Christmas 2014

I'm just emerging from the family and food frenzy that is Christmas.  It is always a fun and intense blast of activities and feasts and treats and traditions. Here's how it went down this year.

Christmas Eve

The fun starts on Christmas Eve day with our annual family outing. This year we decided to go to the Royal Ontario Museum as we hadn't been in awhile. There was a special exhibit of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year which was wonderful (and in case you don't live near a museum hosting this exhibit you can see the photos here). 

An addition was put on the ROM several years ago which serves as the main entrance. I still have a soft spot in my heart for the old entrance, though, with the grand doors and beautiful windows and inside the gold mosaic ceiling in the rotunda. I don't love the new addition - commonly referred to as the crystal - but it sure makes interesting photos with reflections in it of the city - old and new.

  

We always have tourtière for Christmas Eve dinner and this year it was made by my dear friend Kim (we did a trade-off - I made Christmas cookies for her and she made a tourtière for me).  It was delicious and just the right amount for all of our hungry selves after the museum. We had the tourtière with salads and pickles and relishes so it is a pretty simple meal, but oh so delicious.

  
Christmas Day
Santa visited and left some beer for all (well except Ruggles and me as we don't like beer - well, truthfully Ruggles has never tried it). Ruggles had some special dog food in her stocking instead.

Does your house end up looking like this every Christmas morning.  I thought it would be a little tamer as everyone got older, but there are still eight of us congregating for gift opening so that makes lots of mess. Everyone got stacks of books this year along with loads of chocolate (and beer!)

For Christmas lunch we used the tablecloth I bought in Bangladesh. It is hot pink with an orange and black design that certainly deviates from the Scandinavian look I was going for this year, but I love it so we use it anyway. 

Christmas lunch consists of fancy breads and cheeses and meats and we make the best sandwiches of the year. Of course, we start off the meal by popping Christmas crackers and then wearing silly hats and telling bad jokes in English and French.

We have Christmas dinner at my aunt and uncle's house in Toronto with all my relatives, but I didn't take my camera so there are no photos. I always take a cookie tray for dessert and my mom brings the Christmas pudding with its requisite hard sauce and hot brandy sauce. Dinner is followed by a magic show (my uncle is a magician ... and a lawyer) and a gift exchange.

  
Boxing Day
December 26th is a pretty quiet day around our house. We don't partake in the shopping frenzy, but instead just relax for the day. We did go for a walk at a nearby park and then came home and made sushi for dinner. 

  

How was your Christmas? I hope you had a wonderful time with family and friends. We are getting ready to go to the cottage in a few days time for New Years. We've had a warm Christmas this year so even up north they don't have much snow left and the lakes are not fully frozen.  It is supposed to get colder just before we go up and snow is predicted so we shall see.

The Huron Carol

The Huron Carol” (or “Twas in the Moon of Wintertime”) is Canada's oldest Christmas carol and a personal favourite of mine.  

It was written in 1643 by Saint Jean de Brebeuf, a Jesuit missionary to the Huron natives. Jean de Brebeuf lived amongst the Huron natives for twenty-two years, became fluent in their language, and made detailed observations about their culture and way of life. He wrote the lyrics to the Huron Carol in the native language of the Huron/Wendat people to bring them the story of Christmas. Even after Jean de Brebeuf was martyred when the Iroquois natives attacked the Huron settlement, the carol was kept alive in the Huron language for over one hundred years before it was translated into French.

I remember visiting Sainte-Marie among the Huron on the south shore of Georgian Bay many years ago. I always love visiting historic places, but this one was especially interesting because it was the first European settlement in Ontario and is where Jean de Brebeuf lived. 

I like this version of the Huron Carol sung by Five Fifths which you can listen to while reading the lyrics below.

THE HURON CAROL

Words by Jean de Brébeuf (1643)

English Lyrics by Jesse Edgar Middleton (1926)

Set to an Adaptation of the 16th Century French Noel: “Une Jeune Pucelle” (“A Young Maid”)

‘Twas in the moon of wintertime

When all the birds had fled,

That mighty Gitchi Manitou

Sent angel choirs instead.

