Our family: Christmas 2013

Christmas 2013 in pictures

One of the best parts of a family blog, is being able to record moments in our family’s life. Things we would otherwise probably forget, or which would at least fade in our memories. Christmas 2013 has been packed with fun, so here is our family Christmas, in pictures:

Jingle Bell Ball

Our Christmas got off to a fabulous start at Capital FM’s Jingle Bell Ball, at the O2. Not many 9 year olds get to see Olly Murs and Katy Perry live, especially close enough to need earplugs! And the Bug’s grumpy face? Totally because Daddy said we couldn’t take that polar bear home.

Elfie arrived! Lots of people don’t like this mischievous little creature, believing he looks freaky and gives stressed parents one more thing to remember, but we thrilled every morning to discover what he’d been up to overnight.

Selfridges windows Christmas 2013

We took a trip to London to see the Christmas lights. Wandering the halls of Selfridges we found candy canes, Christmas crackers, and a Truth or Dare chocolate game for Daddy’s stocking. The Christmas windows were a treat, with the biggest gingerbread village we’ve ever seen!

But it was the John Lewis windows on Oxford Street that had us most enthralled; incredible animal constructions, made completely of spatulas, kettles, vacuum cleaners and Wii consoles!

John Lewis windows Christmas 2013

Then came our own festive construction. It is tradition in our house that we make a gingerbread house every year. We began with one of those flat-pack houses, where you simply assemble pre-made biscuits. Fittingly, we found it at Ikea. But one year we tried a gingerbread recipe, and we never looked back – the end product tastes so much better, and holds the love and delight of shiny-eyed excitement in a much better fashion than the pseudo-MDF version!

Our homemade gingerbread house. Made with love, joy and festive hope

We made this one with our normal gingerbread recipe, from Good Food, but this year we used the Fairy Tale Cottage mould from Lakeland. They use it to create a chocolate house, but it also bakes well, and made straight edges that were much easier to assemble than our usual free-baked and trimmed panels.

As Christmas approaches, so does Mummy’s birthday. She claims she’s too busy to be bothered, but I wasn’t, so I did all I could to make sure she had a special day in a lovely restaurant, including tolerating my brother’s lobster-attack!

My birthday Christmas 2013

We went for tea with Santa, and asked for Nerf Guns:

Tea with Santa Christmas 2013

Parcels began to arrive – this lovely box contained cheese and Italian preserves, until we emptied it, and then it contained an altogether different kind of gift!

Finally, on Christmas Eve, this happened. Elfie was supposed to go back with Father Christmas, but we didn’t want to let him go. And it’s a good job we didn’t, because he managed to catch Santa in the act and take a photo for us!

Santa came to our house!

We’ll be having a word next year though. It appears he disturbed the Bug – how else could you explain my brother getting up to open his presents at 3.30am?

* Update from Helen: I’ve just read another Christmas 2013 post which has reminded me of the magical moments when each of my children really understood about Father Christmas. I can still remember them clearly, but I’d hate to forget in my dotage, so I’m writing them here:

  • GG was 3 years old. We were staying in a cottage in Suffolk, and her and I were sharing a room. We left a mince pie and Bailey’s on a little table just outside our bedroom. Somewhat of a cynic, even at such a young age, she hadn’t really believed it could be true, but as we crept out of our room on Christmas Day the excitement on her face was a picture. “He really has been Mummy!” How I wish I’d taken a picture,  but I was too busy reliving my childhood with her.
  • The Bug was probably a similar age, but my best memory of him at Christmas was 2 years ago, when he was 4. He is a lover of cuddly toys, and as he pulled the wrapping off a giant squishy bear his face lit up with joy. He hugged that bear tight and there it was in his eyes – Christmas magic.

I hope you have all had magical moments with your children this Christmas xxx

http://www.catsyellowdays.com

32 thoughts on “Our family: Christmas 2013”

  1. My goodness, what a fabulous Christmas period you’ve had! Loving all the pictures….especially the naughty one at the end 😉

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  2. Happy happy joy joy! Looks like a laughter filled Christmas at your place! Have a lovely new year, all the best xx

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  3. Looks like you had an amazing Christmas, absolutely absolutely love your gingerbread house! We are going to start that as of next year along with elf on the shelf but don’t think I’ll even attempt to make it from scratch!

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  4. Looks like the perfect family Christmas…make the most of GG and Bug loving every minute of it for as long as possible! Wishing you and yours a very Happy New Year x

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  5. Well that Santa looks oddly familiar.Are you sure I haven’t spent the night with him in some zipped together somewhere?…
    Looks like a seriously fun Crimbo.I hope you have found time to relax a bit too and recouperate xxx

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  6. What a fabulous Christmas, you are indeed right, these ind of posts are what our blogs were made for. Happy new year. Mich x

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  7. Great photo’s.
    I remember seeing the London Christmas lights when I was a young, the Selfidges ones were amazing.
    Happy New Year.

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  8. Goodness me you all crammed in so much! Just think of all of those wonderful memories you’ll all carry in to the new year. Hope you all have a smashing new year!

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  9. What glorious photos!

    The gingerbread house looked like a real success and I love the snap of the hands poking up through the polystyrene chips 🙂

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  10. It really does look fabulous. And I am beyond impressed with that gingerbread house, having spent 2 hours on xmas ever trying to salvage the carnage that my 3 had wrecked on our Ikea flat pack effort. Never again. Love the loo roll xmas tree … did you keep it??

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    • No, the Elf was admonished severely and the loo roll recycled 😉
      Take my advice, bin the flat pack and make your own – so simple

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  11. I absolutely love how my children, especially my oldest, believes in Santa. She is three this year and I told her that she had to go to sleep otherwise Santa couldn’t come, if she saw him it would ruin the magic. At around 8pm (1hr after bed) I had to go into her room to get some extra blankets for visitors and she quickly pulled the duvet over head. ‘I’m not looking! I can’t see anything!’ she cried anxiously. She was terrified that I was Santa and if she saw me, there’d be no Christmas.
    Love Christmas with children!

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  12. Ahhh that video of the surprise gift was so adorable! I’d love to see some ones face who had no clue he was in there.

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  13. That all sounds so lovely! And I’m definitely going to have a look at that gingerbread house mould for next year, mine turned out a disaster!

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  14. Really lovely Christmas period abd the photo of Father Christmas is fab! You’re right, a blog is such a brilliant way to capture those special childhood moments. I just wish I’d started five or 10 years earlier, there must be so much I’ve forgotten!

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  15. What a fantastic festive season you all had! It looks like you all had a lot of fun.

    And, for the record, I quite like your Elf (and I have Harry looking over my shoulder asking why one didn’t visit us!).

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  16. love those penguins! I really love the tradition of building ginger bread houses also, your’s look amazing. I can’t wait to do this with Wilf next year! xx

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  17. So much fun going on there. You wrap your Xmas tree? Genius. All of it. Glad it was a good one and all the best for 2014 Helen xxx

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  18. awww Helen yours looks like a truely wonderful and magical christmas and such a busy and fun one too. some really terrific photos you took to remember christmas 3013 forever. i did laugh at the paper round the tree and Bug in that box! and your gingerbread creations look great!
    i wish you all a very happy new year x x x

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  19. It sounds like you had a magical Christmas time. So many fun activities and memories that you and the kids will treasure forever x

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  20. Those window displays are truly gorgeous! We didn’t manage to get into Manchester to the markets and shops this year and I really missed it, maybe next year we should aim for London instead! 🙂

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