1. Christmas with the whole family
Every year, we get together for lunch/dinner with my mom's side of the family. This year, it was our turn to host. Our living room was especially repainted for the occasion so my parents spent a long time cleaning the house (I was excused since I am recovering from an injury). My job was to take care of the decorations (more on that below) and wrap the presents.
Before the family arrived, my parents and I were quite stressed but it all worked out really well. We received many compliments on the food, and on how good our house looked, which is very nice! Plus, my parents enjoyed the fact that we worked as a team, and everyone helped out.
2. Christmas food
Who honestly does not love Christmas food? My parents made pumpkin soup, deer with mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce. For desert, we had a typical Belgian bûche de Noël, and I made joulutorttu (a Finnish pastry, I just had to have a bit of Finland). It was absolutely delicious!
3. Christmas decorations
As I mentioned above, I, with the help of my parents, decorated the house. As every year, the fun started with untangling all the knots in the garland of lights. I have been doing this for years so I have perfected this skill, I used to do this in an hour, but this time it only took me 20 minutes (#ohyeah) to untangle 21 (!!) meters of lights. Even though we did not have a real Christmas tree (my parents have learned to resist my nagging it seems), our decorations looked very nice so the Christmas feeling hit me quickly and hard!
I am wearing my study outfit here, so you can see I take this very seriously. Lol!
4. Christmas markets
As in many European cities, Brussels and Ghent have a big Christmas market every year in december. I love to walk around there although I never buy anything because everything is overpriced. I just enjoy the atmosphere and take pictures of the lights.
Brussels
Ghent
