We went to Dudley Zoo today, mainly because the kids were unbearable indoors and we all had to get out!

It was bloody cold, but the penquin had a fun time!

I’ve uploaded some pictures of Christmas Day to our photo album. We didn’t take many photos and the food was so good, that we didn’t take any at all during the meal!

I couldn’t believe how tiring this year’s Christmas Day hs been. Jon ensured that we were up at 5am on Christmas morning to the shout of “I’VE GOT PRESENTS!!!!”. Very cute to see his excitement, less cute to deal with the overtired and excited child 8 hours later!

For the first time, we had Christmas at our house and invited Georgina’s Mother and partner over. Georgina did the whole Christmas dinner thing which was excellent and I did the whole pouring drinks thing which was also good. Even though I seemed to be the only one needing refills….

For Jon and Ben, we got them a wooden train set table thingy (See this picture!). Their faces, especially Jon’s, when they came downstairs and saw it was wonderful. It almost made up for the hassle of building it Christmas Eve! They also did well with other presents from family, especially their grandparents. Now all we need to do is work out how to get them to play with different toys rather than both going for the same toy at the time…

I would like to say sorry to Mum and Dad for waking them so early every Christmas Day. Now that I am on the receiving end, I suddenly realise that waking them up at 5am wasn’t so much fun for them!

On the plus side, it was sooo cute to hear Jon’s excited sharp intake of breath when he opened each present that Santa got him!

We spent this morning in Tesco picking up some jumpers and tops for Jon as he’s grown out of all his clothes. We managed to find some very nice jumpers for him this time and I’ll have to remember to take photos of him when he’s wearing them so that I can post them.

In other news, yesterday was a very social day as Nana and Sam came for the afternoon, Gill and Ben popped over with Christmas presents and then right at the end of the day, Meg and Scott turned up on their way back from Georgina’s Nana’s also to supply presents. I noticed that all these presents are for the boys though and not for me! That’s what happens when you have kids: you become incidental as everyone focuses on the little horrorsdarlings!

It’s finally dawned on me that it’s nearly Christmas! I’m not even slightly prepared yet. By that I mean that I’m not in the “Christmas spirit” if you see what I mean? Work is really busy at the moment and we have three deadlines next week and I’ve been concentrating on that more than thinking about what happens after next Tuesday.

Plans are in place though as we have a work Christmas lunch on Thursday and on Friday we are visiting Santa’s grotto with the kids. Fortunately, I have a wonderful wife whom has ensured that we have done our Christmas shopping and sent out Christmas cards etc. Otherwise, we’d be having fish ‘n’ chips for Christmas if I was in charge…

It’s December already and I have no idea where the time is going this year… Jon’s a bit under the weather with a cold this weekend. he’s got a streaming cold and his eyes and nose are running. He’s cold two tissues and uses the one in his left pocket for his nose and the one in his right pocket for his eyes. He’s quite meticulous in ensuring that he doesn’t use the “wrong” one so with any luck, he won’t get an eye infection this time!

Ben’s quite cheerful today and enjoying playing with the recently finished carboard tubes from the Christmas wrapping paper.