Christmas 2016
Haddington & other adventures
It's early December (the 4th, if you insist) and the pre-Christmas build-up has started in earnest. My only wish was that we waited until December. While Lynne and Daisy were at Sophia's birthday party, Gregory and I did the groundwork with the (fake plastic) tree.
When the girls returned, we set to work decorating the tree, with the children putting everything on the front lower half, and Lynne and I counter-acting this by hanging baubles everywhere else.
The next week, it was time for Daisy's school Christmas play, in which she played Child Number One (a role she has had some considerable experience at playing). She is to the left of the girl in red and she had a handful of lines. Each class, of which there were four or five, had a sketch and a song to perform. Of particular note was a rhetorical question gag by the two opening speakers.
A week and a half later, and it was time to head up to Scotland for Christmas. I had finished on the Thursday but Daisy's last day at school was meant to be the Friday. However, we were very reluctant to travel north on Christmas Eve (the Saturday) and so Daisy missed out on the last day, although we doubt she missed much. We made good progress (we were having lunch at shortly after 11am following a relatively early start) despite high winds and increasingly heavy rain, stopping at service station with a McDonalds, where Gregory seemed pretty underwhelmed by the largest chip ever seen (how big must the potato have been?).
Upon arrival at the Schofields' residence in Haddington, the children were soon ensconced in some Yahtzee action with their grandparents.
Gregory, meanwhile, settled in with some cathartic car action, as is his wont.
On Christmas Eve, we headed to the Odeon at the Fort to watch the film Trolls. The kids posed in front of the reindeer display.
After a film which Lynne and Daisy enjoyed immensely, and Gregory and I made our way through with some enjoyment too, we shuffled over to Pizza Express for lunch and some very involved drawing. I have only just noticed Daisy's antlers dominating the picture (well, I say dominating, but I didn't notice them for a while).
Daisy demonstrated her artistic skills by turning a dough ball into a face, which was for some reason carrying a book entitled "Moggy The Witch".
I busied myself by tucking into meaty calzone. This would later encourage me to go for a run around Haddington to (try to) burn it off.
Daisy dutifully demonstrated delight at her delicious, dusted doughball dessert.
Later, the boys, young and old, played with some blocks, constructing towers at will.
Aware that they had spent most of the day indoors, the children were given the opportunity to run around the back garden...
...starting on opposite sides of the lawn and colliding together for a big hug...
...only to collapse in a heap on the floor, laughing.
With resident babysitters, it was exceedingly rude not to pop out into Haddington for a meal...
...just the two of us, plus a limitless supply of lager beer. Lynne and her new haircut (in case you hadn't noticed) were certainly happy with that concept.
After a warm-up beer in the pub, we shuffled over to the China Garden...
...at which Lynne had soup whilst I had two gigantic spring rolls. It's hard to get across the size of those since you don't know the size of the plate, but trust me they were huge and I did not finish them (despite having post-run hunger).
And then it was Christmas Day! The children didn't wake up too early (if I remember rightly) but soon headed downstairs to see what Father Christmas had brought them. As usual, there was quite a stash, her share of which Daisy attacked with gusto.
Gregory, though, was a little more measured in his present conquest.
Occasionally, the unwrapping of the present elicited an amusingly surprised reaction.
It wasn't long before there was utter, utter carnage. Clearly Grandad Graham had taken his eye off the tidying up ball for a short while and this was the result.
One of Gregory's presents, you may have noticed from an earlier picture, was a scooter and helmet, the latter of which he tried on here, albeit not properly since the straps hadn't been sorted out, hence the really bad fit.
Although still in his pyjamas, Gregory was eager to try out his new present, scooting through the downstairs of the house. Unfortunately, that was the last time that he used his scooter properly for a good while (at the time of writing, in mid-February, his only usage has been walking it round the nearby Woodbank Park, despite our best efforts to encourage or persuade). (Incidentally, you can just see the blurry, spotty, pyjama leg of Lynne has she rushes from one room to the next.)
By late morning, the little ones were dressed and ready for the day ahead, preparing by watching TV avidly. So far, so familiar.
Around that time, the big bird had gone into the cooking box.
A short while later, the Rowllings arrived. Paul fixed me with a penetrating state but Jessica was too busy taking the rest of the room in.
Becky is just checking whether Jessica really put it in the bin, whatever it is. Graham and Santa keep well out of it.
Gregory is mostly delighted to not be the smallest child in town. He's now wearing his Christmas jumper (we would try to get as much wear out of it as possible, obviously).
Daisy, towering above young Jessica, introduced her to a Santa toy as Becky and Louise looked on.
It's a little before noon and I struggle to believe that this was the first bottle of fizz that had been shared around but perhaps it was. Paul opted for a cuppa while Jessica played with one of Gregory's presents (Stripes from his favourite show of the time, Blaze And The Monster Machines).
Lynne drew the short straw and played a variant of bingo with ALL the children. It would have been fine but Jessica was less interested in the rules than a basic, innocent disruption of the game in general, much to the disgruntlement of the other children. The kids were also not immune to the opening of bottles as they imbibed Fruit Shoots to their hearts' content.
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Lynne tagging in Paul for bingo duties, with Jessica seemingly have been extracted, but Daisy wishes a minor clarification of the rules before partaking further.
Fearing that another vegetable would send the Christmas dinner sailing past the critical mass of dishes, there was initial perhaps reluctance to have Brussel sprouts in the mix, but Lynne was keen and so they made the cut. Talking of which, it was therefore Lynne's task to chop the sprouts. Progress here: minimal. ("Is that enough, mum?")
This is the boy just chilling with his grapes...
...but also giving me a crazy grin and showing off his narrow neck. How it supports that head we'll never know. But it does.
The boy had gotten comfortable enough to ride one-handed. As I mentioned earlier, he did use the scooter for quite some time after Christmas but actually last weekend (in mid-February) he did use it again for the first time (in the manner which was intended).
The calm before the eating storm.
A proud Mamaa takes a break from cooking to sit a thirsty young Jessica on her lap.
And then the calorie carnage. It took a few goes to get everyone looking at the cameraman. Unfortunately, we were down one. Gregory did not want to join us at the table so I stuck him in the cot upstairs, which he did not actually mind since he refused to come down for a while after that. Alas when he did come down, and I fed him some of the leftovers in the lounge, he managed to bring it all back up again. Oh the joy of children.
I had been specifically requested (and it was probably the only reason that I had received an invite for the big day) to cook the classic salted chocolate tart. Whilst it's a fairly simple recipe, I was basically just happy that it worked out, although the look on my face is one of mild alarm at the possibility of dropping it.
In what has become a classic Christmas combo, the chocolate tart was accompanied by a lemon tart, the product of Louise's cooking.
And it's probably time we left it there. You can move on to the next page once it is finished.
Or you can go back to the Secret Portal.