Countdown to Christmas 2023: get past the post-Christmas slump by thinking about the next one! (Thread 1.)

[NoWordForFluffy]

364

Morning (just)!

I failed at eating yesterday which meant I got blotto far too early and wasn't well. Oops! 🙈

But we had a great time anyway and I avoided having to tidy up!

Countdown to next year is go go go! 🎄🎅🏻🎄🎅🏻🎄🎅🏻

No cheesecake yet. Think I'll do it in the morning now. I'm exhausted.

Our boiler has decided it doesn't like working. Sigh. Hopefully the engineer will come out to see it soon. He only lives across the road, diagonally opposite!

We live a ten minute walk from Dobbies, Tribe. I might go and look.

Our kids were christened as babies. It's nice your DD is interested.

@NoWordForFluffy She's been interested since this time last year, we're not regulars at church, but we did say that we would leave it to her to make a decide, and it's entirely her decision so that's that!

I guess I need a new dress 😊

why sorry to hear you are still in pain. Hopefully your consultant's appointment will put you on the path to recovery.

Fluffy busy, busy, busy as ever. Have a great celebration meal. I love roast lamb.

Crazy feel better soon. Your Christmas trip sounded magical.

Tribe all 3 of mine were christened as babies. I'm pretty much a lapsed churchgoer now although I definitely felt a bit of a pull at Christmas. You certainly need a new dress.

Apologies to anyone I've missed and welcome to anyone new.

We are fully de-Christmassed apart from one small slice of Christmas cake and that will probably be history tomorrow.

I have cash from MIL to spend. I'm tempted by a fabric sale with a view to making a Christmas quilt. I know I'm pushing at an open door here but should I go for it?

We've been in quite a while & had jacket spuds for tea. I think I needed something fairly plain, I've eaten more than I have all week. Starting to feel the effects of being out all day now though.

I'm pleased with my start on next Christmas though. As well as the book for dd2, I also got her a HP pencil case (she regularly breaks them 🙄) and a pair of nice looking Capricorn pens in Primarni. Not much to be had in the make up section atm though.

Also bought some paper bows since we used the last of the foil ones. They were all of 10p.

Just thinking about a shower now, then settling down to look for nice 16th birthday decorations for dd1.

Oooh, some of you might have seen my update of my alcohol shelf last year. I wanted to display some vintage glassware on it, but most of mine is broken and mis-matched. I found these in the BHF shop for all of £2. Not sure how old they actually are, but they're very pretty & make me smile.

lucysmam I've got some beautiful Sherry glasses that we bought from a Christmas market before DD1 was born - so they must be 30 years old 😱🤯. They are a very simple shape but have been painted with red and blue glass paint. I bet someone with a steady painting hand like you could add a beautiful festive trim to some plain glasses with glass paint.

I have cash from MIL to spend. I'm tempted by a fabric sale with a view to making a Christmas quilt. I know I'm pushing at an open door here but should I go for it?

😊😊😊 Do you really need an answer?

Do I need fabric? Always yes
Do I need yarn? Always yes
Do I need that cross stitch kit? Always yes.

Woolly, now there's an idea! I shall have a scroll for inspiration over the next few days and then lurk around the charity shops/Ebay/Vinted for suitable glasses. I had some glass paints, years ago, goodness knows where they might be now though 🤷‍♀️ suppose I'll look at those too...such a hardship!

The only possible answer to your question re fabric is clearly, yes!

Tribe, you most certainly do need a new dress.

70 between us we are almost a complete pain free body 😂

We are making a good start on Christmas on this thread, I think we have surpassed ourselves.

351

Morning!

I had relatively good sleep last night. I took an old amitriptyline which do seem to have good results. I've a telephone consultation on Friday for NCS referral, so I'll ask if she'll prescribe more for me, so I have a current prescription.

I need to get up soon and get productive. Tricky!

Attached is the pain-free Why / 70 mash up. 🤣🤣

That is an incredible mash up Fluffy. Not sure how much I actually want to look like that mind 🤔🤣

Morning! We had a good day yesterday got home around 10:45. The drive took about an hour longer than it should have to get there due to the horrendous rain and train strikes meaning more traffic.

I need to go to Tesco today as I forgot some bits and pick up my car. Plus some housework. Maybe a nap…

I've made some Christmas purchases, £5 on six rolls of xl 10m wrapping papers and two boxes of crackers from Argos, and £60 for 30 stocking fillers from Claires using a 20% discount code. I can justify the reduced price, £150 full price wouldn't have been on the cards.

