Russian Christmas

January 7th is the day the Russian Orthodox Church celebrates Christmas (according to the Julian calendar) so yesterday we celebrated Russian Christmas with Hannah. Much like our Sinterklaas celebration, for us it is an acknowledgment of the holiday with a few small gifts. The actual celebration involves fasting on the Eve of Christmas and eating a "holy supper'' when the first star appears in the night sky. For the record...Grandfather Frost (the Russian Santa Claus) actually comes on New Year's. Anyway, this year was very small as Hannah is still young, but as she gets older and we learn more about it, she can choose the traditions she'd like to do. I'm hoping she doesn't want to fast! : )
And here's our new handed down train set! Our friends Kevin and Deb came over Saturday night with their son's train set that he has grown out of....the kids had a lot of fun setting it up and then Hannah had fun on Sunday taking it all apart.