I really shouldn't have got up....

J is away for work and I have been feeling particularly unwell with a cold.  I awoke this morning late with the dulcet tones of Him Next Door shouting up the stairs for us to get up ringing in my ears....  Now groggy I staggered about doing the normal morning chores and threw myself in the shower.  So far so good.

Off went G8 to school and Him and Her Next Door to town without a care in the world, leaving me on my own with Gran and Topsy. 

The scene is set.

Just as I was going out the front door, balancing a three quarters cup full of coffee on a small tray Gran shouted for me... oops the whole lot tipped over onto the sideboard in the hall and dribbled down the back of it.... it all seemed in slow motion but I still couldn't stop it.  Five minutes later after unpacking 50 bottles of wine from the top of the sideboard and moving it out to mop up behind it, I opened the front door to throw the sodden kitchen roll out and Topsy decided to chase the post man -  **** dog. 

I remembered Gran. 

She told me she had dropped her water tablet for today, it's the size of a pin head.  Eventually I found it. 

It was now 9.20. Late for work and I can't use the traffic excuse!

Starting again I went out the front door and with a deep breath made it all the way to the office door, second time lucky surely.  Balancing my tray and carrying Topsy so she wouldn't escape again, I fumbled with the office key and just got the tip of it in the lock, Topsy wriggled, I loosened my grasp and it dropped.  Today of all days it fell between a gap in the decking.  Expletives here.  Luckily I have an old wire coat hanger, but I'm not good at fishing at the best of times.

As you can see I made it into the office, late, very.  But here.  I really should have stayed in bed.

Wales rules!

I received an email from G8's language teacher, an extract follows...

I would like to invite you to take part in a new project that the Language Centre has in partnership with Menter Iaith Sir Benfro (Pembrokeshire’s Language Enterprise) and Bwrdd yr Iaith (The Welsh Language Board). The aim of this project is to offer sessions for the whole family to help you assimilate with the area. By providing these sessions we hope to give you a better understanding of the linguistic nature and traditions of the area, which will in-turn, benefit you as you support your child’s education.

What a welcome (albeit a bit late in our case).  The first session included a task where we were asked to list what we think of when we think of Wales; rugby, sheep, singing, red dragons, castles, beaches, farming, community, going back in time, the language etc etc.

We listened to Max Boyce at a rugby match and found out about some local history.

I really can't wait for the food tasting session to come.

When I travelled round the world, one of the girls I travelled with was Welsh and she did the whole flag waving bit - ALL the time.  I understand now, the culture wrapped around her as she grew up gave her so much pride in her roots.

One little session has made me feel quite patriotic and proud to be Welsh, and I'm not Welsh, but if this inclusiveness continues I hope they might adopt me soon.

Grans in trouble again...

(WARNING: probably best not to read whilst eating!!)

Apparently her raised loo seat doesn't fit properly. It gets a lot of use. Her Next Door has been religiously cleaning Gran's bathroom and carefully fitting the toilet seat back on each time - now to be told that this is not worth doing as "it's always loose" has upset Her Next Door somewhat. She feels her efforts have been in vein and that Gran needed only to tell her.

The cesspit also got blocked (again) and poor Gran was accused of flushing too much toilet roll down her toilet. Blaming Gran was due to the fact that between both Him Next Door and J who tend to rectify the cesspit blockages and Her Next Door and me who organise the shopping lists the rest of us are known to be pretty green with our cleaning\washing products and also very careful about what goes down the toilets in the first place. As we haven't had any guests since before Christmas and couldn't blame them, Gran became the natural scapegoat.

This is an urgent matter as I'm sure you can imagine, to help put it in perspective Gran uses her toilet around 80 times a day.

After a few attempts by Him Next Door and J to try and clear the back flow it was decided we needed more rods as they appeared to be a few feet short. This is not by any means the first time we've had a problem, so I am still somewhat at a loss after being here over two years why Him Next Door or J did not think of purchasing enough in the first place, i.e. to be prepared before the next emergency arose! Obviously they never joined the Scout movement.

J and I rushed off to the shops. Not what I had been planning for Saturday morning.

Armed with more rod length the men tried again but after a few more goes decided that the pipe must have collapsed, they said it felt like they were hitting a brick wall. Out came the pick axe and spade, they dug in the place where roughly they deemed the problem to be and had between them decided to break the offending pipe to find the problem.

Her Next Door and I did not think this was one of their best ideas and voted with the telephone. We phoned someone - anyone who would come out on a Saturday afternoon and requested they visit with cameras and jets to diagnose and clear the problem.

