Christmas

It's that strange time of year.  When everything is supposed to miraculously work but it rarely does.  It's a day when we expect so much, but is it different to any other day?  As my brother said to me recently it's one day and it causes so much trouble.  Well for me it is a labour of love.  This is because it involves food and anything that involves food is worth it.  I spend days thinking of where I will buy the best of ingredients.  I want to have a ham that was once a pig that had a happy, free-range life and the same with a turkey or a goose (although the only time I cooked a goose I set the oven on fire - mainly because we went up to the neighbours for a few drinks and forgot all about the goose so I really can't blame the goose).  I also want the best vegetables that I can get and if I haven't grown them, then I want someone who has paid the same care and attention to them that I would have.  I make my grandmother's recipes for cake, pudding and I make candied peel to go in them.  Why do I do this?  I really don't know, I have done so for years.  For years I accepted that people thought I was strange for doing the things I did but I really didn't care.  I do things my own way and always have done.  Now, it's suddenly acceptable to admit you bake or cook your own and it's even admired.  But for years I got funny glances and comments that I was really a bit mad and why did I not just buy it/them.
Anyway maybe I am a bit mad, because as I sit here wrecked after all the hard slog of the last couple of days I think maybe I should just buy all the stuff ready-made and be done with it.  But something always whispers to me "no"!  And ok, I am tired and I have bucket loads of food left but I will make stock, gravys and lots of left-over dinners such as currys and pies and pasta sauces and nothing will go to waste and I will be happy knowing that I have done the best job I know how.