A Wonderful Christmas Time

This was the first Christmas we have all spent together for three years, so you can imagine the anticipation and excitement of a week long family gathering! Frantically preparing the house with a sprinkling of Christmas dust, running around picking up a cupboard full of treats and facing head-on, the dilemma of turkey or suckling pig (apologies to all our vegan friends!).

I had Andy Williams singing away every morning telling me it really is the most wonderful time of the year and looking back we really did have a magical time. With a mixed bag of guests; parents, grandparents, cousins and over excited children (a daughter of 22 plus Nero our furry one 😀) we managed to find something for everyone to enjoy.

We had the perfect start to our celebrations on Christmas Eve with an amazing lunch at Marc Fosh in Palma followed by a stroll around this beautiful city beneath its magical lights. It gave us all a cup of Christmas cheer… the cocktails helped also!

Thankfully there were no major hangovers on Christmas Day because we have a new tradition. For the second year running we packed up a bottle of fizz with some chocolate treats and, for those who could, we headed off for a climb up the Puig de Maria in the gloriously warm morning sunshine… popping open the bottle once we reached the top and taking in the awesome views, what better way to start this day!! It somehow created a lovely sense of calm around the normal hectic nature of Christmas Day… in other words I wasn’t panicking that I wasn’t going to get lunch on the table at three on the dot… although I’m not sure everyone else was as relaxed!

Despite all the odds at three on the dot (UK time!) we started the proceedings on our front terrace  with the sun slowly slipping behind the mountains. A chink of our glasses and we dived into some delicious sea food from the Mercado Del Olivar and a cracking bottle of Viognier from Son Vich. For those of you eager to know, yes, it was back to turkey this year and what a fabulous one we had from Delores our local butcher.

We are very lucky as a family… we are an eclectic bunch but it somehow works. As I look back, our Boxing Day summed up our week together. It couldn’t have been more of a perfect time… playing boules on the beach, washing down our turkey sandwiches and my legendary sausage roll with more fabulous Mallorcan wine. Seeing our family laughing together and Nero (our crazy Cockapoo) dashing madly around the beach with his ball, reminded us all that Christmas is about making memories. Of course tinged with a little sadness that others dear to us were not there to experience this special time.

In the blink of an eye we go from the anticipation of everyone arriving, and  worrying about the potential dodgy secret Santa present one of our Mums is bound to pick, to us waving goodbye and shedding a few tears. For us there’s no better backdrop to creating special memories than this stunning island we now call home… for me that was the best present from secret Santa… although the fondue set is going to be fun! 

P.S. Christmas in Mallorca without Lechona just wouldn’t be Christmas so we did also manage to squeeze in one of the best suckling pig feasts thanks to the lovely team at Can Josep… wonderful local dishes with a stunning view overlooking the magical Pollença Bay.