In keeping with our European culture trend we decided to celebrate New Years Eve in the the way of the Scottish.
It started with the realization that a traditional midnight celebration would simply not be possible this year 
Not only did W and I have no babysitter, but I would be watching my daycare kid until nearly 10PM. Add to that the fact that keeping M and B up until midnight seemed like a really bad idea and I decided to make a new tradition. After a quick look at a time zone map I decided that if it was 12AM in Scotland it would be 7PM here. Much more manageable!
K is a huge fan of all things Scottish so I knew she would love the idea of celebrating like them. As predicted she quickly agreed to my idea and after some research we discovered the traditions of Hogmanay.
We decided we would:
Make a bonfire
Take a torch walk (with flashlights)
make a dinner of bangers and mash
Toast with cider
Sing Auld Lang Sine
Have shortbread
Decorate paper herring
It went very well! We had a nice dinner of Bangers and Mash and ginger beer then with 1/2 hour left till the New Year (in Scotland) we all went out and started a bonfire. K brought out her i-dog and DK her i-cat and they played Snow Patrol and The Kooks while roasting marshmallows. At faux midnight we had a toast of sparkling cider. Various things were toasted; family, a new year, the old year, shortbread and marshmallows to name a few. We did sing Auld Lang Sine, although not very well LOL!
After a bit of frolicking the kids put out the fire with snow chunks which produced copious amounts of smoke (much to their delight), then we came inside to have tea and shortbread. They decorated the cardboard herring while listening to more music.
The biggest hit of the night was the sparkling cider and the girls had a great time pretending it was champagne and falling over repeatedly in the snow. They make pretty realistic drunks considering neither one has had so much as a sip of alcohol.
We never did end up doing the torch walk because it was SO cold that leaving the fire just wasn’t an option, but other then that it went quite according to plan. Yay!
) asked “why seven fishes?”. I had an inkling, being raised Catholic and all, but we all ended up researching it together. I found the best answer to that question in the link above (click on Feast of Seven Fishes) but basically- there are several theories but nobody really knows. 