Christmas (with Batman)

It's been a few days and several million calories since my last post so I thought it must be time to squeeze myself into the Cwtch for an update. How are you all doing? I hope you are relaxed and happy after the long weekend. What did you get up to?

Mum and my sister arrived on Christmas Eve and that marked the start of the festive celebrations for us! 'The Elves' rang the doorbell and mysteriously vanished when we answered it, leaving parcels for the little ones before bedtime, a tradition that began last year. The kids were then happily abed by 19:30....Unfortunately My Boy was still awake at 2:30! Every time I went in - to check whether Santa had filled up his stocking - he would sit bolt-upright and say "he hasn't been yet Mum, WHEN will he be here?" It turned into a very late night for me!* We were all up at 6:00!!!

My mum  and Batman
There were times when we didn't honestly know who would be around for Christmas, as breast cancer and ill health have touched our family this year, and we lost D's Grandpa a few months ago too. As it turned out, we spent the day with both our mothers, our 3 sisters and the children's solitary teenage - and therefore inherently cool - cousin at D's mum's house. I have to say,  it was pretty much perfect. It was really good to spend the day relaxing together after such a trying year - we had lots of laughs, and naturally there were one or two tears for those who are no longer here.

Yesterday was spent at home. Toys, books, lunch, wine and dancing in our kitchen followed by an evening of Downton Abbey and knitting (YAY!). My sister and I sat up crafting, chatting and watching Dirty Dancing until midnight and she completed her first ever crochet Finished Object.

Other people's toys are SO much more interesting! 
I'll be honest, until recently this time of year wasn't always enjoyable. When I was single - living and working in London - it meant making the arduous trip back to Wales for just one or two days. After D and I met, it often involved spending the precious little time we had off work bundling ourselves and boxes of gifts into a tiny sports car, then spending hours in traffic to travel between both our families. (An attempt to keep everyone else happy and not to have to choose one over the other, that left us exhausted and usually arguing.) When I was pregnant with Little Miss I decided that we wouldn't be doing that any more. Christmas became about our little family. It felt totally right to put our children first and to make it a relaxing time for them. It's even better that we all managed to do that together this year. I have to say, this year was the nicest family Christmas yet.

*On Christmas eve I kept myself awake by reading some of the Yarn Harlot's latest book - Free-Range Knitter: The Yarn Harlot Writes Again. There are some fabulous snippets in it, although in my opinion it's not as interesting as Knitting Rules! which I read a while ago, as it's really just a series of observations about people Steph Pearl Mc-Phee knows and random stories that somehow involve yarn or knitting. This is the highlight so far:

6 comments

  1. It sounds like a lovely Christmas! We have made similar decisions about Christmas - I decided early on that Christmas should be about us and our children. The rule here is that Christmas is pretty much always at home, and that absolutely everyone is invited to join us ... occasionally that makes for some interesting guests, but it works for us!

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  2. Even without children to force the issue, we've Christmassed at home by ourselves for the last few years and it is so much better than driving all the way to Wales to be bored for a couple of days!

    Sounds like you had an awesome Christmas. I was saying to Jamie the other day how cool it will be when we can do Christmas properly with kids and everything, but I'm not sure about that now you've said how late you ended up staying up to surprise your son!

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  3. It sounds like you guys had a great christmas. I definitely understand the stress factor. I get 1 day off and try to shuffle between two families. Not fun.

    I love the quote you chose! THAT DESCRIBES ME SO WELL!

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  4. Hi Sarah.
    Your CHristmas sounds like it was lovely.
    I too, as a single person have always found it tiring packing up to visit the parents every Christmas. This year I stayed in Melbourne, and have really enjoyed spending time with close friends.
    I thought I'd let you know also, that I have passed on the liebester blog award to you.
    I've only been reading your blog for a couple of months, but I love it :-)
    Sonia xx

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  5. Happy Christmas, so glad you had a good one. Can't wait to see what you've been making xx

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  6. It is interesting to hear your very honest points about working away from home and visiting at Christmas. I will bear it in mind for when my daughter is older!

    I am glad to hear you had a good one and look forward to seeing more of your posts in the new year.

    ReplyDelete

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