Better than expected.

I did it. I went to Karingal and I survived!

We hit Aldi first and got the deli meat slicer that Three has said he wanted. I also finished off the big girls presents with some age appropriate jigsaw puzzles. 

Then I went to Big W and bought a couple of dresses for Alice and a Pokemon stuffed toy. Sally loves Pokemon so I am sure she will approve of her sister's present.

I then went to the $2 looking for round cake tins. There are none to be had anywhere. By this stage I was getting overwhelmed so Himself and I sat and had a coffee in a not very full cafe (bonus) and nutted out our strategy for the rest of the kids. Supermarket vouchers to their preferred supermarket, a bottle of whisky for One and some smellies for Ebs and Amy. I also got a bottle of green ant gin for The Mermaid's daughter and her fiancé. They love gin, it is a nice gin and has the quirkiness of the green ants.

Baking ingredients for tomorrow, nibbles for Saturday, coleslaw and the makings for a potato salad also purchased. 

Home in one piece with my sanity intact. I kept thinking of Ms Moon's funny about Mary's waters breaking. It made me smiled and I shared it with other shoppers. All in all it was a much better experience than I expected and everyone seemed to be trying to be kind and considerate to all around them which almost felt like a first. Maybe we are all feeling it this Christmas.

A couple of games of scrabble and it is now time to change the shitty litter as it is bin night. The sock is coming along well and, bar any unforeseen incidents, should be finished by Sunday.

A brief chat with One cemented my plan to make Christmas Eve low key and calm. The littlies will be hyped up enough over the next few days so I am sure everyone will like to start the festivities with a few drinks, family and little fuss.

I think I will win Christmas this year.

A mixed day

The phone rang and woke me up. OK, it wasn't early but I have started going to bed after midnight and reading and then sleeping in. Shoot me.

It was Mads. She and Henry had spent the night in hospital because a few people had commented on his noisy breathing. She hadn't been too worried as he is feeding well and gaining weight and is otherwise a content baby. She saw her GP who told her to go to emergency to get him checked out. They did a whole lot of tests and kept them in to rule out sleep apnoea. 

They think it might be laryngomalacia but he isn't presenting typically for that and if it is then it is a severe case. Kids usually grow out of it.

As of 6pm they were still waiting to hear if the ENT dudes were going to get to them today. Sounds like a mess but it is the public system and costs them nothing and they will get excellent care.

J and C and I had plans to go to our favourite yarn shop today. C was picking me up. She then messaged us to say she had some bowel issues and couldn't make it. She ended up in hospital being ... unplugged shall we say. She has had some pretty horrific bowel issues in the past and is understandably twitchy when things don't go according to plan. She is now home with an appointment with a gastroenterologist tomorrow (and, yes, things have cleared).

J and I had a lovely time at the yarn shop and only bought 3 skeins of new sock yarn. This hobby is NOT cheap!! But the yarn is just too gorgeous to leave behind. I could easily have spent $800 on sock yarn alone so I am justifying my $83. Each skein gives me a pair of socks with yarn left over which I can use to make scrappy socks or beanies or mittens.

We had a really yummy lunch at one of Hastings newer cafes. It has replaced the coffee shop which I used to go to when I worked in Hastings. They make everything on the premises from relish to ice-cream. The menu isn't huge but changes regularly and they prepare from fresh.

We popped into a manchester outlet and I was able to tick some gifts off my list.

Himself picked Sally up from her last day at school. Mum picked her up just after I got home. She is very excited about Christmas.

A game of scrabble and Himself is now making homemade hamburgers for dinner. I am enjoying a wine and thinking that I might just make it through the season in one piece.

Tomorrow we will head to Karingal (not a huge shopping centre by any stretch of the imagination but enough to send my anxiety levels through the roof). 

I will have a list.

Lists make me feel I have control.

Breathe in, breathe out

The stress levels are starting to rise.

I have to keep reminding myself to breathe. 

Went to the local discount shop and bought a tree. You just plug it in and it has lights that change colour. The great thing is I can put it up and take it down as I wish so the cats don't get to wreck play with it.

