Christmas!

This was our first Christmas at home just us as a family. It was so nice not to have to travel and to be able to eat whenever dinner was ready. We had an hour long Sacrament meeting at church, and it was wonderful to see everyone there! I was impressed with the turn out- pretty much the same as a usual Sunday. It was great to start the day focusing on the Saviour.

It was also my first time making Christmas dinner alone! Although Dave did help a little when I was feeding Amelia. I was super organised and had everything ready to just be shoved in the oven or have water poured onto it at the appropriate moment, and had written a list of what needed putting in when and how many minutes to put on the timer next. I am extremely proud of myself, and especially my gammon.

D suggested it would be nice to have gammon for a change this year, as we would normally have turkey. I thought that was a great idea, but it was Christmas Eve Eve before I realised I had never done one before and had no idea how to dress it! Thanks to Google I found a delicious recipe sans mustard (D doesn't like mustard) and it turned out perfectly.

Ben decided he'd prefer fish fingers for his Christmas dinner, although he had a nibble on a yorkshire pudding too. Strange child. But we were just grateful that he was happy and low maintenance while we ate.

Amelia had a present while we ate, and she sat happily playing with it for most of the meal. She LOVES her Oball!

We decided to take it easy with the presents and just let Ben open them as and when he wanted to. This worked quite well and we actually opened the last few yesterday (27th). He is very obsessive and needs to be able to look at and take in what he's got before he tackles something else. It's kind of nice really because it means he enjoys each thing, rather than just tossing presents aside and going for the next one.

We tried a few times to get a nice family photo by the tree, or even just pictures of the children, but it didn't really work! This photo pretty much summarises the experience: Ben constantly moving outside the frame and making everyone else laugh! He's brilliant.

Hope you all had a very merry Christmas. Happy New Year!

Gok Wan and the perfect boots

As some of you may know, I have a bit of a thing for Gok Wan.

There he is. Lovely man. I don't fancy him or anything... or maybe I do... I don't know... but anyway, I like him a lot and I want him to be my best friend. I used to love watching Gok's Fashion Fix when we had a TV licence, much to D's disgust!

So imagine my delight when Gok popped up in my dream the other night.

In the dream, D had got tickets to see a Gok fashion show for my birthday. I had a cunning plan that I would dress shockingly badly, then Gok would see that I needed his help, kit me out like a model in free clothes, and we'd be friends forever. And being a dream, it all went according to my plan! I wore these hideous boots that I would never be seen dead in except in an attempt to lure Gok into eternal friendship, and when he saw me in the car park he came and took me by the hand to help me. We went into the studio and I got all my beautiful new clothes and was feeling like Cinderella, then... THE PERFECT BOOTS!

Haha, I have been saving up for beautiful boots for months, so my subconscious obviously knew how much I needed them! In the dream they were these gorgeous jazzberry suede stilettos, about knee high, oh my.

Something like this, but without the platform and, obviously, a boot. I would never buy something this impractical in real life, as it'd be a good 3 years before I could safely wear them without falling over a small child and possibly taking someone's eye out, but what are dreams for, hey?

Gok decided I looked so good he'd put me in the show, so I got to walk down the catwalk in my amazing, free, designer outfit, then the real models brought me flowers and a 3D jigsaw puzzle of London attractions! It was one of the best nights of my life!

I did buy my boots about a week ago, but they ended up being flats and chocolate brown. I do love them though :) And they were half outlet price (about a quarter normal price), so bonus!

Being the favourite

There is a quotation I've heard before that I just love. I don't even know who it's by, but it goes:

To the world, you may be just one person.

To to one person, you may be the world.

I just love that! I've always loved the quotation, but since having children it's meant so much more to me.

Because these little people, they come into our lives so helpless and dependent. And we love them so much and so instantly. We give to them until we feel we cannot possibly give another second or another thing, and then we somehow give a lot more!

And the most wonderful thing about that is that they love us absolutely!

When Benjamin was tiny and I was battling with post-natal depression, my Mum said to me, "You are the most important person in his life." and at the time it wasn't what I wanted to hear. I felt like I wanted to escape my responsibilities and be free. But gradually I realised that I wanted to be that person, I wanted to be his mummy, I wanted to be the most important person in his world. That's one of the reasons I decided not to go back to work, but to be a stay at home mum.

Wanting to take care of them; with Ben, it happened the first time he put his arms up to ask me to pick him up. With Amelia it was the first time I laid eyes on her.

I don't want someone else to be the most important person in their lives, I want them to come to me when they fall over and hurt themselves, and I want to be the one they look over to when they do something very clever. How could I possibly give that to someone else? Obviously some people have to, and some people choose to, but not me!

I have come to realise, even more now that I have two children and my attention is always split, that I don't have to be perfect. Neither of my kids are sitting there with a scorecard, rating my performance and loving me in proportion to that. They love me completely whatever I do: no matter what. As long as I am enough, that's enough.

D said once that I was 3 people's favourite- it was just an incidental comment but it meant a lot to me. Because I am! And because I know it won't always be that way, and that's okay, but for now it is glorious. Even in the middle of the night when it has to be me, and even when both kids are sad at the same time and for both of them it has to be me! It's exhausting, but it's wonderful.

Bath time!

My boy loves the bath!

Bath time is Benjamin's special time with Daddy. I got them these letters last year to play with in the bath. They stick to the walls and the tub, absolutely brilliant.

He loves having his toothbrush to chew, ahem, I mean brush and splashing like a loon. No matter how many times he has splashed, there is always a new and exciting way he can get water on the floor! It just cracks me up!