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  Artist bear by Pauline Wood Valewood Bears |
Christmas in England By Pauline Wood (Valewood Bears) Christmas in England for our family starts with our Christmas tree being decorated around the 16th December, which is my birthday and has been a tradition since I was a small girl to put the tree up for my birthday and so this has carried on over the years. As we live in Queensbury which founded the world famous Black Dyke Mills Band it is tradition for our family to usually take in a concert of theirs which is around a week before Christmas in the village hall when they return from touring back to their village for the Christmas concert which is always spectacular and is a good start to get us all in the mood for Christmas. It seems like most of the village population attend this concert as we are very proud of this band and their achievements over the years. The week before Christmas I always spend shopping for gifts for family and friends, wrapping them up, also buying food ingredients, then Christmas Eve (24th December) is spent cooking and preparing food as we always have guests and have a fun night, I offer them a glass of mulled wine on arriving and later the dining room is set out with a buffet of food which consists of a large joint of ham with pease pudding and salad to accompany this, mince pies, mini sausage rolls, canapés, Christmas cake and a variety of nice cheeses. I also decorate the dining room with the gifts I bought for each guest. On Christmas day we usually attend a mass (church service) and afterwards we go to my parents' house as they cook a beautiful 4 course Christmas lunch for the family, it is usually a nice soup to start with, then a large turkey and also pork, traditional vegetables and Yorkshire puddings, followed later by desserts and then Belgian chocolates with coffee. After lunch we have a gift exchange. Pauline www.valewoodbears.co.uk:80/ copyright picture: Pauline Wood |
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