Solstice Tidings!

We had a lovely day yesterday - we got up quite late (10.30am).

We opened our pressies - two amazing hampers, one from Ds brother Mike, and one from Ds sister Carolyn. We had to stop ourselves from diving straight in!

I went to walk Margarets Scottie Dog as promised at about 11.30 - she lives next door to us, is elderly, has just lost her husband of many years, and is waiting for various joint replacements to take place. She cant walk very far - even the steps up to the back garden are an endurance for her, so every few days, i take Oscar for a little walk up or down the road.

Oscar himself is an elderly gentleman, and is rather set in his ways, including telling me exactly where to cross the road! :-) He walks along, stopping every few yards to sniff another interesting smell, small tail wagging gently.

I think Oscar and Margaret are grateful for my help, and also for a bit of company, although Margarets children visit on a regular basis and take good care of her. I enjoy being able to help out.

Lunch

Douglas took me to a rather nice cafe/restaruant he discovered recently called "The Milestone"
I had 2 tapas dishes.. mini potatoes in a tomato paprika sauce, and a goats cheese and something tarte. Douglas had a burger. The best bit was the deserts.. i had this amazing chocolate pud, it was like a chocolate brownie that melted in the middle, was bitter but sweet, set off beautifully with some ice cream on the side. (I think I could die in this pudding!) Douglas had a cherry pie, which he loved. I tried a bit and wasnt impressed, but then I'm not horribly keen on cherries!!

The Afternoon/Evening

My parents still dont have a working cooker - they are "camping out" in their kitchen using a portable two ringed cooker afair (Baby Belling) and their microwave. The electrician cant wire their new cooker up for another week or so.

We invited my parents round for dinner, so the preparations started.

Douglas had marinaded the beef with red wine and herbs, so that came out, went on its carrot trivet, and into the oven on Gas mark 2 on a very slow roast. (makes it tender etc so ive been told!)

I got a load of potatoes ready to roast, (put rosemary and garlic in to make them very tasty) prepared the sprouts, made Yorkshire Pudding batter and put my nut roast into the oven underneath Ds meat.

Parents turned up about 6, and we had a sumptous meal! We had a Tesco red bowl Xmas pudding to finish with. Yum.

We ate and chatted, Billy came out of the woodwork and impressed the parents by being cute, and at about 9pm they staggered home, rather full!

Gifts

We went to Waitrose a while back, and got some nice wicker trays, and filled them up with some goodies to make two hampers, one for Les Parents, and one for my little brother & wife, Thomas and Kt.

We gave the parents theirs, and they were very pleased, as we had tried hard to pick things both of them liked.

It was really nice to surprise them - they have done so much for us over the years, helping with our various houses, and spending hours doing various DIY jobs and generally being very good parents. :-)

Next Xmas we plan to go up and see D's side of the family, and Im sure we will cook for them, and have a lovely time up North.