It's not Christmas without

• small, cute children singing a song at a church service. It doesn't actually matter what the song is, or how well they sing it: the cuteness factor overrides all of that.
• sunburn.
• beer (although not at my teetotal parents' place, sadly).
  
• Thrice's cover of Carol of the Bells.
• at least 4 randoms at our family's Christmas day lunch. My mum rounds up Christmas orphans each year. This year it's going to be 4 German students and a Filipino family.
• whinging about Christmas songs and/or carols and the crass, northern hemisphere-centric commercialism that starts in September.
  
• midnight mass at the Anglican convent. I love the whole vibe: incense, elaborately embroidered vestments, communion wine, nervously singing a-cappella hymns I don't know the words to and can never find in the unfamiliar multi-lingual hymn book. Am I a closet Anglican?!
  
• Family (which includes some of my friends who are basically family).
  
• sleeping in on at least one day over the Christmas break and doing sweet f-all the rest of the day (reading counts as 'nothing').
• Magical Elves. I know it's unethical chocolate, but it's just so darn good.
  

What are the essentials of your Christmas season?