I love Christmas! I honestly do. I love the twinkle lights, the smell of all the food (and the taste!) and the fact you purposely arrange to meet up with friends you haven't seen for a while. However, there's always so much pressure around Christmas.
I am a stress head (and hot head according to Marco) at the best of times but over Christmas this was intensified by the fact I wanted everything to be 'Perfect'.
I set the dinner table on Christmas eve and any time Marco walked into the dining room, I followed him to make sure he wasn't messing up the table. I put a ban on anyone coming into the kitchen when I was cooking Christmas dinner and I can not count the amount of times I hoover up the tiny specs of dust.
I have no idea why I was stressing so much. I know I wanted everyone to have a lovely dinner - and thankfully it all turned out well. I'm sure if I had burnt the potatoes or over cooked the vegetables no one would have really cared.
Marco said he wished we had gone out to a restaurant for dinner as he could see how stressed I was and I always snap at him. I know it's the age old classic of taking it out on your nearest and dearest but it's not fair.
Christmas should be about everybody being together, being relaxed, laughing and having fun. It doesn't matter what presents you receive or even where you are so long as you're together.
Aside from being a stress head, I did really enjoy most of the day. I loved giving presents to everyone and usually I'm pretty good at buying nice presents. I made a slight error with buying my Mother 4" heel shoes which she can't even stand in, let alone walk in. But other than that, everyone seemed to like my presents.
Everyone ate most of their dinner. My portion sizes were huge! And for some strange reason I dished up an additional plate by mistake. There was plenty left over for a certain pooch.
Shiloh had the biggest Christmas dinner! I think he ate more than all of us and he promptly crashed out on his bed with a food baby growing in his belly.
Next year I will change a few things. For example, I will not buy a real Christmas tree at the end of November and not water it for weeks and expect it to survive. I will also not do a food shop order from Asda and expect to get everything I ordered.
Hopefully we can go to Italy next year. I'd love to do it as a surprise to Marco's parents. We can hire a car and drive from the airport to his father's shop and surprise him there. I think he would be so happy!!
I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and enjoyed spending time with your family and friends. At the end of the day, making special moments together is far more important that any present you can receive (although I do love my Burberry Scarf).
My beautiful scarf from Marco.
All of us at the dinner table.
A cute family shot.
Much love and kisses,
Becky
xxx