Know Your Elves #2 - DVB

Loughc

And here we are again, second person up already. This time we are joined by one of our full timers DVB.

Tomorrow we are hitting mid-February. Mornings and evenings are getting brighter, Ireland are flying it in the 6 nations, things are looking up ever since January fecked off. Now we have the pleasure to get to know @DvB better! As before you have a choice to answer as many or as little from the list below.

1. What's your favourite childhood Christmas memory?
2. Is Die Hard a Christmas movie?
3. What's the best part of Christmas Day?
4. Do you have any Christmas traditions?
5. What was the best Christmas present you ever received?
6. If you could change one thing about Christmas what would it be?
7. Brussel sprouts, yay or nah?
8. What's your favourite Christmas song and why?
9. Best Christmas character from a movie. book or TV show?
10. Favourite Christmas TV advert of all time, and why?
11. White or multi coloured lights?
12. Real or fake Christmas tree?
13. Favourite Christmas food?
14. Do you do anything special for your pets at Christmas?
15. Do you have a Christmas guilty pleasure?
16. Ever had a Christmas cooking epic fail?
17. What is your favourite Christmassy beverage?
18. When do you put up your Christmas tree?
19. Star or angel?
20. Do you have a favourite Christmas film?

I do encourage follow up questions if DVB is up for it! :)

DvB

Me already... wow!

A tad busy today, but should have time to get around to this tomorrow. Will have a think on the driv ehome this evening about possible answers though!!

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120235797#Comment_120235797

No panic at all with getting back to this. Whenever you have time.

DvB

1.      Favourite childhood Christmas memories?

Taking this directly from a thread from a couple of years ago… So many childhood Christmas memories... off the top of my head...

My dad bringing home the RTE Guide, Radio Times & TV times and me marking off all the stuff I planned to watch (& mostly never did)...

Getting a day off school in the run up to go in & see Santa in Switzers (showing my age there) & then Arnotts after Switzers was no more, we'd always get a gift from my mum & dad that day too & lunch in McDonalds, that was almost as big a day as Christmas back then for us!!

Putting up the 'now retro' decorations & the same artificial tree for years, was convinced it was huge & remember being disappointed when clearing out my folks attic a couple of years ago & finding it & realising how small it looked.

Midnight mass on Christmas Eve (which was usually at 9pm bizarrely!!)

Being convinced I heard Santa on the roof one year... & I mean convinced!!!

Staying awake every Christmas eve night through pure excitement & raging because I wanted it to go quicker!!

Going down on Christmas morning & dying to see what presents we'd all gotten. Still remember a bike, star wars stuff, star trek stuff, always getting the Guinness book of records & annuals (Beano & Dandy and shoot or Match as I got older)

Remember how the holidays seemed to take an age to arrive & then every shop closed for what seemed like weeks and all the grownups were off work.

Going visiting my relatives in Cabra, all of which lived in 3 houses in a row on the one street. We did that for at least 20 years, up to the stage I remember being the designated driver so my dad could have a beer or two. *update, the majority of these elderly relatives are now dead unfortunately so whenever I drive past their old houses it really brings back a huge wave of memories & emotions, many of them Christmas related... more often that not being a nostalgic old git it brings a tear to my eye too... great, great, memories & a reminder to make the most of the here & now as it all goes by so, so, fast.

I genuinely can’t remember when I stopped believing in Santa though, I'm sure like many it was around 10 or 11 but I just can’t differentiate the years any more. Christmas memories are a blended mess of colour, light, smells & sounds... & most of all, love & laughter... here's to many many more!!

2.      Is Die Hard a Christmas movie?

For years I was staunchly in the ‘no’ camp. But I remember one summer listening to a podcast discussing the pros & cons and being slowly converted into the ’yes’ camps way of thinking. However, for me I’d consider it an all year film as I could watch it at anytime which I couldn’t say about other Christmas films, so for me its not, though I have no issue with people perceiving it as such.

3.      What’s the best part of Christmas Day?

For the last 12 years it was the early morning & watching the kids opening their presents. The look on their faces stays with me to this day and makes me smile without fail. Even now with them old enough to know the truth they still get excited by the whole thing and it’s infectious!! I know it will end someday sadly and probably sooner than I realize, but for now it’s the jewel in the crown of my Christmas day experience.

