venetia_sassy | Christmas Eve

The day started out rather blearily, thanks to staying up way too late fiddling with florentines, shortbread, caramels etc (I do not have enough airtight containers! Every year, no matter how many I have, it is never enough) but after some revivifying tea, I sat down to my first task of the day - halving and pitting, then poaching 600g of cherries (reduced the sugar a bit, only one cinnamon quill. And oh wow. The smell is amazing!)

I survived this encounter with minimal redecoration of the house and my own self. Disposable gloves and my apron were a great help, although I still managed to smear cherry juice up my forearms and drip on the apron (which went into the wash immediately afterwards, although if I hadn't been checking for stains I might not have noticed them for awhile. The juice dried to the same shade as the flowers in the fabric, it was quite remarkable.)

Then there was wrapping presents and making the vanilla bean bundt cake (1 teaspoon Cointreau instead of lemon extract, since that's what I had) which I have yet to taste but the batter tasted fabulous! Glazing will happen tomorrow.

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We had our usual Christmas Eve dinner with Dee, which was really nice. She gave me a lovely glazed pottery bowl that she bought in 1947, at a pottery on Friday Hut Road in the Forgotten Valley. She saw it being made and they went back a few days later to collect it. It's a deep gumleaf green with an unusual wavy rim. Dee said no one else in the family particularly cares for it and when she saw the pottery I bought at the Artist's Trail last month, she thought I might like it. And she'd like to think it will continue to be loved.

That was lovely.

We also discovered that we are not only connected through Mum's father's family but there's a connection on her mother's side as well. Mum started to mention her grandfather's name and Dee chipped in with his address! Connections within connections.

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We took a few detours on the way home to check out the Christmas lights in the neighbourhood (with some of those blinking lights, I wonder that everyone in the neighbourhood doesn't wind up with migraines.) Now, having tidied up, washed the dishes, finished wrapping presents, read half of 101 Dalmatians, I just need to take Mum's stocking into her room and I'm done!

Merry Christmas!