Christmas joy

This has been a very special Christmas because, unlike most years past, when it's just my husband and me, my brother and his loving family came to visit. Thus, there were many presents under the tiny tree, and Christmas morning was a delight just because of my nephews' and niece's contagious excitement. Even though no one got enough sleep last night, it felt just the way it should be.

Christmas Eve, or Nochebuena, was also very nice as my talented niece helped my husband make his world-famous homemade pizzas. She didn't mind kneading the dough for 10 full minutes (she really loves cooking and is a very good at it, too!).

This morning, as everyone opened presents, Lizzy began to feel a little left out of the action so we had to give her a dog biscuit so she'd feel like she also was remembered.

And then, for our late lunch, early dinner, we cooked up a feast. My sister-in-law made a delicious arroz con gandules, and there were pasteles and hallacas sent by my mom from Puerto Rico, and the pièce de résistance: the traditional pernil, or roasted pork shoulder. I hadn't realized it before but, in a culture like ours, so influenced by Spain's colonial rule in Puerto Rico for over four centuries, it makes sense that pork would be the mainstay of the Christmas dinner table. What more contundente way of showing that you were a Christian and not a Muslim in Spain after 1492 than to have to eat pork for Christmas? This got me thinking about how it would be really interesting to find out when that tradition began to see if my guess is right that it begins shortly after the Catholic kings evict the Muslims from Spain after centuries of their influence there.

 

All in all, it's been a lovely Christmas and, as 2013 begins to walk quickly to its end, I feel blessed and so happy to have such a wonderful family and to have had at least half of them here for Navidad. ¡Felicidades!