How many days till Christmas 2015 then.............?

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Brace yourselves and form an orderly queue.

XMas clock.com says 357 (plus 14 hours)

Happy New Year to one and all. Hope 2015 is a good one

Oh, FFS , I spelled Christmas wrong [arse]

Bloody laptop with it's little keys and I didn't proof read

I'll send a call to MNHQ to change it .

Don't worry, I'm sure we all got it !

Happy New Year! Did you have a good Christmas? Ours was a lot busier than we would of liked so having a few days of relaxing before heading back to work and planning next year.

Lovely thanks nickdrake had a houseful (DH,DS,DD,DF,DM,DBro,DSil, The Cat and myself , plus our three guinea-pigs )

Loads of cooking (I'd done all my menu plans and shopping so well organised)
I like to cook , I kept everyone out of the kitchen (our kitchen/dining room are open plan, so I can set the table, cook and talk to people)

I couldn't get Maris Pipers so I had to buy King Edwards (only bit ) but it worked out fine and I didn't drop the veg in the sink like I did last year (no visitors last year to witness )

I've put everything away now, house looks empty.
This year I did fewer decorations (worried about my parents tripping over all the tat) so I've culled some of the decorations and they're going to the charity shop.

Next year, less sweet things though.
I made a Christmas Pudding because we had company, that was lush .

Just packed my decorations away. My house looms so boring now.

My five year old DD asked me how many sleeps is it until Christmas today...

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Couple of days to sort ourselves out then back to the real world on Monday
DC go back on Tuesday (not jealous, much)

I have put all the decorations away today. It took ages. Still need to find homes for some of the Christmas toys including what now seems like endless Sylvanian family stuff. We are going to see Disney on Ice tomorrow and then it's DD's birthday next week so still busy here. I will be up late Sunday night blowing up balloons and putting up birthday decs. At this rate am looking forward to going back to work for a rest!

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Busy week ahead Guitar

I wondered if you would start a new thread!!

Christmas was good, but this year we only had my sister round and it was quite boring!! Next year we will definitely invite more family round for the big day. And ditto for New Year - it was unbelievably rubbish due to bugs!

Glad to hear you all had a good day! I'm just going to take decorations down now - dd is not impressed!

On reflection, we are definitely having a less stressful one next year, we have had 2 PIL visiting with major health problems, our own LO and 2 huge parties one with over 40 people so something has to be different next year as we are knackered and skint!

I love organising and hosting Christmas as it's my favourite time of the year, I just want to enjoy it more and also make time for some of the things we want to do. We never got time to do the gingerbread house , make a card to santa on Christmas Eve or even a drive round the area to look at the lights so next year we are going to make it a little more about us.

This year was probably my best organised but I am still wrecked after it! Some visitors came very late in evenig on Stephen's Day, DPs came for afternoon tea before a night out on 27th, then we were all at the big family dinner that night, PIL arrived up for 2 days on 28th, NYE was just ourselves but we went to the Parade of Light in the city, drove to Clare on 1st for family dinner, drove home on 2nd and put away Christmas yesterday after a skiing lesson.

I have yet to have an afternoon curled up reading by the fire. I have yet to have a couple of hours in the sales. Today I have to work on a presentation for promotion, and back to work tomorrow.

I also want to do my review sheet, to remind myself next year of good and bad points. But we've already agreed to stay at home next year, as we both saw all the family on either side who wer inthe country. But had our own space to relax in during those rare few minutes at a time, and our own bed to sleep in!

I have no idea if DH is working next Christmas now. He changed his job last year and we got lucky he got this Christmas off, we won't be so lucky next year!

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Biddy sounds like your feet didn't touch the ground, though I reckon you were like a swan, regally sedate on the surface and madly pedalling out of sight.

I looked back on our Christmas and thought how much it revolved round food - buying,planning,cooking and eating, and yes there was a small amount of alcohol , it was only my DH and Dsil who were drinking, the rest of the family don't (so no-one getting tired and emotional over the After Eights)

I love the cooking, my idea of Hell on Earth would be a pre-prepared M&S meal. Followed by Christmas Dinner out (or at PIL)

We're having a lazy day- back to the Real World tomorrow, DC back to school on Tues, then it's all finished for another year.

Booked our summer holiday though

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I did my debrief this morning, and made a few notes to remember come the autumn.

I haven't yet rolled over the spreadsheet, but I did finish adding in everything for 2014. I'll roll it over before the end of the month (promotion process stuff to do on work computer in quiet time - and that spreadsheet stays firmly at work!!).

I was in M&S this morning getting fruit for work (January detox!), and picked up a handful of packs of tags for half price. I still have loads of paper, so I'm not getting more unless I see lovely stuff at ridiculous prices. I did go into the posh Department store looking for lights, as DH wants more white lights for outdoors and I want another 1 string of red ones for the tree - but no joy. Oh well.

I think DH is growing happier over time to allow me to get on with the chaos and madness of being a Christmas nut, as I then indulge him by putting it away in its entirety when we are going back to work and it is not left hanging around for weeks. So I am getting to sneak in more and more things like towels, bedding for DD, mugs for everyday etc, without quite so many raised eyebrows as the year I brought out my first and (then my only) Christmas mug for tea in Christmas week! I think though that I'd like to put out the big crib next year as we haven't had that out for a few years (it takes up the whole top of the hall table).

Back at work though, and I want to retreat back into the Christmas world. (It doesn't help that I only slept for 4 hours last night). Roll on quitting time!!

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351 decorations still up in town and the Mini Creme Eggs are on sale

Decs still up here, I keep them up as long as I want but I feel this weekend is the right time to say goodbye to a wonderful xmas 2014. I have to say this year I got the presents all bar one ( shitty plasticine thing) spot on.

I have some good presents from sales forming 2015;s foundation....and some good ideas for next year, so can keep eye out for offers and sales.

Yes - easter eggs out here too so odd....but as I also have lots of easter decs...a teeny part of me is glad we have easter to look forward too.

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we have an Easter Wreath for the door and an Easter Tree (white twigs decorated with ornamental eggs), it's a lovely time of year (and IIRC quite early this year)

DH was at the Hallowe'en Tree (black with tiny skulls and yowling cats) . You'd think he'd learn

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Into the 340s

We made our own advent tree this year I had an urn I sprayed white, florist foam, white branches and made pockets to go on it from wrapping papers, looks amazing and wasnt hard....

This will also be my much coveted easter branch tree now .

I have another urn and pretty soon we shall have our halloween set up too.

I love decorating the house and marking out these different festivals and all the different c lours...

TBH I think a dream job would have been big window dresser for somewhere like Fortnum.

Someone in our street still has their tree up, with lights on 'n' everything

Hell In A Hand Cart

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Someone in my street has their tree up too!

There's still someone near me with their decs up too.

I'm still finding pine needles, I will probably still find a few in June.