Happy Christmas from the Jungle Reds

DEBORAH CROMBIE: No matter what or how you celebrate, we want to take a moment to wish you joy today, and to say how much we appreciate all of our wonderful readers, and the time we are privileged to spend with you, every day of the year.

I'll be spending today (after a big family Christmas Eve get together with Rick’s side of the family) at home with Rick and the kids and granddaughter Wren, and our dear friend Gigi Norwood. We enjoyed our quiet Christmas so much last year that we decided to do it again. We’re making a pork roast that a friend ensures me is fabulous (fingers crossed), roasted Yukon Gold potatoes in duck fat, Jamie Oliver’s creamed spinach and another Jamie recipe for braised red cabbage with apples. We’re cheating on the desserts and going for sticky toffee pudding and a Chantilly Cream cake from Whole Foods. I suspect there will be a bottle or two of Proseco drunk, and some traditional Christmas crackers pulled.

But mostly we will be enjoying friends, family, and the delight of the almost four-year-old’s Christmas.

Now, we would love to know how you’re spending the day!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: We are home, and will make rack of lamb and have champagne and I hope we will be able to take a walk and look at the world and relax a bit. The baby children are in California and Brooklyn, and we have plans with them for later.  I am trying to convince Jonathan to watch The Man Who Invented Christmas-- a wonderful wonderful writers’ movie, highly recommended, but mostly we will just soak up the niceness. Love you all, so much, and all of you are my gifts.
Happy happy holidays!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Home, and hosting the traditional Hugo-Vidal Christmas dinner, this year with 28 guests, one dog, two fires, three tables and four instruments for the after-feasting music.  As a gift to the Smithie (aka The Maine Millennial) we’re having an alcohol-free party this year - she’s celebrating 18 months of sobriety, and we all want to support her.

So grateful to have all three of my children home safe and sound, to have family and friends to share the day with, and to have this wonderful community today and every day! Welcome Yule!

LUCY BURDETTE: Oh all your days sound fabulous! We did most of our big events before Christmas (trip to California, dinner with friends and family, Christmas Eve service (beautiful!), so will have a quiet day on Christmas. It won’t hurt us a bit to have that time to be grateful for all the family and friends in our lives (including you Reds and red readers!) Luckily, we have leftovers of the yellow cake with caramel frosting and some Key West pink shrimp, so we may have that for dinner!

HALLIE EPHRON: Our gala dinner is Christmas eve… and since Christmas and Hanukah overlap we’ll be celebrating both. Lamb chops, as my kids requested. With potato latkes, of course. And mandelbrot cookies and iced gingerbread cookies for desert. We’ll play some holiday music and play games so the kids are truly tired out by the time they get in bed. Christmas day we have the morning together, the disperse--my daughter and her family to her husband’s family, my other daughter and us to have Christmas dinner with friends. Happy holidays, everyone!!

JENN McKINLAY: I’m attempting raspberry macarons, a nod to Paris, this year. I used to host the holiday meal but the past few years I’ve always been on deadline so I’ve been relegated to chief dessert baker. Peppermint bark, macarons, and apple pie. The eve is spent at church  and then we head home to watch A Christmas Carol with Alistair Simm (tradition!). Our mornings are usually quiet and then we’ll go to family for a meal with me bringing dessert. It’s not the chaos it was when the hooligans were little but it’s a joy just the same. Happy Holidays to all who celebrate whatever you celebrate. Peace.

RHYS BOWEN: just returned from carols by candlelight with the family. On Christmas Day it’s a big brunch, hopefully a walk if the weather allows, an English tea then a big turkey dinner with all the trimmings. I wish you all the merriest Christmas ever!