Interesting convo with MIL today over lunch:
Can you tell that I have no time for some of these sexist, selfish, domestic traditions? I mean, for goodness sake, why should one family member do all the shopping, prepping, cooking and serving, while everyone else just does a token bit of washing up afterwards, then waits for the next meal to magically appear?
I have no intention of making a rod for my own back by starting heavyweight family food traditions that someone (me!) then has to uphold for the next 50 years. Perish the thought!!!
why do people put up with it?
I found myself rather annoyed.
One thing I made sure of when my boys were young was that they could do all the "housewifely" chores and, therefore, be able to look after themselves and/or their families. Neil is a very good, experimental cook (I experiment a lot) and has been known to cater for about 20-30 at a time, and No 2 son is also a very good cook but prefers, most of the time, to stick to recipes. Neil doesn't eat "normal" food due to Crohn's and loads of allergies, so only prepares his own food but he does do the rest of household chores when necessary (problem - he doesn't see jobs that need doing much of the time) and he is a brilliant fixer of problems around the house. No 2 son is useless at DIY (DIL says he is a danger to himself when he has a tool in his hand, but he does try) but he does a lot of the house work - even the laundry until DIL started up her own laundry business, usually cooks evening meals and does a great job with festive meals for largish numbers of people and then he and DIL do the washing up between them.
I'm rather proud of the way they turned out - fit to be good husbands and fathers. Their Dad used to help a lot around the house (a dab hand at the ironing) but was not a great cook although he did make pretty good bread. His mother thought he shouldn't do these kind of things. These were women's work! But he did his best. It's a generation thing.
I was supposed to be invited to No 2 son's house for Christmas dinner and evening but both Son and DIL thought the other had invited me. Never mind, I'd bought my own Christmas roast - fore rib of beef - just waiting to go into the oven now. They all came here, to me, yesterday evening, bearing gifts and the younger ones were allowed to open one of theirs. A little cruelly, Em had given here brother (the one in danger of diabetes) something in an "After Eight" box with a note that said "because I love you so much". It contained (raw) Brussels sprouts! She loves them, but she also knows that he doesn't. She has a wicked sense of humour for a 7 year old. Never mind - I daresay there will be plenty of sweet things for him to tuck into today.
I hope everyone has a very happy Christmas and midwinter festival and keeps the BG as low as reasonably possible.