I love being on holidays

Love love love not having to go to work. I lay in bed this morning thinking I would have been on my way right now. What a great feeling to have the whole day in front of you and you can do whatever you wish. Which today has been scrapbooking and tonight will be sewing. Can't get much better than that.

Mike woke up feeling a heck of a lot better today, must have been the icecream ;-) But as the afternoon has worn on, he's worn himself out. He is a man who likes to run before he can walk.

Oldest stepson came around a few weeks ago sporting the beginnings of a beard, which has since been taken off. Apparently the boys at work bought in some wax strips and were not afraid to use them, ouch! Except Mr. W got wind of it and shaved the beard off before any hijinks could be had.

But I made sure I got a photograph so I could scrapbook it. Hey, a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do, right?

Credits Designer Digitals

Twas funny though, when I was doing this layout I was texting the boy.

Me: "Hey Wes, do you like the cold weather?"

Wes: "Sure, it's okay".

Me: "Hey Wes, do you like milk and cookies?"

Wes: "Carol, I am *NOT* Santa Claus."

Hmmm, if only he knew!

This will go into his upcoming book I am making for him. It was going to be for his 21st but that has come around too quick. Maybe he'll get the book for next Christmas.

Urrrgh

Day after Christmas and Mike started sniffing, and sneezing, and wheezing. I must admit at one stage I did ask him if he had "real" sick or "man" sick, to which he was quite affronted. Today though he has felt like he's been run over by a truck. No sooner had he gotten up from bed, showered and the next thing I found him asleep on the couch, to which he's been there most of the day. He's cursing himself at the moment, he's a bit of a man's man and he doesn't like to feel weak. I've told him, this is his body's way of saying to Mr. Workaholic "hey man, slow down, you need a rest".

So today has been a quiet day. I've done a bit of scrapping, a bit of tidying, a bit of playing around in the garden, trying not to wake him so his body can heal itself in sleep. It's been quite warm too which has made him feel worse. Feeling like this on a nice sunny day is the pits.

Here's the photograph my brother took the day he came down with the kids for a joint Mike's birthday and Christmas celebration. Too bad Miss Bo the cat didn't grace us with her presence. It was fun doing a scrap page using non-traditional Christmas colours and elements. Ahh well, a girl won't go wrong when she matches the background to his flannelette shirt! ha.

Credits Designer Digitals.

Now, I wonder if a bit of icecream will make the man feel better? What do you think his answer will be? I'm guessing yes! Oh, and this is my home made blueberry icecream I made for Christmas, it's delicious.

The aftermath

It's one day, right? A big build up. One meal. Lots of leftovers. And now I'm so incredibly tired. I didn't even bother going into Warrnambool for the sales today. I might head down to Geelong during the week, it doesn't worry me if I get a bargain or just go down and back for the sake of it. My time is my own while I'm on holidays, and it's just nice to go shopping somewhere other than here.

Had a brilliant day yesterday. We had the four kids for a lovely Christmas breakfast, which I hope becomes a tradition. Now that there are drivers licences and cars in the mix, it was nice that they came to us, before spending the rest of the day with their mum and other family. It was so much fun. Lots of yummy food, fun opening presents, I had Christmas Carols playing, lots of photographs. Oldest step-daughter's boyfriend had come along too, so he took a photograph of the 6 of us. We don't have many of these, one perhaps not long after I met the kids, the one taken at our wedding, and this one. So it's pretty darn special for me to have this done. So I actually got him to take about 7 photos! I'll probably do some head reconstruction so I have the perfect mix in the one photo.

Mike was as pleased as punch having the kids all here, it was so great. You think you can see that in the photograph?!?!

And of course the menagerie got presents from Santa too. A frisbee for Lucky and new tennis balls for Molly, which she looks quite content in the background with. Bo was off somewhere with her feathery toy playing.

Lots of fun throughout the whole day. We cruised though for the remainder, being that it was just Mike and I. Because of our big breakfast we didn't have lunch until mid-afternoon. It was so enjoyable, just the way we wanted it. No stress, no driving anywhere, perfect.

Merry Christmas to you

The day has been long, but finally I have a moment to pop in and wish anyone who reads this a very Merry Christmas. And however you spend the day, I hope it is (or has been) enjoyable.

Miss Bo Bo also wishes you a Merry Christmas!

Lists make me happy

Last night I started a list of everything I have to do leading up to breakfast with the kids on Christmas morning. The list was a mile long, front and back of an A4 sheet of paper, even down to the most miniscule things like sweeping the front porch. What can I say, lists make me happy. Even happier was that I am up to date as of right now, with big purple texta lines striking out everything I was having to do.

