From all of us to all of you...

​The Christmas season always starts early here – (usually the previous Boxing Day when we get our next year’s cards in the sale) – Mid December is Chris’ birthday and usually starts our Christmas fun! 2017 was no exception with a packed weekend of planned birthday fun followed by our usual quiet family time at Christmas. This year brought the added bonus of a family cold being passed around and lucky old me started with it the day before Chris’ birthday weekend. Determined not to stop the celebrations, I sniffed my way through a delicious meal at Randall and Aubins. We were first time visitors and will definitely return. Lovely food and surroundings but we were most impressed with the knowledge and integrity of the staff with our waitress suggesting we skipped our starter as she felt it would spoil our enjoyment of our main. The meal was exquisite and we watched in fascination as table after table enjoyed champagne and oysters (we are wimps - what can I say!). There was even a champagne and caviar bar – just ring a bell to get your serving!

We followed our meal (with a few paracetamols and some fresh tissues…) with a trip to the Bridgwater Hall to enjoy the Halle orchestra and their amazing choirs. The smartly dressed red shirted children’s choir were a joy to watch and listen to. By this stage of the day my cold had descended into one of those where eyes and everything were watering. Sincere apologies to the audience members sat close. We’d skipped buying a programme for the concert not realising the words to the sing a long parts were in it! Neither of us realised how little of the words we knew to some very famous carols! Cue lots of miming.  Next stop was check in at our favourite hotel, Innside, and our plans for the evening involved food at the markets and drinks wherever! Sadly, I was now feeling pretty rough and Chris’ Birthday treat was me asleep from 7pm and the Strictly final for him! Sorry! Being up on the 10th floor of Innside meant he had some amazing views to keep him busy.
​The next day we had a lovely family lunch at the always delicious Ashfield House and the weekend ended with a family trip to see the new Star Wars. Sadly, I missed that too! Gutted. Still haven’t seen it so no spoilers please.

Thankfully Christmas saw us all in good health and, after our traditional three generational (and dog) baking session we enjoyed a lovely few days all together eating, drinking, playing xylophones and throwing snowballs at silly hats. Oh, and Christmas Eve I bought all our Christmas cards for 2018!
Merry Christmas everyone.