Unwrapping Christmas

How was your Christmas?  Ours had some not so good and some good!

The not so good.

On Christmas Day the lovely Wayne and I enjoyed a lazy morning with a late breakfast before heading off to have lunch with his mum at the nursing home.  Well, wasn't that a shock to the system - we walked in to find his dear mum quite upset and looking terrible.  She looked like she had aged 10 years in the 2 weeks since we had last seen her.  A bit of history - the lovely Wayne's mum has quite advanced MS (Multiple Sclerosis) and spends most of her days (& nights) in bed as it is too painful for her to sit upright.  She can spend very short periods in a water chair that has her at a reclined angle.  By short periods I mean basically just to move her around.  Well on Christmas Day the staff of the unnamed nursing home got her out of bed and into the water chair so they could do her bathroom routine and change the bed etc.  The thing is they went off and left her in the chair.  She had been in it for an hour when we arrived and it then took another 2 hours to get some staff to finally put her back to bed.  This poor woman was crying from the pain, and she has a very high pain threshold!  Suffice to say, we hunted down staff and all but ripped them a new a-hole and got her put back to bed (we now have an interview scheduled with the Director of Nursing at the nursing home to 'discuss' this).  The upshot of this was that the lovely Wayne's mum was then exhausted.  It was a shame as she had been looking forward to the day.  We ate lunch with her then left her to sleep.  We did go back 2 days later and she was like a new woman - all rested and back to her usual self which was a relief.

The good #1.

My mum and dad joined us for Christmas dinner at home.  They arrived armed with their little dog (Sari), my mum's delish Spinach & Egg salad, and a ridiculous amount of gifts - they spoil us, truly they do!  All of the gifts were very 'us' gifts.  We had a lovely relaxed evening with lots of laughs and way too much food.  The food was delish too!  Sadly I neglected to take any photos which is bad, but we were just having too good a time.  It will be good to do it all again in a couple of weeks when my sister and brother-in-law will be visiting.

The good #2.

Each year at Christmas, we alternate Christmas dinner between my family and the lovely Wayne's family - well his Aunt actually, as we always see his mum on Christmas day.  This year it was his Aunt's turn to see us on Boxing Day and she had insisted on us having dinner at her house, so off we went.  We had a lovely evening and again were spoiled rotten!  We also met her newest addition - a German Shepherd puppy named Rosie.  She is a sweetie and oh so timid.

So there you have it, a summary of our Christmas goings on for this year.