CHRISTMAS IS OVER

Everybody has gone. It’s SO quiet and I am trying very hard to embrace the moment rather than run away from it. What a great Christmas – I am feeling hungover, bloated and tired and frankly looking forward to spending the whole of January drinking water and eating spinach.

As an excuse to devour virtually a whole tub of brandy butter I have just eaten the last mince and followed it up with the remainder of the cold turkey. I’m looking through our Christmas photos and picking up the remaining bits of paper, chocolate and general detritus from around the house. There are lots of bits of paper with names on them. We played the “Name Game” rather too late on Christmas Day – 11 of us, ranging from aged 9 to 69.

It’s a great party game. To play you are each given lots of little bits of paper and a pen. You have to write down at least 10 names of famous people that everybody should have heard of. Each bit of paper is then folded and put into a bowl. You then divide yourselves into several teams. Each team member has a minute to describe as many people as possible without mentioning the name. The list of names in our bowl represented something of the current climate – no points for guessing which ones my teenagers put in and which ones my parents put in. The names went something like this:-

Cheryl Cole (x10)
Olly Murs (x6)
Mickey Mouse (x2)
God (x2)
Jesus (x2)
Susan Boyle (x2)
Tigger
Winnie the Pooh
David Beckham
Rasputin
Idi Amin
Kaffe Fassett

Whenever my son got Cheryl Cole all he had to say was “I love her” and whenever he got Olly Murs all he had to say was “she loves him” pointing at my daughter. When it came to the ones my teenagers didn’t know (bearing in mind they were both on the other team) THEY CHEATED. My son, instead of breaking up the word into syllables like you’re supposed to if you don’t know who it is, said when he got Rasputin “sounds like Sassbulin” – AND THEN had the cheek to be indignant when I got away with “sounds like Biddy Bahmeen” on my go.

I had to sleep with my daughter last night as there were so many of us in the house – it was like sleeping with her when she was three, only with 5 times longer limbs all flaying about, slapping me in the face every five minutes. Hideous experience.

Here is my favourite Christmas photograph. I think this sums up our Christmas pretty well. Here is my mother wearing her new blow-up present from my brother:-

:-