CHRISTMAS 2015

[Christmas Crazy]

Merry Monday Christmas!!!
I hope everybody has a great week.

[Christmas Crazy]

[Noel+]

Good morning my Christmas friends!

MM - thinkingof you & your family and hoping you're having great pre-Christmas fun!

CK - hope your snow dusting was beautiful and your DD enjoyed playing in it!

Jolly - extra prayers for Perky as he travels around the no-go zone after the Paris attacks.

CC - good to see you posting bright and early this morning. Thanks for the Christmas countdown!

[Jolly O'Leary]

Good morning my Christmas friends!

MM - thinkingof you & your family and hoping you're having great pre-Christmas fun!

CK - hope your snow dusting was beautiful and your DD enjoyed playing in it!

Jolly - extra prayers for Perky as he travels around the no-go zone after the Paris attacks.

CC - good to see you posting bright and early this morning. Thanks for the Christmas countdown!

I was thinking that working a no go zone could be good. People are less likely to make mischief where they and their families actually live. Could be one of the safest places in town. It is hard to even think of Christmas after the events of this weekend.

[Noel+]

Well late last evening my sister emailed me there is a change in our Thanksgiving plans. She has offered to host Thanksgiving since my Mom passed but this year her eldest son will be have that honor.

The meal? One look at my DH's face - -- and I iknew I was preparing a full course Thanksgiving Turkey meal the day after. My nephew is fixing Mexican food. He is a cook good on a few items and prefers Mexican food. On Thanksgiving?!?!?! The menu is seracho-peppers tortilla soup; street-vendor tamales; nachos and chorrizos. Now in Arizona we eat Mexican food 2-3 times a week so it is not special. Just shows me how far the younger generation is from big-family traditional meals that I grew up with in the Indiana countryside.

Jolly your San Antonio family seems to have started a younger generation custom.

So I won't be able to take down Thanksgiving til Monday, November 30 and start my Christmas decorating 3 days late due to work schedule. Bummer!!

[Jolly O'Leary]

Well late last evening my sister emailed me there is a change in our Thanksgiving plans. She has offered to host Thanksgiving since my Mom passed but this year her eldest son will be have that honor.

The meal? One look at my DH's face - -- and I iknew I was preparing a full course Thanksgiving Turkey meal the day after. My nephew is fixing Mexican food. He is a cook good on a few items and prefers Mexican food. On Thanksgiving?!?!?! The menu is seracho-peppers tortilla soup; street-vendor tamales; nachos and chorrizos. Now in Arizona we eat Mexican food 2-3 times a week so it is not special. Just shows me how far the younger generation is from big-family traditional meals that I grew up with in the Indiana countryside.

Jolly your San Antonio family seems to have started a younger generation custom.

So I won't be able to take down Thanksgiving til Monday, November 30 and start my Christmas decorating 3 days late due to work schedule. Bummer!!

Lasagna is for Thanksgiving. Mexican is for Christmas day........or so it has been since I left home. I finally figured it out. I got married in 1990 but that was also the year my grandparents went to their "pensioner apartment" and my grandmother only had a tiny galley kitchen. So, the big dinners fell to my aunt's house. Now, my aunt is a wonderful person, but she herself admints she is a "survival" cook. Her kids learned to cook out of self defense though they never went hungry. That combined with the fact that myself, my brother, and my cousins by then would have "significant others" to visit on Christmas, probably brought about the "easy" tamale dinner........I tried to discuss this with my aunt last time in Texas with the guilt trip" What will the grandkids remember? that they had this marvelous dinner at the "OTHER" grand mother's (yes, I was evil) and they had lasagna and tamales at Grandma Hoberg's???

Perky has a late night meeting on Thursday Thanksgiving, so instead of going home and making something with our leftover frozen turkey, I think I will try the minced turkey/sweet potatoe skillet recipe I got from my cousin. Just add cranberry. My favorite flavors of Thanskgiving are turkey, sweet potato, and cranberry, anything else is a bonus. And pumpkin pie of course. We can make Turkey tetrazinni or spaghetti on the weekend of First Advent as a kick off to Christmas!

As a side note, I have considered making turkey fajitas..........turkey, mashed sweet potato and cranberry sauce..........it could work........

[Jolly O'Leary]

oh my Noel, just for fun I googled "Mexican thanksgiving dinner" and got at least 9 links that I want to check out on the first page...........I could consider some for Christmas dinner as I am less "set" on the side dishes then, just turkey, ham, and mincemeat pie required with carrot raisin salad and deviled eggs to go with the Christmas eve smörgåsbord.

[Jolly O'Leary]

After watching The Wartime Farm and since we are not having Christmas guests, we are considering making a "murkey" (mock turkey) and wartime Christmas dinner. We watched the Christmas episode last night. "Murkey" (we might use minced turkey in place of sausage), brussel sprouts (very Swedish), carrots (not something we usually eat alone), "wartime bread", and "mock orange juice" made from "swede". could be fun. If it is a total failure we will have leftovers from the Swedish smörgåsbord and are going on a Boxing day cruise the next day.

