Christmas Eve Traditions
Christmas Eve was show time for Mom to present us with her sweet tooth fixations. We loved it! A pretty table full of goodies! What could be better? It made things so festive and warm!
At dark, which was early in Michigan, the house would begin to come alive with the final preparations for the evenings upcoming festivity! While already for weeks the Christmas lights were put on, the star on the tree-top lit, and the tried and true decorations were in place including a fresh poinsettia flower, wreaths with many candles in the middles and a quaint manger setting that the moss on the roof had been reguled on. At times the decorations were experimental, the year of the snow-flocked tree and that one with the snow flocked windows. Sometimes the decorations got carried away but the beauty of the standards always remained and held tradition. The last presents, and there always seemed to be a million of them, Mom was wrapping in her room and the younger kids, at her request went back and forth, carrying them to place strategically under the tree wherever they deemed best. At times it would piles of one person or another, or at other times, reorganized to not organized. Sometimes we would make guesses at what were in them, but we only did that on the ones where we safely couldn't tell what they were.
Dad was usually hiding in his study around this time, with his nose in a book. Soon he would appear and pointedly sift through his record album looking for what would always be Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. He would carefully place the black and magical thing on the player that came out of the wall and the needle would meet the edge to ignite a brillant sound which would warm the house even more.
There were some earlier years when we all got dressed up, piled in the family station wagon and went to mass at midnight in a beautiful church we didn't know so that we could enjoy the music and the beauty of celebrating Christ mass. I liked that we each our own candle to hold. Later in the mass, lit candles were passed by pretty angles at the end of each aisle until the entire congregation was alight at the same moment and a choir sang. As the older kids begged not to go to mass, and the older ones became more and more, we stopped going to mass. Mom tried to make our own candle lit experience but eventually Christmas eve was spent in the beauty of our own home and the focus became more fun where we did skits and silly things after unwrapping the million presents and feasting on goodies all evening.
On Christmas Eve she always made something that sounded like it is spelled ollie bollion (?). They were basically Dutch holiday donuts with alcohol plumped raisins and shaken in confectioners sugar, always made fresh after going to mass (even though we weren't catholic we went for the pretty candles and music). And then opened presents after.
Mom always served the fudge on a plate of great honor. Whether it was a small, heavy, pretty glass plate that one of us kids gave to her for Christmas the previous year or one of the antique ones with a chip and a crack that we had dug up on the back of our own property as kids and given proudly to her years ago. Either way, the smallest morsels got snatched up the moment the announcement that the celebration of eating could begin.
Nearby on a pretty platter was always my other favorite: delectable pieces of her delicious almond pastry roll. It was always one of the first things to disappear in the evening! What never disappeared was that heavy, colorful homemade fruit cake that adults only ate and kids took accidentally but only ate the pink icing off the top. I had heard that it was good as far as fruit cakes go though I still don't think I would eat it now. Not forgotten but better was an actual homemade crumbly type of actual ginger bread that was made with candied ginger pieces and a graham sort of crust. Mom got creative every year and made new cookies and deserts too. I remember cookies with maple flavored icing, and nut filled treats. There was a very special cookie made from whipped egg whites, sugar and almond paste. They were so special she had to hide them really well from us, and they disappeared anyways though she made them every year. The only store bought item on display was the white, ginger cookies called pfeffernuesse. Delicious but a little avoidable as the powdered sugar always seemed to make a mess falling onto your nice clothes when you ate it. I can't leave out the masterpiece of that years decorated Christmas Cookies us kids made. It was always laid out on a nice large platter to show off only our best creative work and probably because that was what seemed most edible.
Because there was punch you knew the festivities had begun! It was a beautiful and tasty part of the Christmas Eve tradition! As part of Mom's traditional holiday settings start the night before by making any mixture of orange and grapefruit juices and pouring them in anything to freeze to make ice. She used a jello mold or a cake ring but it does not matter. The important thing is the punch needs to be cold and undiluted by regular ice. Add the flavored ice to the pretty punch powl when ready to serve. You can use any large bowl or pan. Add mostly orange juice and some grapefruit juice. You can also add another juices, like perhaps a strawberry nectar. The two other important components are plenty of ginger ale and frozen strawberries that are sliced or quartered. The strawberries float on the surface of the punch making the top of it red. Because of the ginger ale the strawberries tingled in your mouth.
