Christmas Cheer 3

Later on Christmas day (after initial sample of Christmas bread for afternoon tea) we headed ‘round To Roland & Jany’s for dinner.

We were there with 20 people (5 Sparks, A+E, 6 van Esch, Jany’s parents + sister + her 2 kids & friend + Tante Bab).

Back home about 10:30 pm. Steve threw up in his bed at about 12:30 am (food poisoning we think – though he was fine after that & next day). Took us about 45 min to clean it all up. That pretty well summed up the whole evening for me.

Boxing Day

Steven up earlyish and he had a decent breakfast so had no after effects. Nice sunny day outside. Chris and I went out for a walk in the afternoon to post an Xmas card for one of his friends who lives close by. The snow on Christmas morning turned to rain later in the day – so most of the snow has disappeared.

A & E came around for Boxing Day dinner. Torkey (orange zest, thyme & butter mix shoved under the skin and the two oranges halved & stuck in the bird. Some kumara & beans & gratinated potatoes to go with it (plus a Mount Riley Sauv Blanc & later a Jacobs Creek Cab Shiraz) Much more relaxing & the food was decent (and no-one got sick…). Watched the Willy Wonka film (the new one) on TV afterwards.

Sunday (Today)

More rain outside – generally blad weather. The kids were gaming upstairs. Bri & I finished painting the door frames upstairs in the afternoon. I played a bit of Risk with the boys.

Torkey pie (thanks to Aunty Mick and the Edmonds cook for that!) and home made Tiramisu. Just as good as the meal last night!!!

Just FYI – I keep calling it “torkey” in ref to the Swedish Chef on Sesame Street (oor de torkey!)

Christmas Cheer 2

Continuing the build photos of the Xmas bread…

Fruit added and kneading like hell…

The bake it off – low head for a bit to re-rise it then later at high temp to bake them off…

 

Christmas Cheer

Sunday evening – back to work tomorrow (for a day_ so I thought I would catch up with some blogging.

Christmas Day

After Christmas brunch & chatting to Mum & Dad on the phone Bri and I started on building the Christmas bread…

First mixing in the yeast etc

…Bri took her rings off first though…

 

Let the dough rise for about an hour…

Then add the marinated (rum) raisins  & lemon zest

White(ish) Christmas

After the heavy snow last weekend and some repeats during the last week – I think (not sure) that this might be my first white Christmas in NL.

Up not so early this morning – 0800 or so – and it had rained a bit last night. The snow in the back yard was starting to retreat a bit. About 0900 it started snowing for real – big heavy clumpy snowflakes (too warm for anything else). Has kept raining and snowing off and on this morning.

Short call during Xmas breakfast with Mum & Dad after several failed attempts my side to get through. Network is always overloaded to NZ on Xmas day.

The fam is currently settled on the couch watching “Up” on DVD. I’ll have a look at it later.

Later on the prog today is baking the Christmas bread (sweet, filled with nuts and rum-soaked raisins – El’s recipe). Bri just getting started on that now.

Meanwhile am considering whether to brew up another batch of Ginger Beer. The last round (#3 attempt) was better flavoured but:

• Go back to 50/50 split raw & white sugar to lighten colour
• Used less ginger and more spice last time – ok for taste but gave more sediment. Hmmm
• Brew time. 1 bottle had 24 hr (too little fizz) and the other had about 36 (too much fizz). Still need to get the yeast/brew time sorted out so that I get right fizz level. Too much and I lose too much drink fizzing overboard when I open the bottle.

Dinner tonight is at Ro & Jany’s – our turn again next year. Meanwhile our Boxing Day Torkey is busy defrosting in the garage…

Dark Days

Plenty of snow outside – and it’s dark(ish) at 4:30 in the afternoon…it’s funny how the snow glows a kind of blue colour.

‘Twas the Weekend Before Christmas

  

Quite a busy weekend – and real winter weather started in the last week. Caused quite a bit of chaos with the traffic in the last week – and with more snow on the way it could be a white Xmas…

In the meantime Steve had his Judo exam on Saturday afternoon – and gained his green tip…

Winter scenes in the street on Sunday morning

Out and about in the park Sunday afternoon – snowing steadily all the while. Back home after sleighing at the hill in the park and we decided to make a snowman. Bri put a super cool Elvis haircut & sunglasses (a pair of leaves) to make him a really cool snowman…

Ah yes – hat hair…one of those things about being out in the elements…

Sinterklaas 2009

Yet another year has passed and it was Sinterklaas again. After the great success last year we repeated the formula of table grilling and making a Surprise for each other (we drew lots to see who we had to make it for.

Below some photos of the event & the Surprises.

Steve & Rob’s waiting to get started

Chris got a big heart (with some running shorts & shirt & aftershave inside)

Andrew got a VW Kombi (with a webcam & a bottle of whisky)

Steve – a gameboy (with Spongebob)  with Lego and a PS3 Lego game

Robin got an iPhone (with a PS3 headset)

Bri not featured – as Chris had made a fake present – and hid Bri’s real surprise in the garden under the apple tree (wrapped in plastic because it was raining). She got a silver Trollbead and some nice shower cream stuff)

Here are the surprises again.