Before their light the stars grew dim,

And wand’ring hunters heard the hymn:

“Jesus, your king, is born.

Jesus is born.  In excelsis gloria!”

Within a lodge of broken bark

The tender babe was found.

A ragged robe of rabbit skin

Enwrapped his beauty ’round.

And as the hunter braves drew nigh,

The angel song rang loud and high:

“Jesus, your king, is born.

Jesus is born.  In excelsis gloria!”

The earliest moon of wintertime

Is not so round and fair

as was the ring of glory on

That helpless infant there.

While chiefs from far before him knelt

With gifts of fox and beaver pelt,

“Jesus, your king, is born.

Jesus is born.  In excelsis gloria!”

O children of the forest free,

O sons of Manitou,

The holy child of earth and heaven

Is born today for you.

Come, kneel before the radiant boy

Who brings you beauty, peace and joy.

“Jesus, your king, is born.

Jesus is born.  In excelsis gloria!”

MERRY CHRISTMAS, my friends, to you and your family. I'm signing off to spend time with my family, but will be back again after the holidays.

Our Christmas Tree 2014

It has finally happened and none too soon. With just a few days to spare we got our Christmas tree up and decorated. We had to wait until the kiddos came home from university which meant that we got our tree for half price (good thing too because it originally cost $40). We had our annual evening of munching on nibblies while decorating the tree. - some of us doing more munching than decorating and some of us doing both. 

Kate and I decided to go for a woodland-themed tree this year which some people in the family had a hard time understanding. They were convinced that trains went through the woodland and airplanes went over the woodland so train and airplane ornaments could go on the tree. And that somewhere in the world elephants lived in a woods so they could go on the tree etc. We had to do some editing when the rebels weren't in the room. 

We made owls out of toilet paper rolls. They were so simple to make and definitely added to the woodland theme.

My friend and her daughter, who happens to be my daughter's friend, came over to make cookie Christmas trees. We used the speculaas recipe (which you can find here) and it worked perfectly because the cookies are nice and hard. One batch of the recipe made exactly enough for one set of cookie cutters.  We iced the cookies using about 2 cups of icing sugar mixed with 3 tablespoons of icing sugar. The icing hardened well and piped fairly easily. It was a fun activity and will make a nice decoration for a few days and then dessert on Christmas Eve.

 

I have one more post lined up for tomorrow morning and then it is the big day.  Are you ready?  No matter how much I try to be organized there always seems to be that last-minute scramble and multiple trips to the grocery store and exhaustion. It is better this year, but you can still see that I'm posting about our tree two days before Christmas. 

11 Elements of Scandinavian Christmas Style

I love Scandinavian style and especially at Christmastime. In terms of climate and landscape, Scandinavia is very similar to Canada so their style is well suited to the dark, cold, and dreary days of winter that we experience too. 

I've been pouring over lots and lots of photos to get some ideas on how the Scandinavians decorate for Christmas.  Do you want to know how to get some of that Scandi-chic Christmas style for yourself? I've come up with 11 tips to help you along:

1. Embrace white. And use it liberally! There you have the first and most important rule of Scandi decorating. If someone asks you what colour you want an item in, always say white. There is something to be said for all the white. It is simple, it looks clean, and it looks bright. So Step #1 - find all the white ornaments/bowls/jugs you have around the house and put them out for Christmas.

My Scandinavian Home

2. Add tiny bits of colour. Once you have your foundation of white you can add in a little colour. Don't go crazy though - dial it back, restrain yourself. I have the hardest time with this. I figure a white canvas is a perfect backdrop for turquoise or hits of bright green, but not in Scandinavian decorating. In Scandi style, colour means neutrals, like gray, black and beige, possibly light blue or green, and, especially at Christmas, tiny amounts of red. Just a little though or you won't have Scandinavian decorating, you will have Santa's workshop.

