Christmas at my home - how we do it

This is how usually we do Christmas Day at my home and I hope to do the same way this year.

After a all day cooking Christmas Eve and a happy and a blessed dinner we go to bed quite late. In many houses there are the tradition to go to Midnight Mass but it was never a custom in my house, not even when we were children.

Now I'll tell you how it is Christmas morning in my home.

When is still night and everybody is sleeping - and if they are not they pretend to be - I carry a lot of bags full of presents downstairs and fill the sofas with presents. Each person has his sofa and on it they will find their presents.

Now that I haven't little children anymore, the number of presents diminished a lot but even so all the room is filled with happy colours from the wrapping papers and the bows. It's such a joy to see all that !

Then I go up again and fill the stockings already hanged on the door knobs of their rooms and I do something that is a tradition in my corner of the world, at least for some: I put a present on a pair of shoes that each of them leaves at their bedroom door. When we were children we used to believe that Jesus left the present there and in a way He did it, because it was Him who helped my family to have money to buy so many presents.

Once my eldest daughter, who were begining to grow and thinking on some things, asked me if it was really Jesus who gave the present. I explained to her that that present was not Jesus who gave directely but He gave me the possiblity to give her and most of all, Jesus indeed gives us things that we need, and that so many times in life we ask, as He directed us to do and He gives us: "Ask and it will be given to you".

After having all the presents in order, which was not difficult because they were all sorted in bags by name, it was only to put them on the sofas, etc, I will go from door to door saying Ho Ho Ho Ho, a sign that everybody can come downstairs, bringing the presents they found in the stocking and on the shoes. Then they go to the fireplace where they take the present Santa left and comment if Rudolph ate his biscuits and if Santa drunk his Port.

All this happens since they were all little children and it's a tradition that we still keep.

So in the livingroom, after unwrapping our presents amidst a lot of laughing and joy we ran to make us ready for Mass, usually with some new piece of clothes, this after picking up all the torn papers and bows which we will take to the reciclying bin on our way to Mass.

After Mass the children set the table and the lunch, which is half done, is finished and almost ready to go to the table.

While some are in the kitchen, others set the table, others put the apetizers ready for the guests - my extended family - who were almost arriving - now we don't do it anymore as my grandmother, mother and father are not among us anymore, so brother and sister do in their own homes for themselves. 

Then the work at the kitchen is almost done and after a drink and eating some little things, we all go to the table. Lunch goes all the afternoon and when it's time to have dinner nobody is ready for more food and what everybody want is to go to their own home and rest watching a little tv or something like that - I  mean, when they were alive and they and my simblings came to have lunch with us. 

Now it's only us what is not bad anyway, as times goes by and life changes but we must accept it and give thanks.

We will not have the gattering of all the family at my home but it's ok, Christmas is more than that. We have all our children, now grown up, around the table and that is so good.

At that time once again I thank God for such happy and blessed days.

May Our Lord grant us again this year a blessed, peaceful and happy Christmas to us and you all.

Advent

 

Yesterday, First of December, begun this year's Advent. It's a new Liturgical Year that begins and it's a praparation for Christmas.

We must remember that there is no Christmas without Christ.

Happy Thanksgiving

 

To every American I wish Happy Thanksgiving.

May everybody have a good lunch in good company and a lot of joy.

Good luck with the carving.

And now let's remember the First Thanksgiving in America.

"Blaring trumpets and thundering serenaded Don Pedro Menéndez de Avilés as he waded ashore on September 8, 1565. The Spanish admiral kissed a cross held aloft by the fleet's captain, Father Francisco Lopez, then claimed Florida for both his God and his country. As curious members of the indigenous Timucua tribe looked on, the 800 newly arrived colonists gathered around a makeshift altar as Father Lopez performed a Catholic Mass of thanksgiving for their safe arrival in the newly christened settlement of St. Augustine. At the invitation of Menéndez, the Timucuans then joined the newcomers in a comunal meal.

Some Florida historians have argued that this feast - and not the one held 56 years later by th ePilgrims and the Wampanoags in Plymouth, Massachusetts - was actualy North America?s First Thankgiving. It was the first community act of religion and thanksgiving in the first permanet settlement in the land", wrote University of Florida Professor Emmeritus of History Michael Gannon in his book The Cross in the Sand."

 (https://www.history.com/news/did-florida-host-the-first-thanksgiving)

The Christmas Tree

 As everybody knows, I can only think about Christmas time.

Now I'm thinking about my Christmas Tree, that we will put up again, as we always do, on the first day of December.

It is quite old, we bought it some twenty years ago and it begins to show its age but we like it so much that we are decided that it will be there, every Christmas, for some more years.

Then it came to my mind to post some pictures that I already posted in other years to remind me of past Christmas. 

