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My dear mother took on all sorts of extra jobs, including working in the fields and cleaning, to provide for us all the fare we would have at Christmas.
There was always a pork pie on the table on Christmas morning, one with an egg in the middle. Mother would cut us a bit whilst we were looking at our gifts by the fire. We didn't have a lot. We'd have a little gift each and usually something a little bigger to share. One year we had an airship. It hung in the middle of the room and you wound it up and it flew round and round. Another year we had a fret works set from, I believe, Hobbies of Dereham. Mother must have worked hard to be able to provide these gifts let alone the spread she was preparing for us in the kitchen. The smells that were coming through...ahhh... we hadn't smelt nothing like that since last Christmas! We usually had a cockerel which Mother had fattened up all year with household scraps. We had sprouts which father grew in the garden and carrots and parsnips and a swede, probably from the farmer's field. Afterwards we'd have a pudding with real custard.Μύ It was a feast; a feast fit for a king. Then we'd retire to the front room, father to his chair and to sleep. My brother and IΜύ to the peggy-rug in front of the fire to play with our toys, and mother to do the hard work, the clearing -up. And that's roughly what our Christmas Day was like. Of course when we got back to school and we swapped tales with the other children, some literally had nothing. I never heard one bragging about having a turkey for Christmas dinner. Some had a piece of meat. Others sometimes had deer from the estate, which of course would probably be more offal. And that's how it was, that was Christmas. | 
