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December, 2010

  1. Shaken but not stirred

    December 27, 2010 by Amy Hansford

    Alright, last post for the day, I promise. I’m just overexcited at actually having something to write about and the time to do so.
    With 2011 looming, it’s almost time for the New Year’s Eve party. The theme this year is Cocktails.

    In a few days, i.e. once the party has been and gone, I will publish one of those handy ‘costume idea’ lists including pictures for y’all. But until then, I’m remaining tight lipped. Half the fun of costume parties is the mystery of what everyone goes as, and I can’t be giving any clues away on here of course…


  2. Christmas dinner

    December 27, 2010 by Amy Hansford

    As we’re expecting our first child in March 2011, we thought we’d treat ourselves this Christmas Day to having dinner cooked by someone else. It’s probably the last chance we’ll get for another 20 years or so. We have a gorgeous old pub around the corner, ‘The Olde Swan’, complete with original land documents framed around the place as well as old pictures of Milton Keynes (yes, it has an actual history) and open fires galore. Anywho, Alex booked Christmas Lunch there last month so off we set through the snow for our noms.

    I say, through the snow – we had originally planned to walk. However, our cat Echo has a habit of thnking she’s a loyal dog when we walk anywhere and tends to follow us. Last time we tried to toddle to the pub we got within 50 metres and she refused to go any further, meaning we had to turn round and go back (within having even sniffed a bevvy) lest she get lost. So it was safer to take the car. Sorry environment!

    Anyway, long story short, brilliant dinner and great to have someone else deal with all the cooking/cleaning up. I had butternut squash veloute to start. Basically, very very thick home made soup. Nom. Then venison for the mains – I’ve not had venison in years! Finally, some sort of strawberry creme brulee thingy that was also delicious. And of course, it was all followed up with nibbles for the rest of the evening – Twiglets, After Eights, all those must haves :o)


  3. Tis the season…

    December 27, 2010 by Amy Hansford

    …to catch up with people and eat lovely food.

    Yep, I’ve been rubbish at blogging of late. I have all the usual excuses – pick the one you prefer.

    On Christmas Eve, we chauffered our friends Dee and Richard for their wedding. A Christmassy spectaular, with ‘Sleigh Ride’ as part of the service and balloon model reindeer on all the tables. It was a brilliant day, fantastic to see everyone and special to have been able to contibute a favour rather than a traditional wedding gift.

    Speaking of favours and gifts, every reception attendee was met with a goody bag. Lovely Christmassy bits in them, but I won’t spoil the secrets within.

    Another great bit of fun for the tables was the introduction of a ‘pass the parcel’ only with instructions on who should open the next layer rather than relying on music, i.e. the person with the smallest shoe size, the person with the shortest hair etc. I think our table pretty much trampled over everyone’s attempts at doing the loudest animal noise.

    Also, the wedding contained probably the best first dance I have ever seen. You’ve watched the videos of people dancing down the aisle, people re-enacting Dirty Dancing, people slow dancing only to break into Mc Hammer’s ‘You Can’t Touch This’. Rich and Dee not only acted out clips from at least 30 songs, they’d managed to construct it so as to tell the story of how they met. Brilliant.

    Rich and Dee’s first dance