A White Christmas...!

Hello ... and Merry Christmas!  

The trees are still up, the fairly-lights twinkling; the piles of presents now disappeared and replaced by swirling tufts of wrapping paper & ribbon; turkey/chicken bones picked clean and round tummies betraying the post-lunch snooze .... Christmas 2014 is DONE!

And what a happy time most of us were lucky enough to enjoy.

Santa has a strange old time in London this year.  We moved into our new apartment on the 2nd December, so he didn't have much chance to get organised in Ascot.  

The apartment took-up most of Santa's budget too - which was a very welcome gift by the way..!

Mind you, he did manage a fair old pile of presents, given the financial constraints of moving (although again, once the children visited just before they went off to celebrate Christmas with their families, those piles reduced significantly...!).

Julia and I decided to have a low-key, quiet Christmas this year, just the two of us and my Mum.  

I collected my Mum at 9.30 in the morning and brought her home - and immediately dialled-up her grandchildren in Australia using Apple's 'Face-time'.  Granddaughter Sarah was with her mother, but the two boys had spent the day with their Dad and they were winding-down in the evening over there.  Beers in hand and looking well fed and 'presented'..!

It is difficult to express the joy that a face-to-face call can generate.  

Mum sat in front of the large iMac with its big screen and was able to talk to her grandsons and see them in high-definition, brilliant colour and crisp as anything.  She BEAMED...!

I said to (ex) brother-in-law Harry: "it is so easy to just be normal and allow life's little, normal things to happen - which can bring such simple joy".

Then we sat in the lounge and opened our presents, before the expertly-prepared roast chicken was consumed and a bit of quiet TV was watched (despite the slight snoring which may have occurred...!).

And now we look forward to the new year.  

It is freezing cold outside at the moment (snow up north and temperatures below freezing outside here). Tonight is due to go down to about -5 deg ... luckily we'll be wrapped-up warm and enjoying our little nest.

The little Robin is about and some daffodils are already raising their heads (a few even flowered, although this week's temperature may have taken them out..!).  But we have passed the mid-winter solstice and can start looking forward to 2015.  

The possibilities, the opportunities ... Spring isn't too far away.

In the mean time, wishing you all a very festive (remaining) holiday season and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.

Cheers!

Festive Cheer!

Today is the 12^th December and Christmas once again approached, bearing gifts and goodwill, like a benevolent M&S Fairy trailing sparkles and fairy dust.

December will always be bitter-sweet … we lost my Dad in December three years ago.  Every year we celebrate his life with my Mum, sometimes with an early Family Christmas meal (complete with turkeys, silly hats and party games) but this year, having just moved into the new apartment, we went low-key and took my Mum to see the movie Paddington.

For all of you who are children at heart, this is a movie for you.  His little bear face, innocence and love of marmalade will set your heart strings humming and you cannot fail to simply `feel good’. 

My Mum was SO excited and she was completely caught-up in the wonder-world of `the bear from darkest Peru’ for almost two hours.  

If I was of a mind, I might be tempted to think the old man was manipulating us and making sure Mum wasn’t too sad.  He of all people knew how she loves such child-like fantasies.

Anyway, today is also my last day with the current contract - with Thames Water, the largest water utility company in the UK.  Hooray … time for a break and away from the politics.  

Don’t know how anything gets done sometimes with all the posturing, manipulation, backstabbing and nonsense ….  but I’ll be sad to say goodbye to some of the team who are really lovely people and deserve so much better!

 It does allow me to focus on the new apartment though!

As readers will know, this has been a long time coming. We started planning to `downsize’ in February 2014.  We sold our house in Windsor in April/May, but a combination of legal issues (the actual house boundaries did not align with the registered Land Registry plan) and lazy/tardy lawyers (not ours!) meant that the process was drawn-out so that we ended-up only moving into the new apartment on December 2^nd 2014.  A ten-month process, but it was worth every minute of that…!

Our new home is a penthouse apartment in Ascot, about four minutes’ drive from the famous racecourse, with its own roof garden (not much use at the moment, aside from providing a snow patch in which to keep wine chilled..! But will come into its own in Spring, with a lovely BBQ/Braai, outdoor dinner table and separate chill-out seating area).  

The main room (Lounge, kitchen, Dining room) is a large, open- plan area and the installation of the new speakers (that I bought myself as a present earlier this year) provide a sumptuous, relaxing area.  

I just pour myself into the couch, turn on some good music and chill.  Lovely - one of life’s great pleasures!

Mum & the children are suitably impressed and wander around with amazed looks on their faces. For a girl of humble beginnings (from her family’s little terraced house in Luton), my Mum sometimes marvels at the journey she and her family have taken over the past 80 years. 

She really loves the new apartment and couldn’t be happier for us.

So, on to Christmas, once the decorator has finished painting & some of the `statement’ wallpaper has been put up …. the big pile of presents under the Christmas tree will be reduced as children visit us ahead of the actual Christmas (one is going off to a country Manor House in the Cotswolds, the other off to SA for a bit of sunshine) and Mum, Julia and I will be left to celebrate a quiet Christmas by ourselves. Low-key, very relaxed, lots of telly and nibble-food (no great big roast). No need to dress up, travel, or obligations to do/talk/listen/perform…!

I shall be enjoying the sound system though, even if it is Michael Bublé singing Christmas songs…!