Digsdigs

Style at Home

3. Lots of wood. Wood is important, very important. It is best if you have wood floors (light-coloured or painted wood) and wood furniture (natural or painted), but if you lack those don't despair. You can still add in wooden bowls, cutting boards, candlesticks, or logs by the fireplace. If you have a choice, go with light-coloured wood, but dark wood is better than no wood because wood is very important. My theory is that living in a forested country brings out your inner lumberjack and you want lots and lots of wood around your home.

Style at Home

My Scandinavian Home

4. Candles, twinkle lights, and lanterns. Northern countries like those in Scandinavia and Canada get short-changed when it comes to daylight at this time of year and it gets dark very early. The best way to deal with this is to embrace the darkness and light candles whenever and wherever you can. Candles and twinkle lights should be white though (see Rule #1). 

One of the things that is particularly Scandinavian is to put out advent candles at Christmas. These candles are usually white (of course) and are often placed in containers with some greenery added and lined up on a windowsill or down the middle of the table. They are lit on each Sunday in advent. Simple, but effective, right?

Hege Greenall-Scholtz

Kjerstis Lykke

5. Decorate with shiny and sparkly materials. Anything sparkly and reflective and shiny works with your Christmas decor - things like glass and crystal jars and vases or mirrors or silver, gold, or brass plates and bowls. It totally makes sense to use reflective materials that will bounce light around the room when there is so little daylight. Mixing metals is totally fine, as is using tarnished or worn silver or brass. In fact it is preferred as then it doesn't look too perfect. Shiny and sparkly is definitely an easy tip to follow.

My Scandinavian Home

Stylizimo

6. Use elements from nature.  It seems like every room I looked at had something from the forest incorporated into the decor. Things like evergreen boughs, pine cones, moss, wheat sheaves, or even bare twigs, and flowering bulbs. I love the price tag on most of these items as they can often be collected when you go for a walk through the woods or from the backyard.

Stylizimo

Daniella Witte

Planete Deco

7. Use natural fabrics like linen, burlap, wool, and sheepskin.  Nothing seems cozier than a wool blanket or a sheepskin rug. Burlap and linen are more about the texture as the loose weave and soft wrinkles make your room seem more relaxed. 

Planete Deco

Stylizimo

8. Decorate with food. I think one of my favourite traditions in Scandinavian Christmas decorating is using food such as fruit, nuts, and especially cookies to decorate with. The cookies are usually spice cookies that are cut out into pretty shapes and decorated with simple white icing. Sometimes the decorations are in the form of a gingerbread house, but again not usually the wild sugarfests that we often make, but rather houses decorated with restrained white icing. I love how decorating with food really makes it a multi-sensory event. Can't you just smell the cinnamon!

Skonahem

Digdigs

9. Include handmade touches. I love that there are often homemade paper crafts hung on the tree or in the windows of the rooms I looked at. There were things like folded paper stars and small paper cones filled with candies or felt hearts. I especially love the paper cones and may have to make some for my tree this year.

Seventeen doors

Bonordica

My Scandinavian Home

10. Hang a big star in your window. The stars might be made of paper or metal or even plastic and some are lit and some aren't, but they seem to be pretty mandatory ... and pretty lovely.

Stylizimo

11. Be a minimalist. This last tip is definitely the hardest for someone like me. Even if it isn't in your nature to be a minimalist you need to do your best to keep things simple. Like the old adage to look in the mirror before going out the door and remove one item, in Scandinavian decorating you should look around the room and remove about a hundred items. Less is definitely more!

Lantliv via Planete Deco

I love the Scandinavian way of decorating - the simplicity, the coziness, and the homey touches. I've seen a lot of people talking about Scandinavian decorating the last few years so I think I'm not the only one that finds it appealing. You can see my attempt at creating a Scandinavian mantel in this post. Is it a style that you like and try to use in your home?