[CandyKane]

We always have traditional meals on Thanksgiving and Christmas days, but for small get togethers throughout the season we have different meals. I did a Mexican theme meal on Christmas Eve a few years back. In my opinion, if you are the host of the family Thanksgiving or Christmas meal you should at least have some traditional offerings.

[Jolly O'Leary]

We always have traditional meals on Thanksgiving and Christmas days, but for small get togethers throughout the season we have different meals. I did a Mexican theme meal on Christmas Eve a few years back. In my opinion, if you are the host of the family Thanksgiving or Christmas meal you should at least have some traditional offerings.

http://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipe ... nd-recipes

for Noel. Those actually sound quite good. I do not mind the traditional elements with an ethnic twist it keeps Christmas and Thanskgiving fun and reminds me of the movie What's Cooking.

[CandyKane]

We enjoyed a nice weekend. We went Christmas shopping Saturday and had a lazy day around the house yesterday. Last night we had popcorn, hot chocolate, and Christmas movies. One of the movies was 'Christmas with Holly'. Its so sweet.

[Jolly O'Leary]

We always have traditional meals on Thanksgiving and Christmas days, but for small get togethers throughout the season we have different meals. I did a Mexican theme meal on Christmas Eve a few years back. In my opinion, if you are the host of the family Thanksgiving or Christmas meal you should at least have some traditional offerings.

Tamales are very traditional for Christmas eve, it is just my weird family that substitutes them for Christmas dinner. IN some families that have their traditional meal on Christmas eve, they might then have them on Christmas day. Perky and I are already thinking of Christmas dinner in TExas as if we want anything other than tamales we will most likely have to cook it ourselves.

[CandyKane]

It's cold, rainy, and dreary today. I just keep thinking if it was just a little cooler this would be snow. Or the much dreaded ice. We could be like Colorado with the blizzard conditions. The weather channel says it's the first named storm of the Winter season. I never wanna hear a storm described as brutal. Especially not in November. It might be a very long Winter. At least we'll have Christmas to cheer us up.

[CandyKane]

Looks like we might just hit the 2500 posts mark today. I wonder how many posts we'll have by Christmas Day?

[Jolly O'Leary]

Looks like we might just hit the 2500 posts mark today. I wonder how many posts we'll have by Christmas Day?

I would say we only raise the goal by 200 at a time. Then there is no pressure. Christmas should be fun after all!

[Christmas Crazy]

I know that traditions change with each generation. But just like everyone else, I don't like change. I look at my own kids and I see the traditional Thanksgiving meal being replaced with anything but the traditional food items (Turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, rolls etc...). They just don't like that kind of a meal. I'm the only one that will eat any of the leftovers. Some traditions will carry over, but sadly some will go away. I know my daughter will still watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade each year. That is a tradition she has already stated she will continue. But my boys I'm not so sure about. Maybe they will inherit some of these traditions thru marriage.

And when it comes to Christmas, I've really made a mess of one thing. My kids no longer remember a Christmas at home. Ever since we moved down south, we've always traveled back north before Christmas. They only know spending Christmas Eve at one grandparents house and Christmas day at the other grandparents house. I wish I would have realised what I was doing at the time. But, they still have a great sense of spending that time with family. I guess that is what is important.

[CandyKane]

I wasn't planning to raise the goal. Just wondering how big our Christmas thread will grow by the big day. It's so great to see all the activity on this forum. Christmas is always better when you share it with friends.

[ksrjreed]

It so exciting to see that the goal is going to be hit before Thanksgiving, guess my plans of posting into the late hours of Christmas Eve are out the windows, oh well, more time to watch A Christmas Story.

[Christmas Crazy]

On a different note. We watched two Hallmark Christmas movies last night. I am really in the Christmas mood now!

[Jolly O'Leary]

I know that traditions change with each generation. But just like everyone else, I don't like change. I look at my own kids and I see the traditional Thanksgiving meal being replaced with anything but the traditional food items (Turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, rolls etc...). They just don't like that kind of a meal. I'm the only one that will eat any of the leftovers. Some traditions will carry over, but sadly some will go away. I know my daughter will still watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade each year. That is a tradition she has already stated she will continue. But my boys I'm not so sure about. Maybe they will inherit some of these traditions thru marriage.

And when it comes to Christmas, I've really made a mess of one thing. My kids no longer remember a Christmas at home. Ever since we moved down south, we've always traveled back north before Christmas. They only know spending Christmas Eve at one grandparents house and Christmas day at the other grandparents house. I wish I would have realised what I was doing at the time. But, they still have a great sense of spending that time with family. I guess that is what is important.

I have a lot to say but I am short on Christmas time. My cousin has faced the same dilemma only with all family being too close and only one day off from work. I told him years ago, it's okay to say "NO" to family especially if you see them all the time and establish your own home traditions. Your kids may return to their roots once they marry and have their own kids. Then Christmas comes alive again. To be continued.....