Christmas Recap - Part 1

I've finally been able to put together our Christmas holiday recap. This is Part 1, the time we spent at home with Dave's parents and sister.  

At the first of the week we got out the Rockefeller Centre puzzle.  We got this in New York when we visited in 2013 and it has been a tradition to put it together before going to bed on Christmas Eve.  We had lots of help this year. 

We watched lots of Christmas movies, including Polar Express, White Christmas and The Santa Clause.

On the 23rd we had some lovely Nova Scotia lobster.  We preordered them from De La Mer on Roncesvalles. They were all packaged up for me on ice when I went to get them which was great.  

Freshly boiled lobsters are the only way to go!

I made an endive and radicchio coleslaw (which was actually not that great, but it looked good) and Dave made his perfect roasted potatoes (inspired by Jamie Oliver, and they were amazing).

E tasted lobster last year but this time he got his own, and he loved it!

On Christmas Eve I made a salad for an quick late afternoon snack.  We went to church for the Christmas Eve service.  We enjoyed the children's symphony and then the minister read a picture book to the congregation that had a neat little story about the animals in the stable.

When we got back from church we set up our real supper of fondue, oysters and other appetizers.  This is my favourite type of supper and we set everything up on the counter so we could graze, and E wasn't forced to sit at the table when he was super excited.

The oysters were also from De La Mer that I picked up earlier that day.  We made a mignonette and bought fresh horseradish.

Fondue is a tradition of Dave's family.  We did a simple fondue with just steak, turkey meatballs and vegetables. You'll note E in the background watching the Santa Tracker.  He did the quiz to see if he was on the Naughty or Nice List, luckily he was on the Nice List.   Then around 9:00, the Tracker said Santa was in Montreal with his next stop in Toronto - E scampered upstairs so he could make sure he was in bed before Santa came.  Thank you Santa Tracker.

All is calm...

I was the first one awake on Christmas morning so I went downstairs, cleaned up the kitchen and made coffee.  No one else got up until almost 9:00!! I was getting impatient but everyone needed the rest so it was okay.

E's Santa gifts

After we did stockings and Santa gifts, we paused for breakfast.  I made this Cranberry Orange French Toast Casserole (with a separate gluten and dairy free one for Dave's sister), bacon, and a fruit salad.

Then it was back to the gifts.  Among many other things E got for Christmas, he also got a couple of golf clubs just his size, and colour (orange!).

Since it was a beautiful day, we headed down to the park to try them out outside.

Then it was turkey dinner time.  When looking back at our photos I see that I didn't take any of our meal - we had turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots and brussel sprouts.  

For dessert we had this Gingerbread Cake (roughly based on this recipe but I used a gluten free white cake mix and gluten free gingersnaps).  

A few games before heading to bed after a busy day!

Part 2 of the Christmas Recap, our trip to Nova Scotia, will be posted tomorrow.