“Toys in every store. But the prettiest sight to see, is the holly that will be on your own front door”
I love Christmas!
I do apologise if you are a regular reader of my blog for not posting recently. As is normal for this time of year life has been hectic but hopefully with everything now ready for the big day I should have time to catch up!
When I was a child Christmas was magical even though it was on a far smaller scale. Traditions started early with my Mum involving us kids in baking the Christmas cake in mid October and the Christmas pud in November. She pickled eggs and onions ready for Boxing Day and insisted we wrote a letter to Santa even though money was limited and she probably knew that a lot of the presents on our lists were unlikely to be bought.
There was always a real live Christmas tree which my Dad dutifully went to collect and we decorated excitedly.
Sausage rolls and mince pies were baked the weekend before Christmas and we spent Christmas Eve out with my Dad visiting my Grandmother and other friends and relatives wishing them Happy Christmas and if we were lucky receiving Christmas presents. I guess my Mum probably wrapped our gifts while we were out and prepared the capon.
I think turkey was beyond our budget so my parents used to buy some capons, like a large cockerel and fatten them up over the months prior. My Dad would then do the honours and butcher them and prepare them for selling to others, always keeping one for us. As I grew up he taught me how to pluck them, I hated that job, the feathers drifting up my nose!
One of my Aunties used to buy us a box of Dairy Milk every year. We thought we were so lucky. It was the only time we ever received a full box of chocolates to ourselves and I remember thinking she must be really rich to afford them!
Those were the days when salad appeared on Boxing Day, the only day of the year outside the main summer season when it was grown in the garden, that it grazed our plates unlike now when it is available all year!
I remember waking up on Christmas morning and rushing downstairs to see if Santa had been! The fire would be alight, first thing in the morning, unlike other days of the year when we had to wait until we returned from school each day.
When I had my own children and found myself alone, as a single parent, I introduced my own Christmas traditions that we followed every year. The tree was bought and decorated on the first weekend of December with Christmas music playing in the background and our first batch of mince pies, although the children were never keen on them. From that point forward only Christmas CD’s were played in the car and my collection grew as each year I tried to add a new one.
Before we moved up to Gloucestershire we lived in Essex and every Christmas Eve we would visit a friend of mine and her family.
They were from Poland and celebrated Christmas on Christmas Eve with a 6-8 course feast, no meat but always a massive carp! The children loved it, they received presents to open and often provided the after dinner entertainment. I always made sure we were home by midnight so that Santa could come.
They would change into their Christmas pyjamas before leaving out the carrot, mince pie and milk for Santa and his reindeer. I always took a photograph of them on the stairs next to our offerings which over the years created a fantastic collection of photos showing them growing up.
Disney stockings that I had bought way back in 1984 when their Dad and I spent our honeymoon in Florida following a wedding on Christmas Eve became their stockings and were hung on the end of their beds to await Santa’s visit.
In reality this was my chance, once the children were in bed, to release their presents from the loft where I used to hide them away from prying eyes. I would creep into their rooms, remove their stockings, fill them with small presents before placing their main presents in a sack downstairs.
They were never really early risers, thank goodness! They woke around their normal time and would rush in with their stockings and open their stocking presents on my bed before venturing downstairs. The living room would be overflowing with gifts and it was lovely watching them open them.
Amongst the many gifts there was always a china teddy for my daughter from the “Cherished Teddy” collection and a scale model of a car for my son but they never got to see these. I kept them safely stored away, with the year marked on them, until their eighteenth birthdays when I wrapped them all up individually, created a pyramid style display, and presented them. One for each year they had been alive!
On Boxing Day the children would be picked up by their Dad mid morning and off they would go to have Christmas number three. I used to miss them but I also enjoyed curling up on the sofa with a good book, indulging my sweet tooth and watching a good movie before they returned late in the evening.
Once we moved to Gloucestershire these traditions changed.
Dressing the house on the first weekend of December took more and more time as our collection of decorations grew across the years!
