I’m sitting here on this rainy day thinking about the Sharples’ Family Christmas dinner and the things that are traditional for my husband’s family.
Lots of families have no rich cultural traditions preserved from a land far away so we hold on to the traditions of our youth that our family created for us. I find those comforting.
Originally my husband’s family gathering consisted of his parents, 5 brothers, grandparents, grandkids, wives, aunts, uncles, friends, in-laws and out-laws. I was fortunate when I married into the family that his family’s celebration was Christmas eve and mine was Christmas morning. As the families grew and spread out the celebration changed to a day when everyone could gather. This year, it’s the day after Christmas.
My husband is so adamant for the meal to be his Mother’s menu. Just once I talked them into changing it to pizza on Christmas Eve and I almost got kicked out of the family.
Mother always served Lipton onion dip, and she made deviled eggs. She had the port wine cheese ball that has nuts around it with Club Crackers. I still buy one every year for Mick. No one ever eats it.
They always have to have a honey baked ham and then they have baked beans with Ruffles chips to scoop up the beans, and then rolls. They had some sort of potatoes, which I took over, (making my famous cheesy potatoes). Then Mother made some salads. Always a macaroni salad with shrimp. I’m trying to think that there might have been a Jello salad, or things like that but since my husband didn’t care about them, they have long been abandoned. Then they had homemade ice cream with Mothers special recipe.
They made this special ice cream that had lemon extract in it, but they called it vanilla ice cream and it used to drive me crazy. The men would be standing on the porch visiting while the noisy ice cream maker churned away in the ice and salt. Mick’s Grandma also made a depression era banana pie, so it was made without milk. It was water and corn starch and powdered sugar made into kind of a syrup with the corn starch as the thickening agent and then they layered bananas in it. Over the years I kept trying to make it and I could never get it right.
A few Sharples’ Family Christmases ago I tried again. I’m in the kitchen, everybody’s outside and honest to Pete, (without you thinking I’m a weirdo), I felt Mick’s Grandma tell me how to do it. I actually felt filled with the banana pie spirit. Then it set up and came out perfect. The family was touched and loved it. I hate bananas, and I can’t stand smelling them so it’s a big gift for me to make it.
Most importantly there were these special serving dishes. She had the Chip and Dip, she called it, and that was a beautiful green bowl and then it had a brass clip and then a smaller bowl that you put the dip in. We inherited it when my in-laws passed away because we are the place that hosts the Sharples’ Family Christmas now. Mother also had another bowl that she put her macaroni salad in, which I have.
It’s kind of touching what traditions people do and what’s important to them. I love the Christmas traditions and I hate change. I know that now.
This year, some of the brothers can’t come anymore and they have their own families and live in different states and mom and dad are gone in heaven watching us, so the party gets smaller, but it’s still important to do. The world is a different place. We all still need the traditions of The [insert your family name here] Family Christmas.