Ok, so one family, but still. When you’ve grown up as one of 6 kids and celebrated Christmas with no less than double that number, Christmas for 4 just feels mighty small. That said, it had to be done at some point. It’s not that I’m not used to playing Father Christmas, or preparing the big meal, it’s just that I’ve always grown up with the mentality – ‘the more the merrier’. My mother never turned anyone away for any meal, let alone Christmas. She made a concerted effort to invite anyone she thought might be alone, over for Christmas eve dinner or lunch, and somehow always made sure there was enough, no matter how short the notice was. There was always at least 1 of my 4 brothers picking food out the kitchen while a meal was being prepared (of which Shaun has now joined the ranks), and the delicious smells emanating out the kitchen in the build up to Christmas could make the most discerning food critic’s mouth water. We used to make cookies to hang on the tree, bake Christmas cakes, puddings and mince pies, and my favourite, ice the Christmas cake with the sweetest, whitest, most delicious icing I can remember!
Being just the 4 of us this year, it would have been a waste to over cater, and quite frankly, we can’t afford to waste right now, earning rands and spending dollars is physically painful. So we decided to only make what all of us would eat. The menu:
NO… turkey (too dry), NO brussel sprouts (too revolting), NO peas (Lola wont touch them unless they frozen), NO butternut (Lola won’t touch them full stop), NO salad (Shaun thinks it’s a useless excuse for food), NO ham (couldn’t find a normal size, only American sizing!), NO pumpkin pie (Shaun doesn’t approve of vegetables in his desert), NO Christmas pudding OR cake (fruit in cake is just not on!), NO mince pies (couldn’t find them anywhere)…
What we did manage was a super delicious roast chicken with roast potatoes, about 17 heads of broccoli (between Shaun and the kids I can’t seem to find enough in the store), cauliflower, honey carrots, and home-made chocolate brownies, with Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream for desert. Not a bad combination of foods for a Christmas lunch actually, and we tried our best to be American and over eat… which we did rather well too.
The only thing missing in our ‘wintery wonderland’ Christmas… was snow! We came half way around the world, found a cabin in the mountains, and waited in anticipation for those first dazzling snow flakes to fall. Instead, unseasonably warm weather was hovering around the Sierra Nevada mountains, making our ‘white Christmas’ rather warmer and more colourful than we had expected. It was a win in that we didn’t freeze when we ventured out doors, but sad to not wake up to a snow covered land on Christmas morning. Being fairly high up in the mountains there was plenty of snow to be found up the road, just not on our doorstep, so our Christmas’y photo shoot happened in the snow park up the road, instead of our backyard.
After spending most of Christmas eve and Christmas morning on Skype chatting to friends and family (I should have called this a ‘Very Skype-y Christmas’) we weren’t left all that much time to feel lonely, I thank God everyday for who-ever invented Skype! I thought I was going to spend most of the day wishing we were in SA and pining for our family, but spending the day just the 4 of us, walking in the forest and playing around the house felt normal, and lovely. It wasn’t the big festive, crazy group with noise (ok the children did actually supply a good level of that), or witty banter with loved ones, but it was calm and sweet, and a chance for us to decide exactly how we wanted to spend our Christmas, make our own traditions and choose our own path. It was a good experience, despite my fears leading up to the season. That said, there is no replacement for wonderful friends and family around the table at Christmas time. We missed you all, each and every one of you.
As lovely as a quiet Christmas was, I can’t wait to have a big, noisy, raucous, sensory-overload style Christmas with as many friends and family as we can squeeze into one place! I guess no matter how many times I swear after another crazy Christmas, that we will be calm and keep it simple the next time round, I am always pulled back to ‘the more the merrier’. You couldn’t have set a better example for me growing up Mum, thank you! Here’s to Christmas 2014 – back to the crazy!! 🙂
