Words for Wellbeing - Christmas Edition!

Welcome to Words for Wellbeing

Welcome to our final edition of Words for Wellbeing for 2021 - the Christmas Edition!

As is becoming our tradition, this edition is packed with some of Emmanuel's favourite Christmas recipes, family traditions and well, anything Christmassy.

From our entire Fit4Life Wellbeing team, we wish you all the most safe, healthy, happy and restorative of Christmas holidays and look forward to seeing you all again in 2022.

To our entire Emmanuel Community and please enjoy everything on offer in this edition of Words for Wellbeing.

A Christmas Blessing

It is crazy to think that we are preparing for Christmas and the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. Whilst putting us the Christmas tree with my six year old daughter, it dawned on me that Christmas is a time that fills us all with so much joy. Watching her excitedly pull out decorations that she and her older brother had made at childcare and kindergarten and listening to her recall previous Christmas celebrations with family and friends, made me stop and think about how Christmas is a time that enables us to reconnect with others. This year, for many, it will be the first time they have seen family and friends for two or three years, but for some they will be spending the festive season without those they love close by, due to living internationally or for many other reasons. It is with these people in mind that we stop to pause and reflect on our own lives and all the wonderful people we encounter. These may be people we know really well, or people who are just acquaintances, but they are all people who are created in the image of God. 

For people of Catholic faith, the birth of Jesus is symbolic in that he was given to us by God as a universal saviour and mediator. When setting up the nativity scene at home, I pondered those who have been a saviour for me this year, offering their ear or support when it was needed. In this same vein, Jesus offered those within his world 2000 years ago the same support, so his birth is something we mark with joy and celebration.

This Christmas season we offer all those within our community a joyous Christmas. May it be filled with love and laughter and the grace and warmth of those you love, both near and far. 

God, grant us the light of Christmas; 

which is faith. 

God, grant us the warmth of Christmas; 

which is purity.

God, grant us the righteousness of Christmas; which is justice.

God, grant us the belief in Christmas, 

which is truth.

God, grant us the joy of Christmas; 

which is Christ.

Emmanuel's Family Christmas Traditions

For our final edition of Words for Wellbeing 2021, we have asked staff to share some of their Christmas traditions and favourite things about the festive season.  

Why are Christmas traditions important?

Christmas rituals are an important part to building a strong bond between family, and our community. They give us a sense of belonging and a way to express what is important to us. They connect us to our history, help us celebrate generations of family and always make us feel closer to loved ones even though distances between might be great.

• Christmas movie watching Pj’s matching family (this year Christmas sloths and FRIENDS)
• Backyard cricket
• Cherries and champagne for breakfast
• Watching national lampoon Christmas day with pudding
• Personalised Christmas cards
• Our tradition is that we have themed place mats and each person has to locate who they think they might be.  One year it was politicians, other year canton characters, celebrities, singers etc.  This year it will be birds.  So….my sister Anne is the perfect one, so her place mats have been Bambi, Mother Teresa and this year a Dove.  My other sister is bossy, so the politician year she was King Jong Un from North Korea.  You have to guess which place mat belongs to you.  It’s funny watching family members decide what placement might be theirs.
• I always sleep over at my sister’s house to wake up with my nephews on Christmas morning
• We always have to have a hot lunch with the entire family regardless of the weather!
• Our family is very competitive when it comes to Stealing Secret Santa and backyard cricket
• Our family tradition is to watch A Mr Bean Christmas on Christmas eve and read Russell the Sheep Saves Christmas, good for a giggle. 
• I usually make the kids and husbands favourites; pretzel bark, 3 ingredient Xmas cake and Baileys and tim tam xmas balls. Recipes included below.
• Our family ALWAYS watches ELF…we never get tired of the jokes and Will Ferrell.
• I make my kids dress up in something red and take a photo for our annual Christmas card.   I do this really early in September! 
• When we put the Christmas tree up we always put on a song called “Run, Run Rudolph” by Chuck Berry and dance around to it.  
• A couple of days before Christmas Day, we always watch our home movies of video we recorded when the kids were little.  It usually makes me cry at how much time has passed and how big they’ve grown!
• We listen to Christmas Carols sung by the cast of “Glee. “ as we drive around looking at Christmas lights.  We always drive down “Santa’s runway” on Christmas Eve.  This is when the residents of Tulsa Close, off Moonah Street,  light candles in paper bags lining the entire length of their street, making it look like Santa’s runway.  All the residents of the street give you candy canes into your car window and say hello.  It’s a one night only thing that they do. 
• I like to circle things I like in catalogues in red texta and strategically leave them around the house.
• Christmas day - At the farm near Koroit. Roast lunch, BBQ tea, mum with the Sydney Christmas carols on in the background. 
• Boxing Day - Cricket on, refreshments by the first ball, homemade pizzas for lunch, Backyard cricket across the day. 

