I haven’t put up anything for a couple of days and the reason being, we have family here to spend some time. As one daughter was coming from Belgium  (where she lives) for her vacation, and family from Alberta (son and family) and Vancouver (daughter and family), we thought we would celebrate ‘Christmas” together.

We also, Don and I, suggested that each family would pick a theme and prepare a dinner from start to finish, this way we weren’t in the kitchen all the time. (good idea, huh?) They could not, say, called it Italian and put out a plate of pasta and leave it at that. Oh no, you had to go the whole 9 yards.

First night, we did the Christmas dinner….turkey, mashed potatoes, 3 veggies, homemade cranberry sauce, gravy and stuffing. By the way, the temperature here was 37 plus degrees. For dessert we had pumpkin pie with whipped cream, shortbread and homemade mincemet tarts. Whew! Christmas crackers, candles and some decoration took place as well. Also, some mini gift cards…after all, we did say Christmas, right? You all know us so well….

The kids took the job of cleaning up and what a great help that was.

Day Two – Carole, from Belgium, prepared a Belgian “stew”..it has a name I can neither pronounce nor spell. We had Belgian style frites and it was wonderful. This time (again) the kids took over the job of cleaning up. I have never been kicked out of a kitchen so often in my life. I tried to give away more Christmas baking for dessert.

Day Three – The two families (with teenage daughters in tow) prepared this next adventure. Don and I were first banned from the dining room area (open style home and hard to do), then the kitchen and finally the entire house. We were left on the deck. The girls were shown what I have as far as candles, tablecloths, dishes are located and were left to do their thing.

The day before we were asked to take a guess what their theme was an, of course, could not. Well, here the story continues…..

The table was perfectly set with a blue cloth and a shining silver cover…candles, black and white on the table and, around the room many candles were on (battery operated). When it was time, we were invited back into the house, asked to pick out someting in the bottom of a big box and, lo and behold, they were wands..one for each of us….from Harry Potter! Our grandchildren are so hooked on Harry and the gang, it was all making sense now.

Dinner was fabulous…each dish has a name from one of the foods eaten in the Potter movies…in reality it was a spinach and strawberry salad ( Gilley weed and red slug salad) , macaroni and cheese  (mugglemac), with asparagus (broomsticks) and, for dessert, a chocolate “pudding” cake. They called it The defence of black arts pudding. The two moms helped out in the kitchen as well, but my oh my, this was a production. The thought and work put into this dinner was mind boggling.

Today, being day four, one family heads back to Alberta. We get to keep the others for another day and then, they too, will leave the parents/grandparents. The one sad note was one son and one more daughter were unable to attend. It would have been so wonderful to have everyone, just once, together at the same time.

We are so very blessed for this past week  I don’t think I would change any of it. The kids went down the channel on a raft, everyone went cherry picking, the girls swam in our lake, played bocci on the lawn and just relaxed on the deck. By night time (sun finally set) it was beautiful…we played hawaiian music,and just laughed and talked.

Thank you God for this time. We surely won’t forget it.