December 27th and 28th 2025

On December 27th my mum and stepdad left our house, where they'd been since Christmas Eve. My mum says it's a very nice hotel and she will be back! Haha. It was so nice to have room for them. We had leftover pastries for breakfast. 

Then my cousin Peter arrived about 12.30! He had been in Leicester with the rest of his family for Christmas, and was coming to us for New Year. We were pleased to have him visit for so long, but had warned him that we both needed to rest (2025 was a hell of a year!) and wouldn't be doing much. We planned lots of downtime watching films on the sofa, and Peter was fine with that.

He and Lee headed to Tesco for supplies and I sat with Kiki on the sofa. Then we watched several films and played games and just hung about with each other, which is one of my favourite things to do with Peter! It was a chill day after the chaos of Christmas.

On the Sunday we had made plans to go to Leeds to see our friends Leanne and Adi in their new house. Peter was fine to come along with us, but he decided to go to see his parents who were on holiday somewhere near Bakewell. So we set off separately. 

Leanne and Adi's new house is lovely and we just sat and chatted. We had some picky bits to eat. I admired Leanne's huge collection of York Ghost Merchant ghosts, which is huge! I have four and I love them, so it was nice to look at them all. 

We got home around 4.30. I had worn a comfortable dress as I was quite in pain so I didn't want anything complicated. It's a summer dress really but with leggings underneath I was fine.

Peter was already at home, having taken a spare key, I had promised him that we could do some crafting while he was here, so we did some soap making. Most of it turned out fine but we had some problems with one of the batches. It still smelt nice though. We left it all to dry until the next day. 

We ordered Indian food for tea which was delicious, and then again we just chilled and watched films for the rest of the night. 

Kiki has turned into such a cuddly cat since we moved into this house. She still doesn't like to be picked up, but she does come and sit on me a lot when I'm snuggled under the duvet on the sofa, and she often sleeps on me overnight. Too cute! 

Peter making Poppy stand up like a penguin

Leanne's amazing ghost collection. I love the silver polished one

Making soap

And here's my dress - as I said, really comfortable was what was needed!

Boxing Day 2025

In my family, Boxing Day often looks exactly like Christmas Day only with more leftovers and a bit less stress. It's always lovely, and we always have a good time. We had a slow start to the day - I needed a shower - but had breakfast and then made lunch again for about 1pm. I made cauliflower cheese but the sauce didn't really thicken, but it was fine. We had bunches of leftovers to eat. 

Then in the afternoon we went to the pub! This was my suggestion but I think I might have started a new tradition! I wanted to do it now we live in Penistone which has several decent pubs, so I persuaded everyone else. We wanted to go in the brewery tap place, which I haven't been to yet, but it was packed full so instead we went next door into a pub that's alright. It was busy but we got a table and had a drink. It was nice! Lee took a quiz book so we asked some questions and enjoyed ourselves. It was a nice change. 

Kiki was sitting on me a bit in the afternoon which is always nice. She often sleeps on me, too. She's getting more cuddly as she gets older (she turned two in January 2026 so she's little still). Lee was wearing his new Die Hard t shirt that my mum gave him. I was wearing one of my favourite Scarlett and Jo dresses which was my first one; I love the prom dress feel of it with the netting underneath and so on. 

I had ended up with three different types of Irish cream before Christmas so my stepdad and I sampled all three of them just to make sure they were nice!

It was a nice, chilled day. 

All four of us sitting round the dining table when we had lunch

Kiki with her little feet tucked in

Lee's new t shirt, it's funny

The Irish cream sampling party

And finally my dress and tights just before bed

Christmas Day 2025

And so it was Christmas Day! I love Christmas and really wanted this one to be lovely in our new house, and it was. It was quiet with just the four of us, but lovely. We were up and ready by about 10am I guess, and had breakfast first. I had got croissants and nice pastries and stuff. Then we went to open some presents. 

I got lots of lovely things, including this pit check from Dodworth colliery. We used to live in Dodworth so I'm so glad to have this! My mum also bought me this RM pin badge, which obviously must have belonged to someone who worked for Royal Mail, but as those are also my initials I'm glad to have it! My mum bought me a printers tray, too, which I'm going to put on the wall and fill with lots of lovely things. I just haven't quite decided yet where to put it. Lee bought me a voucher for a spa in the Lake District so it will be nice to go back there later in the year. Oh and Jacqui bought me the Bluey hot chocolate set - I love Bluey, all my friends know this now which is borne out by the fact that Sarah bought me a Bluey blanket for my birthday!

