Happy New Year!

Wishing everyone a very happy new year and lots of good luck all year round!
In Austria it is custom to hand out little trinkets on new year's day - little coins, ladybugs, pigs, chimney sweeps, and clovers - all to bring good luck for the new year.
New Year's Eve is celebrated with friends or family, and often the guests particpate in a game of pouring lead - little figurines are melted above a candle and the molten lead is quickly poured into a bowl of water. The resulting forms that appear are studied for clues to the future. At midnight, the national radio stations all play "The Blue Danube" and everyone who has a partner dances the waltz. JK and I once danced the waltz on top of a mountain after ski-trekking our way up all day. It was wonderful. And it was very cold.
This year, we were all exhausted, so early in the evening we toasted with Mexican hot chocolate, which JT loves, and after watching a rousing episode of MacGuyver on dvd (I had to nudge grandma and JK a few times), we toasted with some sparkling cider at midnight and promptly went to bed. We are such old folks.