The Nigel Slater Christmas Chronicles Readalong 2024 Part 2

[RainbowZebraWarrior]

Welcome all new and old friends.

The journey continues.

The rest of our house is not so spacious as the hall! It's a very odd design and freezing as the hall way creates a sort of central atrium of chilliness that pervades the rest of the rooms.

I think Terry Pratchett had it right!

Dh now also poorly and dd has hurt her neck somehow-slept oddly on it maybe- so she's phoned me from her room to get her a hot water bottle. Not much sleep here. Hope you are ok @RainbowZebraWarrior I can see you have also been up in the small hours...I have always had awful insomnia and it's worse when I'm poorly. I will be like a zombie tomorrow!

Sorry to hear it is spreading @piscofrisco but hopefully some consolation in house prettiness.

@RainbowZebraWarrior hope this is soon sorted and you’re comfy.

I fell asleep as soon as I got back yesterday. Today and tomorrow tend to be my steroid bounce days so there is some sewing and blocking to do, as
well as knitting the start of a garment for dh to check on sizing (I pretty much style it out on garment sizing, even though I follow a pattern). This is from my stash as an artistic attempt at tidying up.

Hoping that dh and ds get the tree down today or tomorrow. We don’t talk about what the treatment side effects do at the weekends - vertical hold is a bonus at that point!

I’m putting on some freezer croissants and fresh coffee. Wafting the lovely odours across the thread.

I love your wool colours @Bimblesalong...I'm saving for wall colour inspo.

Thanks @piscofrisco this is my “stash box”. The lady who designs the wool is called Marie Wallin. She also designs the colour work patterns and these are a work of genius. Her website is too tempting!!

Crafting/ piano all makes it well worth the cold mitts strategy I’m using to counteract neuropathy which can be a side effect of my treatment (which can result in damage to and loss of fine motor skills). As well as wearing an ice cap (cold cap) to stop the medicine circulating to the roots of my hair, saving as much head hair as possible, I wear frozen mitts and socks to safeguard fingers and toes. When it gets challenging I put myself back into my childhood memories of walking back from sledging in the deep snow back home, head, fingers and toes frozen from the fun but exhilarated from the tremendous time - as well as exhausted. There was a brilliant selection of sledging hills in a park area that dipped down to a stream - the whole town would congregate there in the snow.

You are made of stern stuff @Bimblesalong I'm full of admiration. And what a beautiful thing to be visualising to get you through it. We had a similar sledging hill in the Peak District village I grew up in. I was lucky to be able to take my girls when they were tiny during the big snow of 2010. We arrived at my parents on actual Christmas Eve and were able to go sledging with the whole village. It was truly Magical.

I've been busy this week so been skimming a bit but got up early this morning to read todays chapter with a coffee and a puppy snuggle on the sofa - the dark chocolate spice cake sounds amazing!!!! Has anyone made it? @piscofrisco @Bimblesalong @RainbowZebraWarrior thinking of you all - @Bimblesalong hope you get to enjoy a good couple of 'up' days your wool colours are beautiful! x

Morning all.

@Bimblesalong your wool basket is stunning. Hope you have a good couple of days. Tolerating that cap and the gloves and socks must be an incredible challenge. Your way of thinking of childhood snowy memories is a real testament to your positivity. Keep channelling x (I have some neuropathy in my hands associated with my EDS so hope you avoid)

I talk every year of making the dark chocolate spice cake as it looks divine. Realistically, that's not going to happen before Christmas this year, but I'm hoping for some baking time over the holidays.

Haven't slept. Mostly just binge watched everything Nigel has available on iplayer (quite a bit at the minute) DD is now ill with a cold / flu virus and was awake crying at 2.30am needing cuddles and paracetamol. Mr Darcy has come down with cystitis again (the vet suspects it's the stress of the Christmas tree) They all sleep in and on my bed anyway, so I'm lying here with one either side of me feeling grateful that I've been a comfort to my two babes in the night.

Need to get up and take the car for MOT. Thankfully, just in the village, then straight back home to DD. Won't be able to pick it up till teatime which actually lessens the stress for me now as DD will be off school. Got a couple of things that will also need to be cancelled now to allow a bit peace and recovery time for the household.

@piscofrisco everyonesending hugs and solidarity from my household to yours x

Hope everyone has a good day. 19 days till Christmas!

Gah @RainbowZebraWarrior what a day eh? Hope you both get to nap.

I am tempted by the chocolate spice cake. I wonder if part of it would freeze well - ds2 is off to networking events for a week and dh is coeliac and also eschewing cake for a while. I leap at the opportunity to make something “fully leaded”. I guess a nice alternative will be to make a full cake and drop portions off to friends’ doorsteps as I’m unable to do much socialising indoors at present (immunity is compromised and other side effects make planning unreliable).

let’s hope we’re all ok for the big day!

Your snowy visualisations sound VVN @Bimblesalong - literally embracing the cold. Good luck for today. Adding some festive photos from La Maison du Roy, a Christmas decoration emporium in Passage Jouffroy which is open all year round. DH proposed in the Hotel Chopin at the end of this Passage so it has special memories for me.

@LillianGish that's looks right up my street!

Sorry you didn't sleep @RainbowZebraWarrior it's the pits. And love to DD. I wonder if she has what we have and it's doing the rounds-time of year for it I suppose. DH has as always gone one better and is throwing up as well!

I was meant to be getting my hair done this afternoon. I've been saving up for it as I was having the full works, cut, colour change, some sort of miracle glossing treatment, blow dry. Hair looks like silage currently. So annoying!! Not that I'll be going anywhere for anyone to see it at this point I suppose so that's a mercy!

