So This is Christmas and What Have You Done Geneameme

Christmas is coming quickly and fellow Aussie geneablogger Sharn White has created the “So This is Christmas and What Have You Done?” Geneameme. which is making us reminisce.

This very thought-provoking geneameme, has stretched my memory back, here’s what I’ve come up with …

Q1 . WHAT KIND OF CHRISTMAS DID YOU HAVE AS A CHILD?
A. Let’s see … I do remember going to the local church service and also carol singing sessions with my grandparents occasionally, but I don’t remember my parents going to the carol singing at all. It wasn’t their thing.

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 Q2. WHERE DID YOU SPEND  CHRISTMAS?
A. Christmas has always (except for one year) spent at home with my family in the Adelaide Hills. Usually all the reli’s came to to their place.

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Q3. A LETTER AND SOMETHING YUMMY FOR SANTA
A. I don’t remember ever writing a letter to Santa, but I do remember seeing a present under the tree one year saying it was for me and from Santa. Not surprisingly it was in my mum’s handwriting, so I wasn’t fooled. I do remember making big long multi-page Christmas gift lists which I’d put on the fridge weeks before Christmas, so it was giving my parents plenty of time to work out what they’d get me.

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Q4. THE CHRISTMAS TREE
A. A christmas tree is a big thing for me, and I would assume that is because we’ve always had one, so it seems wrong not to. I remember that we use to go an get a real pine tree from a pine forest near our house. One year it was so big it touched the ceiling. While these days I’m happy with my fake tree, there is something about the smell of fresh pine that nothing can replace.

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Q5. DECORATING THE CHRISTMAS TREE
A. I don’t actually remember a whole lot about decorating three tree. There was certainly no tradition to it. But I’m guessing it was left to my mum and me. I don’t think there was any “traditional” ornaments, more simply the same ones year after year as that’s all we had.

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Q6. DID YOU DECORATE OUTDOORS?
A. No, as my family weren’t overly Christmassy, we didn’t get into decorating it that much, and certainly not outside.

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Q7. CHRISTMAS CARDS
A. I do remember our family getting a few cards, but not a whole lot. My grandma on the other hand used to fill her entire kitchen bench. She’s a very big christmas and birthday card person. Me, nowdays, I’m probably somewhere in between. I normally  send out a batch or cards earlyish December.

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Q8. CHRISTMAS STOCKINGS
A. I reckon one year mum filled a pillow case with bits and pieces for my brother and I, but we never had Christmas stockings as such.

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Q9. CHRISTMAS PRESENTS
A. I’m sure I made presents for my grandparents when I was young, but I can’t remember anything specifically. As for when did we open gifts … apparently mum and dad didn’t think that 6am Christmas morning was appropriate, so made us wait even longer (which is, you know, FOREVER when you’re a kid!) I remember two presents I gave my brother, one was a few lumps of coal (charcoal), as that’s all he deserved that year. And another was I gave him $20 in $1 coins, and had wrapped each of them up indivially, along with other cardboard that size too … so he had to open ALL of them to get his money. I really don’t think he was overly impressed at my effort.

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Q10. YOUR FAVOURITE CHRISTMAS PRESENT
A. Still thinking on this one … but I do remember getting a photo album of baby photos of Mr Lonetester fro m his sister a few years ago. That was a VERY cool gift.

I also remember making scrapbook pages showing photographs of my little brother’s newly made headstone which Mr Lonetester and I got made up, and seeing my family’s faces when they realised what it was. That was special.

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Q11. WAS THERE ONE PRESENT YOU WANTED BUT NEVER RECEIVED?
A. I always wanted a BMX bike and never got it, so I was a bit miffed about that as they were so awesome! So much better than a regular bike … alas I had to cope with “just a bike”.

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Q12. DID YOU GIVE GIFT TO TEACHERS AND FRIENDS AT SCHOOL?
A. No, don’t think I ever give gifts to teachers, but I probably gave small gifts to a few school friends.