With £120.00 ringing in all our ears Him Next Door and J pushed a little harder on the rods and POP, all was well. They believe because they've never had enough length of rods until now this problem had been building up - so to speak.

Him Next Door duly filled in the hole that they had dug to reach the pipe. I came along and saw he'd missed a bit and topped it up with the remaining soil left piled around it. Much neater, lovely and level. I was told in no uncertain terms that the hole was by design, ready to plant a shrub! Doh. I'm also in the dog house - with Gran, again.

No Milk, No Post & No School

Ummm and no 4x4.

We've been snow ridden for coming up to a week. Being slightly more remote than we had been used to, getting our essentials is not at all guaranteed.

Luckily we have enough oil for a few weeks and loads of logs - so we are keeping warm at least.

J though will start growing horns if he does not have a supply of milk for his coffee. He should really think about an intravenous drip. Perhaps we can go direct to the supplier and milk the cows at the farm next door.

No post = No bills. Sound.

No school, well at least we have childcare 'on site' to help us out a bit (one advantage of multi generational living) and G8 is of course happus iawn. She likes school very much but snow is WOW.

A drawback to working from home though is that unfortunately I can still get into work. Damn. I tried to come up with a convincing excuse; too cold, path much too slippery - but they didn't wash with J. He just turned up the heating and brushed the path. Rotter! I'm considering an Employment Tribunal.

To celebrate the snow J has been building a sledge out of our old kitchen cupboards. He says it's for G8 but we all know the truth. Men never really grow up. We have some wonderful slopes we can walk to in the dam next door. A veritable playground.

Wheeeeeeeeeeee.

Find that inner child.

Christmas traditions

I think each family has a unique Christmas but made all the more special in the knowledge that something similar is happening in other homes all across the world.

Here are some of our family traditions - how similar are they to your own?

G8 opens her advent calendar from the 1st December - little wooden symbols to hang on a Christmas scene. Now the dog has to have one too (for heaven's sake!) although hers is of the chocolate variety.

The three of us; J, G8 and me go to choose the Christmas tree for our house - it takes a bit of ooing and ahhing and how big is thating before we can all agree on the best one. Once home the smell is gorgeous and fills the room. G8 and I decorate, we're as happy as Larry and it can take hours of faffing. We have a fairy on top.

In Christmas week we go to Church, which in our case is at the bottom of the garden. This year G8 is in the play with the Llysyfran Mummers and there are refreshments, including warm punch afterwards. There are also games and a Welsh concert party by ALAW. Bendigedig! Donations are going to Shelter Cymru's Christmas Appeal this year.

Christmas Eve we prepare a (rather large) shot of whisky & a mince pie or two for Santa and a carrot for Rudolph. Then we all have to work out which chimney he is going to come down - each year since moving we've had the same discussion. I assure G8 it won't be the Rayburn as he'll burn his bum, likewise the wood burner. Instead it'll be the one we don't use in the dining area. Here we then very carefully lay out all the wares ready for Santa's night time visit.

A newer, more technological tradition for our nuclear family has been tracking Santa using http://www.noradsanta.org/ Great fun - there are also lots of Christmas games for all who are young at heart, try it!

Finally, it feels, we pack G8 off to bed - relief. To wind her down beforehand we read Christmas stories in front of the wood burner with oodles of hot chocolate for all.

Once G8 has given in to sleep we spend our time scurrying around, drinking whisky, eating mince pies and Topsy Dog helps with the carrot now. It's hard, but someone has to do it.

We pack G8's stocking up with little goodies, including a small orange. We believe this represents the gold that Father Christmas first dropped when coming down the chimney and which had been luckily caught in a stocking instead of being lost in the grate. Did you also know that green was the traditional colour for the British Father Christmas (remember in A Christmas Carol the Spirit of Christmas Present?) It was Coca Cola ads that ''popularised'' red as the color of Santa's suit in 1931. I learnt that last week in Chapel (our neighbours had invited us to a family service. It was really lovely and we met Santa, although not the "real thing" of course - he only comes Christmas Eve).

First thing Christmas morning G8 bounds in to our bedroom, we've tried to get her to look at her clock and not to jump on the bed before 4am! This year we've installed a fibre optic tree in her bedroom, which lights up at exactly 7am, do we have any hope that she'll wait for this before leaping on us? My guess is nope, not a chance!

G8 opens her Christmas stocking in a frenzy on our bed... this is my favourite part of the day really... it's so cosy and it's a joy to watch her face.

