Brightly Twinkling Christmas Traditions

Christmas Traditions 

A hoy-hoy and Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! I am feeling, for once, in a festive mood! I’m listening to Christmas music, the house is decorated, and I am thinking, planning, and buying ingredients for Christmas baking; and I thought, let’s do a Christmas Blog! I’ve been posting a lot (in my opinion) of cooking and baking blogs. To break this up, I canvased my friends and we all agreed that a Christmas Traditions blog would be interesting – hopefully. Not just what I do now, but how my (our families) traditions have morphed with time and people coming and going from our lives. Hopefully this peaks your interest and you stick around with me! 

Ghosts of Christmases Past!

Oh that’s right, we are totally gonna go there! LOL. Anyhoo! Whenever I think of Christmas, I immediately think of two things: going to my Grandma’s house and waking up to the smell of mom’s bacon-wrapped chestnuts in the oven. The bacon-wrapped chestnuts were just that, you took canned chestnuts and wrapped them in bacon. Then, though, then you would smother them in a ketchup and brown sugar concoction and bake them in the oven. They would get bubbly and the ketchup mixture would thicken and coat the bacon/chestnut presents. Enjoyed hot or even room temp – no, not kidding – they were delectable, and quite honestly, a wonderful smell of tangy ketchup and rich bacon to wake up to! Growing up in the Midwest, Christmastime was usually cold. Therefore the experience of walking from the frigid cold into the almost glowing warmth of my Gram’s house, was etherial. Even the smells were a complete opposite: you would walk from a cold, almost nothing-type smell that is weirdly tinged with salt from the roads, to the plethora of rich, sweet, and warm smells of Christmas dinner. 

And of course, the center piece to her dinners, were the ridiculous variety of cookies she would take two days to make; all laid out on her small, round table. From sugar cookies with and without thin, green glaze and sprinkles, to her Russian tea cakes, cornflake wreath cookies, to chocolate chips, to peanut buttery bird’s nests with chow mien noodles, to peanut butter cookies. I know I am missing a lot, but those mentioned were my favorite. LOL. She would also make (and make sure there was extra for me to take home) her Green Salad. As known, maybe, we Midwesterners love our “salads”. Salads meaning something sweet with cream cheese and cool whip and mini marshmallows. My Gram’s Green Salad included mini marshmallows, pistachio pudding, maraschino cherries, cream cheese, and Cool Whip. This was all mixed together into a delightfully light yet sweet as hell concoction. Plus, it was green and red: the perfect Christmas side salad. That’s right, people, SALAD, don’t fight us on this. LOL. 

Christmas Day, you ask? In my family, it was Christmas Eve that was THE BIG EVENT, and then Christmas Day was more laid back-ish. I remember going to our family friends’ house to open gifts then, after Aunt Vi and Aunt Mil moved onto our property, we would go over there and open presents. Before Aunt Mil (who had late stage Alzheimer’s Disease) my mom and I never baked Christmas cookies; after Aunt Mil, however, we had to! She loved to “help us” to the best of her abilities, and of course, her favorite part was to decorate and taste all of the cookies!  One time, to our shock and laughter, I had turned my back to ask my mom a question. When I had turned around, the sprinkles that had been in the small, plastic container were gone. Aunt Mil, however, had a “sprinkle mustache” around her mouth – needless to say, those sprinkles did not get used. LOL. Usually with our collies right under the table, ready for scraps. What’s that? We did have any pre-Christmas traditions? Well, we did! 

We had very good family friends, Glen and Becky, who owned a Christmas Tree farm. He had been my dad’s boss, but they became very good friends and, honestly, I have a lot of memories going over to their house in the summer just as much as the winter for our Christmas tree. I grew up with them and honestly considered them family. We would sit in their heated pole barn. When a customer would come, my dad and Glen (and whoever else was there) would go out to get a tree, and I would stay in the barn to collect their money (when I got older). There was sometimes food and hot cocoa. In later years, dad and I would go to cook and bake the entire day and at the end of the day, we would all sit down in the house and eat the feast dad and I made. Not to sound cheesy, but it was almost the quintessential Christmas environment with the entire day encompassed in the sweet, woodsy pine smell of the trees, dad’s chickens being grilled, and the cozy, warm scent of apple pies that baked. Now that I think back, it was kind of like a Hallmark moment! Ha! Who knew?!

This next Christmas thing that I did, I cannot honestly tell you when it started, when we started doing it, for how long, OR who decided it would be a good idea! Pat, my Godmother, might remember, but I cannot! LOL. All I know is that for the next ten years or so, Pat, my mom, me, and then Miss Krissy kicked off the Christmas season the first weekend of December by participating in the Christmas in Kouts bazaar. It’s not really a bazaar, but I’m not quite sure what else to call it! Let me explain in a holly and jolly way! (Yup, gonna keep doing that throughout the blog). Christmas in Kouts was a town-wide craft show that the entire town participated in! If you made or crafted things and wanted to be involved, you told the town what you were selling and your address. The stores in the town did the same! The town then put all of this together in a type of Christmas treasure map for people like us to follow throughout the entire weekend! We would drive from house to house or store to store (mostly house to house) and look through at their wares! 

