Christmas

Some Weird Weather

/ handmadebyjo / 2 Comments

121222 Winter FogI got up at 7:30 this morning and wasn’t able to see out of the windows in the house. The temperature had risen from 41 degrees when I went to bed to 52 degrees now and the wind was gusting up to 30 mph.  Every window in the house was fogged with only one in the corner of the patio having a little visibility.  In looking out of it what I saw was banks of fog rolling through the fields, swirling about like I see the snow doing on those windy winter days.  Well, it was beautiful a day or so ago.  Now I’m afraid Christmas is going to look more like mud season. Sigh.

From year to year I always dream about how I can make my home as warm and festive as possible for my guests.  Snow always enters into the picture because in my mind is always that Norman Rockwell ideal.  Truth be told the snow doesn’t matter that much.  It does during the day when I look out the windows as I’m doing my preps for the big Christmas eve dinner – it helps me feel the mood.  When the appointed time arrives and the candles are lit along with the fireplaces and everything is bathed in the glow of firelight it is Christmas.

Having an old, old house helps to bring back the Christmases we all envision in our heads (at least I do).  Mulled cider, roasted meats and vegetables, candied fruit, cookies, music and laughter.  The only thing that’s changed is the wardrobe.  I try to treat my guests to the best I can do mixing traditional and expected with some sort of culinary surprise.  Years later they still talk about my “Seven Swans a Swimming” dessert which involved petit choux swans filled with ice cream swimming in pools of chocolate.  I must admit they were pretty spectacular.

It’s the little things, the details.

After the day I will post what I have in mind right now for the surprise.  We’ll see if it gets pulled off.  Meanwhile I will just hope for a little less fog so I can make my way for ingredients.

Swans

 

Tradition

/ handmadebyjo / Leave a comment

OrnamentsChristmas has always been about family traditions for me.  A time to reminisce about childhood and family members now long gone. To that end the decorations I use on the tree each year have special significance for me – they are the glass balls that were on the tree the year I was born and every year since.  There are other ornaments that my mother gave me to keep the traditions alive when I had my children and Christmas in my own home.  One in particular has graced the trees of my mother, grandmother and I would hazard to guess my great grandmother.  It is a wool felt Santa with a molded paper face.  At this point he actually doesn’t have much shape and I think he’s missing a leg and faded to a strange color but he is the quintessential tie to the past for me.  I imagine him getting a special spot on the tree each year, taken from his tissue lined box. He’s small but has the happiest face, probably happy to be out of that box for the 3 weeks a year he spends in daylight.

100101 (18)

Once these decorations come out it’s time to bake the cookies. Every year the same ones.  What makes them special is that Christmas is the only time I make them.  I pull out my 1952 copy of the Betty Crocker and work my way through the holiday cookie section.  Thumbprints, Russian Teacakes, Molasses Christmas trees, they all have their place.  Even if no one eats them I have to make them because it wouldn’t be the holidays without all that butter, sugar and nuts.

The other tradition, one that I haven’t followed so closely in recent years, is that of a Suet Pudding.  This was something we always had every year.  Yes, I know it sounds disgusting but is really a delightfully rich, dense cake made with molasses, raisins and highly spiced.  It is steamed and served hot with a melting spoonful of hard sauce and a tart frothy lemon sauce.  You take a bite and all at once you have warm and cold, sweet and tart, wonderful.  It’s time consuming to make but I think I will make one this year.  Our friend Russell was commenting about a pudding his grandmother used to make when he was a kid. When he described it I knew it was the same as ours so I think I will make it to share.  The only thing better than celebrating memories of Christmas past is to help bring memories back for other people.

 

Ghosts of Christmas Past

/ handmadebyjo / Leave a comment

100101 (17)

After getting our Christmas tree in Heath a week ago I was thinking about our first Heath tree.  The living room had been in the process of rehab and I forced everyone to make commitments to get things done by promising a Christmas Eve celebration when the walls had very large holes still in the drywall, nothing was painted and the plastic had not been off of the floor for almost 3 years.  There’s nothing like the thought of 20+ people coming to your house for dinner to get things done.

Russell was to finish a paneled wall  going over the huge hole above the fireplace.  The entire room, walls and trim had to be painted.  The baseboards had to be trimmed (another job for Russell).  The plastic had to be pulled up, the glue from the tape removed from the floor.  Furniture had to be rearranged throughout the house – it had all been in one room since we started this project.  Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning.

Christmas fell on a Friday that year.  When I arrived the Saturday before the panel was on sawhorses in the living room – unpainted.  They needed to “acclimate”.  I believe the woodwork had one coat of paint and not all of the walls had any paint at all.  To say I was a little stressed is an understatement.

Russ and Carmen insisted we come and get a tree for the room.  I was thinking, “Is it going to be big enough to cover that HUGE HOLE above the fireplace?!?”  Russell just smiled.  We spent the morning hunting for trees, eating, socializing.  We came home to see that my brother in law had finished painting the entire living room while we were gone (he’s a painter by trade).  The girls pulled up the plastic from the floor and we moved and cleaned for the rest of the day.  And the first tree in over 20 years was put up in front of the bay window.  The vintage Santa took his place and it seemed as though we could pull this off.

That Monday the panel was primed and placed above the fireplace.  When I arrived it was just a matter of a few decorations and some major cooking.  Large candle sconces went over the electrical boxes on the walls.  We put candles everywhere.  Cait had made 80 luminaries for the driveway.  Candle carriage lamps lit the mantel covered in fruit, nuts and berries.  Every place at the table had a candle and there was very little electricity used that night.  People were charmed, enchanted by the soft glow.  Those of us that had pulled this off were just thinking, “It’s all theater.”

I had just spent the past couple of months working at Old Sturbridge Village when all of the events were by candlelight.  Initially we had an event where people took guided tours at night to see how people saw things in the 1830’s.  It was all a matter of social standing.  If you were poor you saw things by the light coming from your fireplace.  As you moved up on the social ladder you may have had candles made from tallow or beeswax.  Those in the fine houses with money had oil lamps in addition to the firelight and candles.  So you saw a progression from poor to rich and it got brighter all the way.

I think the house at Fort Pelham Farm saw a complete progression.  I’m sure many candles were used but they were used in a much more judicious manner than that Christmas Eve in 2009.  We’ve come a long way in our creature comforts but there is nothing that says Christmas to me more than candlelight.