4.      Do you have any Christmas traditions?

We put up the tree & decorations on the Friday of the late late toy show with the kids in school, when they come home they have their own decoration that they bought in the run up that they put on the tree ( we let them buy one new decoration for the tree every year) then when we’re taking them down we take one decoration off before turning off the lights for the last time and that’s that until November, all the decorations come down the next day & get packed away.

To be fair we have loads of little traditions, our Christmas’s are quite consistent that way but they’d be the symbolic ones really.

5.      What was the best Christmas present you ever received?

Have so many memories of great gifts it’s hard to pick one. But I think the year I got a bike as a surprise i'll always remember clearly. Even though I was young (9 or 10) I knew my mum & dad were really struggling financially at the time & really wasn't expecting too much for Christmas, so seeing their delight at my shocked & awed face will live with me until the day I die. It was a pure moment of Christmas bliss, a child receiving a fantastic surprise gift & the joy it gave the parents giving the gift.

6.      If you could change one thing about Christmas what would it be?

Rose (or holly) tinted glasses no doubt, but I’d love us to go back to celebrating Christmas the way we used to, when Ireland closed down for more than 24 hours and people weren’t up at the crack of dawn on St. Stephens day to hit the sales… when Christmas music played on the radio until new years & not midnight of Christmas Day, when all these started to change it was for the worse IMO.  I’d love for us to take that step back & allow ourselves the time to actually take the season in & not be in such a hurry to start & end it all. It’ll never happen but I’d have loved my children to experience one of my childhood Christmas’s.

7.      Brussels Sprouts yay/nay?

100% yes. We eat them all year round, fresh & frozen, I enjoy a nice sprout.

8.      Favourite Christmas song & why?

Andy Williams, ‘It’s the most wonderful time of the year’

I’ve previously outlined my fondness for this one in many music related threads, the odd thing is that despite being aware of through my Dad who liked Andy Williams in general, for a long time growing up this song disappeared and was rarely heard on the radio or included in Christmas compilations etc. so had been lost to me.  This came back to me via a visit to my now in-laws one Christmas as they had a 5ft tall dancing santa with a button on its based that when pressed activated him to dance & sing this song, this was a lovely reminder of it. Then in later years after the kids were born they loved playing with this santa and would have us all in stitches playing with it & their reactions will stay with me until the day I die. Ever since then it took on a whole new meaning and quickly became my personal Christmas anthem.

9.      Best Christmas character from a movie, book or TV show?

Clarke W. Griswald.

He’s been a part of my Christmas build up since 1989 and I never tire of ‘Christmas Vacation’ and watch it every year without fail in the build up. I still laugh every time I watch it and suspect that will never change.

10.  Favourite Christmas advert of all time & Why?

Guinness.

As most regulars on here are no doubt aware I love the adverts, with the new adverts thread every year being my personal favourite new thread each year so love to see what new & wonderful ideas will be presented to us. Not one has come close to this wonderful advert that encapsulates so much of what I love symbolically about Christmas Eve night. I dread the day Guinness decide to move on from it, though secretly believe they never will give the love for it by so many.

I still see my first live viewing of this advert as the Rubicon moment for each Christmas build up, once I see this advert it’s definitely Christmas!

11.  White or multi coloured lights?

We have white lights on all our trees. One year I’d love to go ‘quality street’ look and go multi coloured (that’s what we always had at home when I was growing up and associate multi coloured lantern lights with my childhood Christmas’s) but the Mrs. likes the trees to be a certain style so suspect we’ll be sticking to white for the foreseeable.

We had multi coloured external lights for 2022 and we agreed we preferred the white so will change that up for this year also methinks.

12.  Real or fake Christmas tree?

We have 4 trees in total, all are fake and the 2 main ones we have downstairs I love. As much as I like the idea of a real tree I remember us getting them a couple of times as children and the needles were everywhere and by the time Christmas day came around one year the tree was bald! The smell was divine but can be replicated for the most part now by candles so will stick with the fake fuller looking trees.

