Tis the season. Great.
Well, As I said, the christmas stress is starting to creep up on me.
I have this scene in my head of how I want this christmas to go, and so far it's not going to be anything like my picture-perfect day.
Abraham wants a real tree, I can't think of anything worse (my asthma would kill me for all the pine scents and needles! plus Aesop eating pine needles is not something I need to think about!). I want a nice tidy artificial one. Abraham tradition is they put up the tree on the 20th of Dec, for family reasons, and well.. we're having our christmas day on the 17th of Dec, so the the heck will that work?
He's decided the this christmas should be just a quiet, pretty much non-event and that we should save our energy and money for Aesop's 1st birthday in March. I agree, but that doesn't mean we should have a pretty tree, and stockings! In my mind that means we don't buy gifts for absolutely everyone in the whole family, and we hold off on the advent calenders, the turkey, the cookies and milk, and all the other 'big' things.
I really just want to have a beautifully decorated (with nearly all handmade decorations, of course), small yet lovely, artificial tree to put Aesop's gifts under. I want to have a stocking for each family member that is going to be present on christmas morning (Me, Abraham, Aesop, my mum and dad and Abraham's mum and her partner.) I want to read Aesop ' the night before christmas' on Christmas eve, and then have a lovely long sleep.
I want to wake up in the morning at the usual time, ( around 9:30), eat our breakfast and shower etc, and then have the grandparents arrive.
I want to sit around, open our stockings, and help Aesop open his gifts, and take lots of nice photos, and have a good time.
Then I want to head to the kitchen and prepare the most beautiful, yet simplistic, of pre-roasted chicken, leg ham, salads,homemade bread, barbequed kebabs and corn on the cob. I want to make malty minty balls like my sister used to make every christmas.
Then we can all sit around and eat until we're full, talking and laughing and lapping up the sunshine.
I want to spend the afternoon down at the chasing a ball around, riding our bikes and generally just having fun.
Then we can have a lazy dinner of leftovers, and sit and drink beer and wine ( not me of course..), and play cards until we're ready to go to bed.
Thats what I want to happen.