I couldn't find round cake tins for the cake I am taking to the Mermaid's on Sunday. I did find some jars on which I have etched the kids initials for their popcorn to go with their popcorn makers. I bought some Italian nougat for Fave sis in law. I was going to get some Italian olive oil in a pretty container but Himself baulked at the price. The container alone in a fancy gift shop would have cost the same but it is all about keeping the peace at the moment. He has sanded and re-oiled the outdoor setting so we can use it when the brothers come over. I think that is his way of saying he is trying.

I should be knitting the second sock but I am here procrastinating instead.

I shall go and knit.

************

And I did. If I don't get the sock finished I will be so close I will take it on Sunday and finish it there!

Tomorrow I am going to the yarn shop with J and C for a bit of knitting and a bite of lunch (not at the yarn shop but in a really nice cafe round the corner). There is a new homeware shop so I might find something there for gifts. If I haven't bought by now I usually know what I am getting but I am a bit stuck this year.

Anyway, in keeping with the spirit of the season and the fact that, when all is said and done, it is about the children I will leave you with the following. I crops up every year and I am sure you have seen it but it makes me smile every time I see it. 

Peppery nuts

I do have other grandchildren and I do love them all but I don't get to see them as often nor get sent photos! One sent me this on Friday. Lily has finished kindergarten and goes to big girl school next year. (As does Audrey in NSW). One is actually a good foot taller than Ebs not that you would realise in this photo which I cropped to hide identification in Lily's certificate of graduation. There were tears from the educators as she is a popular wee thing. I wonder how Ivy will go without her big sister next year. 

I tried the other recipe for pfeffernusse where you cream the butter and sugar and molasses together rather than melt them. This also has an egg. I think the texture is better although Himself pronounced them dry (that might have had something to do with him stuffing something the size of a small egg covered in icing sugar into his mouth). I had planned to glaze them but this recipe called for the warm pfeffernusses to be tossed in a bowl of soft icing mixture and I am thrilled with the result. They sort of glaze themselves with a bit of dusty sugar left as well. I shall double the recipe and make smaller rolls for next weekend. That will be plenty for the kids on Saturday and to take to the Mermaid's on Sunday.

I wonder if pfeffernusse are to Christmas what hot cross buns are to Easter. Would I be vilified if I made them all through the year?

I recently read that the tradition of giving gifts at Christmas predates Christianity by eons. My atheist soul (is that an oxymoron?) is starting to feel more comfortable with the upcoming weekend.

The week in between this weekend and the next, though, will be busy if my list is anything to go by. Not busy by others' standards but this black cat doesn't do too many things in one day without having a quiet meltdown. 

My brothers and their wives are coming here for lunch on 29th. After the debacle that was our last family get together in February I am not looking forward to this. I am sure everyone will be on their best behaviour but the tension will be there. At least it won't be a long lunch as the Teachers have a long drive back home.

And then we can all relax and enjoy the summer. As I have said before, I am not one for NY resolutions but next year is going to be so different in so many ways.

CAKE

The kids dropped in. They tried my pfeffernusse and we played guess the spices. They guessed them all bar the white pepper. Interestingly there is no ginger in the recipe but a strong sense of ginger from the bite of the pepper. (Hence pepper nuts I suppose).

I had to warm the dough in the microwave to make it malleable so will try the other recipe tomorrow but with the same spice mix. If that works I shall make more during the week and ice them appropriately.

I offered them a taste of my fruit cake. Three isn't a huge fan but his daughter is. Although I'm not sure about sticking it in the ear. Maybe it adds to the flavour. 

 

She ate the whole slice, shoving the final bits in her mouth cos mum was eating a pfeffernusse and she wanted to try it. She didn't.

After running around chasing a speeding toddler Granny was knackered. 

The kids went home with zucchini, carrots and a cucumber. Sally was given a rose. Tequila sunrise - one of my favourites. 

Two games of scrabble and I am just holding my lead for the month. Himself got 7 letters out in both games, thrashed me in the first but I redeemed myself in the second.