13.  Favourite Christmas food?

As a person with a real weakness for fruitcakes of any description Christmas is a dream/nightmare what with mince pies, pudding, & Christmas cake all front & centre. But for me the real treat is stollen, every year come late September I start my annual checking of Lidl to see when they get their marzipan stolen in, and once they do its best of luck to the waistline until January!! It’s the one food I 100% associate with Christmas.

14.  Do you do anything special for your pets at Christmas?

Only have goldfish so nope, other than moving the tank to a different location to accommodate the tree we don’t do anything else pets wise.

15.  Do you have a Christmas guilty pleasure?

Nothing jumps out to be honest. Though I must admit I do enjoy on any long work drives in the build up sticking on a Christmas carols/classical CD or playlist for the drive home. Its rare i'd get the chance to just listen to something like that by myself with work or family not distracting me.

16.  Ever had an Christmas cooking epic fail?

Genuinely can’t think of any.

Do remember one year after we had all finished Christmas dinner copping I’d left a tray of potato croquettes in the over though. We had so many roast potatoes & mash that we never noticed they were missing. Does that count!?

17.  What is your favourite Christmassy beverage?

I don’t really have a Christmas only beverage, I’m not a fan of hot chocolate or flavoured lattes etc. so in terms of hot drinks, definitely not. Even for alcohol I don’t have anything specific I’d leave until Christmas. I do however like whisky but would only drink an odd one throughout the year, but over Christmas would have a couple of nice Jameson black barrel whisky’s, and definitely on Christmas Eve after the kids have gone to bed. I love that moment, sitting down with a nice whiskey with the tree lights twinkling away and the world quiet outside in expectation of the morning to come.

18.  When do you put up your Christmas tree?

For years I’d have only put up my tree around the second weekend in December. But since the kids came we have brought that forward little by little, so now without fail all our decorations go up the Friday of the late late toy show. I take the day of work, as does the Mrs. And once the kids have gone to school, Christmas FM goes on in the background and the decorating commences.

I look forward to that day every year.

19.  Star or Angel?

Stars. Though getting some of them to stay up at the top of the tree can be difficult, its an art in itself!!

20.  Do you have a favourite Christmas film?

I do, two in fact.

The first is the aforementioned National Lampoons Christmas Vacation, this without fail is watched every year in the build up. It drives my Mrs. Mad, but the kids love it too so we always end up watching it together (& fast forward through the swimming pool bit for the kids!)

The other is, ‘It’s a wonderful life’ yes its of a time & contains bits that are clearly outdated for modern audiences, but there’s something about it that just says Christmas to me. Unlike Christmas Vacation I wouldn’t watch this every year but every second year or so as it’s a special watch and needs some time to sit back relax & take all in.

Deja Boo

Thanks for sharing your lovely Christmas answers DvB! :)

Posy

What wonderful answers. 😁

Your love for both your family and the Christmas season shine through with every response. 🙂

Loughc

Ah wow DVB some fantastic answers. A lot of answers are scarily on the nose to my own.

I remember see my parents old artificial Christmas tree and thinking how small and thin it looked but I vividly remember it being huge!!

I also got the Beano & Dandy and shoot or Match annuals as well.

TRS30

Top answers there. Especially love hearing about people’s experiences of Christmas growing up and how it shaped their current love of the season.

DvB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120241180#Comment_120241180

Thats a really lovely thing to say @Posy thank you so much.

I know it was a bit long winded but just wanted to answer as honestly as possible.

Thanks for reading!!!

CheerLouth

Great answers @DvB, a lovely read with my cuppa this morning & as per Loughc, some answers very close to what my own would be.

DvB

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120242728#Comment_120242728

I think many of us over a certain age would have similar memories of Christmas past to be fair. Ireland was a far simpler place back then.

I must say taking part in these kind of questionnaires is fantastic for reminding you of whats really important though, and I always remember in older threads @Loughc making the point that Christmas is really about love, family & friends and not gifts etc. I think those of us who have that shared love of Christmas were lucky enough to experience the true meaning of Christmas and that's why it means so much to us now.

TRS30

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120242824#Comment_120242824

I’m 100% certain that my love of Christmas stems from the amazing Christmas’ I was luck enough to have as a child.

Deja Boo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120243435#Comment_120243435

I've had quite the opposite experience, yet resulting in the same effect.

Jude13

Great answers DVB, many are the same as mine would be just swap Cabra for Walkinstown.