Merry Christmas!

Here is how we spent our Christmas....

The Claspy tradition from my childhood (via my Swedish ancestors) is to open presents on Christmas Eve (though I think I am the only one of the three of us who still does this). So after returning from Lessons and Carols and eating some delicious "Farmer's Pasta", we began investigating what had been stashed underneath the Christmas tree.


When I was young we would leave home on Christmas Eve to attend the children's service at our church, with no presents in sight underneath the Christmas tree. Then, miraculously, when we returned home from church and dinner, the tree lights had been switched on and there were piles of colorfully wrapped presents under the tree - how did THAT happen? If it happened to be a white Christmas, we would inspect the front drive for hoof prints in the snow! I always felt lucky that Santa came to my house twice, once to deliver packages and once to fill my stocking.

The big present at the VZ household this year was a replacement computer for our aging (5 year old...) Mac - which Gabi inherited. No more watching the "spinning beachball" while trying to run two applications at once. Well, at least not for a couple of years....

Christmas Day was rather leisurely - since presents were opened the night before there was no need to leap out of bed at the crack of dawn - a good thing for Gabi, who is known to sleep until early afternoon! I remember a great story from my childhood about early morning Christmas excitement. My Grandma Hoffman would often spend the night at our house on Christmas Eve and would share Bill's room. One particular Christmas, Bill was so excited about what might be in his stocking that he found it hard to stay asleep. Finally, in the wee hours of the morning, my Grandmother let Bill creep out of bed to investigate his loot, hoping that she might be able to get a few hours of restful sleep once his curiousity was satisfied!

We spent much of the day reading, working on a jigsaw puzzle and trying to fill in a jumbo crossword puzzle that was in the newspaper. We also tested our current event knowledge with the BBC's year-end news quiz.

Having just the three of us around for Christmas dinner did not prevent us from preparing a big Christmas feast.

I am not sure when the Swedish Smorgasbord tradition began for the Claspys (no doubt sometime after Ken joined the family), but we have continued this tradition every year. Ham, red cabbage, potatoes, Swedish meatballs, cheeses and lingon were on the menu (no pickled herring this year).

We also like the British tradition of opening Christmas "crackers" , reading the very corny jokes included inside and of course wearing the crowns.
Living in the south, we do not expect (nor particularly want) a white Christmas. Before this year there hadn't been a white Christmas in the ATL since 1882....but look what we got....
Thankfully it will be back in the 60s by Friday! We ended our Christmas Day playing a round of Clue and watching one of our favorite movies of the season, "Holiday Inn". We have a collection of videos (yes, this is the only reason we have kept a VCR in the house) of classic holiday movies that we love to watch every year, like: "White Christmas", " Wonderful Life", "Bells of St Mary's" and the original "Miracle on 34th Street".


I think I know every line in each of these movies (as well as the lyrics of those classic songs like , "Sisters"). Of course we also have the classic Rankin and Bass stop-action greats like "Rudolph" and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town".

Ken and I were remembering when the only time you could see these shows was when they were played on network TV. We remember marking our calendars with the dates and times our favorite Christmas cartoons would be airing!

All in all, a restful and relaxing holiday. We missed sharing the day with family, but dusting off some of the old family traditions makes it feel like we ARE spending Christmas together! Happy holidays!