Christmassy.

First things first, our front door has finally turned pink.....or magenta:

In our house, the colour terminology depends on where you went/go to school. Pink may be considered a particularly feminine colour yet magenta, of course, is manly as it's the colour of valour, of blood spilt on the battlefield. It's all about  perception. The girls in our family are happy with pink, yet the boys console themselves with magenta.

The sample pot that I had decided on, way back in the dim reaches of time, turned out to be all wrong, so the painter had to randomly conjure up this precise shade.....by mixing up a bit of this and a bit of that. Of course I had to endure lots of eye rolling when I explained that I was a simple girl and all I wanted was bright pink that could be passed off as magenta.....after the requisite four coats were applied he admitted that he was 'quite chuffed' with how it ended up. Me too, I love it. And in case you were wondering, so do the boys.

Why does our tree always undergo a dramatic growth spurt just at the beginning of December? I'm sure that it grows centimetres at this time every year, moments before we lug it inside to be all loved up. This was our tree, the first year it did Christmas with us.....nine years ago:

And this is how it looks this year:

 

So, while we've been wrapping presents and cooking....today we made Turkish Delight and all day I've been in denial about how much gelatine, or rather gronund up animal hoof and horn, is actually needed to get it to set. Yuck/yum.....I've also been reminiscing about Christmases around our tree, which for the rest of the year sits forlornly potbound in a corner of the garden struggling to receive the attention that it craves. Miraculously, this year it has performed again and has now outgrown the whole family....and that's no mean feat.

In a blur of daydreams of Christmases past, I've been thinking about that first year when we lived over the river in a different house, when the not quite one year old was covered in the horror that is a bad dose of chicken pox and how the fairy sustained scorch marks on the pink tulle layers of her dress when she ventured too close to  the cooktop in the only just finished in the nick of time kitchen.....about the year when all of the hints and innuendo paid off and there was a pink KitchenAid under the tree....and about all of the hysterically funny dress up concerts over the years that it has inspired our children to perform.

So then, because Christmas is such a bittersweet time for tripping down memory lane, I started remembering all of the people who have helped us celebrate our own version of Christmas around this very same tree. About how, against all expectations, we have been so fortunate to have four amazing children to share our lives with. And about how my dad won't be joining in. This will be the fifth Christmas that he's been gone and while it's not as raw as the first...or even the second...there is still such a sense of absence always present in the shadows. For me, the magic of Christmas seems to be equally about the creation of new happy memories to add to the memory bank and an opportunity to unashamedly dip in and reclaim old ones.

My heart goes out to anyone reading this who has lost a loved one this year and who will be experiencing their first Christmas without them. I remember so vividly what it feels like, I think it's because Christmas rolls around, without fail, year in year out and acts as a prompt for hope for the future and an opportunity to indulge in recollections of the past.

Rx

Christmas.

Mercifully festivities kicked off yesterday at the sensible hour of 7am. We have spent too many Christmases exhausted having been wrenched from sleep in the very very early hours. One particularly memorable year it was 4.30am. The secret was to set the alarm and enforce that there was NO getting up before it went off. It worked.

Here was the show before presents carefully choreographed by Tobes and Mimi (aka Santa and his helper):

While opening presents we ate and drank this:

My surprise present was this 120 year old 5 trumpet epergne:

Which Kim bought from Mr Kent at his splendid antique shop Kent and Kent, 3 Morrison Street, Hobart. Mum and I plundered the garden and tried it out with sweet peas and roses yet agreed that it looked best with artichokes. Luckily there were five growing on the one plant.

Between bouts of cooking and socialising I read this:

I couldn't put it down. My head is swimming with Marjorie's recipes and handy hints yet here's one I thought was timely in the lead up to dressing up for New Year and I quote directly from p115 of Danielle Wood's Housewife Superstar: The Very Best of Marjorie Bligh:

Gown Protected

If you .....walk to parties or dances, protect the bottom of your frock with a rubbish bag. Make 2 leg holes and pull on up to waist. It may look strange, but your frock will keep clean.


It will be perfect - especially if it's raining here in Hobart as is predicted. Not quite so sure about the recipes for mock oysters (mix cooked mashed brains with salt, pepper and lemon juice into a thick white sauce p119), stretching butter or rouge in case you run out (cut beetroot p104).

The thing about Christmas is that after all the hype it is always over so quickly, don't you think?
R