As I write this, its the start of January, William's been back at school for four days, we've been off the drink for five, and I've got one foot back in the work camp. I should actually be in recovery mode from my hernia operation but it got cancelled at the last minute as my surgeon is sick. I'm having it next week instead which, of courses poses work related problems that I was trying to avoid by having it in the holidays but sometimes you just need to play the hand your dealt. I'm sure I'll have more to say on the matter next week. But while it's still fresh in ma heid, let me walk you through the last two wondrous weeks of rest, relaxation and sheer indulgence. Nae wonder we're aff it.
Once I completed my marking marathon, it was 100% Christmas. I don't know how I'd managed to seemingly get reasonably organised in the midst of the red pen work, but I had so once I shut my computer down, it felt like I opened the wine and we got into full festive mode.
**I never managed to finish this post. It's now the end of Jan and I'm writing super retrospectively**
Okay, back to the story. Computer closed = Christmas.
On Friday 23rd, William and I headed to Auchan and did the Big Shop to last us through Christmas and beyond. There was a lot of humming and hawing over which type of bird to buy so we went nuts and bought both a guinea fowl and duck. More on them later. I was also stoked to find a "bûche glacée that was gf so I was feeling very ready for Christmas. In the evening we got our Christmas glad rags on and went to the square for vin chaud. I wanted to go to Le Boulevard for a burger but they had no tables so we ended up at l'Aragon for what turned out to be a bit of a disappointing meal (they forgot the wine, and my meat was really fatty) But, it was great to be out and just getting into the festive spirit.
Our dinners below. Check out how pink William's burger is. He didn't bat an eye. So French.
After feeling like I'd been indoor for days and days, I suggested we do a bike ride on Saturday morning. It was just a simple route along the river but it was a beautiful morning and really great to get out in the fresh air.
As the afternoon took hold, we decided to invite anyone that was available round for some Christmas Eve drinks. We ended up with a houseful and it was lovely to fill the house with chatter and laughter after weeks of quiet due to work commitments.
Amazingly, William went to bed without much over excitement and before we knew it we'd all had a solid sleep and were ready to see what Christmas Day would bring...
**EVEN MORE RETRO-RETROSPECTIVE POSTING!!**
Okay, back to Christmas morning. It's was just wonderful. As the cliché goes, it was magic. Santa brought his gifts; and we exchanged ours too. Then William's biggie from us: a Nintendo Switch. He genuinely cried when he opened it, he was just so amazed that it was all his. We spent the rest of the morning setting up the switch, playing with new toys, and footering around. We had nowhere to rush off to and it was liberating.
Then it was time to get our gladrags on for our very exclusive Christmas lunch. I went full Strictly sparkles and William broke out his bow tie! Then it was onto food. Iain did most of it, and it was the glamorous sous chef in the background. Seafood platter to start then a pintade and all the trimmings, including my very own, homemade, stuffing balls. I have to say it, they probably made the meal!
Leesa, Anthony and their kids came round in the late arvo which was great. It was lovely to spend time with good friends, and it also meant William didn't just have to hang out with adults the whole day. Leesa even brought some GF mince pies. What a legend.
The 26th was typically slow. William opened the mammoth Sonic the Hedgehog lego set that Alan had sent over and began tinkering away with that. Iain and I, meanwhile, drank lots of tea, and wondered when we should start on the wine again, and get into the mountains of cheese. William and I did get out for a bit of a wander. It was a glorious day and it was great to get some much needed fresh air. But our day was only going to go one way: Lego, Ninendo, Cheese, Wine.
On the 27th, we happened to run into Jess and all her family in town. I mentioned that it was our wedding anniversary the following day and she just said, well why doesn't William come for a sleepover and you guys can go out and celebrate. As you can imagine, the boys were totally up for it so that was us: a wee unexpected night on the town to celebrate 10 years of marriage. Town was unexpectedly mobbed and after trying to get into five different places, we managed to get a table at Vintage Cafe. The food was absolutely delicious. We could easily have stayed out for hours but decided to come home and put the fire on and open a bottle of red!
The next few days just became those weird days in between Christmas and New Year when you don't really know what day it is or what you should be doing. Suffice to say, we filled our days with lots of Lego, Nintendo, Baileys, cheese. Suffering from a little cabin fever, we decided to get out of town on the 30th for a proper country walk. We headed to Lac du Gabas out north of Tarbes and it was a really well spent afternoon. We timed it perfectly too, with the light starting to fade just as we got back to the carpark. 10kms in the bank. Smug doesn't even come close.
We didn't have any plans for Hogmanay. But we were happy to stay in, get the gladrags on again, have a few bevvies and watch all the usual NYE tele. We even let William stay up for the bells. He was a bit underwhelmed by it all tbh, but it was cool to bring in the New Year together, especially as we had a feeling that 2023 might be bringing some new adventures.
2023 started off with the best of traditions. Some good old Ne'er Day Steak Pie. It. Was. Immense:
Then we just had Sunday and Monday to try and get back to reality (we even took our tree down - but that was in anticipation of my surgery on the 4th) and William actually went back to school on the 3rd. And that was that, another year of festivities, done. We had one last thing to do though, have a birl on the Big Wheel! Hooray!
And here we are: 2023.
Lorna. ;-)
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