Christmas Eve

Although there are four Sundays in Advent, the fourth one is followed by less than a week - just three days, this year, in the final runup to Christmas. So rather than continuing my Advent posts, this is my annual Christmas Eve one, but continuing the daily updates.

December 21st was the fourth Sunday of Advent, and the church we're connected with had a communion service with carols rather than a more traditional 'nine lessons and carols'. I went to that, and enjoyed it, then chatted to some friends afterwards.

It's been our custom for many years to go out to eat at Alexander's on the last Sunday before Christmas. We got the idea from some friends many years ago. I can't technically say it's a 'tradition' because it wasn't handed down to us by parents or predecessors, but it feels like one. So at 12.30 we drove to the marina and then walked the few hundred metres to Alexander's.

Richard had the stifado, which he said was excellent. I had a mushroom omelette, which looked quite interesting, but wasn't as great as some meals I've had there. Still, it was filling and it's good to try something different. 

Third week of Advent

Sunday 14th December was the third Sunday in Advent. It was also a special anniversary for us: 48 years exactly since we went out on our first date, and 46 years since we got engaged. 

But there was no chance to go out to celebrate. I didn't go to a church service, either, as I knew I had to do a lot of cooking and baking in the morning. Every other Sunday our friends come over for an afternoon of games (with a DVD for the teenagers), followed by a shared evening meal. I always provide bread and a dessert, while they usually bring cut up vegetables and protein such as cheese, eggs and tuna.  Through the cooler months, I also make soup. 

In addition, I was hosting our local writing group lunch on the Monday. I wanted to ensure there we had enough variety of food, so I planned to prepare some of that on Sunday morning as well. And our Sunday lunch, which wasn't complicated as I used a previously frozen chicken dish, so I only had to prepare roast potatoes and veggies to accompany it.

I started around 10.00am after a leisurely breakfast and shower... and I tried not to rush, so I wouldn't get muddled. I first started the carrot and ginger soup, one of my favourites; I add previously boiled chick-peas in too, to give it some protein. Then I started preparing some chicken breast with a slightly spicy thick sauce, to serve cold on Monday. And put the ingredients for a loaf of bread in the breadmaker.

Then I leafed through all my recipes looking for something to make for dessert in the evening; nothing really inspired me, so I tried a lemon blondie recipe I had previously downloaded and printed. I had quite a lot of lemon juice which I had frozen last year from an excess of lemons, so it was good to use some of that up. 

By this stage, the kitchen looked like this:

I also wanted to make mince pies... so I had to tidy up a little, to make room for the food processor, and for rolling out the pastry. 

Happy Christmas

I started writing two posts in the past six weeks, but didn't finish either of them. I may still do so, and then publish them back-dated to when I started to write. Today, however, is Christmas Eve so I will continue my annual tradition and post a picture of this year's Christmas cake:

Not significantly different from previous years' cakes. But I don't think I've put an approximate star shape in the middle before (which was my intention, though it doesn't look very star-shaped). I made it at the end of October, fed it a couple of times with Cyprus brandy and put home-made almond paste on it at the end of last week. This afternoon, I made royal icing in the food processor, so it's done, albeit finished rather at the last minute this year. 

I've tried to pace myself with food preparation over the past week. Our freezer is extremely full. But today was fairly busy and tomorrow will be hectic trying to time everything correctly, and keep things hot. Neither of our sons are able to be with us, but our local friends, with four of their offspring will be joining us. And I can't, somehow, let go of the family tradition of making too much food with a lot of options, both for lunch and for tea/supper. 

But, hopefully, I then won't have to cook at all for the rest of the week.

We'll go to the church service tomorrow morning, as we usually do, which should help to focus on the real reason for Christmas for an hour. 

Seasons greetings to all who read this, and wishing you every blessing for 2025.  How strange to recall that, quarter of a century ago, we were all feeling concerned about the 'millennium bug'...

Christmas Eve

Christmas on Wednesday seems ideal. On Sunday, I went to a carol service at LCC which Tim was organising and leading. It only lasted an hour, so we were home in time for me to ice and decorate the Christmas cake before lunch. I didn't feel inspired to do anything fancy, so this is what it looks like:

I didn't do anything much in the afternoon, other than updating another local church website, which I run, and also uploading our annual newsletter to our family website.

I designated Monday for cleaning the house. The usual dusting and mopping that I try to do weekly, plus some window-cleaning which was long overdue. I cleaned upstairs and changed our sheets too, something I usually do on Wednesdays. I had vaguely thought I might get everything done in two or three hours in the morning; in the event it took most of the day, alternating with various other things I wanted to do. Tim made some peppermint creams in the afternoon, and in the evening he assisted in the production of another 40+ mince pies.

Richard and I also went to the fruitaria on Monday, to buy large quantities of potatoes and carrots and broccoli and various other things we're going to need on Christmas Day.

And then, really, there wasn't much left to do.

