Why I Love Christmas

It seems to be fashionable nowadays to dread Christmas. Often I read amusing articles with tales of nightmare families and a stressful time shopping and cooking for the big event. This is so far removed from my own experiences, that this article is for me an antidote to Christmas dread.

I am very lucky I know to have a loving, supportive family; we actually enjoy getting together, and there are never any rifts, arguments or bad feelings (not that I am aware of anyway!). Christmas has followed the same format for me ever since childhood. It was Christmas 1978 when we started gathering as an extended family—aunt and uncles, cousins and so on. This year will for ever be fixed in our minds, as we had a tragedy in the family. My 15-year-old brother David was killed in a road accident a week before Christmas, leaving us as a two-child family with me and my other older brother Matthew. The only way my mother could cope was by spending the time with the extended family. And thereby started a tradition which continues almost 40 years later, with a new generation of cousins.

Boxing Day Walk

It has to be said that we are quite an eccentric family. Usually there are up to 18 of us who celebrate Christmas Day and Boxing Day together. My oldest cousin and her husband were eating lentils and recycling long before any of the rest of us bothered! My uncle (now no longer with us) smoked a pipe continuously throughout his waking hours, and filled his house with cats and books. The rest of us are just verging on the mad, and every few years we introduce a new ritual or tradition. One that has been going for many years is to sing carols in four-part harmony round the piano, including quite taxing numbers such as 'The Shepherd's Farewell' and 'Adam Lay Y-bounden.' One of our long-standing traditions has been to go for a long, healthy walk on Boxing Day, and usually lose a few people along the way somewhere. Sometimes these lost souls have no idea how to get back to base camp; this was before the days of mobile phones, and even now some of us have them, they invariably get left behind or switched off. In recent years we have combined the walk with going to the pub and seeing the Morris Dancers dancing and performing the Mummers' Play (we know the plot really well now!). Some people don't bother with the walk and just sit in the pub; some people don't bother with the Morris Dancers, but some of us (me included) manage to walk to the pub and back, have a few drinks and watch the Morris Dancers!

Another tradition which I introduced a few years back was to have a pantomime performance back at our house on Boxing Day, after a very late lunch. The panto is no longer than 15 or 20 minutes long, and I usually write it a few days beforehand. It is a radio play really, so no-one has to learn their lines or even knows which character they will be playing until about five minutes before the performance! Usually I write the pantomime for about eight performers and eight audience/hecklers. Shouting and heckling during the performance is actively encouraged and is sometimes written into the script!

My family checking their lines just before our panto performance...

Anyway, back to Christmas preparations and the big day itself. For me Christmas starts in December with decorating the house and doing my lists of food and presents that I need to buy. We have oak beams in our living rooms, and it takes ages to bang a load of pins into them ready for my alternative to having a traditional Christmas tree. So I think we may as well have the house looking festive for a good long time. The decorations are a mixture of home-made ones (mainly made by me), gifts from my mother and others that I have bought; we live next door to a plant nursery, which has a Christmas shop, only selling the most beautiful and tasteful decorations!

Decorated Beams with No Symmetry or Colour Scheme

However, we do have a little driftwood tree that I also like to decorate.

Going to Christmas markets, writing cards, hanging up cards that we receive, and ordering presents online are all part of the fun. I am lucky enough to have a husband who helps—at least he does drive me to the shops, but I am chief shopper, as I have lots of great ideas. I refuse to write 100 cards all by myself, so that is also a shared activity.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this piece, my parents hosted Christmas for many years, but about six years ago my mother decided that enough was enough, and wanted to pass on the hosting to someone younger and fitter. Unfortunately our house is not big enough to seat everyone at one table, which is what we prefer to do. Boxing Day is more of an informal affair. My cousin Rachel and her husband thus took over the hosting at their house. It is very much a collaborative affair, and everyone has their speciality that they like to cook or buy. Rachel cooks the turkey, roast potatoes and sprouts, and I do the carrots, another vegetable dish, bread sauce and about four puddings. My mother makes the Christmas pudding, my uncle (a different one from the pipe-smoking one!) cures his own salmon and buys a ham. Sam (another cousin) and Veronique bring champagne and cheese from Germany. My aunt makes Christmas cake.

We have a few traditions at the table, such as singing a couple of French songs. One of them is a raucous game (Sauras tu passer le traderidera?) which involves passing things round the table whilst singing a song—warning! If my brother is playing it is best to remove all valuables and glasses from the table beforehand! I thought that this game was unique to our family, but I have just checked on YouTube and found quite a few families who also play it!

Other traditions include: voting on whether or not we have too many vegetables with our lunch (red cabbage got voted out a few years ago), voting on the best way to cook sprouts (Rachel still insists on boiling them though!) and Sam always does a special taste test of both the Christmas pudding and cake, and declares whether they are pudding or cakey. The year he and Veronique were in Zanzibar, I sent them some cake in the post to try out—the post office almost refused to authorise it as a perishable good, until I pointed out that Christmas cake never perishes!

Christmas Day at Ian and Rachel's House

Finally, of course, we have a long session of noisy board games for those who are still awake. The other options are going for a walk or falling asleep in front of the television, as well as singing carols of course.

Christmas! I love it, and long may it continue! This year we shall have the added dimension that my daughter Jess will not be with us, as she is spending a year in New Zealand. Still, there is always skype...

Homemade Mince Pies

Jelly and Trifle

Sprouts My Way