Month: December 2025

And so to the final entry of the year, although today, Sunday is the 28th so I’ve gone wrong somewhere over the year!

Whilst Christmas is the big event, it’s a personal experience for our little family. We had a lovely family day, everyone loved their presents and we enjoyed a quiet day at home. The photo for Christmas Day is my table set up, simple but fun, what’s Christmas without a crocheted Christmas pudding / Lindt chocolate, a Lottery scratch card and a Santa pocket to hold your cutlery?

In the evenings preceding Christmas, my daughter and I watched some classic Christmas films. There is something magical about sitting in front of the tv with the lights on low, twinkling tree lights and nibbling on the Christmas snacks. We watched Love Actually which I haven’t see for years, it’s funny how a film suddenly feels of its time. It is still thoroughly enjoyable and is a who’s who of the ‘Brit pack’ in the early 2000s and yes Emma Thompson’s scene with the Joni Mitchell CD remains heartbreaking. Emma Thompson was in our Christmas Eve film too, Last Christmas. Another film tinged with sadness due to its George Michael soundtrack. The film is pretty sad too although as I had seen it before I was ready for the twist which I never saw coming the first time when I watched it in disbelief.

We normally try to fit in a trip to the cinema around Christmas and although we had found a film, we couldn’t fit it into our schedule. Instead when the boys went to London on a football away trip, my daughter and I went to Bournemouth for the lights and ice skating. It was a great time to see the lights, the evening was mild and dry and the mad pre Christmas crowds had disappeared. I got some great photos this time. The ice skating was so much fun, and I did progress from hanging onto the edges to being able to skate around the rink independently. My daughter twirled and looked graceful on the ice, the ballet lessons paid off!

I like to read a warm, cosy book over Christmas and the new Charlie Macksey book, Always Remember fitted the bill perfectly. It’s a beautifully written and illustrated book to cherish and keep for the tough times. It’s like a little pep talk with pretty pictures. My other read has been the absolute opposite of Always Remember but equally an excellent read. Nesting is the story of a woman and her young children trying to escape a coercive relationship, it’s a story which will haunt you.

Finally I’ve been putting a few figures to my parkrunning this year. I’m very proud to have done 51 runs, 40 volunteers and to have gotten a new PB. Saturday’s run was stunning to finish the year, bright blue skies, warm sunshine and a winter chill in the air. I ran comfortably and look forward to new adventures in 2026.

And so to the penultimate week of the year. It’s been a funny week, there were so many Christmas events last week but far fewer this week and it was a strange mix of Christmas and everyday life.

It is always a week to carefully balance life in a school. Christmas isn’t the same for all children and it’s trying to offer a little festive magic but not hyping it up too much. We did simple Christmas activities, sensory stories, Christmas songs, crafts, jigsaws and on the wet play day showed a Christmas film. As staff we did our Secret Santas after school and they were all top gifts. I got a tote bag saying obsessed with Vinted, my team know me well. The image of me above was part of our team’s Christmas card, AI was very kind and definitely glammed us all up!

At home, I had all of Christmas pretty much wrapped up last week so I spent some time just adding the nice little touches, for example creating our hot chocolate station to the more mundane of replacing batteries in some of my lights and retiming the timers. I may be a bit of a perfectionist in my Christmas decorations. I was delighted to finally find a lovely wreath for my gate. I’ve been looking at my usual favourite shops but none had anything, real, stylish and natural. By total chance, I visited a parkrun this weekend and the allocated parking was a B&M car park. As I had a little time I popped into the shop and got some amazing buys, more extras for the hot chocolate station and a wreath I loved and fitting all my criteria reduced down to £5, I was very happy.

I was at a new parkrun on Saturday morning as on Friday evening I travelled to see my parents in the West Country straight from work. My daughter and I enjoyed a Christmas dinner with them and lots of Christmas treats before they jetted off in the morning for a hot and sunny Christmas holiday. It was a quick visit but my only chance to spend time with them this festive season. As luck would have it, a new parkrun has recently started near them in Bridgwater so I popped there on Saturday to finally achieve my Gold Obsessive badge, my 50th parkrun of the year. I was so close last year with 48 runs and thanks to careful holiday timings and no injuries I did it this year. I feel that’s taken the pressure off and I know it won’t be repeated next year as I already have 4 weekends away booked with no parkruns available.

Another achievement this week was 1000 Wordle games recorded. I have played many more games but it took me a while to register, however I am very pleased to have hit the milestone.

The final picture is a hand drawn picture of our neighbour’s dog by my daughter. It has been framed now and is a work from the heart for his Christmas present. We all miss his wife so much and her dog was everything to her so we hope and know that this personal present will be very welcomed.

I have had the most lovely, lazy day today. The first day in months when I’ve been able to simply rest and potter at home, no driving! I did go for a long run this morning before the heavy rain started. It’s definitely been a day to hunker down and we’ve opened the Christmas chocolates and had a fancy mince pie. Christmas is here.

The German word vorfreude is perfect to describe this time of year, the joy of the anticipation of happy times. It’s been a lovely festive week, I’ve sung and signed Christmas songs in performances with our school choir, enjoyed a delicious Christmas dinner with my class and team and made a gingerbread house from scratch. I’ve also pottered around our town’s Christmas market before heading over to see the lights in Bournemouth. All the festive feels ..

This week I’ve finished putting up all our decorations. We did the tree last Sunday and I added my new decoration, a robin from the Eden Project. I love to have a new decoration from our year and this is from our wonderful break in Cornwall at Easter. It was a memorable purchase as I bought it as I walked through the gift shop having finished the parkrun there, one of my favourite ever runs, such a stunning location.

I put a lot of time and effort into my little tableaux over the house, the rainbow tree and disco lights in the kitchen, my gingerbread village in the lounge, my bay window lights and snowflakes and a nativity window with simple lights too. It took a couple of evenings but I am happy with the results, the house feels Christmassy, warm and welcoming. My energy levels are way higher than last week, I’ve been buzzing and doing lots of things to prepare for the season. I got a final few things in the Christmas market yesterday and am now ready, presents are wrapped and those needed have been posted today. It’s a lovely feeling, I can totally embrace the season now.

Among all the busyness this week, I had my Christmas nails done. It does not show well in the photo but they’ve been painted with a beautiful sea green opaque and are perfect for the season.

For parkrun, I went to my old home parkrun, to celebrate my friend who was doing his 250th run there. It did get me thinking that for those of us who started pre pandemic, milestones will take a lot longer. On current timings, mine will be due in early ‘27. This also made me reflect on the last and first parkruns around the Covid pause which I ran at this venue and remembering the atmosphere. The venue also got me reminiscing on the old route, running through streams on wet days, my daughter running her first parkrun, a crazy New Year’s Day run as part of the now defunct NYD double. It is a stunning course and one I really should do more often, it was a lovely, warm and friendly morning.

Saturday was full of Christmas cheer and we finished it in Bournemouth for the lights and Christmas market. It was a different setup to previous years and the traditional tree lights have gone with more futuristic designs instead. It was lovely but I did prefer the more traditional lighting of previous years. Surprisingly we didn’t have our spectacular, but v pricey, hot chocolate but ended the evening in a cosy pub instead. There was more Christmas fun today when coming home from a football tournament we saw many decorated tractors ready for the annual Christmas drive this afternoon. It’s all these little local traditions that make this season special.