24 December 2007

Happy Yule

Kids tobogganing on Christmas EveYesterday's weather was atrocious: 32mm of rain and up to 7°C, so most of the snow and ice melted, causing torrents of water to pour down the hill into our ditch. We escaped by going to Belleville to see Enchanted, which was formulaic and predictable, but which the kids enjoyed. Overnight we had gale-force winds and the temperature dropped again, turning the rain back to snow and creating a more festive scene for Christmas Eve.

We're getting lake-effect snow showers today, which is getting us all into the mood nicely. The official definition of a white Christmas here is having two centimetres of snow on the ground on Christmas Day - which seems a bit more sensible than the UK equivalent of a few flakes falling on the London Weather Centre.

So far today I've made the bread sauce and stuffing and some sausage rolls (plus pancakes for the kids' breakfast). I found a good-looking recipe for cranberry relish and used another one of my historic appliances to make it. I know the mincer is historic as, like the cream-maker, it proudly proclaims itself to have been made in England. This also belonged to my grandmother (and quite possibly her mother, too).

The Christmas drink of choice round here seems to be egg nog, which I can't quite bring myself to make, but Mike managed to track down some ginger wine in the LCBO in Belleville, so I'm not short of festive alcohol. Cheers!

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