Bridget what?? Okay, let me tell you what we did! Can I just set the mood here? As mentioned before, this occurred the first weekend of December. I think is snowed every time during this event. Every. Single. Time. Sometimes not too bad, but most of the time, blizzard like conditions. LOL! We live in the rural Midwest, so, a lot of country roads. Unplowed country roads. BUT! We are midwesterners! Our salads have Cool Whip and blizzards don’t bother us! OR we are just crazy and it shows how much this tradition meant to us! LOL. Anyhoo!! My mom and I would get up super early, bundle up (because even though we are driving from location to location, we have to walk from car to said house). Decked out in thick socks, boots, jeans, long sleeved shirt plus sweatshirts plus heavy coats, all topped off with mittens, scarves, and hats! 

As mentioned before, mom and I would head out into the (not so bad or super snowy) streets, and slowly and carefully make our way towards Pat’s house. Once there and hellos were exchanged, we would quickly go over which houses or locations we wanted to visit and see what piqued our interest and what they might have to offer! Many of the homes sold cute, Christmasy crafts (many of which still decorate my home each and every season). Some places sold baked goods, others would treat this like a garage sale (not cool), but interesting. LOL. In all, it was great to go from house to house, each one decorated for the season in their own manner with their own treats! Some places would offer free cookies and cider or hot chocolate. Other places sold such treats – the Boy Scouts always had really good cookies! Either way, it was like walking into each vendor’s house to see their Christmas traditions and how they celebrated. Yes, they were selling their wares, but they did so with excitement and a twinkle in their eyes because they were sharing a piece of themselves with you. Their homes (or garages) where always warm with sensory overload (in a good way)! 

Warmth and smells of freshly baked cookies, or nut rolls, or bread would greet you along with vivid greens, reds, browns, and pristine whites of the season! We definitely had our favorites, and we always made sure to go to those locations. Some places, we learned, had to be visited before they sold out (usually those were the baked goods houses). Mom found a lady whose nut rolls came very very close to Aunt Mil’s (no one could ever find her recipe). Santas, snowmen and women, reindeer, and cheery faces and smiles were always a guarantee along with cute and never before seen Christmas decorations or crafts. Sometimes, for lunch, we would go to the catering place in town and grab a quick sandwich. Sometimes we would go back to Pat’s for lunch. At the end of the day, we would have dinner together (sometimes just us Christmas travelers, other times Guy and Tommy would join in). Either way, we would spend the entire day together gathering Christmas crafts and treats! It was cold, slushy, and our noses would run and we would sweat and dramatically pull off clothes as one does when you come in from such temperature extremes, but we also laughed, hugged, and helped one another through the thick, cold snow. 

In later years, we added a cute town to our tradition, New Carlisle. Their downtown, I am sure, was very cute and nice throughout the year, but when I saw it, it was always during the Christmas season when they were all decked out in their Christmas finest! And to walk into its stores! WOW! Greeted with big, bright trees decorated in different styles, and colors, and themes! Mine and Krissy’s favorite sections, were the Halloween towns mixed in with the ceramic Christmas towns! Honestly, I think my favorite things here were all of the trees with the variety of ornaments! So many fun and cute ornaments! And the colors and lights and garland! They really did put a lot of work into their shops and town to make it as festive as possible, and they succeeded! 

Enter The Boyfriend

LMAO!! Well, I can’t very well call him The Husband! We weren’t married! HAHAHA. As The Boyfriend and I started dating, I got introduced to his family’s traditions. Now, Christmas Eve was spent at his mom and dad’s with a ton of family, friends, liquor, and food! At first I would make some kind of cake, but then, as Linda discovered I could make Cheesy Potatoes, this is now my required dish for Christmas Eve. Have you seen the blog on this? No, go check it out! HERE!! After we got married, and he got upgraded to The Husband, I had started a tradition of my own. I sneakily invited the family over for turkey sandwiches after Thanksgiving and then BAM! Would have them help me decorate my Christmas tree. I know, diabolical genius! Now, however, The Husband and I go camping at The Dunes National Park that day after Thanksgiving (because, quite frankly, it is the only time one can get into those camp grounds!) Also, we love that not a lot of people are there. 

Christmas Present… and Treats! 

In college I began to bake Christmas cookies and hand them out or have them for Christmas Eve and Day. However, I have a secret to tell you. Come in closer, closer, closer. There. Okay, I don’t want Santa or his Elves overhearing: I hate baking cookies. HATE IT. To me, it is so repetitive and I never know when to pull them from the oven so they end either burned on the bottoms or not cooked all the way. So, I did this for a couple of years and then I stopped. I would much rather make a bread, or cupcakes, or cake, or some type of specialty item. And maybe one or two varieties of cookies. So. I started doing just that! I’ve made Christmas cupcakes, eggnog bread, vanilla cream filled brioche buns (that was a favorite)**, an assortment of cookies, and this year, hot fudge sauce! I typically make three items and then, pass them out like a little Christmas treat elf! My boy, Moose was my original helper in passing out treats, but this year, Miss Calliope will be my new helper… we’ll see how she does. LOL. Eric has been making (and is now expected) to make Swedish Cardamom rolls like his great-grandma used to bake. This is now our yearly Christmas tradition… making and giving out treats. 

Christmas Future… AKA – Conclusion

I know that this is a little different than most of my blogs, but I thought going through the Christmastime traditions would be a nice way to not only end the year, but to show that just because it is a tradition, does not mean you have to be stuck to it. They can change and mold  to our ever changing lives as well. And that’s okay. Do I miss Christmas in Kouts? I do, but in a way, I recreate that same feeling for myself when I make and deliver treats to my friends and family. Have a wonderful Holiday Season and a Happy Year and we will see you in 2024! 

** credit should be given to THE HUSBAND on the vanilla buns as he was the one to make the brioche buns for me. I did the rest. There, hope your happy, HUSBAND.