SUNDAYS WITH CELIA VOL 72
Hello and welcome to Sundays With Celia Vol 72. It’s been a very busy couple of weeks filled with family, friends, lots of cooking, and plenty of fun. All of those activities kept me from the blog, so I thought I’d use today to give you a little peek at what I’ve been up to. But first, let me start by wishing you a very happy New Year! I hope you enjoy much success, health and happiness in 2019. And, I’d also like to express my sincerest appreciation to you for following along here at After Orange County. It means the world to me. Thank you.
A Recap Of My Holiday Season
So, let’s start from the beginning. Two days before Christmas we were invited to spend a night in Palm Springs with friends who had rented a beautiful, golf-course-frontage home for the holidays. As a hostess gift I brought them some homemade Chocolate Brioche which I prepared on a brisk winter’s morning the day before our visit.
I doubled the recipe, making one loaf as a hostess gift…
and one loaf for my family to enjoy on Christmas morning. It was yummy, and I’ll be sharing the recipe here soon.
When we returned home from the desert on Christmas Eve my youngest son went to work preparing homemade ravioli for dinner. What a treat to have someone else help out in the kitchen. I’m very lucky because all of my boys enjoy cooking and are quite good at it, often giving me a run for my money.
But if you’re like me, and probably the majority of women out there are, the bulk of the holiday shopping, decorating, wrapping of the gifts, and preparing the holiday meals likely falls to you. That is true in my case, and thankfully I consider it a joy, and take much pleasure in it. So, on Christmas Eve I have a tradition that I practice alone, because frankly, once all the preparation is done everyone else has long since gone to bed. This is the time that I survey my home, making sure all is ready for Christmas Day ahead. So, step inside and join me for a final look around my home, and what was Christmas Eve 2018…
The gifts were under the tree (or should I say 3 little trees)…
The stockings were hung by the chimney…
Old Saint Nick decorated the bar…
Candles illuminated the foyer…
The Dining Table was set for our upcoming Christmas Dinner…
And the kitchen table was ready for our Christmas morning breakfast.
We awoke on Christmas morning and there was a dusting of snow outside. In my book there is nothing better than a White Christmas.
Don’t tell my grandchildren but my husband always dresses up as Santa and distributes the first gifts on Christmas morning. Then Santa exits and suddenly Brad makes an appearance, giving the excuse he overslept. He has a lot of fun with this tradition.
After the gifts were opened I went to work preparing breakfast while the rest of the family played in the snow.
Our Christmas breakfast always includes my absolutely delicious recipe for Crustless Quiche. It’s one of the most popular recipes on the blog and if you haven’t tried it yet you really should!
After breakfast we got to work on our traditional Christmas Dinner preparation, which is always a family affair. Our menu is as follows…
Salt Encrusted Prime Rib of Beef
Whipped Cream Horseradish
Parmesan & Pepper Popovers
Creamed Corn
Creamed Spinach
My eldest son takes charge of the Prime Rib…
and also prepared the Popovers. This year he used a recipe from Williams Sonoma for Parmesan & Pepper Popovers and they were outstanding!
The Popovers were delicious with both the Watercress Soup we served as a starter, and with the Prime Rib.
Christmas dessert varies each year in our home. This year I decided to prepare a Pecan Slab Pie. I will try to share the recipe for this sometime soon as well.
One of the highlights of our after Christmas holidays was a visit to SkyPark at Santa’s Village. I can’t say enough about this really special place right here in Lake Arrowhead. If you are in the area you really must plan a visit. It is very, very well done!
My granddaughter met the Snow Princess…
and made miniature snowmen with one of Santa’s Elves…
And my Grandson had a blast rock climbing…
while his sister painted a nutcracker.
Right on the heels of Christmas it seemed New Year’s Eve arrived too soon, as that would be our last night together with family before everyone headed home the following day. We celebrated New Year’s Eve with my family recipe for traditional Spanish Paella.
And for dessert I prepared a recipe I recently got ahold of for Momofuku Milk Bar’s Corn Cookies. I told you about Momofuku and their terrific desserts in this previous post. They were super yummy. Stay tuned and I’ll be sharing that recipe as well.
So as you can see it’s been a very full couple of weeks around here. And like most of you out there, I spent this week putting away the holiday decor. As usual, things felt a little sparse afterward. It’s always a bit depressing to remove the decorations and officially put an end to the festivities. So I had fun going through the photos I took during the holidays and reminiscing about the good times we had and sharing it all with you.
So there you have it: SUNDAYS WITH CELIA VOL 72
Happy New Year!
Thanks so much for dropping in!
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All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Unless otherwise noted, all photos are the original property of Celia Becker @ www.AfterOrangeCounty.com and may not be reproduced without specific permission.
