Christmas Traditions

[Jaymes]

Leaping linzertortes!  I can't forget the second annual round of this Holiday Tradition.  Must get my way-behind the rum ball butt to the Recipe Archive and whip up  three cubic yards of Jaymes's Caramel Corn!

How did I miss this. "Three cubic yards" -- that should last a while.

[Jenny McClure]

Just reading through this thread has reved up my Christmas Spirit, I really can't wait to head back to Ireland for Christmas.

We always left mince pies and stout for santa, and some carrots and hay (my grandfather was a farmer) for the reindeers. There was always a bite out of the carrots and mince pies as Santa didn't have time to eat the whole thing.

Since we have all gotten older and moved on, the traditions have changed slightly but only because of age. We still all go home to stay with out parents and they still do a stocking for us which is at the end of our beds when we wake up on Christmas morning (now they don't have to worry about waking us due to the vast quantitiies of wine and hot whiskys drunk before bed). Even my husabnd gets a stocking. Breakfast is always my grannie's homemade wheaten bread, with smoked salmon and scrambled eggs. Mimosas of course. Then everyone gets showered and dressed, the fires are lit and we open the presents. Dinner is the full works, usually cold assorted seafood for starters and then turkey etc. then cheeses and port followed by pudding . We too have Christmas crackers, whcih completely baffled my husband the first time. After the final course we head to the living room and play games like charades and pictionary which usually ends up very lively due to the quantities of alcohol that day.

Then it's off to bed. Boxing day is the next day and when our home team has a big rugby match. So all the friends and family gather at the rugby club to watch the match and celebrate Christmas some more.

Cant' friggin wait!!!

[FabulousFoodBabe]

Crustella ... geez, my grandmother used to make those and Strufoli by the gross. That was always Christmas to me, when I was a kid.

We stopped giving gifts to the adult siblings, but always give my FIL a case of Graeter's ice cream (he's the most bad-habit-free person in the world, except for this. I swear, he can eat through the whole thing in a weekend).

On Christmas Eve, the kids always decorate a half-sheet sized, stocking-shaped cookie for Santa Claus: when they were little, they carefully decorated it in a holiday motif. Now, they mix everything together that they can find in the refrigerator, that can be spread on the cookie (one year we had mustard, barbecue sauce, chili sauce, and capers on top of the frosting). I think they're on to me

We've always spent Christmas Day in our own house, so the kids could wake up in their own beds, but usually had guests, too. In most of the places we lived, we either hosted or attended a Christmas Eve buffet, and got into the habit of making "hors d'oeuvres" dinner for the 24th when we moved here.

A few years ago, when we lived in Atlanta, we decided to go out for Christmas Dinner because it was just the four of us. We found a little restaurant in Buckhead that served limited menu and decent wine, and wound up having a great time. Ever since then, we go out for Christmas Day dinner, in the early afternoon. This year: Gaia in Greenwich. Can't wait!

[Kris]

When I was a kid, Christmas Eve was a big deal at my Aunt Belle's house (paternal grandmother's sister). It was always very exciting because we'd get tons of gifts from the adults. We stayed up past midnight and were allowed to open the gifts we received that evening. The meal was always pretty much the same - turkey, dressing, ham, mac & cheese, stringbeans, etc.

Aunt Belle has passed on, along with all of the rest of the older folks. But the Christmas Eve tradition still continues. For the last several years, my aunt (father's sister) has been hosting Christmas Eve. This year we're doing a seafood & pasta menu.

On Christmas Day, my sisters and I were allowed to open the gifts from our parents. We'd get up very early and find lots of presents under the tree. Even when we hit our late teens/early 20's, my mother & father would still get us lots of gifts. As I got older, I'd know some of the gifts I was getting because I'd go shopping with my mom for my younger sisters. And she'd let me pick out some of the gifts at that time. There were still a few surprises under the tree for me though. I could always expect to get some pajamas or a house robe though.

