Was That It?

Well, that's Christmas over for another year. Back to work today, yippee!

Mind you, we had a pretty good Christmas. Christine was working the morning shift, so she wasn't there when the kids got up but tradition was maintained. No-one was allowed into the tree until we all had a cup of tea and had woken up a bit. The girls had already opened their stockings which Father Christmas had left them on their beds. One of the presents they had were baseball caps with lights! Lots of fun, which meant I couldn't have a lie-in! Jayne had been incredibly excitied during the last week and it was amazing she survived!

The girls and I, with our cups of tea, went into the tree and opened presents, - and what a lot of presents there were. However, we all saved one present to open when Christine came home. Breakfast, then dressed and ready to cycle up to Church. The weather was great. Blue sky, bright sunshine and cold and frosty air. Really beautiful, and the Church was lovely and warm. Bethen served the wine.

After Church, we cycled up to Haigh (pronounced Hay) Hall and apart from a few dog walkers, we seemed to have the world to ourselves. The girls had the swings to themselves, and when they got fed up with them, we went to the Hall and looked out over a mist-covered Wigan. There seemed to be something magical being there on Christmas Day. From there it is a fairly steep hill down from Haigh Hall to the Leeds - Liverpool canal, which, when you're free wheeling, you can get a really good speed on, - so much so, my eyes started watering. We visited our favourite little bridge on the canal, which has now been re-surfaced making cycling over it so much easier. From the canal, we cycled back towards Wigan to Top Lock and the Kirkless Hall pub which had a warming, strong Christmas Ale on tap. Sitting outside, the canal looked really good in the sunlight with mist rising and gently swirling above the mill-pond like surface of the water. Unfortunately, you will have to imagine what it looked like from my description, because, like a wazzock, I forgot to buy film for my camera!

When we got home, Christine arrived back from work and we opened the rest of our 'prezzies, after which, we started getting the meal ready. No turkey and all the trimmings for us, we had a fusion Chinese/Indian/Thai meal which was really tasty, did not take long to prepare and did not leave us bloated. After that we just chilled in front of the TV for the rest of the day.

Boxing Day and the 2 subsequent Bank Holidays were very similar. While the east of the country was getting a belated white Christmas, we were bathed in blue skys, bright sun and freezing temperatures which gave the world its own special type of beauty.

Three days to go before New Year's Eve; - can't wait!