Christmas Eve was show time for Mom to present us with her sweet tooth fixations. We loved it! A pretty table full of goodies! What could be better? It made things so festive and warm!
At dark, which was early in Michigan, the house would begin to come alive with the final preparations for the evenings upcoming festivity! While already for weeks the Christmas lights were put on, the star on the tree-top lit, and the tried and true decorations were in place including a fresh poinsettia flower, wreaths with many candles in the middles and a quaint manger setting that the moss on the roof had been reguled on. At times the decorations were experimental, the year of the snow-flocked tree and that one with the snow flocked windows. Sometimes the decorations got carried away but the beauty of the standards always remained and held tradition. The last presents, and there always seemed to be a million of them, Mom was wrapping in her room and the younger kids, at her request went back and forth, carrying them to place strategically under the tree wherever they deemed best. At times it would piles of one person or another, or at other times, reorganized to not organized. Sometimes we would make guesses at what were in them, but we only did that on the ones where we safely couldn't tell what they were.
Dad was usually hiding in his study around this time, with his nose in a book. Soon he would appear and pointedly sift through his record album looking for what would always be Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker. He would carefully place the black and magical thing on the player that came out of the wall and the needle would meet the edge to ignite a brillant sound which would warm the house even more.
There were some earlier years when we all got dressed up, piled in the family station wagon and went to mass at midnight in a beautiful church we didn't know so that we could enjoy the music and the beauty of celebrating Christ mass. I liked that we each our own candle to hold. Later in the mass, lit candles were passed by pretty angles at the end of each aisle until the entire congregation was alight at the same moment and a choir sang. As the older kids begged not to go to mass, and the older ones became more and more, we stopped going to mass. Mom tried to make our own candle lit experience but eventually Christmas eve was spent in the beauty of our own home and the focus became more fun where we did skits and silly things after unwrapping the million presents and feasting on goodies all evening.
On Christmas Eve she always made something that sounded like it is spelled ollie bollion (?). They were basically Dutch holiday donuts with alcohol plumped raisins and shaken in confectioners sugar, always made fresh after going to mass (even though we weren't catholic we went for the pretty candles and music). And then opened presents after.
Mom always served the fudge on a plate of great honor. Whether it was a small, heavy, pretty glass plate that one of us kids gave to her for Christmas the previous year or one of the antique ones with a chip and a crack that we had dug up on the back of our own property as kids and given proudly to her years ago. Either way, the smallest morsels got snatched up the moment the announcement that the celebration of eating could begin.
Nearby on a pretty platter was always my other favorite: delectable pieces of her delicious almond pastry roll. It was always one of the first things to disappear in the evening! What never disappeared was that heavy, colorful homemade fruit cake that adults only ate and kids took accidentally but only ate the pink icing off the top. I had heard that it was good as far as fruit cakes go though I still don't think I would eat it now. Not forgotten but better was an actual homemade crumbly type of actual ginger bread that was made with candied ginger pieces and a graham sort of crust. Mom got creative every year and made new cookies and deserts too. I remember cookies with maple flavored icing, and nut filled treats. There was a very special cookie made from whipped egg whites, sugar and almond paste. They were so special she had to hide them really well from us, and they disappeared anyways though she made them every year. The only store bought item on display was the white, ginger cookies called pfeffernuesse. Delicious but a little avoidable as the powdered sugar always seemed to make a mess falling onto your nice clothes when you ate it. I can't leave out the masterpiece of that years decorated Christmas Cookies us kids made. It was always laid out on a nice large platter to show off only our best creative work and probably because that was what seemed most edible.
Because there was punch you knew the festivities had begun! It was a beautiful and tasty part of the Christmas Eve tradition! As part of Mom's traditional holiday settings start the night before by making any mixture of orange and grapefruit juices and pouring them in anything to freeze to make ice. She used a jello mold or a cake ring but it does not matter. The important thing is the punch needs to be cold and undiluted by regular ice. Add the flavored ice to the pretty punch powl when ready to serve. You can use any large bowl or pan. Add mostly orange juice and some grapefruit juice. You can also add another juices, like perhaps a strawberry nectar. The two other important components are plenty of ginger ale and frozen strawberries that are sliced or quartered. The strawberries float on the surface of the punch making the top of it red. Because of the ginger ale the strawberries tingled in your mouth.
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