Christmas in the UK

Will and I had a good trip to Will's folk's place on Friday 19th December, first catching the airport bus from Heathrow to Oxford, then a small local bus from Oxford to Standlake. Very conveniently, the bus stops directly opposite his parent's bungalow 'Arden'. We had a lovely couple of days/nights catching up with them. It is always nice seeing 'our' bird table that Will's dad built for us when we were living in the UK, but unfortunately we weren't able to bring back to NZ with us. It's nice to know it gets lots of use at Arden.

On Sunday we drove to Claire and Mike's place near where I used to live in Wokingham, not far from Reading. I had briefly caught up with Claire for an afternoon/evening in London, but hadn't seen Mike yet, and Will hadn't seen either. Nicola had also arrived, having travelled there after a wedding in Wales that weekend. Claire and Mike got married in August so we had a lovely evening catching up and celebrating their wedding.  

 

They have a beautiful greyhound called Dylan, so we also enjoyed catching up with him!

 

Mike was on chef duties for the night, whipping up a very tasty curry dinner...

The next morning we caught up with Stephen and Kate, friends of ours from Bearwood College where I lived and worked for 6 years. It sounds like there has been a LOT of change at the school over the last couple of years, so it was good to catch up on all the news. The school itself still looks the same, as grand as ever! The flag poles have been added since we were last there a couple of years ago.

After our Bearwood visit we headed into Reading for the afternoon. Will caught up with one of his old Reading University colleagues, then we had an enjoyable wander around the shops. Considering it was only a few days before Christmas it wasn't actually that manic.

That evening was another nice chilled one at Claire and Mike's. Will takes his job as my personal pedicurist seriously and sorted me out with glittery gold sparkly toenails, perfect for our upcoming adventure in Vietnam. Mike decided he also wanted to get in on the action so Nicola sorted out his nails for him! He actually wore it to work the next day too, which is pretty brave for a builder!

On Tuesday morning we dropped Nicola off at the train station. Will and I then drove to Potterne, near Marlborough to visit Will's half-sister Nemmy and her family for lunch. I had met Will's cousin Max before, but hadn't met his brother Hugo, so that was really nice. They live in a lovely old country home, complete with boating lake. We went for a walk after lunch with Ramsey, their boisterous black lab puppy. Ramsey loves swimming and spent a lot of time retrieving tennis balls from the lake!   

After lunch we then drove to Stroud to catch up with Rhian and Beccy who I played rugby with for 6 years at Reading Ladies. They have two gorgeous twin boys. Some of you may remember the super cute photos of Will holding the boys dressed in bear outfits a couple of years ago? Well, Otis and Xander are now 2 and a bit, and little blond bundles of energy. Once the boys were in bed we got some take-out Indian for dinner and had a very pleasant evening catching up, before driving back to Oxfordshire.

The next day was Christmas Eve and we spent a relaxing day with Will's parents before heading into Witney to have dinner with Will's brother Andy and family. The kids are now 12, 10 and 8, so have grown up a lot in the two years since we last saw them!

Christmas Day was also very relaxed. It was just Will and I and his mum and dad, and involved copious amounts of food! Turkey with all the trimmings, followed by Christmas pudding with brandy butter for dessert. Will was in charge of carving the turkey.

Will's dad might be a few days shy of 90, but he can still get excited about opening Christmas presents!

Christmas evening we had a really nice Skype chat with mum and dad back in NZ (where it was Boxing Day morning). It was lovely that they got to see and chat with Hugh and Sanda, and get bit of a tour around the garden room and kitchen.  

On Boxing Day Andy and Jo and family came around, and we did Christmas all over again! Here is James rocking one of his Christmas presents. I think he wears it well!

 Katie enjoyed making some balloon animal creations from one of her presents.

 

Ellie has gotten into knitting in a big way, and she is pretty good at it in a super short amount of time! This is a teapot cosy that she knitted for Sanda as a present.

We tried to take a nice family photo of the kids, but had to battle James' mischievous streak!

This one didn't turn out too bad though...

The Browne family were rocking the Christmas jumpers!

The next couple of days were nice and chilled, making the most of our time with Will's parents. On Sunday night we had a bonus visit from Nicola which was lovely. We walked across the road to the local pub for a very nice dinner (duck, yum!). It was great seeing her again before we left. It's pretty tough when you only get to see your good friends in person every two years...

 

On Monday 29th it was back to Heathrow, and back on a jet plane bound for Hong Kong, ready for the Asian leg of our trip...