This morning we went to Metro to pick up the turkey we had ordered; it turned out to be rather smaller than we need to feed twelve people, but happily there were some 'spare' turkeys, so we bought one of those too. And a few other items, but I didn't buy up half the supermarket, as some people seem to wish to do when it's going to be shut for - shock horror! - two whole days.

So Tim has now taken over in the kitchen. The first turkey is cooked and carved, ready for re-heating tomorrow. The second one is currently in the oven, with the smell driving the cats wild. I took the opportunity of putting about 100 photos in albums, when I realised that although I ordered some in October, I had done nothing with them. They date back to December last year, so it was quite a task. But that's now done.

I then found all the gifts we had been given by my siblings when we visited the UK in October, plus a few that have arrived in the post, and put them under the tree:

Now it's 5.15pm and the last thing on my pre-Christmas to-do list is to write this blog post. We're having our favourite local fast-food tonight ('Souvlaki Express') since the oven is fully occupied, then going to a carol service at the Greek Evangelical Church, in which Tim will be singing.

So let me take this opportunity to wish anyone who reads this a very happy, peaceful and blessed Christmas.

Over half way through December...

The weather was still pretty warm right up to the end of November, and even the first few days of December. It simply didn't feel as if Christmas was coming, despite decorations, of varying degrees of gaudiness, appearing in our neighbourhood and downtown.

The writers' group had our now traditional Christmas get-together followed by bring-and-share lunch on December 2nd, and one of our members was efficient enough to have printed newsletters and written Christmas cards to hand out.

I was not that member.

Still, I had sorted out almost all our family Christmas gifts at the end of October before our trip to the UK. I felt quite pleased about it, despite feeling that it was somehow too early. I made our Christmas cake at the start of November... and since we are not into partying, or wild decorations, it didn't seem as if there was much to do.

And yet, I have this uncomfortable memory of spending the last few days before previous Christmases desperately trying to bake, and getting stressed, and thinking of all the things I really wished I had got around to earlier...

So when my friend Sheila started telling me about her family's Advent 'calendar' idea, I wondered whether I could find ONE thing to do every day in December, in order to prepare for Christmas. Which, after all, is part of the point of Advent. I was slightly stymied by it being already December 5th before I heard about this, but I reckoned that I could write off the first four days since I had already bought AND wrapped the presents, and made the cake.

So I did a bit of brainstorming and came up with about twenty things I wanted to do. Some were very quick (like 'feed the cake' or 'order the turkey') and some slower ('write the newsletter'). One or two were not precisely related to Christmas (such as 'clean all the windows').

One of them was to buy a poinsettia, something we forgot to do last year. But then a friend visited and brought us a lovely specimen:

So that was very easy.

On December 5th I made our Christmas puddings, which steamed all day and are now in the fridge.

On December 6th I made our mincemeat:

Then the weather took a very cold turn. Cold enough that it was actually a degree or two warmer in the UK than in Cyprus. Richard serviced our central heating and the gas man came last Monday.. but the radiators did not come on. And in a house with big rooms, high ceilings and tiled floors, it was COLD. We piled on layers of clothes, and actually went out to buy a couple of electric heaters, but they had limited effectiveness.

Then a wonderful, wonderful man came and fixed the heating. And we started to feel as if our bones were beginning to thaw out.

I spent the next couple of days writing a family newsletter; never an easy task, but some people appreciate it, so we keep up the tradition. It was a particularly difficult one this year and I played around with several possible formats.

Then I had to wait for a day or two as we needed a new cartridge for the colour printer. So by that stage already I had lost the impetus of doing one thing each day, and never regained it. I did manage to write all the cards - two days later than planned - and post them the following morning, although I'm not certain if they will arrive in time.

Six cards have arrived for us, so - as has now become a tradition in our home - I found last year's cards, most of which arrived late December or early January, and hung those up instead.

Last weekend I made our first batch of mince pies:

And then, because we all like it, and often used to make it at Christmas, I made some gingerbread.

Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo until after I had cut it into several parts and frozen most of it, but here's a picture of a small slab that I kept out:

The thing I jotted down for today - and actually DID today - was to put up our Christmas tree.

Or rather, I delegated it to my enthusiastic small friends, one of whom had asked me about a week ago if she could help put it up again. Sheila is much better than I am at putting things together anyway so I sat and took a few photos, happy to have delegated this task once again:

The two older girls had fun decorating the tree with as many ornaments as they could pile on, but Elisabeth, who is now three-and-a-half, was more interested in setting candles out on a bookshelf, and playing with the Nativity set. Here she is, with the finished tree in the background:

I thought I might make a chocolate yule log, something I haven't done before.. but am still pondering that one. Tomorrow we're going to go out and order our turkey (something I had intended doing a few days ago), and I'll also make the marzipan and do that layer of the cake tomorrow. If I get around to it, anyway. At some point I'll put the newsletter online and link to it, and of course I still have to ice the cake. I might make some fudge, although I think Tim will probably do that. And I will ice the cake on top of the marzipan early next week.

But it really does seem as if quite a bit has been done.