In 1987, my mom started the tradition of hosting a Christmas day brunch. She'd have a little gift for each of us at our place setting and we'd enjoy belgian waffles, sausage, home fries, chicken and broccoli pockets, fruit salad and a dessert of some kind. In recent years, I've been making my sour cream coffee cake for dessert. Sometimes a new item or two is added to the menu too.

Several years ago we decided that it was too burdensome for the adults to buy gifts for each other. So we have a Secret Santa, where we draw names on Thanksgiving. We exchange our Secret Santa gifts during Christmas brunch and my niece & nephew open their tons of gifts.

Christmas dinner is no big deal since we're usually stuffed from brunch. Some years I've cooked a light dinner for hubby and me, other years I haven't.

I'm 35 now, married and my husband and mother-in-law participate in my family's Christmas traditions since they don't have any other family. Hubby and I don't have a child yet but when and if we do, I don't expect the Christmas tradition to change much. And I don't want it to either.

[lesfen]

My Christmas' haven't been the same since I met my husband. We still have a great time at Chrismas, don't get me wrong, but I miss the old days.

When I was a kid, my parents always had kind of an "open house" Christmas Eve. My mom would make a big meat and cheese tray for sandwiches, cheese balls, chips and dips, cookies, etc... easy stuff to keep out for the visitors that would be wandering in and out over the course of the evening. After my parents went to bed, my siblings and I would creep out into the living room and wait for an appropriate time to wake them up again. We thought that 2:00am was perfectly reasonable! We would sit out there in our PJ's and go through our stockings, shake presents, watch crappy Christmas videos, and just talk until they came out. I'm not kidding... we did that until I was about 28-years-old, and we would still be doing it if my husband's family didn't have a family reunion every Christmas Eve. Actually, now that I think about it, my brother and sister still do it without me.

After the presents are opened, my dad makes eggs, bacon, home fries, and toast for breakfast. This is about the time that I show up... just in time to help mom start Christmas dinner. We always have roast beef and it's always the best roast beef of the year. The rest of the day is spent eating, drinking, playing Euchre, and playing any of the board games that we received.

[Allura]

Christmas Eve is a fairly big deal in my family. We go to my aunt's house and have an Italian "Feast of the Seven Fishes." Some years I think it's more the "Feast of a Dozen Desserts."

First course, pasta: spaghetti or linguini with white clam sauce and with calamari sauce. My mother makes the calamari now; my grandmother used to. She stuffs the bodies with breadcrumbs and cooks them and the tentacles (which most of the guys fight over...) in a somewhat spicy red sauce. oh, and there's usually some spaghetti with butter, too.

Second course is fish. Fried eels, shrimp, scallops. Crabcakes. Shrimp scampi. One or two steaks or filets done on the grill, salmon, flounder, halibut, something like that. Bacala (salt cod) salad usually is on the table, but rarely eaten...Veggies usually include broccolli w/cheese sauce, maybe asparagus or green beans, or mushrooms, or some combination. I prob should start looking for an idea; I tend to bring a side and/or a dessert.

Third course is fruit, nuts, and raw fennel. Gives us a good chance to make room...for dessert.

Fourth is dessert. We go bonkers. Everyone tends to bring something, and some people bring multiples, so we end up with close to one each. Chocolate jelly roll, cookies, and ricotta cheesecake are about the only constants. Everything else is whatever looks good at the bakery or someone feels like making. I'm thinking of making the chocolate pecan pie I made for Thanksgiving, since it was so rich and this side of the family didn't have it. A trifle's another possibility.

At some point we roll home, drunk (well, except me...it's funnier that way...) and go to sleep. Christmas Day is much more casual and meals go all over the place. Some years breakfast is bagels & danishes, sometimes it's eggs to order. Depends how awake and energetic my mother's feeling. We open gifts - the "kids" still get too many - and eventually whoever's coming over comes over. This year dinner will be brisket and latkes since Hanukkah's the next day and my father is Jewish. I believe we'll be leading off with lasagna and/or tortellini alfredo, just to mix our ethnicities up. Should be fun.

