Welcome. I hope you are all enjoying Christmas Eve.
Some will sit down to a feast tonight others on Christmas day. My home was a Christmas Day feast.
Joyful havoc ruled.
The day began with a mad pajama clad dash downstairs often before the break of dawn with a tipsy Dad leading the 6 boy charge.
I’m certain there were years when most of us didn’t bother changing into street clothes at all.
The kitchen was a one woman whirlwind. You did not get in Mom’s way as Christmas day kitchen tramplings were overlooked by the children’s aid of the time.
Our Christmas meal was basic and special. A giant turkey with Mom’s delicious stuffing (which she taught me how to make), and her cranberry sauce, raisin, apple, pumpkin pies, cookies, candies and chocolates galore, nuts of many types, mandarins and weird things like blood pudding your dad liked.
Yea we always had brussels sprouts the DEI hire of vegetables too which I think were made part of the traditional meal to remind us that hell existed.
Then there was Mom’s homemade Christmas cake. One year she washed out the crispers from the fridge and used those as her mixing bowls. I loved that cake but it can’t be duplicated.
I think Christmas dinner was the only meal I ever ate as a kid that didn’t include ketchup.
I remember coming home for Christmas one year so sick with the flu that the room started to spin when I walked in the kitchen and was overwhelmed by the heat and aromas.
I spied a bottle of whiskey on the table and proceeded to down 6 shots in quick succession, big ones. I slept till the early evening.
Still I was home for Christmas.
I loved making Christmas dinner for K.
Cranberries, a pie or two and prepping the stuffing the night before. It always felt a bit like my childhood all those years ago.
It is early morning now and I found Mr. Robot waving to me from the back of a bookshelf.
He is a Christmas ornament Kathy gifted me many years ago. I had forgotten about him.
I will take it as a sign from K & Xavier and I will keep him with us as we trod new paths.
Please enjoy our reader carols. This has been an especially fine year of selections, add your faves in the comments. We’ll have more on Christmas Day. My thanks to all.
From Cyclist – The Shepherd – Frederick Forsyth – read by Alan Maitland from CBC Radio
From testsubjectx1 – Martina McBride – Please Come Home For Christmas
From Lord Dilligaf – Watchman of Zion
Also – Gregorian Chant Medieval Carols
And – Hodie Christus Natus Est – Christmas Gregorian Chant
And one more … Hodie Christus natus est – Sweelinck
From Appreciative Reader – In The Bleak Midwinter – Holst – Tenebrae conducted by Nigel Short
From DCH – “Christmas Time’s A’Coming” by Bill Monroe
From Kiki9 – Who Put The Stump
From Norman in New York – La Sierra University Orchestra – “Fantasia on Greensleeves” by Ralph Vaughan Williams
From Surele Surele – for KING + COUNTRY – Little Drummer Boy
