I'll happily admit I'm the Christmas fairy in our house. I
love everything about it, with the possible exception of a little incident last
Christmas when someone hit my car on a roundabout. But there are some things
which make the season just that little bit more special.
1) Christkindlmarkt.
My hometown has a German Christmas market which, for me, embodies everything I
enjoy. Dark nights lit with glimmering lights, stollen cake, mulled wine,
German stalls selling ornaments and wind lights. Plus I love being about to pop
down there at lunch for one of their pretzels.
2) The Christmas
food. Specifically, my mother's cooking. This year we've ordered a
three-bird roast and a sirloin for Boxing Day, which will be combined with my
husband's mash and my mother's roast potatoes. You know, one year I saw a
recipe for "using up left over roast potatoes" and found myself
thinking "Whaaaa?" Believe me, there's no such thing as left over
roasts in my mother's house.
3) The wine.
We're back to the mulled wine, of course, which is a wonderful thing to have in
front of the TV on a snowy night. But let's not forget that since we don't have
to be up in the morning, we can also drink all the Sauvignon Blanc, Torrontes
and plum wine which will be waiting for me under the tree.
4) Lush. Okay, I
know Lush is around all year. I love just walking past that place and bathing
in the scents that waft out of the door. But at Christmas I get treated to
vouchers for the Lush spa, which is one of my favourite places to spend an
afternoon. Much as I love an ordinary facial and massage, there's something
extra special about having them with mood music, rose-scented bubbles,
chocolate body scrubs and finishing off with homemade lemonade and dry ice.
5) Writing. I'm a
writer - who wouldn't love getting time off work to be able to write?
Admittedly I almost never write holiday-themed stories, despite my occasional
fantasies about sex under the tree and sharing sticks of rock. But this year I
hope to finish off three pieces I've been working on for a few months - there's
nothing like fairy lights and wine to serve as inspiration.
So what do you love about Christmas? Every comment is
another entry to win the Blissemas Kindle!
These days probably my favourite thing is going 'light-spotting' with my kid. We ride around the area on the top deck of buses, early in the evening, seeing how many wildly OTT displays of festive lights we can find.
ReplyDeleteMy youngest son loves that! We go on random busses to places we don't even know just to see all the different light displays.
DeleteI used to do that too!
DeleteI think the thing I love most about Christmas time is the smell! I just love the smell of cinnamon and spice apples and pomander oranges. On Dec.1st we ditch all the lavender and rose scents we use the rest of the year and bring out the cinnamon, sandlewood, spice apple and orange and the smell just somehow makes you happy, like a natural aromatic high! My birthday is Dec 22nd so it's a great all-in-one festive time. This year I'm extra excited because my son and his partner are coming to stay for three days over Xmas (haven't been here since Easter) and she's expecting my first grandchild. I do love taking my youngest all around to see the lights, we buy a super-saver rider ticket and just catch random busses to anywhere to see all the lights, and he really loves that, I love his excitement over waiting for Santa too (he's 13 but autistic so still a believer which is wonderful). I celebrate Saturnalia on 17th too though we tend to call it Smuturnalia in our house as kinky friends come round for a feast (think willy shaped ice cubes and naughty names cocktails) and read erotica, it's a kids-free Christmas just for the grown-ups. :)
ReplyDeleteI like the sound of Smuturnalia :)
DeleteLeeds.... Xxx I'm here also and absolutely love the smells of chritmas,now I want mulled wine mmmmmm
ReplyDeleteGot to love mulled wine...
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