Christmas with the kids

Christmas - the time of year that children love. It is also a time when adults can lose the plot, especially if they have kids… or dogs!

On Christmas Eve my daughter came to stay. She brought her dog too. We spent the day shopping, talking and laughing. Our evening was planned out; we were going to the disco at my local before heading off to Midnight Mass.

As we were getting ready, I linked my laptop to the television and we took it in turns to choose songs we liked on Youtube. When we were ready, and after a bottle of rose, we headed out.

I couldn’t believe how cold it was. The ground was still covered in snow but it had now turned to ice. It was treacherous, especially when wearing high heels, and we clung onto each other.

By-the time we got there, nearly everyone was over the limit. People barged past, knocking my drink all over the place, others were coming up bear hugging me and wishing me a Merry Christmas while planting slobbering wet kisses on my face.

Nice but not Nice. Nice because I have so many wonderful friends but also not nice because I hate being pawed over. I spent the whole evening trying to dislodge someone dressed as one of Santa’s elves, who constantly told me he loved me, always loved me and always will. Needless to say, when I saw him on Boxing Day he had no recollection of it. Surprised? Nope!

Anyway, Mass starts at 11:30 - strange that, seeing as it’s called Midnight Mass - and we were supposed to be making our way to Church at 11:20. By this time the whole place was in full swing and my daughter decided she didn’t want to go. I reminded her that we had made arrangements, so we compromised. We would have ’one more drink’ - famous last words - and then head off.

Which is what we did. But we had company. I still don’t know who the guy was but he thought it would be a good idea to accompany us. Initially he thought it was a huge joke until I reminded him that if he didn’t behave I would personally kick him out through the Church doors if he misbehaved.

Of course we were half an hour late and I was embarrassed at entering halfway through the service.

Looking around, I was surprised at how many people had turned out. The Church was only a quarter full, but on reflection, the weather was really bad.

The High Church of England is not the joyous occasion you’ll get in other churches. It is a very serious and frankly quite boring place to be. The new vicar, a woman, held the worst service I have ever heard and I wished I’d gone down the road to the other Church.

Once communion and the service was over I chatted to old friends and we made our way back to the pub only to find that last orders had been rung. Blast!

We couldn’t get a taxi home and had to walk it. I have no idea what the temperature was but it was like being on an ice rink and it seemed to take forever. Once we were home, I made us a pizza, we warmed up in front of the fire and then toddled off to bed.

Christmas Day this year was spent at my parents. We all met at their place, opened our presents then went to the club from 12 - 2pm before going back for lunch.

Mother did us proud as usual. Lunch was wonderful. We ate until we burst, laughed over the ridiculous jokes inside the Christmas crackers and then entered the living room to watch the Queen’s speech.

Her speech this year was a disgrace. What happened to the usual format? The majority of this year’s speech was focused on diversity, and even God save the Queen was played out on kettle drums. It made me feel sick to think that even our Queen has been dragged into the politics of the multicultural nightmare we are in.

We headed off home not long afterwards for a relaxing evening in front of the fire. But it wasn’t relaxing, not when you have four dogs running round.

My family all head North on Boxing Day, but I didn’t want to go. I stayed home to look after the monsters. I don’t believe in locking dogs up all day, mine spend their time with me, but boy has this Christmas been hard work.

Two adult dogs and two puppies. My puppy is fine, it’s the other one. Maybe it is because she is pure white. They always say that pure white dogs are mental; it’s certainly true about this one. She won’t do a thing you tell her. She just manages to squeeze under the sofa, where she then chews the leather, and she will not come out.

Today, I had to lift up the sofa and drag her out by her tail. Don’t worry, it didn’t hurt her, I was gentle and the floor is highly polished lol

Princess has wound up the other three dogs for the past three days. She has tiddled in the living room and kitchen, done number two’s in the kitchen, eaten the surround sound remote, shredded my new slippers, started eating my door frame and ripped the telephone wires off the wall. Last night she managed to get a Christmas cracker from the tree and ‘pull’ it with her dad. He shot off into the kitchen like he’d got a rocket up his arse, but she just sat there with a silly grin on her face.

I know she will make a fabulous dog, when she finally grows up, because she is the spitting image of her father.

For now, she will be going home and I can’t wait. Normality will resume.