Hey, everybody! Reader here, and now that the calendar has flipped over to December, it’s really starting to feel like Christmas time is truly here.
We had our staff Christmas party on Saturday night, and even though it was the last day of November, and December technically arrived during the revelry, I just have a hard time feeling Christmassy until December officially arrives.
Now? It’s go time!
Today, I’m already thinking about the traditional Christmas meal. You know… turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce, and all the different desserts you can handle. All the good stuff!
That’s always what we’ve enjoyed around the Read home over the holidays (and still is), but over the years, we’ve added to the traditions.
We’re not a Ukrainian family, so we never enjoyed the deliciousness of Ukrainian food over the holidays, until my awesome sister-in-law, Niki joined the family, so that ushered in perogies and other treats to our Christmas traditions. Count me as overjoyed about that!
And last year, we really did something different.
Because we weren’t able to all be together on Christmas Day, we gathered our family (Mom and Dad, my brothers and their families, and my cousin Kala) at my brother Curtis’ house in Balgonie on December 23rd, as he, Niki and the kids hosted everybody. And it was an absolute blast.
When it came to the meal, though, we all figured that everyone would be getting their fill of turkey, etc. on the 25th at various extended family Christmas gatherings in Regina, Saskatoon, and at the farm at Conquest.
So, instead, we had Chinese food and pizza for our family celebration. And it was AWESOME!
We adults and older kids enjoyed the Chinese food, while the kids were more into the pizza, though some of the younger ones got brave and tried some new things, and found that they liked them, too!
And then on Christmas Day, those of us at the farm got our traditional turkey, so it was the best of both worlds.
There’s something about a great meal, whatever it may be, that makes hanging out with your loved ones even better.
As much as it’s nice to stick with the usual, it never hurts to try something new. And hey, you just might create some new traditions!
