adventures of an american housewife in the south of france

Holidays in Montpellier, Part 3: Ramona’s First Christmas

Hmm, January 6th today.  Am I still allowed to write about Christmas?  I hope so because it was a special one - Ramona's first!  Last year we spent Christmas Eve driving home from our Italian Road Trip and didn't give a whole lot of thought to presents, stockings, or a tree.  But we wanted to do things differently this year, because even if Ramona won't remember her first Christmas, we will! We started off the holiday celebrations by picking out a Christmas tree.  We went to the Marché de Noël, got some vin chaud (bien sûr!) and picked out a little tree of our very own.

I was surprised by how many ornaments we've accumulated over the last 20 months!  And we got even more this Christmas.  Michael and I continued our tradition of exchanging ornaments as presents and we got several "Baby's First Christmas ornaments from family.  We have quite a haul to bring back to the States with us someday!

Next, we took Ramona to meet Papa Noël.  This was so fun!  Every year Michael's company has a holiday party for the children and we were excited to take part this year.  There was a (really weird) magic show, lots of sweets and games, and of course Papa Noël.  Ramona was a good girl and slept the entire time we were at the party!  Not even Creepy, Skinny French Santa could wake her.

On Christmas morning we opened up some gifts, put on Ramona's new Christmas dress from Aunt Tori, and headed over to our friends Sam and Adrian's house for dinner.  We had a traditional English spread with Sam, Adrian and their families.  As it turns out, English Christmas dinner is a lot like American Thanksgiving dinner - turkey, potatoes, gravy, brussel sprouts, and more.  I could not have been more thrilled, you all know how I love Thanksgiving dinner.  We also tried some black pudding and Christmas pudding.  Every time I asked what was in the black pudding, I was told, "you don't want to know."  So we'll leave it at that!  Thanks for the great night, Sam and Adrian!

the pitter patter of little reindeer feet

my contribution to dinner, Mom's Pinecone Dip

Merry Christmas!

I hope your holiday was merry and bright!    

4 Responses to “Holidays in Montpellier, Part 3: Ramona’s First Christmas”

  1. Sabbio says:

    By the way I know what’s black pudding… I had a doubt,just checked and yes it’s what I thought it was :s

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