A Very Fun Christmas Celebration

We had a really nice Christmas celebration this year, and it started with a quiet Christmas eve dinner of cracked crab, a little salad and garlic toast. I've always tried to have crab on Christmas eve in one form or another. For a long time I made crab raviolis, but decided to simplify things by just having the crab as the main show. It is always such a nice way to start off the holidays.

We sure did make short work of those crab parts :)
Christmas morning, everyone arrived in time for brunch. Pictured are: Pierre's second cousins,left, Chloe, then Marlene. Nicole, Caitlin, and Cyrous tucked in the the back.
Pierre's cousin Sophie, mother to the lovely girls above, having a conversation with our friend Armel. It was nice to hear French spoken again.
Cute little Christmas couple.
Sisters opening up their gifts......
Dave digging for his prize......

A quiet moment before dinner.
I love these little candlesticks I found at CB2.
Aperitifs anyone?
This ham was so good, but sure doesn't photograph that well! I made this wonderful glaze for it with many spices. I served Swiss chard, sweet potatoes with diced comic pears, and roasted garlic mashed potatoes.
We all had to wear our Christmas cracker crowns!! Everyone was a good sport and complied. Hey its Christmas, its the only time you can get away with wearing a tissue crown as an adult right?
To end the evening we had coffee, tea and a slice of buche de noel.
It went by so fast, as it always does, but we had such a good time with family and friends, that all the work was totally worth it.
I hope everyone had a wonderful day and now I'm off to plan New Year's eve dinner......

* I just realized that Pierre was not in any photos I snapped! Sorry about that, but he was there and contributed to the fun!!