but not at a hotel in Amsterdam. Just here in Sompting.
Saturday I worked in the morning. I spent most it doing this display:
It’s a large cardboard box (that our green johanna composter came in) that Tarly and I had cut a hole in and painted brown on Friday. I made the fire and grate from coloured paper at work, dragged one of the library armchairs over and found a coffee cup and cushion in the staff room. Another colleague suggested stringing the Christmas cards up and someone else has suggested I make some flying ducks to go on the wall 😆 I think it looks good but would like to have a fireside rug there too to complete it.
While I’m posting photos of library displays here is my 12 Days of Christmas display currently in the junior library. Scarlett helped with this one too – the excessively glittered partridge is hers and she coloured in lots of the dancing ladies and drumming drummers 🙂
I spent some time researching Chatterbooks which I have pushed for and volunteered to run in my own time and finally had approved and signed off. I now need to put together a proper plan of how it will work and set some dates. I’m also hoping to put together some minor training for colleagues on it so that I have support in recruiting members and people talking about it to others and getting some copy ready to go on the West Sussex website. Unfortunately this will also have to be done in my own time really as I can’t see me fitting that into my 11 hours a week ;). Looks like 2010 will be the ‘Year I volunteer!’
Home for lunch and Davies and I made some more baubles from old Christmas cards. He did really well at that as it is pretty fiddly and tasks like that have always been ones he struggles with. He suddenly went really pale and quiet during lunch and said he wasn’t hungry and he was really cold. Scarlett had been the same on Monday when she started going down with whatever it is she has. He ended up taking himself off to bed with his DS.
I wanted to go to the allotment as it’s been totally neglected for the last month or so. To be fair there was very little we could have been doing anyway with such wet weather and we have very little growing at the moment but I should have got up there before just to cast an eye over everything, particularly with the high winds we’ve been having. Our composter which I hadn’t really installed very well had blown over which meant all the half rotted food was just sitting there. Fortunately the weather has meant it was just rotting more rather than stinking. The door seems to have gone altogether though so we need to sort out a replacement for that before we can add any more material to it. Scarlett came with me and we pulled about half the parsnips which have grown quite well and checked the carrots which haven’t. We removed various debris from our wildlife pond and then as we were already pretty muddy just from doing that decided that would do for now and we’d come back up again soon. Our plot looked pretty much like everyone elses and there is very little you can be doing on the allotment at this time of year anyway but I really want to make sure we build on what went well this year.
Then we called into Lancing as we needed some bits for the evening. We were off to the Not Swingers for dinner and it was Mexican night. I’d wanted to get some chili chocolate (but couldn’t find any in Lancing), some Sol beer and lime and either some Mexican wine or some tequilla. Tequilla is very expensive so I changed my mind about that but did get some Mexican beer, limes and some nice chocolates to take. We also called into the library as Scarlett wanted to see the display up and predictably she chose a book to borrow too.
Back home again I had a bath and got ready to go out. Davies had continued to go downhill but said he was fine about us going out. We did say that if it had been Scarlett who was ill we wouldn’t have gone as she wouldn’t have got the level of cosseting and care from my Mum but Davies would be more fussed over by her than if I’d stayed home with him.
Scarlett made us all laugh as the bath was already run that Ady had had waiting for me and as she was muddy from the allotment (and her feet smell from her shoes) he said to her ‘go and jump in the bath quickly before Mummy has it’ so she did
fully dressed! Nutter! 😆
Mum and Dad arrived and we headed off to Mike and Rose’s. Rose’s sister and husband were also joining us and Rose has been very keen for her sister and I to meet. She says we are very alike but her sister is a dog-loving, children-intolerant, social worker whereas I am pretty much the opposite 😆
Mike, as always, had gone all out with his culinary theme of Mexico and we started with Tequilla Sunrise cocktails and chili-infused nibbles. The food was actually all really nice and Mike always does a serve-yourself style with so many dishes and options if I don’t like something I can easily avoid it. This time there was nothing I had to eat at all that I wouldn’t have chosen to :).
We started with home made dips and tortilla chips – guacomole, salsa, some chickpea based (clearly I didn’t eat that) and sour cream. This was followed by a taco stuffed with lettuce, salsa and quorn mince cooked with chili. I was quite impressed with the quorn mince. The main course was enchiladas with cheese and tomatoes, a pepper and tomatoes salad and refried beans for those who wanted them. Dessert was a chocolate and almond pudding. Chili chocolates to finish along with tea, coffee and cointreau (departed from the Mexican theme at that point, but we had had Mexican wine with dinner).
It was all very nice but the vast combination of mixed drinks – cocktails, white wine, pink fizz (Rose’s sister was driving so opened a bottle and had one small glass but then noone else seemed to like it so I drank most of that) and finally Cointreau meant we were all pretty inebriated by the end of the evening. We had rousing conversations about education but it all stayed very amicable, if animated ;). Davies had rung me twice during the evening and actually I’d told him at about 930 that we’d only be another hour or so. That hadn’t quite happened as time had done that black hole thing when we moved away from the dining table. We finally got home somewhere after midnight. My memory is a bit patchy but Davies came and slept with me as he was still semi-awake and not feeling well.
Sunday I woke up feeling dreadful – clearly all self inflicted and expecting no sympathy ;). A text conversation with Rose revealed they were feeling equally as rough. A lovely evening but always sure it could have been just as lovely without the alcohol abuse and write off of the following day really… maybe next year I really will make a concerted effort to reduce my drinking.
Davies had woken feeling much better, it clearly is just a cold with one day of feeling rough while going down with it. The kids were supposed to be going to the Badgers Christmas party and Ady and I had some Christmas shopping planned but Davies didn’t feel up to it and Scarlett didn’t want to go alone so I was spared that ordeal with my hangover ;). A quiet morning and then Scarlett and I walked up the hill to Mike and Rose’s to collect Ady’s car. It’s only about a 15 minute walk but very steeply uphill – we sang The Grand Old Duke of York, increasingly breathlessly, to keep us going 😆 Diversion home to my Dad’s to collect a cheque for the kids swimming lessons for next term and then to the swimming pool to pay it in. Tuesdays are going to be crazy next term with sea scouts and brownies afterwards at slightly staggered times.
Back home again I felt able to face some food and then we all got changed and headed out again to Brighton to see Them With Frozen Tails (- neither of the photographed actors were in the one we saw). I’d seen it on the Brighton Theatres website about 6 weeks ago and thought it looked good. We don’t tend to go to pantos as they are just so pricey and never really seem worth the money. None of us watch soaps so never know any of the minor celebrities that star in them so this seemed like a good festive treat alternative. It was excellent, really funny and with loads of audience participation. Lots of fresh, topical humour and the third story (it was three animal stories narrated and acted out with virtually no props) was all improvised with suggestions from the audience on characters and plot. We had a good brave knight, called Sir Bread, who acted like a hamster and saved the world by turning people into kittens, working against an evil crazy yeti called Bob who lived in a microphone and wanted to take over the world by throwing snowballs at people. It was hilarious 😆
We were home by 630pm and Ady cooked the kids some tea while I had a bath, then I cooked our dinner. Loads of the TV chefs seemed to be having Christmas specials on tv yesterday so we watched some nice soothing Nigella making cooking turkey and Rachel Allen baking and decorating a gingerbread house. Then, way earlier than usual, it was bedtime.