Dessert tomorrow is blueberry cheesecake and a blueberry semifreddo, which I made both of today. Semifreddo! What a fancy schmancy name for icecream. Usually we go down the chocolate pavlova route, but this year I said to Mike lets do something different. I opened a cooking magazine that was full of Christmas recipes and went bang, pointed and decided, yep that will be it. Although there are no cherries to be found anywhere at the moment apparently due to the wet unseasonal weather that has been striking our shores, hence having to swap to blueberries.

Talking about weather though, the last two days have been glorious and we're building up for a balmy sunny day tomorrow. YAY! Now THIS is Christmas weather.

Tonight's plans are for number one stepson to arrive, the Christmas Eve church service, a drink at a friends place up the road, and then we're off to see some Christmas lights, especially a couple of farms near here which deck themselves out to the hilt. Looking forward to it.

You'll recall I was participating in the All About Me challenge at Designer Digitals throughout the year, but kind of fell off the bandwagon when my hard drive went kaput and I lost all but 2 of my pages. Well I jumped back on for the last challenge for the year, it was describe a day in your life right now. Well I described my whole month in one foul swoop! I wonder how many other women out there have experienced the type of December that I have. ha.

Credits Designer Digitals.

Not many more sleeps to go

And I have a list a mile long of things I need to be doing, but the majority can't be done until tomorrow. So tomorrow is not looking like a fun day! ha. Stepson number 1 is travelling down and staying the night, we plan on going to the Christmas Eve church service and then when it's dark we'll travel around to see the Christmas lights. There's a farm close to here that outdoes itself every year, so I'm looking forward to seeing that again.

Tuesday just gone was a big day. We went to Altona to the Crematorium to where my grandma and grandpa are placed. I like to go every year and spend some time just talking to them. May be silly, but it's something I do. Back in Geelong we also went to see my dad and Mike's mum at the cemetary and lay some flowers. I know we don't need to go to the actual places to visit, they are with us always in our hearts, but it's something we do.

I also saw my mum for the first time in over a year on Tuesday. It was okay. We both didn't break or anything. No need to rehash anything, no need to even speak of it. It was just from that day forward. I hope.

Then we travelled down the coast for a mid-afternoon lunch with Mike's dad, and lordy lord you have to love him, he put on a 3 course meal all cooked by himself for us, we had the bon bons, a lot of laughter, Mike's sister and children were there too, it was a lot of fun. I'm so proud of my father-in-law, he wouldn't even let us girls in the kitchen to help him, he wanted to do it all himself.

I tell you though, a lot of people work right up until Christmas and then have holidays. Never again. I've thoroughly enjoyed having this week before Christmas off, I've been able to clean the house, get the spare room ready for Wes, have done some baking, done some visiting, done last minute things, it's been lovely.

Plus done a bit of scrapping, I mentioned I went to Tarrington for our work Christmas function and I found the haybales. Apparently haybales are dropped off at homes, and mind you this is a very small town, for the residents to decorate as they see fit, to the delight of passing motorists. I think I set every dog off barking in town as I stopped to take photographs of all the ones I could find. I particularly liked the snowman, it was great, only when you get up closer do you realise his eyes are bicycle wheels, his nose a road cone, his mouth an tyre innertube. Terrific!

Long live little towns that go to these efforts for the delight of people either visiting or passing through.

Credits Designer Digitals.


Now I have a little dog to bath so he'll be beautiful, white and fluffy for Christmas. And I'll probably get quite soaked in the meantime!

And just for a change ...

It's still raining! Yep, that ark is looking mighty good.

I have a dirty nasty little secret to divulge, and it will change your life with regards to Christmas baking! The primary school here had a fundraiser recently and I bought a bucket of cookie dough, Billy G's cookie dough to be precise. I got the shortbread and it's delicious, I'm about to put another batch on now.

Sure sure, if I wanted to be all pedantic about Christmas I would be making my own shortbread, and yes that's an enjoyable part of Christmas, but to be honest I really haven't enjoyed the lead up to Christmas this year. Perhaps I've enjoyed small parts of it - the Carols on Friday night, the finishing of the wrapping of gifts, the delight of Tristan when he found his package under the tree ready for Christmas day, and my own particular joy when I found out the four kids are coming to our house on Christmas morning for breakfast. Other than that, it's kind of passing me by and if I can make it easy in any way, I'm all for it, so onward and upward to the cookie dough.

As usual though each Christmas I do buy a new decoration for the tree and this year I found a fabulous piper which I knew Mike would love. Or would he? Little did I know he was an Irish piper, and here's me thinking he was resin! ha!

Credits Designer Digitals here.


Over and out. Now off to "bake" or to just roll, cut and stick in the oven to be more precise, ha!