5 OS Pleasures in your Day Today part 2

VJsmum

Lovely pressies
Walk with OH along the canal
The best roast dinner I ever cooked - fillet of beef with homemade yorkies and proper gravy. Sticky toffee pud after - no eschewing today
Family game of Uno for several hours
Watching Miranda and arthur Christmas

Happy Christmas all, a visiting family day tomorrow.

sparrer

Another amazing Christmas Day, superbly cooked meal by DS, their three were thoroughly spoiled - just as they should be - and the little 7 y/o foster son experienced his first Christmas. It was very moving to see the wonder in his eyes from the start to the end of the day, and although he'd been told about the reason for Christmas, to experience it was a different matter. The only question none of us could answer was 'I know it's Jesus' birthday today but when is Santa's birthday?'!

Sadly I have to return home in the morning so won't be going on to Yorkshire at the weekend. The forecast for this area is snow so will set off before it starts. Very disappointed not to be staying longer but of course it's a risk we take at this time of year.

Happy Boxing Day to one and all, hope the sun shines for you tomorrow! Night night

Frith

Sounds like everyone had a good day!


Here are my pleasures for today (Christmas Day).


1) A bit of a lie in!


2) Made the starter for Christmas Dinner - smoked salmon pate (I was not impressed) and a loaf of soda bread.


3) Christmas Dinner with mum, dad and brother. Duck and all the trimmings then HM Christmas pudding.


4) Rather an emotional incident in the middle of Christmas Dinner. My mum has always felt a bit left out that she has only 2 relations (her dad was an only child and she has more children than relations!) She moved to the Midlands from the North East in the 1950s and her parents both died quite young in the 1970s.


When I researched her family tree, I found one of her dad's cousins is still alive. To cut a very long story short, I searched for him on the internet and found he was a speaker at a dinner last year so I wrote to the organiser and asked him to pass a message on. Didn't really expect anything to come of it...


Anyway, in the middle of dinner, mum played an answering machine message from him! It was so very strange, like getting a message from the international space station or relayed to us in the middle of a desert. He introduced himself and is "one of 4 with 3 sisters" (so mum's total of relations went up from 2 to 6!) and is happy to have a chat if she would like to ring back. The most moving part is that he sounded a bit like mum (and presumably what her parents and grandparents must have sounded like).


5) Sons came back at 3pm and opened the stockings. Smaller son said "NOW I feel festive!" and even bigger son said "I did miss you a bit, to be fair"!


6) Watched James May about Action Man then Dr Who.


7 Went to parents' later so they could see sons and we had a few games of charades.


That's it! We're having another Christmas Dinner tomorrow. :-D

DundeeDoll

Sparrer saint nick's day is 6th dec so i'd go with that.
1) lovely xmas day with lovely pressies and the family all here. One of my faves was an rnli book where i the hero save the day by calling 999 for rudolph when santa's sled crash lands in the sea.
2) spent all day in my scottie onesie, pressie from my children
3) friends arrived and did yet more vegetable dishes so this year we had a dozen side dishes to accompany the turkey, salmon and veggie flan.
4) fiendish jigsaw finished minus the one piece that i suspect must be in the dog!
5) learnt how to make xmas tree napkins out of our green cloth napkins. Very quick and very effective. Hooray for youtube http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=plkWFQ89XyE

Penguins86

Hoping to be a bit more OS as w get sorted and settled into our new house.

1) everyone seemed to enjoy Christmas dinner
2) there's heaps left to make bubble and squeak (maybe about a week's worth!)
3) the annual photo quiz received the usual mixed review. OH won and I beat my mum!
4) Mince pies were lovely even though half of them needed a little persuasion to come out of the tin
5) some lovely presents which will take pride of place in the kitchen
6) spending the day with the family in our home

Today we're hitting the sales...will be good to get a washing machine as the laundry is beginning to pile up and we've got money to put towards it

mhagster

Will try and post my Christmas pleasures again....lengthy post not allowed this morning ! Not even disappeared it was not allowed!

We did our exchange of gifts at midnight which was nice and sparkly and shiny rather than with sun streaming in the window. Everyone seemed pleased with their gifts.

I woke up early as usual and had some nice chats with friends who were still on Christmas Eve, chatted to one very excited 7 year old....I miss that magic of Christmas now mine are all grown up.

Made a pavlova which was delicious when eaten much later on with peaches and mangoes on it ( shoulda/woulda/coulda been blackberries but we know what happened to them!)

Long drive to the beach ( I do wish we lived nearer) , since we were last there all the free parking is now metered but luckily someone passed on their ticket when they left, so we didn't have to worry about rushing back .
Spent a pleasant afternoon ensconced on a deck chair reading a UK magazine

Has dinner when we got home, gammon , spuds and peas from the garden , parsnips, honey glazed carrots, gorgeous sprouts and asparagus, cheese sauce,pineapple chutney ( made very quickly by me) and cranberry sauce. Absolutely stuffed !