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Q13. CHRISTMAS FOOD
A. Christmas day for us is a traditional hot food lunch (roast chicken and lamb with roast vegies), followed by homemade Christmas pudding and something else for dessert, and lots of nibblies which you don’t need but eat anyway – because it’s Christmas. Included in those nibblies are what we know as polish sausage, which is chocolate biscuits mushed up with crown mints, and coconut, and made into a log, put in the fridge, then sliced. And a fav of many of my family is my mum’s almond bread. I don’t think she’d be allowed not to make it!!

And another comment about food (well sort of) was that we usually shared Christmas lunch with the entire population of Australia’s flies as we ate outdoors, and of course they love hot Christmas lunch as much as we do. It wouldn’t be an Aussie Christmas without the flies, would it?

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Q14. A SPECIAL CHRISTMAS RECIPE
A. Well since I haven’t ever hosted (or even cooked) a Christmas meal, I don’t have a special Christmas recipe, but my mum’s Chrissy pudding, her polish sausage, and her almond bread are all well-known and loved Christmas treats. Though I’m not sure if they were passed on to her from someone else – I’ll have to ask. Meanwhile on Mr Lonetester’s side, a long-standing tradition that his grandma did, was makewhat she called “icecream cake”. It’s really just ice cream mixed with a heap of fruit which all of the family looked forward to each year.

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Q15. CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS
A. We are probably to most un-Christmassy family, that at least does celebrate Christmas. We do Christmas, but don’t have any traditions.

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Q16. CHRISTMAS MUSIC
A. Other than going to the local church to sing carols when I was a kid, I never went caroling. But these days I do like to have Christmas music on when I’m wrapping presents.

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Q17. YOUR FAVOURITE CHRISTMAS CAROL
A. Did I have a favourite carol as a kid?

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Q18. CHRISTMAS PARTIES
A. I’m not remembering any Christmas parties from my childhood. And from a little more recent times, we haven’t had many work Christmas do’s – the joy of a family business. As for street parties, there was a neighbor about 5 or so years ago who invited all the locals around, that was nice, but then they moved.

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Q19. CHRISTMAS CONCERTS/PLAYS
I don’t remember being in any Christmas plays, but I do remember that Gumeracha (the town I grew up in) had a Christmas street party every year, and one year I was asked to play Mary. I had to stand next to whoever played Joseph, and hold a doll which was Jesus.

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Q20. CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS
A. Spent lots of time playing – usually outdoors. Probably tadpoling, rolling around everywhere on my adjustable roller skates, enjoying the sun and swimming. There was also caravan trips, and interstate relatives visiting. Summer holidays was a fun time.

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Q21. WHAT IS YOUR EARLIEST CHRISTMAS MEMORY? 
A. I think my earliest Christmas memory would have to be the HUGE Christmas tree at the house at Cudlee Creek. We moved from there when I was eight, but I really don’t know how old I was when we got that tree.

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To finish off this post, I have been hunting for Christmas related photos over the past two weekss, and I must say that I am very disappointed, as there’s very few. And none showing the opening of presents, the lunch table, or the tree.

Anyway here’s a few that I did find …

2 Responses to “So This is Christmas and What Have You Done Geneameme”

1. Sharn White says:

   December 13, 2014 at 2:51 pm

   May I please come to your place to taste that Polish Log Alona? It sounds delicious!And I’m sorry but I can’t stop chuckling over that $20 you gave your brother. It must have taken him until boxing day to unwrap all those ‘coins’… Great memories and I love the photos. I have none at all of Christmas. Thanks for joining in Alona xx

   Reply
2. Jenni says:

   December 13, 2014 at 3:41 pm

   I make that “polish sausage” but the recipe I got from my sister in law’s mum many years ago is simply called “Crown mint slice”. Breaking up the mints can be problematic unless they’ve been in the open air for a couple of days to soften them up. Must make some next week, the ingredients are on the table ready to go.

   Reply