Emmanuel's Christmas Recipes

Baileys Choc Truffles

Ingredients

•  375g malt biscuits
• 395g can sweetened condensed milk
• ¼ cup Cadburys drinking chocolate
• 2 tbsp Baileys Irish Cream (or add more, depending on taste)
• 1 cup desiccated coconut
  

Method

• Place biscuits in food processor and blend until fine crumb.
• Add all other ingredients (save ½ the coconut) and stir until well combined.
• Refrigerate for 30 mins.
• Form balls and roll in left over coconut.
• Refrigerate until firm (makes about 48)

Dust with more drinking chocolate, drizzle with melted chocolate, place in paper cases etc, etc.

Elaine’s No Fail Pavlova Recipe 

Ingredients

• 2 egg whites
• 4 tbs boiling water
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla, cornflour & white vinegar

Method

• Set your oven to 200C.
• Mix all ingredients together in a mix master until the consistency is thick and shiny.
• Pour onto a lined tray. Don’t flatten it out too much so that you can enjoy a nice fluffy centre and crunchy shell.
• Place the tray into the oven for the first five minutes before reducing the temperature to 100C for 55 minutes.
• Then, most importantly, DO NOT open the oven door for at least half an hour!
• Decorate with whipped cream and your favourite toppings.
• Mum loves a crushed peppermint crisp and strawberries...

Ballinger Gingerbread Family Recipe

Ingredients:

• ½ cup Brown Sugar
• 2½ cups Plain Flour
• 2 Tsp ground Ginger
• 1 Tsp Bi carb soda
• 125g butter (chopped)
• 2/3 cup Golden Syrup

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC
2. Put all ingredients into the bowl of a food processor and process until a smooth dough appears
3. Divide the dough into two pieces and wrap in glad wrap.
4. Refrigerate for 30mins
5. Roll dough out to 4mm thick, cut into your desired shapes
6. Bake for 8-10 mins (dependent on individual ovens)
7. When cool, decorate with icing.

Pretzel Bark

Ingredients

•  About 230g mini pretzels, broken into smaller pieces, more or less to cover the pan
•  1 cup butter
•  1 cup packed light brown sugar
•  2 cups chocolate chips
•  Sea salt

Method

• Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line an 11X17-inch rimmed baking sheet with aluminum foil or parchment paper. Cover the bottom of the pan in a layer of broken mini pretzels. Set aside.
• In a small or medium saucepan over medium heat, combine the butter and brown sugar. When the mixture starts to gently simmer and bubble, let it cook for 3 minutes without stirring. Immediately pour the hot caramel mixture over the pretzels in a back and forth motion to cover most of the pretzels (a few empty/dry spots are ok as the caramel will fuse together during baking).
• Bake for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and place the pan on a cooling rack. Immediately sprinkle chocolate chips evenly over the top of the hot caramel and pretzels. Let the chocolate chips sit for 2-3 minutes until they melt. Use an offset spatula or rubber spatula to gently spread the melted chocolate over the toffee. Lightly sprinkle with sea salt.
• Let the toffee cool completely at room temperature then refrigerate if needed to help the chocolate set up. Break the toffee into pieces and try not to eat the whole batch.