I'm so sorry to see so many people here have fluey illnesses enter their homes. Bimbles I hope you have a good weekend after your treatment - I love your coping mechanism for dealing with the freezing icecap and mitts.

I asked ChatGPT the other day to compare Copenhagen's weather with my Scottish area. While Copenhagen is slightly colder in winter, we get more snow and rain and fewer hours of daylight. Yet we don't do the hygge thing in winter! I think we are missing a trick!

Lillian those photos are so exquisite - like something Nigel would take

I really enjoyed your photos too, @lilliangish

@RainbowZebraWarrior @piscofrisco @bimblesalong and any one else I have missed who is having health woes, I hope you feel better soon. I haven't been feeling great either, but lovely GP seems very quickly to have got to the bottom of it. The NHS gets so much criticism, but it does actually work a lot of the time.

I have decorated a bare tree in the front garden with lights. It looks pretty, but I need some more lights for the middle bit. Might post a photo when I am happy with it!

Wow @LillianGish those photos! ❤️

@piscofrisco I was also meant to be having hair and treatment etc at 10.30 this morning but cant face it and cant leave DD that long. I've just dropped the car in the garage, then round to the hairdressers and shoved some money at them to pay for it, apologising profusely and shuffling out backwards looking like an urchin (Pyjama bottoms, snoopy sweatshirt and bobble hat, anyone?) The shame!

Still, it is done and I am back home to rest with DD while I await the dreaded MOT call later this afternoon.

@ClaudineChronicles hope you're also feeling better soon. Please do post a photo of the tree. Outdoor lights is my favourite thing ever. My cleaners son is coming to do mine on Saturday.

@MovingCrib I also thought the same about Copenhagen weather versus ours. I've been quite shocked, really as I've been checking for weeks (due to go in 15 days). I was all ready to buy full-on ski wear and thermals when it's no different to Newcastle mostly. I do feel now that embracing the hyyge is the way to go.

Oh yes the weather is very similar to Northern weather here. It's unusual to have snow (they did have quite a lot last year!). You mostly need to dress in layers and a good, warm scarf and hat is a good idea.

Sending healing wished to all those who are feeling ill. I can guarantee, at 3:26pm on Friday 20th December, I will start coughing. It's like clockwork, the minute I break up for Christmas.

I had a fabulous, MNVN (maybe not very Nigel) day yesterday, including putting up some outside lights, making Christmas rock cakes with the children (they have both taken one each to school today), decorating the Christmas Village (porcelain, some of the houses are from my childhood).

The children then had a Christmas picnic, whilst watching the Muppets Christmas Carol, and, once they were in bed, I made a bay wreath. Thank you so much for the instructions, earlier!

I love the Bay wreaths. I'd never seen one before this thread. I might attempt one if I get time.

I don't join in much, but I do read every day and I just love the camaraderie on this thread. Much love to all who are suffering.

@Seasidebubbles thank you for the tip to help repair the children's stockings. I did them today and it worked really well. It stabilised the fabric and I feel confident that they aren't going to rip when I stuff them. Best of all- no sewing! (Well I did a little bit- DS2s santa stocking has been without eyes for about 12 years. I found some embroidery thread and did some little French knots and now Santa can see again. )

@MamaWeasel -love the name! Life takes over and I don't always find the time to post (I'm on leave this week which is why I've been about a bit more) but even dipping in to read the thread can lift your spirits. Now, while you are here, I've broken open the Christmas cupboard- fancy a treat? I highly recommend the Lidl cream Truffles, but there's a bit of everything in there- sweet, savoury and even some alcoholic. It is celebrations today chez Bob as DS1 passed his driving test.

Ooooh yes please, I'll have a cream truffle, thank you! Congratulations to the young Bobber!

Very many congratulations to young @BobBobBobbing indeed. I've enjoyed a dark chocolate and ginger florentine in celebration!

Lovely wreath @WeMeetInFairIthilien

DD and I have been dithering about what to feed ourselves this evening. After going round the houses and trying to muster some energy, I've just rang up for some Chinese food to be delivered.

The weather isn't looking too great, so hope everyone is suitably warm and cosy.

I've been making (very simple) gift labels today. NVN most likely, but it was a lovely cosy activity with a coffee and a Christmas film on.

Eta the blue ish ones aren't finished yet, they need their black dotted outlines.....

Nice and easy chinese sounds like just the ticket when you need all your energy to get better.

Beautiful homemade labels seem v Nigel to me. I'm madly jealous of people with all kinds of arty, crafty skill. I have the vision but lack the co-ordination skills. My fingers just don't take instruction. DD is the only one in the family with fine motor control and is a decent artist and cook. I'm trying to gently pull her into the ways of Nigel...

A lovely wreath @WeMeetInFairIthilien, and sounds as if you had an enjoyable day Hope everyone who was ill yesterday is feeling a better and more relaxed today. Pleased the stockings will last for a few more visits from Santa @BobBobBobbing, and ‘yes please’ to the truffles (must get some next time we’re in Lidl)! Your gift labels are lovely, @MamaWeasel, how nice to have a specially made label on a gift. Enjoying reading about everyone’s making and doing!

6 December

A tale of two polenta

Our family tree contains centuries of blacksmiths, gunsmiths, silversmiths and metalworkers. In what sometimes reads like an episode of Peaky Blinders. My grandmother worked in a dairy, delivering milk by horse and cart. A single Mum, she brought up a daughter and four sons alone. (My grandfather died aged 32) I knew her only towards the end of her life, when she was bad tempered, contrary and exhausted. Visits to her house were memorable, if only for the tin bath hanging by the coal-fired kitchen range and my puzzlement at being in a house without an indoor bathroom.