It's almost Christmas and it sneakily caught up with me. This weekend, I was feeling better and so was Harneet (yes, I infected him). So, we went out and got our tree to make our house look a little more festive. Decorations are now up and the house smells wonderful.

Growing up, Christmas was a big deal in our house. I know a lot of people have mixed feelings about the holidays. I am fortunate enough to have plenty of good memories to still keep me excited. Gifts were a part of Christmas but not the only thing. As long as you thought of getting someone something, that was enough. In Kuwait, we had our own small community and we celebrated pretty much every festival with great enthusiasm. We were one of the resident Christian families and Christmas parties were always at our place. People would always be there after we returned from mass and bring their friends along. I remember good food, singing, dancing, and good friends. My folks really knew how to throw a party. And yes, there were gifts under the tree 😉. I have so many fun stories I remember but it would take 15 posts to get through them so I'm going to move on. Christmas prep would begin at Advent. We would put up our tree, decorate it as a family and my mom would start making kuswar (Christmas sweets made by Mangalorean and Goan Catholics). Mama would make a large variety of sweet and savory snacks and we loved helping her do it. We would then visit friends for Christmas with a sampling and wish them. Now, I wouldn't know what to do with the scale that Mama made, so I do a miniature version of kuswar to keep up the tradition. This weekend and today, I made some rum cake, nevrios (like sweet empanadas stuffed with dry fruit) and kulkuls (I used to think of them as little worms growing up). Here are some pictures of my efforts. I will probably make 1-2 more things before Christmas. The nevrios and kulkuls are traditionally fried in ghee but I experimented with Mama last year and we managed to bake them and still have them turn out great. I'm still rummifying the cake and it will be the right amount of boozy by Christmas 👍.

The house smells of a combination of baked goods and tree and I'm getting ready for the holidays! Here's something funny. Making these sweets is tiring and boring to do alone so I told Alexa to play my classic Bollywood station from Pandora to keep me entertained. Turns out classic is now songs from the 90s. I had a moment of realization that another generation is out there and the music I grew up with is now classic vs. contemporary!