On Christmas Eve we would venture out in the morning to deliver wreaths to my parents’ graves, a tradition I still follow now. Then we would deliver at least one present to a member of our family or friends and then later we would go to eat dinner and do an activity such as ice skating, bowling or to the cinema. The cinema turned into a firm favourite, as they turned into teenagers, and we would take it in turns picking what to watch.
Later dressed in our Christmas pyjamas we would still have our photo on the stairs and Christmas Day was spent unwrapping presents and eating our dinner, just the three of us still in our pyjamas.
On Boxing Day I would cook a gammon and mashed potato which we would have for lunch with pickles and cold turkey before getting dressed and venturing out for a walk with the dogs. The rest of the day was then spent playing games and stuffing ourselves full of buffet style food which I would have cooked in the morning. Uno and Rumikub were firm favourites but I always included a new game in the presents on Christmas Day that we would try out. Some found themselves resigned to the back of the top shelf of the linen cupboard never to resurface and others joined the ranks of our top ten!
Eventually my children grew up and Christmas had to be rethought. It was hard to leave all our traditions behind, I felt bereft, like we were closing an era of time but in 2021 we celebrated our final family traditional Christmas.
On Christmas Day amongst their gifts they both opened a picture frame complete with twenty four photos of each of them on the stairs starting when my daughter was 22 months old and my son was 3 and a half, right up to the present day. I also bought them an extra additional present which they were not expecting.
I had found some glass baubles which you could open and placed a piece of paper inside. I then hung them on the tree on Christmas night so they could find them on Boxing Day. Each piece of paper contained a clue as to the location of where the next clue was. By following their individual Treasure Hunt they could seek out the location of their extra present hidden somewhere in the house. Even at this age, now grown up as such, they loved working out the clues and were amazed by the presents they eventually found. It was a fitting end to our family Christmases together.
When Christmas 2022 dawned my son was away with his partner for the week and my daughter was away working.
I wasn’t sure how I would cope but hubby and I had already discussed how we could hopefully start our own traditions.
He made his first batch of mince pies on the day I dressed the Christmas trees. We have two now, one in the living room and the second on the landing.
On the 23rd he baked sausage rolls and more mince pies, bringing back some childhood memories for both of us and we decided to go out for a Christmas Afternoon tea on Christmas Eve. Although in year one this didn’t quite work out as our favourite cafe was shut and we had to move it one day earlier. Everything happens for a reason and we learnt we quite liked being at home on Christmas Eve.
The night before Christmas was spent in our pyjamas watching a Christmas movie – the choice last year was Love Actually. I still find myself smiling when Hugh Grant dances down the stairs to “Jump” sung by Girls Aloud and crying when Emma Thompson realises the piece of jewellery her husband bought wasn’t for her. She listens to Joni Mitchell “Both Sides Now’ whilst secreting herself in their bedroom. That feeling brings back some memories I’d rather forget but I love the film anyway.
Christmas Day dawned and we still had our stockings in bed as normal before hubby cooked us both salmon and scrambled egg bagels for breakfast. Presents were then opened downstairs. The day continued pretty much as normal with dinner in our pyjamas. I have to say I missed my children but we video called them both and I still enjoyed the day.
Boxing Day we attempted to play games but it just wasn’t the same and a real anti climax.
This year we have been to Lille and to visit friends in Holland plus we’ve booked tickets to visit one of the country’s fabulous palaces complete with light show and afternoon tea – posts to follow. We are taking wreaths to my parents on the 23rd and spending Christmas Eve at home, bundled up in front of the fire and watching another movie. We’ve not chosen this year’s film yet.
My daughter is again by choice working but my son is in his new home with his partner. Given the choice of being with them on Christmas Day or Boxing Day we have opted for the latter and will be driving over with their presents, the mashed potato and pickles, sausage rolls, mince pies and some games!
Although the traditions have changed across the years I wouldn’t have changed anything and treasure the fantastic memories we have made. If you’ve never made any traditions, think about doing it this year, it definitely adds something to the Christmas atmosphere and creates happy times you will never forget!
A Midlife Adventure 