[rooftop1000]

Christmas Eve is a fairly big deal in my family. We go to my aunt's house and have an Italian "Feast of the Seven Fishes." Some years I think it's more the "Feast of a Dozen Desserts."   

First course, pasta: spaghetti or linguini with white clam sauce and with calamari sauce. My mother makes the calamari now; my grandmother used to. She stuffs the bodies with breadcrumbs and cooks them and the tentacles (which most of the guys fight over...) in a somewhat spicy red sauce. oh, and there's usually some spaghetti with butter, too.

Second course is fish. Fried eels, shrimp, scallops. Crabcakes. Shrimp scampi. One or two steaks or filets done on the grill, salmon, flounder, halibut, something like that. Bacala (salt cod) salad usually is on the table, but rarely eaten...Veggies usually include broccolli w/cheese sauce, maybe asparagus or green beans, or mushrooms, or some combination. I prob should start looking for an idea; I tend to bring a side and/or a dessert.

Third course is fruit, nuts, and raw fennel. Gives us a good chance to make room...for dessert.

Fourth is dessert. We go bonkers. Everyone tends to bring something, and some people bring multiples, so we end up with close to one each. Chocolate jelly roll, cookies, and ricotta cheesecake are about the only constants. Everything else is whatever looks good at the bakery or someone feels like making. I'm thinking of making the chocolate pecan pie I made for Thanksgiving, since it was so rich and this side of the family didn't have it.   A trifle's another possibility.

At some point we roll home, drunk (well, except me...it's funnier that way...) and go to sleep. Christmas Day is much more casual and meals go all over the place. Some years breakfast is bagels & danishes, sometimes it's eggs to order. Depends how awake and energetic my mother's feeling. We open gifts - the "kids" still get too many - and eventually whoever's coming over comes over. This year dinner will be brisket and latkes since Hanukkah's the next day and my father is Jewish. I believe we'll be leading off with lasagna and/or tortellini alfredo, just to mix our ethnicities up.  Should be fun.

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What kind of dessert should I bring and what time?

tracey

[chemprof]

We have some good Christmas traditions in my family, but it's been hard since we lost my mom...

However I thought I'd talk about a holiday tradition I do for my students (especially since I'm in the middle of it right now!). Every year right before finals we have a holiday party. I make a giant (to me) batch of chicken gumbo and black beans. When I say giant, I mean about 4 gallons of gumbo and 3 gallons of black beans. That's a lot for me, and I feed about 70-100 students and faculty. The funny thing is, I'm not quite sure why it's gumbo and beans, except that those are the two dishes, meat and veggie based respectively, that I know how to make in massive quantaties.

So, I just finished the last batch of roux (a use a microwave recipe that's not too bad, from a community cookbook my mom gave me called "Tout de Suit al la Microwave"...a little scary b/c EVERYTHING in there is by micro!) and tomorrow I'll make the chicken stock and black beans. It's funny to me that I can by 20 lbs of chicken and 3 lbs of black beans and feed the same amount with each!

I also put up my Christmas tree this weekend, and students (and in some cases their kids) are very happy to help decorate (yes, occasionally I end up with a large group of ornaments clustered in a corner of the tree by a friend or students' 2 year old, but that's ok!).

Anyhow, 48 hours from now I'll have a house full, and I'll know that the Christmas season has started, and that the semester is almost over!

Anne

[JCD]