We had our starter at 1pm, we had pate and cheese and things on crackers. Just nice things we all like. Then we started cooking our main course. Lee and my mum had faffed over a turkey but as I don't eat it I just didn't really pay much attention. I also decided to just have stuffing for my dinner rather than buy a nut roast or something. I never really enjoy it so I had stuffing, Yorkshire puddings, all the vegetables. It was lush! I think the table looked pretty good too. 

We opened more presents after lunch and just chilled out. We had some dessert at some point and had wine and so on. It was just a nice day. At some point I put my pyjamas on but before that I had been wearing this dress from Simply Be - although I think it's one of the brands - that I often wear at Christmas. It's fancy but comfortable and I really like it.

The sky was quite clear later on so we went outside to look at the stars. We got quite a good view! There's not a lot of light pollution around here so we decided we will definitely make a date over the summer to lie in the garden and stargaze!

I found this cup at the back of the cupboard and pulled it out as it was festively themed!

The NCB pit check from Dodworth Colliery, what a thing to own! 

The dining table at lunchtime, it needed to be extended! 

Lee got me this Bruce album on vinyl too 

My Bluey themed gift 

In this gorgeous dress before I got changed into my pyjamas

RM badge

Oh I did one book swap this Christmas instead of loads, this one was organised by Gwen and Janet but my partner turned out to be my friend Sarah Beth, so that was cool. They sent these gorgeous books, all of which I am looking forward to reading

Orion later on in the evening

And another constellation, not sure which it was 

Christmas Eve 2025

The few days before Christmas were a bit of a nightmare - things happened at work and I ended up sorting it out and staying there ages on the Tuesday, so I was glad to be off work for a good while after that. Lee had to work Wednesday morning but I just hung around the house. In the past few years Lee and I have been out for lunch on Christmas Eve and I was keen to carry on this tradition. It just sets the tone for Christmas in some way for me. It is nice to just spend the time with the two of us before seeing tons of people over Christmas, and it gives a nice ending to the busy-ness of working before and everything. So I had booked a table at the Waggon and Horses which is a lovely pub in Oxspring. It's really close to where we live now, and I had been there for craft club Christmas dinner a couple of weeks before this. Lee likes their Yorkshire puddings so he readily agreed.

We got there about 1pm and shared some Yorkshire puddings to start with. I can't remember what I had for mains, I am really failing as a blogger here and didn't take a photo! Oh well, it was delicious. We got home and I made my lemon cheesecake. It is famous in our family for being delicious and it's even been featured on TV! Sometimes it doesn't quite set properly but mine all looked amazing and set perfectly. I ended up making three as there was a lot of mixture, but I knew they would get eaten. One of the amazing things about our new house is that our old fridge lives in the garage and I usually keep it full of wine and other drinks, but it helped at Christmas to have space for puddings and so on. 

My mum and stepdad arrived about 3pm I think. They, like us, were excited to spend our first Christmas in our new house! We helped them unpack everything and then we just relaxed. We had all had big lunches so we had just bits for tea, and lemon cheesecake of course. We unpacked all the presents round the tree. One of the great things about this house is the size of the living room. It's huge, but also somehow feels really cosy? I love it. It was especially cosy with a Christmas tree in it. The tree was new and it's massive! Katniss claimed one of the presents for herself and slept there for ages, so cute. It was a nice, relaxing day. 

I ordered this Yule log from a woman locally and she delivered it while I was at work I think. It was basically just ganache inside with some brownie bits, so very rich. I only had a bit but Lee liked it and my cousin did too

The Christmas tree. Our living room is on the first floor of the house and has a Juliet balcony. We need to cat proof it but when we do I'm looking forward to having these doors open in the summer. The tree looked gorgeous!

My nails for Christmas were an OPI mini in a lovely glittery red, it lasted well and was very festive

Yorkshire puddings for starter

The hearth in the pub - which is a really old building - had this gorgeous decoration. It was so cosy and lovely

My cheesecake was a success! 

My mum and stepdad had been on a cruise for my stepdad's birthday and they bought me these tiny crocheted earrings, aren't they so cute?

And finally here's Katniss on one of the presents as we relaxed in the evening

Weekend in Durham Day #2

As I said previously, we were up in Durham the weekend before Christmas visiting Lee's family. We stayed with Lee's dad and stepmam, Mary, so when we woke up on Sunday morning we had breakfast with them and sat chatting with them for a bit. Then Lee's dad Michael had booked us a table at Il Cancello which is an Italian restaurant in Beamish village, near the museum. We hadn't been before but I generally like Italian food, so it was fine by us. 

