What happens after the day after Christmas

Lots of coffee:


A much needed walk:


And plenty of rest and relaxation in awkward positions and on top of heaters:

Christmas in London

This year was very different than our usual Christmas experience because it was the first year that we have been away from our families. And, our first year to be in London for Christmas. Despite that, we managed to have a really nice Christmas week and day and are looking forward to being back to normal next year!

To kick off our Christmas spirit, we went to see the Nutcracker. Due to the limited number of seats that were available by the time I bought the tickets (more than 2 months before the performance!), we had no choice but to sit really close to the stage, which was great! The Royal ballet does a really beautiful and different version of the Nutcracker than what I'm used to and we both really enjoyed it.


Then, of course, Jim had to make his famous cheeseballs and snickerdoodles, which were a great hit with me and amongst our friends.


Meg and Dan are back for a couple of weeks, having a rest between fabulous travels, so we've had a really nice time catching up with them. On Christmas eve we all hung out and had a low-key dinner before attempting to watch Its a Wonderful Life (not a success, as we only made it through half of the show):


Jack is so happy to see Meg and Dan! And they look great--tan and rested after just returning from South Africa.



We all got some rest and regrouped on Christmas morning. Meg made delicious scones!


We got all kinds of fun stuff in our stockings. Jim gives me the evil eye after I made some comment which I now can't remember. But you can see that he has a 'flyer kit', which was given to him by Dan. We have lots of not so great flying paper airplanes all over our house now, which Jack has enjoyed chasing around.


Only a couple of more weeks until our baby is due. I'm looking pretty robust in these pictures. Serious overeating has not helped me to feel less waddlesque.


Group picture!


We tried to get the cats to pose in a friendly manner, but they weren't cooperating. We had to accept this 'aloof' and 'cool' picture. Lucky for them, we forgot to put them in their Santa suits. Next year!


New socks!


New Jacket!


New Art!


New Underwear!


Jim as Kenyan warrior. Thanks to Meg and Dan, we now have some really beautiful art and blankets from Kenya and South Africa.


Cheers! Mimosas.


Between eating our faces off, we took a walk on Hampstead Heath. There were lots of happy people out enjoying the gray day.




After a few hours of questionable food preparation (like, were my rolls going to rise? Miraculously, YES! But he of little faith went out and bought some more bread, just in case. HUMPH!) we had a delicious Christmas dinner. Meg made really delicious beef tenderloin and brussel sprouts and Jim made creamy scalloped potatoes, I mixed together the Yorkshire pudding and Jim and Meg put it in the pan and we also had homemade rolls. There was food in abundance!


Jim cuts the beautiful Yorkshire pud!


We had a little rest before we got to dessert.


THEN: lemon meringue pie and chocolate pie. Jim's lemon meringue pie was BEAUTIFUL when it came out of the oven. He put it on the counter to cool and left the room. Fifteen minutes later he came back in to find Finchley with his greedy face buried in the meringue. BAD PIGGY CAT!!!


Here is the culprit, post-pie consumption. We removed the part that he was chowing on, which left a slightly less perfect looking pie (still delicious!):


Thanks to modern technology, we were able to talk to and see our families on Skype! Not as good as seeing them in person, but it helped to make them seem not so far away. It was almost a perfect Christmas, full of family, friends, lots of food and happy times. Merry Christmas!