As slbunge, I come from a Polish American family and we did do the oplatek thing also. Another tradition was “wigilia”, a Christmas eve celebration that included no meat. Every year, a different relatives house was chosen and everyone brought some non-meat dish to share. There was mushroom soup (dried porcini in vegetable broth with sauerkraut or sour salt) with home made noodles--and as I got older I began to contribute the dried porcini as I am an avid mushroom hunter. Also white borscht. Then there was always the herring my mom would get from the market and brine herself. Of course then there were pierogi (cabbage, potato and cheese, sauerkraut, and once I defied tradition and made wild mushroom ones which were killer!!!) and kapusta. Relish trays of all assorted pickles and olives and also lots of boiled potatoes to have with the herring. Sometimes we’d make potato kluski (sorta like gnocchi, my husband affectionately calls them starch blobs). My mom would also make stuffed mushrooms (stuffed with onion, the mushroom stems, butter and cream) and it was fun to go to the supermarket with her and find the biggest, best cultivated mushrooms we could find! Time has wandered on and now the family is smaller and spread far and wide, mom and dad are gone, but I still try to make a couple few of these things for my nuclear family Christmas eve. Thanks so much for the thread, this is my first post and I joined just to share in the memories!!!

[H. du Bois]

My BIL (whose mother trained at the Cordon Bleu) brought the tradition of beef wellington, potato gratin, green beans and some scandalously rich chocolate dessert into our family. Since then, the Christmas dinners (he & my sister cook) have always been a variation on the beef tenderloin & potatoes theme. A couple of years ago, the dessert was Mario Batali's chocolate valpolicella pudding, which was so decadent no one could finish it!

As for me, my own favorite holiday fare was the time I did a multi-course seafood meal on Christmas eve, complete with English Christmas crackers and lots of champagne. Between the paper litter from the popped crackers, the broken shells from the lobster & crabs, the champagne corks, and the torn wrapping paper from all the gifts, my kitchen looked like a bomb had gone off in it, but it was such a happy mess.

Ellen

[Lori in PA]

Welcome, JCD! Nice post about nice memories!

[Peter B Wolf]

When I was a kid, Christmas Eve at my house started at 4:00pm, when my Grandmother, who lived with us, took my sister (two years older than I) for a "walk" outside, needed to last an hour (while 'der Weihnachtsmann' / aka Santa Claus was coming).

As we got back into the living room a nice fresh spruce tree was all decked out and "Live", yes live, candles where glowing on it. Presents were under the tree, but always unwrapped. What I hated most was that all of us had to stand and sing at least the first verse of some 2/3 Christmas carols: Silent Night, Oh Tannenbaum and another. My mothers voice sounded like one of the sirens at the Lorelei, Oma hummed and dad only mouthed. Horrible. Some tears were shed, I don't know what for, and then we attended to the gifts.

Grandma/Oma and my mom went into the kitchen and prepared the traditional poached Carp with mustard sauce and drawn butter, boiled potatoes and some kind of salad greens. By the way, we all were all dressed up in Sunday clothes or new ones just purchased for the festivities.

That Carp was something else, it was always purchased alive at some fish monger a day or two before the 24th. It was kept in our bathtub until eating, or rather cooking time or when my grandmother killed it. Don't know how.

One year, I remember distinctly it was 1940. Apparently the fish was slaughtered and we had dinner when the doorbell rang. I am getting ahaed of myself.

During these war years German families were required to always keep all bathtubs filled with water, in case a bomb during an airraid would hit , and we would have water to extinguish the flames.

So anyway, the carp is being consumed, the bell rings, we open the diningroom door and stand in three inches of water in the hallway. A neighbor living upstairs in the apartment house had to go in the basement to get something and noticed water dripping into the cellar from our place. Realisation set in: carp was removed from tub, faucet opened to refill tub, carp got cooked and eaten, water still running. End of story.

Now adays, carp turned into some nice smoked salmon, smoked eel, steak tartar, and a few good cheeses. No carp - no water in the hall.

Christmas day, Goose or Capon. Not to forget Christmas Stollen from Cafe Kreuzkamm in Muenchen (formerly in Dresden) Presents is good FOOD, and family, and thanking for our health.