We have always trooped over to Him and Her Next Door for the big event - nowadays we don't have to get wet and de-ice the car, we can just walk down the back corridor and there we are! Santa has usually been extra busy here. We start with a Bucks Fizz, yum and G8 is the elf for the day reading the labels and handing out the presents. We have always done one gift at a time - as part of the joy for all of us is the giving, seeing what others get and watching faces light up (or drop on occasion!) It takes longer but I think it's important for G8 to realise that giving is just as lovely as getting.

Of course we then eat way too much, drink a little more and collapse in a heap of exhaustion at the end of the day. But for the magic of Christmas for the children (of all ages) it really is worth it.

Christmas comes but once a year

thank goodness.

The great writing of the cards started early this year as I knew all would be chaos with the kitchen half done... It's very tempting to do a round robin on the PC but for some bizarre reason I ritualistically hand write notes in all the cards where I haven't seen someone in a while.

It can take some time and I get hand ache as I never use pen and paper really at any other time of the year... except perhaps to write a cheque or a note to myself, but nothing of any substantial content.

My Christmas witterings to others is mainly inane rubbish, I gabble on not in the least sure anyone is at all interested (bit like this blog really!) But I insist on doing it every year.

I get constant interruptions from (in descending order) G8, the dog, J, Her and Him Next Door. I end up making silly mistakes; love from Me and the dog - hmmm, Benblydd Hapus, Dear Joan and Joan - the list is long. Unlike the PC I can't undo my mistakes without leaving a trace that they were ever there, I have to either cross it out or start again.

This year we had a lovely card from Viking Direct, now I have never been round to the Viking Direct's for tea lately so I am not sure regarding the return card whether to write a chatty note or just Happy Christmas from all of us. Modern etiquette is a minefield.

Between Her Next Door and me (I think J managed to write one card so far - and he said he might just do mine) we have kept the local postman in a job. We needed a bag to get the cards to the post box and a loan for the stamps. We try hard to grab visitors when they come to take some home with them, but there is a limit on how many we can do this way.

Someone who will remain nameless (but you know who you are), always sends Christmas cards from her work's franking machine. This brings back memories. When I worked at the bank someone got caught out doing that when a card got returned - address unknown. All the staff were called together for a group dressing down and the offending card was waved in front of us as a deterrent (we all tended to sneak the odd card in and they knew it)! Not quite in the politicians league but it stopped me dead - I am such a wimp. Now in any case I haven't a franking machine within a hundred mile radius so it's back to the stamp.

After finishing the cards all I've got to do now is wrap the presents and decorate the tree - what a doddle!

Gegin Fach

Her and Him Next Door used to have a large kitchen and separate dining room.

Now they have been reduced to an open plan kitchen, dining, sitting room. They get under each other's feet. Sometimes I fear they might kill each other as the cooking area of the kitchen is Her Next Door's domain whereas the dishwasher is fiercely defended by Him Next Door. Unfortunately the two areas overlap; occasionally when Her Next Door is dishing up and Him Next Door is trying to put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher - there can be clashes.

Raised voices and underhand sniping. Looks which could kill.

On the positive side there is less to clean.

Her Next Door has always been a keen cook and enjoyed making meals for others. Before we moved we used to pop round to Him & Her Next Door's home on a Sunday for (wait for it...) Sunday lunch and a few lazy drinks in the afternoon. Things have changed. We now share the cooking between the families for four lunchtimes a week. Her Next Door and J each do two meals per week, Monday through to Thursday. Friday and the weekends are left free so that we can do our own thang! We initially used to eat our cooked meal in the evenings but we found we drunk way too much red wine and Gran doesn't like to eat late - so it got moved to lunchtime instead.

Both Her Next Door and J enjoy cooking, and when anyone asks Her Next Door whether she eats out much she always replies yes, at least twice a week. They compare cookery notes and have had great fun learning to use the Rayburns.

We try to buy less from the large supermarkets. Him Next Door grows all our vegetables through the summer months. We have a farm a few steps up the road where we get our pork and beef from, we know all about the pedigree of the pigs and cows and even get to watch them rolling about in the mud or grazing in the fields. Our eggs are supplied by a friend who has a smallholding. We still get our milk delivered from a local supplier. We've acquired the odd fish from the reservoir on a bartering system, i.e. you gut them and you can keep half. All great really and part of the reason for moving.

It's not all roses. Sometimes we have to eat lettuce for days on end, you can run out of ideas very quickly for different ways to serve the stuff. I am not the greatest red meat fan, yet we have to find room in the freezer for a whole cow and work out how we are going to eat it all. Good job we have lots of visitors to devour the excess!