I can't remember what I had to eat at all, but I know it was nice. It's over a month ago so I really don't remember! After we had finished Lee's dad and stepmam were rushing off somewhere else so we said bye to them and then went back to Lee's mam's house for a bit. It was less crazy there than the day before with just six of us there. It was nice to see them. We didn't set off home very late and we got home quickly. I had a relaxing bath with a festive bath bomb, which was nice!

I've got both outfit photos in this post because my last post was long enough without me adding to it. On Saturday I was wearing a dress from Yours that I've had about a decade. It's black on top and then a mint green skirt with black patterns on the skirt; I love this dress and wear it a lot! 

On Sunday it was a bit more of a casual outfit - I got this top from Sainsburys just before Christmas. It was in the sale so was only a few quid. I like the peach colour and the sparkles. Then I got this cape type jumper from there too. It was great to put on over Christmas, it has a slight sparkle in it. My skirt used to be a dress and I wear it a lot because it's easy to chuck on. 

Oh I was wearing these earrings at the weekend too. I got them off Vinted and I'm not sure I would have bought them if I'd seen them in person first because they are quite big and heavy. Cute though!

Here's the Yours dress I was wearing on the Saturday, I must wear this more

In the restaurant on Sunday with Lee's dad and stepmam

The fog came in while we were in the restaurant, we couldn't see a thing! We got to Lee's mam's safely though

A new peachy top with sparkles and three quarter length sleeves, and a skirt that used to be a dress

And with the caped jumper on top

Weekend in Durham Day #1

As usual, we went up to Durham the weekend before Christmas. I swear it's only about six weeks since I wrote this post for 2024, but nope, the year has passed incredibly quickly and here I am posting about Christmas 2025. I've got quite a lot of posts to catch up on and I'm hoping to do that soon, but I've also been working a lot more so I'm behind. 2026 has already started at a lick but I'll get there!

We set off on Saturday morning, but not early as we were tired and wanted to take it steady. We set off just before 11 I think. The travel was fine, we stopped to pick up coffee, and we got to Lee's mam's house at about 12.45. A lot of people were already there so we just joined in the party! Our friends Paul and Lianne are always invited too, so they came not long after we had arrived. Lee's mam had made vegetable curry and rice and a bunch of other things. What I ate was delicious! 

There were 24 of us in total I think, it was mad. A lot of us ended up upstairs where Lee's youngest brother has a dartboard and karaoke set up and I was talking to Lianne, my sister in law Libby, and Daniel's new girlfriend Macy. We hadn't met her before so that was nice. 

A couple of years ago we started doing Secret Santa for all the adults in the family to simplify things and it works really well, so we swapped presents for that. Lee and I had asked for a new toaster and kettle in a lovely teal blue colour, so we were pleased to get those. I also got a bottle of champagne and a book - Libby was my Santa and so she had chosen well for those! I'm not sure what else Lee got. Lee's mam had also done stockings for all of us which was cute, they had some nice things in! 

Lee's stepdad was making cocktails, I don't even know what they had in them but I kept drinking them all the same. They were nice! I took a million photos with everyone like I do, all my nieces and nephews just put up with me now. I also took a picture of Bev with all her kids. It was a good day! 

We always stay at Lee's dad's over in Chester-le-Street so we headed over there quite late and chatted to them for a bit before bed. 

Sparkly tights and one of my pairs of Dr Marten Chelsea boots which are basically the only things I wear in the winter

Listening to some music on the way up

Buffet spread

And a close up of some of the buns that Gemma had made I think

When I asked Gemma for a photo she wanted to do this Myspace angle...

...but here's the photo I would have taken. Her jumper lit up, it was fun 

Me and Lee's sister Kim and Libby, Andrew's wife. Yes it's a big family! 

Me and one of my nieces, Caitlin

Lee and his brother Chris, they're very similar looking

Another of my nieces, Tillie. I don't always get a photo with her - which is fine, it's totally up to her! - but this year I did. I loved her jumper!

Lianne, Paul's wife. I'm sure she's never sure how she ended up with all of us when she married him, but she did!

Poor Daniel on his own dartboard!

My stocking, Bev had them all hung up her stairs which was cute

Me and Paul

A vodka sunrise I think, no idea but it tasted nice

And something blue. I don't know, but it was definitely blue

Sat around chatting 

And again

My third niece Leah

One of my nephews Bradley, I didn't get the other one but he was there

Here's Bev with all her kids 

And finally one with Lee's stepdad in too!