My family and I wish all of you the same: Merry Christmas and Happy Hannuka

[jscarbor]

Have to bring this up again. Anyway, I can't tell you how much I love Christmas, especially now that I have children. My son Jett is 3.5 and gets it. He is really worried about Santa this year since he knows he's been naughty. Of course he's also been great! My daughter is 10 months so this is her first, it goes without saying, (I guess I just said it) she has no clue. That being said, traditions, family, friends and making this time special means so much to me now. When I started this thread a couple years ago I did it because my family did not have many traditions and my wifes did. I did not want to have to adopt her families traditions and have nothing that was "ours". So, I have "stolen" a few like the stocking getting filled and sneaking into kids bedroom and placing it on the door knob so that its the first thing the kids see in the morning or Santa gets some pate and cheese with wine instead of milk and cookies. We mix that in with some of my wifes traditions. All this might have inspired my born into family because they are doing a few things that are great as well.

So, anybody that might be new to this thread, please share what you love and remember and still might do in regards to Christmas.

Merry Christmas folks!

[Carrot Top]

We always make food for Santa's reindeer. Because Santa of course gets cookies and milk everywhere, but his reindeer must be hungry too.

Oatmeal, cornmeal, sesame seeds, a bit of brown sugar, and gold glitter so that the reindeer can see it in the dark. Toss all together, put in little bags, and each child tosses their handful onto the ground outside, on Christmas Eve.

Strangely enough, usually by morning it is gone. The wind perhaps, a handy broom, or even maybe Santa's reindeer.

And the children are happy to see that the reindeer had a good warming snack to keep them strong and proud on their important journey through the night skies.

[srhcb]

Oatmeal, cornmeal, sesame seeds, a bit of brown sugar, and gold glitter so that the reindeer can see it in the dark. Toss all together, put in little bags, and each child tosses their handful onto the ground outside, on Christmas Eve.

Strangely enough, usually by morning it is gone. The wind perhaps, a handy broom, or even maybe Santa's reindeer.

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Hmmmmmmm

This may explain the Christmas tale rat families tell their children, "The Magical Golden Christmas Eve Dinner"?

[Carrot Top]

the Christmas tale rat families tell their children,

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You reminded me of something else we used to do. . .Christmas Eve day, we'd watch The Tailor of Gloucester by Beatrix Potter from this video set.

It is the story of how on Christmas Eve, the animals can talk. . .and the adventures of the tailor's cat. Some lively mice, a rat or two I believe, and a wander through a cobblestoned town at midnight by the cat - and of course, how the mice sew a fancy vest that is due for the Mayor's wedding overnight for the tailor who has become too ill to do so. "Twist! Twist! We haven't any twist!" the tailor cries to his cat and the cat mews back, before the tailor falls into bed ill, for he is poor and has run out of thread.

His cat secures him some, and carries it home, placing it under an upturned teacup for him to find in the morning.

Oh yes. Quite forgot the food part. There is a large party where the mice eat many good things and the cat tries to eat the mice but fails.

Edited December 2, 2006 by Carrot Top (log)

[srhcb]

Have to bring this up again. Anyway, I can't tell you how much I love Christmas, especially now that I have children. My son Jett is 3.5 and gets it. He is really worried about Santa this year since he knows he's been naughty. Of course he's also been great! My daughter is 10 months so this is her first, it goes without saying, (I guess I just said it) she has no clue. That being said, traditions, family, friends and making this time special means so much to me now.

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jsc,

Thanks for reviving this thread!

I've historically been ambivalent, even antagonistic about holidays, Christmas in particular. With one notably expceptional period, during which I actually dressed up in a Santa Claus suit and spent Christmas Eve spreading Holiday Cheer with my trusty "Reindeer", (really and excuse to get out of the house), I managed to avoid festivities and family celebrations altogether.

But since I've aquired a de facto grandson, (GF's daughter's son), the Season has taken on a lot of personal meaning to me. My "family" is quite similar to yours in that Zach was three in August, about the same time his "Baby Sister Jenna" was born.

This will be the first Christmas Zach really "gets it", and I know that like Jett, he understands he's been naughty at times, and that this may somehow impact the number of presents he can expect. (fat chance! )

I find myself wondering what some of his earliest memories will be, and what new traditions might develop that he'll carry on himself some day. I do know that Zach will get to "help" make cookies, since I've had him in the kitchen with me as much as possible since he was an infant.

