Jingle bells...

Well, again I haven't posted in a while, so a lot has happened in the meantime. JJ is contracting in Birmingham at the moment so he is away during the week and so christmas was a bit chaotic this year, I was reduced to wrapping the last of the presents on christmas morning!

Christmas Eve was nice - we went early evening to my Aunty's to see my cousin Glen, his wife Emma and their ADORABLE twins Darcy and Pheobe. Even JJ got sucked into playing with them, they were so sweet. We had intended to be there an hour, actually turned out to be about 2 1/2 hours, but we had fun so then headed home ot have our traditional German christmas. JJ had chosen to have cotlette this year, with cheesy mash and, as we no longer have a proper dining table, we used our cafe table which was quickly abandoned for the little tables on the sofa as the cafe table wobbles somewhat precariously. Then after the meal, we came to the important part - PRESENTS!!!!!

I got my camera (FINALLY!) and I am over the moon! The instruction manual is ridonkulously long and I have yet to download any piccies from it, but I think I am already part way to annoying JJ by Photographing EVERYTHING, regardless of interest or beauty.

The First Photo on the new camera

Only problem is, whenever I put it down for 2 seconds, JJ has it in his hands... I also got the most adorable Polar Bear money box - I had been eyeing this enviously in Sainsburys since they first appeared and had debated buying one before christmas in case I didn't get one. We also gave the doggies a water fountain with which they were spectacularly unimpressed with, though Sherb enjoyed the box.

As we were a bit later than we we had intended, by this time we were pretty tired and so I only managed to read a tiny amount of the instruction manual and took a bunch of bad photos. I think that JJ liked his pressie - a membership to the UK Wolf Conservation Trust and a photography day, plus a couple of small bits.

Christmas morning was a little fraught, trying to get out of the door when the presents weren't wrapped and the dog cage was buried under 6 ton of crud and the dogs sixth sense told them they were going on a trip about 3 hours before we left so that they dashed around in excited mania. However we finally got to my Mum's and were able to relax. The turkey had gone on a little late so veggies were still being prepared.

We opened our stockings (in a plastic bag this year as I had forgotten to take the stockings over at any point) and including a "wonderball" which was the weirdest thing I've seen - a ball of green crepe paper about 3 inches across which you slowly unrolled, revealing little presents, like a plastic lizard and luck tokens. We came to the conclusion that it was possibly oriental in origin, a lot of the presents had oriental characters or an oriental flavor. Sherb enjoyed the paper...

We had a glorious christmas meal - prepared by Kris and Dad, Turkey, two types of roast pots, parsnips, broccoli, peas, carrots, sprouts, broad beans in white sauce, cranberry jam, bread sauce and gravy. We then rolled away from the table without pudding as there was no way it was fitting in and then we finished opening presents, handed out by whoever was wearing the penguin hat of power.

After a somwhat vindictive Boppit session...

...we then watched the Mock the Week DVD, causing much hilarity, until Kristy and Thai dozed off on the sofa, Kristy blaming Thai's majical sleep inducing aura, which then spread to John.

and finally headed to bed. Unfortunately, we didn't pump up the mattress enough so JJ slept pressed up against me and stole the sleeping bag, so one side was frozen, the other side par-boiled. Ad in the fact that JJ forgot his nasal spray and was doing his bet impersonation of a congested rhino and I didn't sleep.

Next day, we eventually dragged ourselves together, hopped in the car and headed to JJ's Mum's. The traffic wasn't too bad except when we were in sight of the toll booths they shut the tunnel for a bit.

We happened to be stuck just over from a flatbed that must have contained Father Christmas making some last minute deliveries.

We had another christmas dinner at Paulines - delicious as ever with the Xmas pud and then, after a short sit down, we started to construct Tina's present from Father Christmas - a trampoline. It was past dark when we finished but we all had a go, Tina staying out on it for AGES.

We then headed in where Pauline plyed us with more sinful food and fixed the computer and laptop and showed Tina how to put songs on her mp3 player.

John Realises how bad the computer problems are...

...And tries to explain the problem to Pauline.


John snored on the sofa for a bit so I bought him home and he snored some more on the way home. We snuggled up on the sofa and watched a little telly before we headed to a contented bed.