Sunday, January 4, 2009

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to everyone... I hope you've all had a lovely time over Christmas and the start of the New Year.

I'm officially back now, and my mum (or "Ma" in Afrikaans) is also back in sunny South Africa. She arrived here in the UK on the 26th and flew back a couple of days ago on the 2nd. We had such a lovely 7 days relaxing, shopping and keeping busy in the kitchen. Ma helped me make marshmallows which I hand out to the neighbours, and we made a delicious pie from the leftover turkey and gammon after Christmas. It was lovely to have Ma help in the kitchen and I thought I'd share some photos from our 'holiday'. I don't yet have all the photos, but as soon as I do I will put up some more.

We collected Ma at Heathrow early (very early) morning on Boxing Day. We decided to indulge fully in the festive spirit and dressed up in our Santa Suits. A really good idea we thought, until we arrived at the Heathrow arrivals terminal and realised that there were plenty of other people there dressed normally and already over Christmas. One lady came up to us to tell us that her son said "I didn't know Santa had a wife!"... bless him! At least Ma thought it was funny an grabbed her camera to take this picture of two slightly embarrassed and tired Santas.

We took her straight home, this is the first time Ma saw the house and met Banjo! She loved both! (Even if she looks a bit serious in the photo)

We then sat down for a movie while Mr Laundrybasketcase got busy in the kitchen making us a very good Christmas lunch. He does the best roast potatoes!

And that was just the start of our holiday! I'll post some more photos of the foodie stuff we did in another post.

So, have you all kept up your home keeping routine over the Christmas period? I'm glad to say that mostly I did, the only thing I totally and completely neglected was the ironing. So today, I had to suffer the consequences, and spent about 5 hours ironing away. At least I got to watch some TV as I went along.

Have you got any New Years resolutions? I've decided to keep mine simple this year, I only have three:
  1. Wear more dresses (I'm sick of jeans and trousers everyday - it also means I get to go shopping).
  2. Do more yoga.
  3. Read more Afrikaans books.
The third resolution I decided upon is an important one. Although I was pretty much bilingual from about 6 years old, living away from my home country has meant that I don't speak much of my mother tongue, Afrikaans, anymore. Although I still speak Afrikaans to my family on the phone, and I have an Afrikaans magazine subscription, I'm not often exposed to it anymore and as a result I often get a bit tongue tied when I switch over into Afrikaans. It's such a privilege to be bilingual, and I never want to lose the confidence to read and speak the language I was brought up in.

Have you got any New Years resolutions?

Ironing is not on my New Years resolution list because it's just something I need to do.
But I'll be doing a post soon about Ironing - how to do it faster, more efficient and what the best ways are to get through a load quickly. I certainly need to learn about this myself!

Have a great 2009, and I hope to catch up on every one's blogs this week.
x

8 comments:

Lesley (Notesfrommydays) said...

Happy New Year to you!!!! I have to confess to letting my cleaning slip but will be back on track this week when the children back at school I promise! I have been doing DIY stuff though which is part of my new years resolutions to get all those little jobs around the house done!!! i want another christmas lunch now after seeing yours!! my hubby makes fab roast potatoes it must be a man thing?!
Lesleyx

MelMel said...

Your home is lovely, enjoy your family time!xxx

Debbies-English-Treasures said...

Hello sweetie,
I`m so glad that you had a lovely time with your gorgeous "Ma"!
And you two make the most gorgeous Mr & Mr Christmas ever! Lol
I truly understand about the language thing...
I`m okay talking in Portuguese to my mum and other member that I see regularly, but then if I have to with strangers... for some reason I just start stuttering and the words don`t come out!
And if I try to right in Portuguese... I`m having trouble with that too!
So I`m thinking to start visiting Portuguese blogs often... to try to refresh my "dumb" memory... Lol

Speak to you soon,

Love,
Debbie Moss

Debbies-English-Treasures said...

Sorry... I meant to say write...
How " dumb" am I???

Janey Lee Grace said...

Hiya
Fab blog !
thanks for linking to my site http//www.imperfectlynatural.com I'm sure theres lots we can link up on ! Are you a member of my lovely forum
Happy n3w year
Janey Lee Grace

Yogihan said...

Wow, Hi Janey! I'm so excited to get a comment from you, I'm a big fan of your books, and I'm still planning on doing a book review of your Imperfectly Natural Home book on my blog. Since reading Imperfectly Natural Woman I've made so many changes, hence why I don't promote the use of bleach and chemicals for cleaning on my blog.
Thanks for popping by!
PS: Yes, I am indeed a member on your forum! And I get your monthly emails.

Victoria - Florence and Mary said...

I love that you dressed as Santa at the airport!

Victoria xx

Tinyholder said...

Bunjo is gorgeous, I love greyhounds they make wonderful pets! Love the santa suits too! :-)

A note on perfection

Many of the posts featured on this blog are about doing household chores the correct, or so to say perfect way. My intention is not to make readers feel that the way they are running their households are wrong. So if making the bed, or ironing shirts in a certain way doesn't fit your lifestyle, do not feel guilty about it. But by learning the correct way of doing things it might just come in handy for those times when special guests are staying, or when you need to iron that shirt perfectly for a job interview. So enjoy the learning, but skip the guilt and LOVE your homes. x

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