I have made my list which will be added to but at least now I have a plan. One and Three et al are set for Christmas Eve - and the great bearded one will be just up the road at the local park at 5.15 thanks to the local fire brigade. Our next door neighbour sponsors them so he often stops outside our place to say g'day to the neighbour. It will be a lovely end to the afternoon for them.

Now I must go and try to finish the first sock of a pair I plan to give The Mermaid on Christmas Day.

Friday

I have started to dread calls from Three in the middle of the day! 

Day-care rang him to say that Alice had something in her eye and needed to go to the doctor. After previous experiences there was thought that they might be trying to offload again but they sent him this photo. 

This is not a happy baby!!

He was asking if he could drop her off to me if he couldn't take the rest of the day off. He had forgotten he now works for a company that gives a damn about their employees and their families. 

I said I would meet him at Sally's school so I could walk her around the streets if she was fractious so he and Amy could watch her final assembly.

She had slept a bit and was in a good mood so I was able to see Sally get an award for being awesome. Well, that was Grany's interpretation.

The preps then sang a song thanking their buddies for all their support during the year and wishing them well in high school and beyond. Sally took this task very seriously.

I then came home to complete the cake and make the dough for the pfeffernusse. 

Unfortunately the dough is very hard so I am not sure how I will be able to roll it out. I might have to warm it a bit. Probably serves me right for mixing a couple of recipes together and swapping honey for molasses and guesstimating the grams in 6 tablespoons of butter. The cloves worked well being crushed in a pestle and mortar so if I have to redo I know I have ground cloves!

We then had a couple of games of scrabble and Himself got this ...

Double letter with the Q, double word score and all letters out! 111 points. He was rightly chuffed!

Alice saw the doctor. Nothing in her eye. Maybe conjunctivitis. Maybe irritation. She is happy now but didn't like the doctor.

Sally got her final report for the year. It is excellent and she is very advanced in the three Rs. But more importantly she is confident, well liked and very caring of her peers. 

Grany and Grumpy are very proud.

 

Sunset glory

This was the view from the couch last night. They might all seem the same but the clouds and colours were constantly changing.

Three rang at lunch time. Could we pick Sally up from school. Don't have to ask twice, kiddo! The excitement on her face when she saw Grany made my heart sing.

This is how you know your grandchild goes to school in a rural area!

It turned out that Amy had overslept (Three drops Alice at daycare on his way to work and leaves around 7.15). She didn't wake until 8.35. She drops Sally at school at 8.40 and starts work at 9.00! She worked back to make up the time, hence the pick up request. 

When she picked the girl up we talked about school holidays. There will be two weeks when she is back at work so I said we will have Sally as often as is necessary. No need for her to go to school holiday program. 

Pfeffernusse were something I bought for the kids at Christmas. Not for any particular reason although Two loves them. When Three dropped over at the weekend he was full of glee that he had found some - I had no idea they meant something to him, too. So today I decided that I would have a go at making some. I sent Himself off with a list of ingredients. To my surprise we don't have ground cloves in the local supermarkets. He came home with whole cloves and we will try grinding in a pestle and mortar but if that doesn't work I'll pop one in whole with the other spices when I melt the butter and molasses and hope I remember to remove it!

Cloves always remind me of Dad. He hated them because his mother put oil of cloves on his teeth to relieve a toothache! In the same way that it took me a long time to start to like cinnamon after mother made us drink cinnamon oil in milk to prevent colds on the assumption that the girls who worked in the cinnamon factories during WW2 didn't get colds.

So tomorrow I will bake another Christmas cake - this time with whisky - and prepare the dough for the pfeffernusse which should sit in the fridge for a couple of days to let the flavours develop.

I need some netflix suggestions. I watched Merlin and loved it. I then watched the first series of Knightfall (about knights templar) which was ok but series two was leaving me cold. I am now watching Irreverend, a gentle comedy set in beautiful Mission Beach and it is pleasant enough but I want something to get stuck into. Suggestions please. Anything but horror. Blood and gore is ok as long as it isn't gratuitous (which is why I ditched Knightfall).

One day I might post photos of the sunrise but that would mean getting up before ... well ... the sun rises!