Has anyone seen any other good offers on Christmas bits or stocking fillers? I'm looking at not really spending more than £2 per item on stocking fillers, five kids aged 2-14 years it really adds up quickly. Anything minecraft, roblox, xbox, friends, wednesday/nevermore academy, toddler fillers especially.

I've had a busy few days trying to get the house back into order (not just Christmas chaos!) and restocking the fridge/pantry. Managed lots of cleaning and some sorting. And cooked some nice food for a change - including tomorrows dinner ready to just throw in the oven as DH and I both have to go to the office (unusual for us nowadays).

Dd has been very busy back at hockey - the keeper who is only playing indoor due to pressure of work got injured at work so DD was called this afternoon for a match tonight - she happily went along despite a Cup match yesterday for the ladies team and 1st of 3 trial sessions for national team this afternoon ! I don't know where she gets her energy! (But it may mean a poor parent teacher meeting this week at school as she's so busy with sport...)

Off to bed now and hopefully a decent sleep - but it feels like a Sunday night that I haven't done my homework...

Just checking in, no Christmas prep yet but we did get a puppy yesterday. A cocker spaniel 12 weeks old so she is still settling in but she she is such an adorable little thing

350
Hope your car is ok (and your bank account wasn't hit too hard) Wreck

Busy day in work (isn't it always 🙄) so it's all boring here.
Most exciting thing today is that my wrapping paper storage bag was delivered this morning 😂 which is excellent timing as I popped in to town again yesterday and ended up picking up 4 rolls of bargain Christmas paper

I also finished a cross stitch Christmas card yesterday (started because I wanted a small project, not sure if I'll send it to anyone though) - quite proud to have one half done project complete on my list!

I feel like this is the only safe place to say I've done 80% of my Christmas shopping for 2023! 😂 got some lovely festive Yankee candle gift sets from the reduced shelf for DM, DMIL and DH nanna this morning 🙌 and with the exception of DH and his DF (because they are IMPOSSIBLE!) I know what everyone else is getting, although there's only 10 actual gifts still to purchase

Also picked up my wrapping paper in card factory and all the 'special' cards, all at least 50% off marked price so am happy with that!

@Mommabear20 that did make me laugh and well done to you. I'm also cracking on with the xmas presents for this year. Bought 4 Sara Miller at Portmerion frosted pines trays reduced from £17 to £9 and some festive mugs thought i would do homemade chocolate stirrers, mugs and trays sets for some presents. Diet started today, need to lose the half stone gained in December :( then will probably start looking at Summer holidays :)

Almost tomorrow! <sneaks in>

Busy day!

Almost finished my current cross stitch, finally. And finished watching season 4 of Strike (which is amazing; some are directed by Susan Tully, for us oldies who watched Grange Hill, or Eastenders!).

I bought make your own cracker kits today, plus raided Rex London for fillers. Sleep now.

349 Morning. Finally had a good nights sleep so feeling good and refreshed today. Why can’t my body do this every night?

Can’t believe how organised everyone is being this year. At this rate everyone on the thread will have finished shopping by August and spend until December fighting the twitch

I can’t bring myself to watching the Strike series Fluffy - I’ve listened to them on Audible and they’re read so well by Robert Glenister that I think sewing anyone but him in the role would be all wrong.

Will be finishing my second project of the year tonight - I’ve made a scarf for niece out of chunky ‘mermaid yarn. Yesterday I made pockets for it so tonight I just need to attach them and sew in the ends.

I am scaring myself with how organised I am Crazy 😂 it was so much better last year not waiting till December to do it all though, so now I have gone the other way it seems.

I can buy for my little ones for Christmas but I have to leave my older ones until I get an idea of what they want. I was ok last year as my boys wanted a ps5 for ages so I grabbed one in the summer but this year will be harder

At the rate we're crafting we should have a pre-poncing thread 😁 my Pinterest Christmas Craft board is getting bigger by the day.

I bought a few knitting kits from Aldi last year, I'm doing a scarf and hat for DD and a hat for me. I just need to finish off a couple of other projects first....

I’ve ordered some socks for stocking fillers.

I've not bought anything really as yet. But I generally buy as the year goes on, as I see things which appeal. And I've not put any effort into looking yet.

DS is generally predictable (he's autistic, so likes what he likes. DD throws more curve balls our way!