say, I would have it again, and many times over.
My parents and Lia left on the morning of the 30th and that day we spent cleaning to get ready for New Years, which we were hosting with the other two groups. I'm going to leave the story of New Years and afterward for tomorrow or the next day though because that retelling will be another long post and I just don't have it in me to describe it all over again.
x o
Sara
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