This year it's even a more poignant time for me, since my own Father passed away this past year. He wasn't much for big celebrations either, but every year for as long as I remember he took great interest in having a beautiful Christmas tree.

My family had a civil engineering company, and our field crews would scout for a nice balsam for my Dad's tree all year. At it's grandest, Dad's tree stood sixteen feet high, about ten feet across the bottom, and was decorated with many hundreds of ornaments, some of which he'd inherieted from his own parents and were over one hundred years old.

Last year we knew it was my Father's last Christmas, one way or another. (He had Ahzheimers) The nurse's aid we had helping out cut a tree from her farm and my Sister made a special trip home to decorate it. To tell the truth, it ended up having a rather "Charlie Brownish" look, but Dad sure seemed to enjoy it.

THANX,

SB

Edited December 2, 2006 by srhcb (log)

[racheld]

These are such rich, wonderful remembrances, and I'm so glad the thread is revived, year after year. It will have another smile-inducing run-of-season, then again will go into the closet with all the decorations, to rest and await another season for sharing old memories, old recipes, old tales and new, as traditions are honored, created, and carried on in family after family.

Our tree is up already, the upstairs one, what we call my "Victorian Tree," a big round one to the top of the windows, pink gauzy angel on top, and all decorated in burgundy, silver, gold, pink, white, and many ornaments, old and new. Lots of the decorations have come from thrift shops, the crackly old boxes signaling long use and numerous holidays; the shine is gone in places, the paint a bit chipped, the lace on the doilies a bit careworn, but that tree SHINES.

Caro chose it year before last, one of the lights-on-already ones, and we have it in progress, with a cloth over the glass of the coffeetable for laying out the hundreds of ornaments, bows, angels, golden apples, swans, blown glass spheres and hearts and bells, the kugels and the ropes of pearl beading, all taking their places, with white silk roses and bunches of burgundy something-flowers stuck into gaps and filling all the spaces around that top-to-bottom spiral of gold-edged satin ribbon.

KittyDear has already adopted one spot on the velvet skirt, and has made a wispy-gray little nest beneath the boughs. The button-up skirt will require removing, a good shake out into this crisp Winter wind, and perhaps a cool trip through the dryer to be the same.

Tomorrow will come the "downstairs" tree---a small version to sit atop the buffet, perhaps a yard tall, and totally covered with HUGE ornaments---silver, gold, white and clear. I would never have thought to put such large icicles and balls and bows on such a small tree, but the effect is magical. A white-robed Santa stands waiting beside, tiny satin-wrapped presents in each hand.

And the old, yellow Santa will be present, as he has been for the past five years or so, since we rescued him from the 25c bin at Goodwill. He stands grinning, his tightly-rounded little cheeks shining, one booted foot aloft, as his entire being shows his years of being companion to a heavy smoker. His beard, hair, white fur trim---all have taken on the jaundiced tinge of an over-ripe banana; he's grimly, smilingly ugly, and we love him. That's the way of the South, I suppose. Our oddities and eccentricities, our crazy uncles, our drama-driven aunts, and our slapdash-mannered kin are not hidden away from prying eyes. We trot them right out, set them up in the parlor, and introduce them to all callers.

When my children were growing up, we always had an artificial tree---royal command and sovereign decree from my Dad, who just KNEW a spark from the fireplace would conflagrate the place the minute a cut spruce entered the room. So we decorated it the Sunday after Thanksgiving, a nice way to continue the thanks and usher in the giving season. It was handy, also, to have the decorations already up, because the first Sunday in December was Cookie House Day.

We started out with about five little ones from our tiny church, who came over after Sunday Dinner. I had cut little cardboard patterns, duct-taped the forms together, then taped those to thick cardboard squares. On the long bar, paper plates of all kinds of "bought" cookies and candies and pretzels, gumdrops and canes and crackers stood ready. I usually made a gallon of the butter-powdered sugar--flavoring frosting we used for birthday cakes, but for this one, I always used a drop or two of orange extract.

