Well, school awaits the children in the morning and for me a lovely big pile of new yarn and my trusty needles are calling! The weather was mild today and Toby rediscovered the joy of being outside and bouncing on the trampoline – thankfully using up some of that bundled up energy!

It was lovely and gave me some breathing space so I sat and sorted through my old portfolio of illustration work. It’s funny looking at it all now as I’ve not painted for years. I’m not sure I’d remember how to paint these days. Maybe one day I’ll pick up my brushes again.

If you’re interested in seeing any more of my paintings I’ve uploaded a selection over on flickr. I was really grateful for all of the kind comments that you left me
about some of my work that I showed in an earlier post – thanks for all
of the compliments.

I’ve begun to look forward to the start of term! I love all of the excitement and magic that comes along with christmas but now it’s all over the children are just restless and suffering from a bit of cabin fever. Keeping them both occupied is not that easy – they both have such different needs and poor old Toby just can’t bear being outside when it’s dreary, cold and wet. So it was lovely yesterday to have a change of scenery. Amy and I joined the others from her ballet school and headed into London to the Royal Opera House to see the Nutcracker.

It was wonderful! I have taken Amy to the ballet before but she was only 4 and she  didn’t really appreciate sitting still for so long. Now that she’s a sophisticated 8 year old she found the whole
performance riveting and I think I spent as much time watching her face
as I spent watching the performance. To see her so entranced was a
really precious thing.

We didn’t get home til midnight so today we’re having a pyjama day and listening to a CD of Tchaikovsky’s music – all in all a good end to the christmas hols!

I hope your Christmas was a good one and you ate, drank and had a merry old time. We certainly did and our Christmas day, despite getting off to a shaky start thanks to Toby’s lack of sleep, went well. We’ve visited family and friends and are now back home and able to play with all of our pressies!

I got a cold for christmas – not my favourite present and I’m hunting around for the receipt to see if I can give it back!
Failing that 3 very large whisky hot toddies tonight might do the trick! I did also get some nice presents and had to show you my favourite one which is from my husband and (luckily for him) came beautifully wrapped and ready to give.

And inside was the lovely Hortense (dingy winter days don’t make for great photos – you get a better look at her here)

I’ve long had my eye on all of the wonderful creations over at Sweet Nellie but I no longer have to admire them from afar now I have one of my very own to cherish! She even arrived with an extra cute little party hat which she will don tonight to see in the new year!

So from Hortense and me – very best wishes for a very happy and healthy New Year!