Christmas Festivities: Part 1

My week of nonstop feasting has come to an end, so it's time to blog about it! Christmas seemed especially crazy this year because of all of the things I had to do. On top of attending the usual multiple celebrations, I also helped out a lot and put on a celebration almost entirely myself.

After spending long hours wrapping presents (really, I think I wrapped for at least 4 hours), menu planning, grocery shopping, and baking, Christmas Eve finally arrived. We spent the 24th and days preceding at Adrian's parents' house pretty much feasting the entire time. If you've seen my Thanksgiving post, you'll begin to understand. Christmas brought even more opportunity for gluttony, as 20-some family members came to celebrate.

Adrian and I had the task of setting up the table, which was no small feat. After finding chairs and then figuring out how to place as many people as close together as possible, the task of seating people remained. After some fussing and then finally putting the youngest kids at the coffee table, all was well. And the wine glasses with ornament "placecards" were rather cute :-)

So then came the meal. Naturally, it followed an afternoon of grazing on appetizers and sneaking cookies; and it began with standing up, joining hands and saying a prayer, which was especially amusing this time around. Remember that Adrian's niece and nephew were seated at the coffee table? Well, they were served their plates of food before everyone but had left them to join in the prayer. This wouldn't have been a big deal had Olive not been on the loose. Mid-prayer a strange *gulp gulp gulp* sound became apparent. Adrian and I immediately exchanged glances, he whispered to me regarding the whereabouts of Olive, and then I knew. Sure enough, she was up at the coffee table gobbling down the kids' food. She managed to eat an entire serving of cornish hens before the prayer ended. During the meal, the pug bandit also tried to swipe some mashed potatoes, resulting in tears and the kids moving to higher ground.

With the meal actually beginning, the great soup race then commenced. Adrian's cousin coined this term at Thanksgiving, and it's quite fitting. Thanksgiving begins with curried pumpkin soup, while Christmas begins with borscht (placed in the lovely terrine you see in the picture above. I love bringing it out because it's only used these 2 times a year). Anyway, Adrian's dad who is probably impatient to serve all of the meat he has carved, quickly dishes out soup to everyone in an assembly line fashion. We proceed to eat it as fast as possible. In fact, because there are so many people at the table eating so quickly, the first person is likely to be finished with the soup before the last person gets theirs. 

After the soup course comes all the glory. This year there was actually so much food that several things, including an entire roast and the rolls, were completely forgotten about and didn't get served! What was served, however, was fantastic. There was duck:

There were cornish hens. Many cornish hens:

And then there was the worm:

I'm not really sure if there is a more appropriate name for this. It's simply referred to as the worm. It consists of a huge pork roast that's stuffed with sausage, onions, spinach, and probably some other things. Then, it's rolled up (usually longways to be more worm-like, although this year Adrian's mom tried rolling it differently) and is finished off by wrapping it in bacon. It looks fancy once it's sliced:

Of course, there were also plenty of side dishes. I'm sure I won't even remember all of them, but I'll give it a shot: stuffed cabbage with sauerkraut, rotkohl (red cabbage), gravy, mashed potatoes, pierogies, green jello... ah, I can't remember the rest. Trust me, there was a lot. 

On top of that, there were about 400 cookies and other desserts... That may be a slight exaggeration, but there are always a ton for that night, as part of people's gifts to take home, and lots leftover for breakfast for the rest of the week. Yes, Adrian's mommy allows cookies for breakfast :-)

In addition to the piles of food, there are also piles of presents (hence, the 4 hours of wrapping). I'm not sure that my camera could completely capture the mountain of gifts, but this was only a portion of them anyhow. The pile magically regenerates for Christmas morning too.

As always, Christmas Eve was nice. Lots of eating, belly rubbing, and playing games :-)

I'll have more on my Christmas Day menu later...