Us For Christmas Wed, 26th Dec 2007

Last Christmas we booked the family into a restaurant that had a soft play facility, it was easy and simple. Obviously too simple; this year (strangely, impulsively, and irrationally), we asked everyone over to our house! Ha! What were we thinking?

I suppose it could be because it will be the last Christmas here, or maybe we just thought that now that we have two kids, it would be easier for us or something. I can’t really say, but hey — we went for it anyway, and you know what? I loved it!

OK, Ruth probably found it a nightmare (or at least very tiring), but I have always loved playing the host — it took me back to the old days when the place was always filled with “the band” and various liggers and hangers-on.

We have a big table in the kitchen, and it expands, so a couple of days beforehand, we decided to see how big a table cloth we’d need, so I expanded it, and discovered that one of the leaves was wobbly as a result of a hardwood slider being sheared — so I had to do some joinery and fast.

This meant a trip to the cellar for the electric saw. All I could find was some pine — it would have to do. The whole thing took about half-an-hour — even though I had to do it twice because the first attempt was not a tight enough fit. The dust was everywhere, so Ruth was not very happy.

I am getting used to doing everything twice. You might remember that Olivia’s years of bouncing resulted in her breaking some spars on her cot, and we upgraded her to a proper bed. (see “Bed-Switching” post), well I had two goes at fixing the broken spars (the glue set too quickly on the first attempt). The plan was to fix her cot and give it to the baby, dismantling his cot and giving it away. David Paul is so big now, he’s almost climbing out of his wee cot, so there was no delay.

With the spars fixed, we assembled Olivia’s repaired cot, just got it through the studio’s doorway and along the hall — but we could not get it through David Paul’s bedroom doorway; it was just a smidgen too tight!

So we had to dismantle it again, get it into the room and then build it up again! I removed his cot and dismantled it for Charlie to collect on Christmas Eve for the church. We quickly re-arranged David Paul’s room, and Ruth loved it! We put the baby inside, and he zonked right out — and remained asleep for a couple of hours… we had to wake him up.

In that respect, the cot was a success, however, Olivia recognised her old cot, and is pretty upset about it. She wants it back, and has declared that it is “so unfair”! I am just glad that the baby is a boy — so we have avoided the hand-me-down clothes and toys.

Anyway, with the cots and table sorted out, we put away the tools and began moving things about for Christmas Day.

Christmas Day

Of course, everyone arrived at the same time, more or less, so it was chaos for about half and hour as we tried to cope with getting everyone’s coats and bags, finding them a seat and organising each drink.

The living room was crowded with gifts and people — and Olivia loved running about it all! When called, we all sat around the dining table according to the place tags Olivia and I had made in the morning, and spend a couple of happy hours over a lovely traditional dinner. I even tried my very first ever Brussels Sprout (not very nice, but not terrible)!

We retired back to the living room for coffee and drinks — it was still too warm to light the fire — after the opening of gifts, everyone seemed to flag at the same time, lounging on the sofas, well-fed and happy. Ruth’s Dad nodded off, and I think Chris and Alan might have had have a couple of winks too!

I went out for a walk in the fresh air, along with Olivia, Joobes and Big Al, and when we returned, folks were making moves to leave. We lit the fire, and relaxed even more as we have more space to stretch out! Mumsie and Alan were the last to leave as Mumsie had been a great help tidying up.

Eventually, Ruth and I were alone. The kids were zonked out in their rooms, the dishes all washed (by machine), and all the rubbish taken away by Big Al & Charlie to the city dump. Ruth was exhausted on the sofa, and fell asleep in front of the glowing embers until I nudged her to go to bed.

She did amazingly well, and all on top of caring for a baby and an excited toddler all day. We were up late on Christmas Eve setting up the video camera (charging it up and searching for a minitape), and we were up just a few hours later — at seven — with an excited Olivia opening her gifts from Santa. It was a busy, and very long day — but a wonderful one too.

In the end, it was about family — everyone was there: hale, healthy and happy. True Christmas spirit, and a wonderful feast. I have stated on this blog before about my take on Christmas, (see “It’s A Wonderful Life” and “Christmassness” for example), and nothing has changed by view on the subject. I appreciate Christmas simply for being an annual reference point. I can compare one with the other, and I know that this year was brilliant. I have had sad ones in the past, and no doubt I will have sad ones again in the future, so I feel no guilt at all for having (and knowing) such a happy time!

Merry Christmas!