The Dark Christmas Tree

It's December the 24th and my Christmas tree is finally up. But there are no ornaments on it.

My friends tease me because I don't like to decorate my home for Christmas very early in the month of December. In the Christmases of my youth, we would always wait until Christmas eve to decorate the tree. There's nothing like feeling the season when you're hanging ornaments, listening to carols, sipping creme de vie and smelling the intoxicating smell of the pork roasting all day in all of the garlicky goodness that is our Cuban Nochebuena.

So I like to wait. It's not that I don't love Christmas. I totally do. I love everything about it. 

And it's not like I haven't been busy. I finished all my shopping by the first week of December (thank you, Cyber Monday). 

We (by "we," I mean Lucy) have made vats of creme de vie. It's all been bottled and tagged and delivered to our friends. This includes my dearest Desi Arnaz Jr. (see photo below). *sigh*

(I'm kind of in love with my tags this year, but that's not important right now.)

This past week I have been busy hanging our Christmas stockings, by the chimney with care, of course. ;-)

I have already given my girls their traditional matching Christmas PJs.

This week I also stocked my hutch with my favorite Christmas dishes.

We (again, by "we," I mean Lucy) have made countless Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies. (That also means we have eaten countless Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies, but that's not important right now.)

I edited and packaged our annual Christmas video and a family keepsake photo album of the highlights of everyone's year. They are all wrapped, tagged, and ready to give to the rest of the family tonight at our annual Nochebuena celebration.

The kids made our annual run to Porto's already this morning. (25 tamales, 25 croquetas de jamón, 25 pastelitos de guayaba, 25 pastelitos de coco, 25 pastelitos de guayaba y queso, 4 loaves of Cuban bread, a dozen papas rellenas, and some steak sandwiches to get us through the day. =D)

But it's already noon on Christmas Eve, and my Christmas tree is still not decorated. And I'm okay with that.

Let me explain. My son, Adam, just got home today. Happily, he'll be with us for the rest of the week. He arrived on the o-dark-hundred flight from San Francisco and barely slept last night. He's here and napping now.

He was so looking forward to coming home for Christmas and he wouldn't be putting up a Christmas tree in his world. And so, I am completely content to wait with that dark tree in my living room.

When Adam wakes up from his nap, we will hang the ornaments, listen to Christmas Carols, sip some creme de vie, and enjoy the intoxicating smell of the garlicky goodness that is our Cuban Nochebuena.

I'll be reminded of the Christmases of my childhood and we will have made a memory. Isn't that what Christmas is all about?

Feliz Navidad, my friends!

Let the Noche Buena Preparations Begin!

It's time to get ready for Noche Buena at the Darbys!

 
I wish you could all come. It's going to be such a fabulous event!

We've been up to our eyeballs in party preparations and I'm totally excited.

This year we are hosting my big, fat, Cuban family. And our house is small. Freakishly small when I think of the logistics of serving 30 people at a sit-down event, but that's not important right now.

So we are figuring it all out, or as we say in Spanish, "resolviendo."

Me (a little distraught and a little whiny): "But it's just going to look like our little house is just over-crowded. I want it to be magical!" *sigh*

To which my family responded by jumping into action. (I can be very persuasive when I'm whiny. =D)

Amy came up with the idea to cover all the pictures in Christmas wrap to make them look like gifts. And that made me happy. I think it's starting to look pretty festive.

 

Eric added greenery and lights to every corner of the room.

It's coming together quite nicely. It seems that every spot downstairs (including the bathroom and kitchen) has been touched by Christmas and this makes me totally happy.

Today is the day I send the boys out to pick up the extra tables and chairs from my mom's garage. We are enclosing the back patio with a heavy canvas curtain. And we'll have to move out all of our living room furniture to have room for the tables. (When I say we, I mean Eric. =D)

And no, there's no room for the Christmas tree. (I know. Shut up.)

But my Creative Team made the executive decision that we will put it out on the front lawn and bring it in on Christmas morning. I kind of like the craziness of that. At least this is one Christmas we won't soon forget!

[Side note to all of you who start decorating back in November: I have nothing against decorating your home early, if that's what you like to do. I, personally, don't. I prefer decorating a few days before and turning it into An Event. It keeps me focused on Christmas itself. But that's just my way.]

Meanwhile, I'm in the kitchen with Adam cooking up batch after batch of our fabulous Creme de Vie. (Click here for my famous super-secret Creme de Vie recipe.)

 

I finally gave up buying the beautiful bottles at Pier One (plus it was getting a little expensive). The local wine shop was glad to give us (as in free!) their empties and I just made personalized labels for the recipients. (I like how the snowflakes on the tablecloth reflect onto the bottles and enhance the snowflakes on the labels.) Pretty sweet, no?

I have found that after a few cups of this wonderful stuff, everything seems so much more....I don't know...magical?

How are your preparations coming along? Do you host? Do you travel? (Do you drink?) ;-)

Salud!

I don't know anyone who truly likes egg nog.
And then they try our Cuban Egg Nog and all perception changes.
We call it Creme de Vie. ("creme" rhymes with Auntie M. and "vie" rhymes with More For Me! =D)

Rather than making cookies for gifts, we make and "package" the Creme de Vie. (we also keep a whole lot for ourselves, too.)
Typically we make it for the non-Cuban side of the family.  They seem to like it. Or at least they are very polite about it.
They have not yet asked us to stop, anyway. =D

Here is our super secret family recipe. Guard it with your life!

Creme de Vie (Cuban Egg Nog)
1 can condensed milk
1 can evaporated milk
6 egg yolks
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup rum (make it Bacardi for the Cubanness of it)

Mix the sugar and water until the sugar is dissolved over very low heat, stirring constantly - about 3 minutes . It has to be low so the sugar doesn't carmelize, but makes a thick sugary water. Put the egg yolks in a blender and mix with the condensed milk.  Slowly add the evaporated milk and mix completely.  Flavor with the vanilla.  Add the sugar water and finally the rum as a preservative. ;-)

Now that I've told you, I'm going to have to kill you.