For the first time in sixteen years, we didn’t host our family Christmas. Our daughter Heather and her husband Ian invited the nine of us to theirs for the day and it was lovely. Our just-one-year-old grandsons Seb and Gabe were in toy present heaven and were great fun and well-behaved, even going down for a nap at the same time for the final hour before we ate. I sat at Seb’s bedroom window while he fell asleep, drinking in his lovely wide view over the River Plym estuary.
Ian did a fantastic job of producing a big Christmas dinner for the first time. My Everything (my wife, that is) Janette and our daughter Bev helped during the morning, but he’d prepped well and everything went like clockwork. He’d had the turkey roasting on a low light since 10pm Christmas Eve. They placed Janette and me at the ends of the table, each of us with a grandson in a highchair beside us and his mum on the other side of him. The boys talked to each other in delight and chuckled all through their messy finger meal, and kept us all giggling with their wide-eyed, gravy-smeared antics.
Our daughter Jackie and her husband Ashley said they want to host us next year. Their place is a modern flat in a converted Napoleonic naval engineering college. It’s nice and airy but has nowhere near as much room as Heather’s house or ours. I’m sure they’ll make it work somehow.
My day at Heather and Ian’s came to an end quite suddenly at 4 in the afternoon when I slumped like a landslide. I’d been horribly ill for the past week and we weren’t sure I’d make it there at all, so I’m glad I lasted that long. Bev and Janette poured me into the car and got me home, where I was in bed and asleep before the cup of tea Janette brought up to me had cooled enough to drink.
We had a lovely day! 
How was yours?
I do hope you’re doing better, David. My Christmas was very quiet and peaceful. I did get LOTS of baking in. So all was well.
Thanks, Maripat. I’m submerged under the flu right now.
Glad you had a pleasant Christmas.