A Day in My Life – December

Today I awoke about 5.30am (after a great nights sleep on our new mattress). It had cooled down overnight and was now quite windy. I debated going for walk but decided I’m feeling too lazy after my busy day yesterday (doing lots of baking). Instead I stuck to my usual morning routine of letting the dogs out to the toilet and getting a cup of tea to enjoy while playing on the computer. I check my e-mail, twitter and some of the my fav blogs. Saw that A Vision Splendid now has a e-book so I bought that (good value for $12 I think).

I then worked on our budget. It’s a pleasure doing it now that we’re on a cash budget and are moving forward rather than backward. Such a wonderful feeling, esp. at this expensive time of year.

And most of my little containers even have money in them :-).

At some point I put on a load of washing and at 8am I headed up to have a shower and get ready for the day.I found Christy out of bed so got her ready and told the girls to go check the advent calender. Todays treat was a visit to see Santa and go out for breakfast.

We left home just before 9am (to avoid the crowds).  It was great as when we arrived in David Jones their was only family having their photo with Santa so we didn’t have to wait long at all.

This is a great Santa – and one we’ve been too most years. He spent quite a bit of time talking to the girls – which Christy loved and Amy is still happy to do.

After photos the girls were allowed to pick a Christmas ornament. This was on the advent a few weeks ago but we didn’t manage to do it that day. I also got myself a nutcracker. For reason I decided I wanted one this year and thought this fellow was cute (but when I got home I realized he really needs a friends…oh, well, next year).

Next up was a quick trip to the newsagents so I could get some envelopes for my Christmas cards. The girls also got a kids magazine each. We bought some cheese rolls for Christy and headed to Gloria Jeans for breakfast. The only seating was in the smoking area but no one appeared to be smoking so we sat there. Kevin and I shared a cheese & spinach roll and we each had a small iced chocolate. Just as we were finishing some people sat near us and started smoking – so we quickly packed up and left.

It was a nice treat for us since we rarely eat breakfast out (though Kevin informs me he does). Christy was especially excited by the whole thing and I think this will become a new Christmas tradition for us.

On the way home I suddenly realized we should stop at another shopping center so I could pick up some frames I had had made. Since parking was difficult I just went in and got them while the girls and Kevin waited in the car.

We got home just after 11am and Kevin was good enough to put up the new frames.

I then finished putting together the gift baskets for today’s Christmas lunch with family friends.

I did all the baking yesterday, plus made a potato bake and desert. I also hung out the load of washing, tidied the kitchen (didn’t want to come to the mess) and unpacked the dishwasher.

Christy had fun rolling over the bubblewrap that had been around the frames.

Just after 12pm we headed next door to my Mum’s. We had a lovely afternoon with some very good family friends. Mum hosts this every year and we always a lovely time.

We sat outside to start with, then moved indoors for lunch. I forgot to take a photo but I had some potato bake, a bread roll and roast pumpkin salad.

For desert we had white chocolate and coconut cheesecake that I made, followed by tea/coffee. The tray below shows what I made for the gift baskets – shortbread, caramel fudge, cookies and xmas puddings (I’ll try and post some recipes later)

We exchanged gifts and chatted and laughed. Chirsty had a great time playing with a belated birthday present – Find it. The tube is full of things and you have to see how many you can find in a certain time. Apparently their is a penny hidden inside – which we could not find. Jenny, who gave the gift, was going to take it back to the shop. But when Kevin looked online apparently the penny is VERY hard to find and if you find it you can type in the details of the penny. So we will keep looking.

We eventually came home about 6pm. I bought in the washing and sorted it out.

Kevin replanted the mandarin tree he bought yesterday (and planted to close to our ornamental pear), and watered the veggies for me.

I started to upload todays photos so didn’t take any more. I got the dogs their dinner of leftovers (from Friday nights party) and a bowl of potato bake for my dinner. Then Kevin and I sat down to watch a couple of episodes of True Blood. I’ve been reading the books since the first one came out but the TV series is a lot more serious. Seems pretty good though (though some of the sex scenes are a bit too much).

We headed up to bed about 9pm and I put Christy to bed (Amy had fallen asleep on the couch and I’d sent her up to bed earlier). I read for a bit before turning out the lights and drifting off to sleep.