Phone calls to family back home ....priceless gift of chatting to great niece and hearing what Santa had brought her .

Pavlova for pudding.

Christmas in summer time is just so foreign to me, even 4 years on. It just seems so wrong, even though I follow the same traditions as I did at home plus a few newer ones as the kids have got older. Yesterday morning the sun was shining, the tawny frogmouths were back in the tree ( not seen them all week) , out at the veg patch at early o'clock and sweet peas smelling lovely and stunningly bright zucchini ( courgette) flowers in full bloom. Pea pods full of peas. Carols playing ..listening to UK radio. Traditional foods eaten but still feels different. Last 2 years we have spent in country cottage back home but that didn't seem like Christmas either as we'd already done gift exchange and meal before we left. Oh well.....maybe next year it will feel more Christmassy !



Today was up early...just for a change and watched UK telly as it was happening. It was not particularly warm today...a cardigan was required! Stayed dry after overnight rain ( much needed by the garden) , we popped into next town and couldn't believe how busy the shops were! Waaah! restocked wrapping paper and ribbons in the sales.

Had a snoozette and now back watching UK telly! Quite a lazy day really, though did do a monster ironing whilst watching Call The Midwife.

Back to work tomorrow !
Have a lovely Boxing Day

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

Flamed! As always!




BoP would had provided an image last evening, but due to the risk of fire and the use of real spirits, it was thought that serious injuries would occur if you attempt to follow do as the BoP. Note the distinct lack of French ingredients. Now where is my Meccano set!


5 Putting the Chjrimbo pud on fire, with glaced sugars. Now soaked in Whisky, ready to warm many a weekend til Easter. Recipe was available earlier in November. And I am not gloating, this real butter one was the best yet!


4 The fumes from the pud were incredible.


3 Watching the Shakespeare series on Sky Arts catch up. Now, I gave up at school on the KR book. What a complete and utter trash. Now watching My Shakespeare, I can see what I missed.


2 Days we is off up northwards to see little nieces.


1 Short words are best and the old words, when short, are the best of all wc

VickyA_2

Merry Christmas everyone, albeit a day late. I've had a good couple of days with my parents, brother and (of course) Mr VickyA!

Pleasures:

1 Church service on Tuesday night in the village down the road from my parents. Always a good "do" with mulled wine & mince pies shared after the service. Thinking of Frith's incident with the Pavarotti wannabe, there was a lady who lived in that village and attended the church with similar aspirations. Lovely lady, but she always warbled loudly and rarely in tune. However, it was always a good lesson for my brother & I in tact.

2 Christmas Day with the family.

3 Walking the family dog! She's exhausted now, having retrieved a number of tennis balls, and is asleep in front of the fire.

4 New Years Eve menu is sorted. For those whom asked the other day, I'm making a beef in red wine from The Hairy Dieters "Eat For Life" book. Pudding will be a frozen berry pudding from the same book.

5 Have received some fantastic presents. Very lucky indeed.

I hope everyone is having a restful time.

DundeeDoll

Merry xmas vickya
Lovely looking pud bop and see mariners nearing top of the table
Watched call the midwife having long soak in bath so ironing still not done here mhags
1) leftovers for breakfast - bubble and swueak with mash, spicy polish cabbage, sprouts and an egg
2) lovely walk in the park with the dogs. Very hard frost
3) did 3 more jigsaws while catching up on yesterday's bbc offerings
4) lunch mini xmas dinner from leftovers
5) tea was the soup i made xmas eve but we forgot to eat d'oh. Then made my nanoblocks grandpiano. All in all a lovely boxing day which would have been a nsd if car hadnt been hungry.

Broomstick

Evening all

DfV, I forgot. As soon as I've posted this I'll send you my list!
&, DD, thanks for links (& socks on other thread - fantastic -and DD christmas tree napkins - have green ones, have had a go, will do this next year!)
Frith, your #4 sounds very emotional and rather exciting too.
Glad everyone's Christmases sound happy.

Five pleasures for Friday:

1. Good day yesterday playing lots of board games and having some nice food and cheery phone calls with my parents.

2. Rice crackers with cream cheese and smoked salmon left over from yesterday for brunch.

3. Had a bath with one of my Xmas Lush bath bombs (Dashing Santa one) which turned the water the colour of smoked salmon. Very exciting. Think there was a smoked salmon theme this morning.

4. Have been on my own since mid-afternoon since both DSs are out. Very peaceful. Had a good long chat with my best friend on the phone as well.

5. Have been very generous with the logs on the fire so it's roaring away and I'm toasty. Made apple and parsnip soup for my tea and some for the freezer. H/m soup in front of a real fire is a very simple and very lovely pleasure.

Sweet dreams

B x