It will  be more details than the whole tree but each one will remind me of hapy times and make me feel looking forward to see it up this year again with all the decorations that we have for a long time.

I always count on my girls to put the tree up and decorate, they already know how I want things done.

So, next 1 of December there we will be carrying the boxes of the tree, the lights, the balls, everything, to put the tree up.

I can't wait for it.

Sweet things for Christmas

Christmas is a time for good things, and also the ones to eat. So now I'll post about the desserts and all non savoury things for Christmas that we are used to have.

In my home, rather, in my family since I know myself, we have some things on Christmas that we can't fail making. They are portuguese things like Rabanadas, slices of fried bread, Sonhos and Bolo Vicente (Vincent cake).

About this cake I must tell you that is a tradition developed by my grandmother as she always made it at Christmas time - and only then, only at Christmas time!

So everybody waited for that glorious moment.

When I got married I replaced my grandmother on that task and started baking  the aforementioned cake for several households in various sizes, depending on the number of persons in each house.

My grandmother is in Heaven now and I never stopped baking the Bolo Vicente because everybody likes it so much and to honour her too.

So another thing she always did were the Rabanadas, also called Fatias Douradas (Golden Slices) and the Sonhos and, as with the cake, I replaced her doing for us and for them, my Grandmother and Parents. To the other homes I din't make it but as we all used to get together for Christmas Eve and Day, they  always eat them in my house.

For the Rabanadas we always mix sugar and cinnamon and put on top of them while they are still warm. My uncle likes to eat them with honey. It's very good too.

Never mind the food that appears first in the picture, this is sausage rolls, I mean the other one, it's Arroz Doce, a thing similar to Rice Pudding but much. much better.

A Christmas Log made by my sister. Oh I do like it but mainly the Fios de Ovos, on top of it.

The Bolo Rei, a must in every Christmas in this corner of the world - here half eaten because it's very good.

And we can't forget the Mince Pies

and the Christmas Pudding.

And something that I always make for Christmas but that we begin eating since the first falling leaves: Apple Crumble. 

These pictures I'm posting here are from past Christmases but I will try hard to not forget to take some pictures of the ones I will make this year and post them after Christmas.

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Partying at 

A Stroll Thru Life  

Slices of Life

My Wee Abode

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas

I know that in this corner of the world, where I live, it doesn't usually snows. In the North, yes, but not here.

I know that some years ago, a lot of them, it snowed here, after a very big discharge of hail. First it was fritening, and some hours after there it began snowing. How lovely it was. 

But it was January, not December.

Anyway, we can dream, isn't it?

Just look at the athmosphere of this painting. The snow covering the floor, the heavy sky ready for more, the light inside the houses, people talking, it reminds me when we are out and feel like going home. And we go, feeling all the peace.

One thing that helps me to feel as if it snowed is to look at nice wintery and Christmassy scenes, so I will post here some for you to see too.

We really can feel that we are in those pre Christams days, wondering in the streets and window shopping.

Going home...

Well, we never know, maybe it will snow this year.

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Partying at A Stroll Thru Life

I'll be home for Christmas

 

This is such an interesting advertising. We can learn History in old ads, we can study social and mental History by the way they dress, the houses, what they write, how they think but in this one we see all that and more, we see the end of the World War II. 

It talks about how, for some time, it was advised not to travel but as the war ended, people could see crouds of men in the transports, ships, trains but also in buses going home. And it's here that this Company enters. They advertise how as in this new world they can provide a good service on the return to normality and help bring happiness to each home and family.

And above everything, in that Christmas children would be able to see their parents and wives would be able to see their husbands coming home - the ones that didn't die in the war, that is.

In this Christmas that is coming now, when life is getting harder, for several reasons, around the world, let's hope that every mother can hear their children, and every children can hear their fathers and every woman can hear their husbands saying:

I'll be home for Christmas !

And the season goes on

 

I give thanks for being able to buy presents for my family. Thanks God.

That said, let's enjoy the process and the season.

How good it is to look for things, to do window shopping and admire the decorations.

To feel well in the spirit of the season, let's stroll by those wonderful times from the past shown in magazine covers and advertisement.

It was such an wonderful time.

I do feel really well watching those illustrations.

Let's go.

Notice the cloths, the environement, the joy as everybody feels the Christmas season, the men rising the Father Christmas, the boy happy watching it, the women strolling and the happy couple in the left corner.

I can feel I'm there. In my mind, in my soul, I am one of those. Such wonderful times.

People arrive at the store, looking everywhere and thinking where to go.

Up the stairs, full of enthusiam, looking to each side, watching the things to buy and the people around. Such anticipation.

Some full of presents already while others arrive all happy.

Enough, I have enough, let's go home.

I'm going home, I'm just getting there.

How good it is to go back home, to see, approaching, the light in our home.

Thanks be to God.