Each child got a paper plate, to choose all the building materials and attach them to the roof first---it was a rectangle a bit wider and longer than the housetop; the hangover made neat eaves for applying icicles. A gentle score down the center, and the flat board bent in the middle to set neatly onto the house. The finished roof dried while the house was decorated.

Everyone also got a little plastic punch cup filled with icing, and a small plastic spatula for spreading. And when, at time for icicles and other decor, we handed each a filled pastry cone, eyes widened and faces lit up even brighter. Children just LOVE being trusted with pleasant grownup tasks, and this was not the TIME for "no, you can't do this; it's too messy." They strewed icing with merry abandon. Licking fingers and arms for stray icing, even an experimental squeeze into an open mouth---that's what the BIG bowl of homemade dill pickles and the bowl of salty pretzels was for.

When all was finished, handfuls of the leftovers, the broken cookies, the unused candy, pretzels and other edibles, all went into the house, and the roof was set on, its weight of icing and cookie-shingles keeping it in place. We made pictures, Moms returned to carry the sticky carpenters home, and we cleaned the kitchen. And I never waxed my floors for the holidays until after the party.

After about the third time, several adults requested to come make a house for their dining tables or for an upcoming party in their home. So several years, we had a wine-and-cheese party on Saturday night, everybody brought bags of goodies to decorate with, I made the icing and cardboard forms, and when it was over, they all helped clean up and set out the decorations for Sunday.

This got to be so popular over the years, I had people wanting to reserve a place as early as October, and we finally had to move it to the Fellowship Hall of the Church. Several Moms in other churches around the county called for instructions; I gave out the icing recipe and they started having parties of their own. I wonder if they still do---I haven't been there for Christmas in years.

Too much reminiscing on a Saturday night---maybe more later of the Eve dinner, the morning presents, the dinner on Christmas Day. And this year, even another dinner party on the 26th---hats and crackers, games and toys---Gracie will be here!!

moire non,

rachel

Edited December 3, 2006 by racheld (log)

[Lori in PA]

Lovely, Rachel, though I admit to feeling rather exhausted JUST reading about it.

[jscarbor]

The "season" sarts with thanksgiving in my family. There is always a getogether, sometimes reluctantly because, well, we don't know who to invite. There are divorced parents on both sides, one side is less likely to show if the other shows. Its a real hassle, one I can't imagine giving to my children. This year and I think 3 of the last 4 were at my house. I think one of the main reasons it ends up at my house more ofter than not is because of peoples utter fear of cooking a turkey. So I end up with the turkey and only the turkey so that I can concentrate on that very "difficult" task of cooking a large bird. Little does anyone know the turkey is so easy! I guess they are used to their mom's cooking the bird for 8 hours and to their surprise find out that they have a dry tasteless bird? Luckily all the sides the rest of family bring are GREAT! My mom makes a legendary oyster dressing along with a semi new to the holiday fruit cornbread dressing that is fabulous. Sister brought sweet potato soufle and a salad. Dad and his wife brought deviled eggs and cranberry sauce and father in law brought dutch apple, pumpkin and pecan pies. Lunch started off with an excerpt from George Washingtons Thanksgiving Proclamation. Everyone dug in after that. In order to keep the family around a little longer (if we feed them dessert they leave immediately afterwards) we adjourned outdoors to drink wine and watch the kids play. The weather was spectacular, maybe 70 degrees only a hint of clouds in the sky. After 30-45 minutes we finally ended the suffering and served the pie. What great pies!

This year, because of a planned roadtrip with Mother in Law (didn't come to thanksgiving) to see some Cristmas lights, eat some killer catfish and to take a vintage steam engine train ride, we did not get to the tree the day after thanksgiving. Instead we arrived back home on saturday after the short roadie. So, even though we were a little car dreary from 10 hours on the road we decided that getting the tree "up" was a priority or was it? Well the excitement of getting the tree up was actually deflated by the realization that we were tired. So the tree would wait one more day.....