The Week In-between

Christmas Day has been and gone, almost a week ago now – and we’ve eaten the gifts of fudge and chocolate!  Our Christmas Day started with our family tradition  breakfast of hot croissants filled with ham and cheese, followed by a pot of  coffee.  Then we joined friends Dot and Derek and son Brent for Christmas Lunch out at a local restaurant, The George.    With three lunch sittings, the place was heaving with people, most of them oldies out with grown children, it seemed, and some of the patrons looked so much older than us, we commented.

 

Christmas Lunch at The George

The food was certainly very tasty with plenty of variety, and I loved being able to choose delicious cooked salmon for my Christmas Lunch.  Robin decided on the more traditional beef, hot ham and roast chicken.  Finished off with Christmas Pudding and custard, so yummy.   I’m easily satisfied and didn't bother with the pavlova, fruit salad, or cheesecake.  Although dining out was very nice for a change, I think we prefer staying home and cooking up a fancy BBQ  - we will probably do that next year.  

And how about our very own Christmas Tree over the back fence?    Pohutukawa trees produces a brilliant display of red flowers made up of a mass of stamens, and is an important symbol for all New Zealanders. In Maori mythology, its flowers are said to represent the blood of a young warrior who perished while trying to avenge his father’s death. When Christian settlers arrived in New Zealand, the blossoming of this species’ bright red flowers in December and January inspired its alternative common name of the New Zealand Christmas tree.

Pohutukawa tree over the back fence

For a change, we decided to stay home between Christmas and New Year, and we are relishing the peace and quiet.  We felt quite smug watching the evening news on TV showing  long queues of cars trying to leave on their holiday trips.  Robin has done a couple of outside jobs, spraying Miss Muffet’s Revenge on the under side of  the Archgola with gay abandon .  Those spiders are very industrious so this may well take care of them for a while.  Then the canvas seats on the patio chairs got a good scrubbing, and were put out to dry.

Ad just what is my ironing board doing outside with it’s legs in the air?  It didn't take too kindly to being leaned on rather heavily and I seemed to have snapped the legs.  Once more, Robin came to the rescue and fixed it for me.

Doing odd jobs

New Year’s Eve will be a quiet affair at home this year, celebrating with a nice home cooked meal and a bottle of bubbly and something tasty for supper – that's all the excitement we need these days.  Once again, it will be good to stay off the busy roads.  Wonder if we will be able to stay awake till midnight?  It never used to be a problem when we were younger, we remember.