Christmas traditions

For a couple of days around the Holidays every year, I find myself fighting melancholy. Without delving too deeply into it, a lot of it has to do with two things - being 3000 miles away from my family (it's coming up on 15 years, and I still pine for home), and the other is to do with both the busy-ness and the commercial aspects of the season. I hesitate to sound scrooge-like or ungenerous, but I get depressed over what sometimes feels like an obligation to buy gifts. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE pleasing the people I love with gifts that I know (or hope) they will like. But to return to a theme that seem to be popping up for me lately, I do long for simplicity.

I'm working on it.

And just maybe I could start a lot earlier and be more organized?

Nah.

Anyway, after that bummer of an opener, today the Christmas spirit crept in. We've been going through the motions of preparing, and just like forcing a smile or a laugh eventually makes you feel lighter, the joy is starting to well up -

Chose our tree... ...and decorated with Sweetpea who hung in til we were done.

Skated on some weird phony ice rink.
Sweetpea rocks her skating outfit.

Decorated a gingerbread house.
The gingerbread boy was eaten within 24 hours. RIP.

Chatted with a jolly man in a red suit.

And made the shortbread!

This is a tradition in my family. My Mum makes The*Best*Shortbread*EVER. We don't doll it up in my family - the shortbread is plain and unadorned and best enjoyed in the afternoon with a cuppa tea, or throughout the evening long after dinner's over. Or for breakfast. Growing up, Mum's shortbread was always stacked neatly on waxed paper in film tins from Kodak (where she worked before having me and my sister). She still does it every year whether she likes it or not - December 1 my sister, Dad and I start hounding.

I make 'em plain like my Mum, but Sweetpea loves her sprinkles so we set some aside for her to decorate this year.

It's the traditions and magical moments of Christmas that I'm trying to make sure I acknowledge for my daughter. This post over at cjane hit home for me. There's a sweetness and melancholy (there's that word again) to the memories of childhood, the warmth and safety and good smells and sepia-toned moments that make it important - even an obligation - to create that for our own children. So I try.

Mum's Shortbread

• 3 scant cups sifted flour (your choice - white or whole wheat)
• 1 1/4 cups of butter
• 1/2 cup brown sugar (pack it in there)
  

1. Cream the butter, add the brown sugar gradually and cream together thoroughly.
2. Add the flour slowly (mixer on medium speed)
3. When stiff dough is formed, turn out on lightly floured surface (some folks knead, my Mum doesn't)
4. Roll into a long cylinder of dough and place on wax paper on a cookie sheet. (Flatten the ends)
   
5. Chill until it gets firm.
6. Cut into 1/4 inch slices, and place on cookie sheet.
7. 300 degrees, 18-20 minutes. Watch it! It burns easily.

Eat. Be Merry. Chill on the melancholy, life's too short.