My Dad, Wicked Step Mother Julie, and brother Max all arrived on Monday afternoon for Christmas. At 12:30 on Christmas Eve, I finished work, packed the laptop away and the festivities started. The bairns loved their Christmas Eve box which contained The Night Before Christmas book, new pj’s, hot chocolate, marshmallows and reindeer dust.

The bairns woke at 7:30am on Christmas Day, much to Grandma Julie’s disappointment, as she’d been awake since 4am! Stockings from Father Christmas were opened first, and then after breakfast, the rest of the presents started to be opened. Ross likes to make sure the presents aren’t opened in one go, and that they are spread out over the day, so it was 4pm by the time we’d opened them all. Thank you to all those generous people who gave lovely gifts.

We made a quick trip to The a Orange Tree for a cheeky drink at lunchtime It’s just as well we live so close, as Ross kept darting off to keep an eye the Christmas dinner. The Strong’s joined us for a quick one, and before long we were sat down in front of a feast! Thank you Ross, for a lovely meal. It was epic.

Boxing Day was a rather sedate affair with my Dad using the leftovers to good effect with Christmas Chelsea Buns. Yummy! Uncle Max left us in the morning and it was with a heavy heart as I waved him off.

On Friday, Grandad and Grandma left to visit the rest of the family on their Christmas and New Year road trip. We were then off to the hospital to have my bloods checked ahead of the afternoons Chemo. We decided that the bairns should come along so they can see what happens, and they don’t need to be worried or scared of the Chemo. We’re in a private room so they only saw what was happening to me and we could control what was going on. They were great. They watched what happened, made some Lego, watched some stuff on the iPad, and were stars.

Once we returned home, we just chilled, and had some family time. The antihistamines made me drowsy so it was bath and early bed for me.

We’ve still got lots of Christmas wine left, which is mainly because I don’t fancy it. I had a couple of glasses of wine on Christmas Day, but it was just really going through the motions. Bring on next Christmas when I WILL be free of cancer and this year will just be a memory. Oh how we’ll laugh!

Jx