Archive for the ‘holidays’ Category
12 Christmas Memories: Part I
Some of my fondest Christmas memories from childhood in a handy 5-part series.
Read on...Ghost of Christmas Past (Revisited)
The newly-crowned Princess Wanderlust Scarlett has tagged me for a most glorious Christmas meme–to write about 12 of my favorite Christmas things. I’m choosing to write about 12 of my favorite Christmas memories over the years.
I will fulfill my meme-ly duties in due time, but for now, Scarlett’s tag reminded me of a general Christmas memory post that I put up last year around this time.
Now let’s revisit “Ghost of Christmas Past” from December 17, 2006:
I am a loyal reader of Petite Anglaise, and her December 13 post has been resonating with me for days now. Petite is separated from the father of her young child, and in this entry, she admits struggling to make Christmas special for Tadpole, as she calls her daughter.
If you’ve read my 100 things about me, you know that my parents were divorced when I was very young. And so, I’ve been in the shoes of Tadpole–having adults around me trying to make everything seem normal when, it turns out, I suppose it wasn’t (whatever “normal” means anyway).
So the more I’ve thought about Petite and Tadpole, the more I’ve been thinking about my own childhood Christmases–and the more I’ve felt the need to write this post.
By Christmases (plural), I mean that we had two every year. If today were 20 years ago, this might have been the morning that I woke up at my Mom’s house, opened gifts, and then prepared for our Christmas dinner, which usually included my father and his family.
That’s because one or two weeks before the big day, we had “Mom’s Christmas,” a full celebration only a little early. More than the early gifts, though, the highlight for me was the unveiling of Mom’s cookies–chocolate chips, Michigan rocks, ricotta, kolaches, butter pressed, pizzelles. Of course, some time in the weeks before, we had decorated the cut-outs, which involved a couple of my girlfriends and a slumber party.*
Man I’m missing home (and childhood) right about now.
Anyway, some of the reason behind having two Christmases was that my mom is a nurse and always worked Christmas day; on actual Christmas morning, she usually came over to my father’s house for a little while.
But I’m sure the bigger reason was that with two full holidays, nobody missed out on a family Christmas experience. In fact, as kids, we were blessed with double the fun.
And the best part was that all of this seemed completely normal to me even though I knew the other kids at school weren’t having the same deal (suckers!). Now, as an adult, I see that this was the plan. And it worked.
Don’t buy it? My testimonial not enough?
Take Exhibit A, then, depicting what the two Christmas set-up made my normally curmudgeonly grandfather (may he rest in peace) do to himself one year:
See, Christmas miracles do happen.
*These are not the actual recipes my Mom uses. As you can surely understand, these are top secret and under heavy guard. I did, however, try to find some that are close to hers.
Decorate Your Own Virtual Gingerbread House
Well it looks like November caught up with me. Near the end of the last week, I started getting awful stomach cramps and they lasted pretty much through the weekend. And then I got feverish. And nauseated. And muscle-achy. Etc. Blech.
Basically I and most of the school age children in the village have fallen ill with a nasty version of the stomach flu. You see, I had the privilege of riding the bus with them several times in the past couple weeks . . . to and fro from the Internet café.
If you don’t know, the public and school bus are one and the same around here. Lucky public, I know.
Anyway, I’m very behind on answering comments and emails because I’ve been spending a lot of time sleeping, but I did have a chance to look at some of my favorite blogs over the weekend. So glad so many of you are still posting like mad!
One thing that I saw and had to share was a post on London Southern Belle with a link to Home Sweet Home–and a virtual gingerbread house that you can decorate yourself!
I probably won’t decorate my own house too much this year because I have moving boxes everywhere, not to mention puppies, so we’re a bit crowded; this gingerbread house was just the thing to help get me in the holiday spirit.
Never one to skimp on decorations (hi Scarlett!), I used about 90 percent of the little available doodads on that site. Too much fun!
Hope you enjoy this as much as I did–and, by the way, check out Allsorts, the blog with Home Sweet Home as that Jenny B Harris is one crafty woman.
And for those in Italy watching Sky–Happy Lost Season 3 Finale tonight! Woohoo!
thanksgiving in italy
Happy Thanksgiving…
from our table to yours!
This photo was actually taken last year, but it was our Thanksgiving feast and the first time I had prepared one by myself. And it was complicated from the start.
First, we were supposed to have our own turkey, raised by P, but two weeks before Turkey Day, a sly fox got the bright idea to have her own feast early. So we had chicken instead–just as well as my grandmother never made turkey as she didn’t like it anyway.
Then, considering many of the traditional Thanksgiving foods aren’t even available here, I had to get stuff flown in (think cranberry sauce and sweet potatoes–yes, I know you have them in north and perhaps central Italy but I can’t find them down here). Other than that we had filling/stuffing (mom’s recipe!), mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, and peas.
Well, *I* had all those things. P didn’t go near the sweet potatoes or cranberry sauce. Maybe this year.
We’ll be having our Thanksgiving dinner on Sunday since P’s working today (and, accordingly, so am I)–remember it’s not a holiday here. But I hope all of you have a wonderful day; I’ll catch up to you on Sunday!
Thanks for the Thanksgiving funnies Gil!
Today I’m thankful for:
All the Thanksgivings I’ve spent with my family, both at my mom’s and grandmother’s house. Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday–it revolves around food and being grateful. How can you go wrong?
And you know what? I don’t have even one bad memory from any Thanksgiving, which is pretty impressive considering I come from a family of divorce and otherwise unhappy marriages. Indeed for the most part I had a happy childhood anyway, and for that I’m truly grateful.
And hopefully I’ll get to have some more Thanksgivings with my family as the years go on–and P will be forced to try all the foreign foods. Hah!
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone who is celebrating!
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[tags] thanksgiving, thanksgiving in italy, turkey, thanksgiving comics, nablopomo, 30 days of thanks[/tags]
What’s Cooking Wednesday: Trick or Treat Tomato Eyeballs
Happy Halloween!
Some of you have asked about what’s going on in Italy for this “holiday,” and I’m sorry to report: niente. That means nothing.
In some parts of the country, they are starting to get children involved with costumes and whatnot, but no one around here does any such thing.
This could be because I don’t have kids yet…because if you think my kids are going to miss out on trick-or-treating, well, you’ve underestimated me and my weakness for candy.
I’ll even have the good stuff shipped in from the US and distributed to the neighbors (for distribution to the children, of course, with other healthy treats encouraged too):
Added bonus is that the kids around here most likely won’t have to cover up their awesome costumes with big ole coats like we always had to do where I grew up….
Anyway, back to the business at hand, I’m keeping up the Halloween theme for this week’s What’s Cooking Wednesday and giving you a quick, fun idea for a holiday treat.
But there’s a catch–you have to go here to find the recipe for
Trick or Treat Tomato Eyeballs
Why not whip up a batch and then head over to Ghouls Just Wanna Have Fun to celebrate?
Also, check out the true ghost stories over at Tui’s True Spooks Blog Carnival. Make sure you turn the light on first though! There’s some creepy stuff in there.
And, since it is the last day of October and I’ve yet to post my Monthly Musing, I’ll give you a little bit of why I love this wonderful month as we say good-bye for another year:
Sweet sweet October
Only a few words to say
How much I love you…
Sweaters, fireplace fires,
My birthday, delicious soups,
And this year, puppies!
What do you love about October?
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
Calabria Guidebook
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