Mini Christmas Puddings

Buy a supermarket brand fruitcake, crumble it up in a bowl.  Dampen the crumbled cake with either brandy or Orange/apple juice.  Roll up dessertspoons/teaspoons of mixture into a balls.Next step is to drizzle melted white chocolate on top to resemble custard and then cut up green and red lolly snakes to look like holly. 

Buche de Noel

A traditional French dessert served after the main Christmas dinner is the Bûche de Noël, a roll of light sponge cake, covered in chocolate or coffee buttercream textured to resemble bark to evoke the tradition of burning the Yule log. This Christmas tradition of burning a large log in the fireplace was meant to symbolize a new beginning for a new year and any misfortunes were burned in the flame.

Baileys Tim Tam Christmas Balls

Ingredients

• 2 packets Tim Tams (cold)
• 200g condensed milk
• 1/4 cup Baileys
• 1 x handful salted cashews
• dessicated coconut (for rolling in)

Method

• Blitz biscuits and cashews mix in Baileys and condensed milk.

• Roll into balls and cover with coconut.

• Refrigerate.

3 Ingredient Christmas Cake

Ingredients

• 1 kg mixed dried fruit
• 3 cups chocolate flavoured milk
• 2 cups self-raising flour

Method

• Place dried fruit in a bowl and pour over chocolate milk. Cover with cling film and place in the refrigerator overnight.
• Preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced). Line a 20cm round cake tin with baking paper and set aside. Sift self-raising flour over the soaked fruit and stir the mixture until combined.
• Pour mixture into lined tin and place in the oven for 2 1/2 hours.
• Check the oven each hour to make sure that the top isn't burning. If you think it will burn then make a cartouche (ring of baking paper) and place on top of the cake. Continue to cook until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Rachy's Christmas Recommendations

We've felt as though a special commendation medal needs to be awarded this year to our Wellbeing Co-ordinator extraordinaire Rachele Sloane who had her Christmas tree up in OCTOBER!

As a part of her prize, she's shared with us some of her favourite Christmassy Movies and her favourite Christmas PJ family photos because she's definitely as festive as a freckle!

Favourite Christmas Movies

• Christmas Vacation
• Love Actually
• Elf
• Home Alone
• How the Grinch stole Christmas
• The Santa Clause

Year 7 Journal Club

Thank you to everyone who contributed to making our first Journal Club such a success. Year 7 Journal Club was a wonderful collaboration between Wellbeing and the LRC and three incredible teachers - Mrs Skilbeck, Ms Hill and Mr Laidler.

We’re so proud of our group of students for trying something new and we’re so impressed with how expressive you all are in your own very unique and talented ways.

Over the three sessions we were able to try three main styles of journaling:

Week One: Art – experimenting with different mediums, mixtures of drawing and writing and experimenting with colours and shapes.

Week Two: Photography – here we explored how we might use photos and images in different ways to express ourselves.

Week Three: Poetry – we were able to use an object to elicit emotions and then use creative metaphors to write poetry. We're so happy to share one of the poems, by Maddi Crowe, written in this workshop.

Most importantly, please keep journaling in any way that YOU choose. We hope your journal is filled by the time we see you again in 2022!

Take care and have the most wonderful, restful holidays,

Orange the World - Guess the Lollies Winner

Congratulations to Mia Hetherington of Year 7, the winner of the guess the lollies competition to raise awareness for Orange the World and money for Emma House!

Thank you to everyone for your donations. We've been able to fund a care package for a family in need.

Mia generously shared her winnings with her art class. Well done Mia!

Fit Bits

Our weekly Fit Bits links are designed to energise, motivate and encourage us to take brain breaks and mindful moments throughout each day for our minds and our bodies. We hope you love these Christmassy ones!

Energisers:

Brain Breaks:

Mindful Moments:

Motivational Music:

Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays

Wellbeing will be enjoying a wonderful restorative break alongside all of you, but we'll be back on site and ready to introduce you to a new team member on January 27th!

Take great care everyone and enjoy every moment of your break.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

Love from your Fit4Life Wellbeing team.