Belated Christmas Posts #1 | Christmas Dinner With Friends

In the first of several belated Christmas posts, here I shall detail a truly delightful evening spent in the company of some very good friends, and some brand new friends.

One night in early December, a few of us gathered for a pre-Christmas Christmas dinner blow out.
There was a lot of food, and even more organisation and preparation. I'd like to think that by making that initial To Do list I helped us all on our way. There were a lot of treats too, and some mulled wine (I had two very diluted glasses, my first ever substantial taste of wine!), along with a hasty tree decoration and a board game. The night left me with a warm glowly feeling and, in the first week of December, made me feel like Christmas was truly beginning. Very slowly. I don't like to reach my Christmas peak too early and experience burnout. This is important.

I look so uncomfortable here; I have no idea why, we were making mince pies!

Our guests arrived just as everything was coming together.

So civilised. So grown up. Such a blurry picture.

And Dessert

This stuff has got it going aaaaawn

It's so nice to spend time with your friends in the run up to Christmas. So much of Christmastime can be dominated by family-time, and while I'm sure everyone enjoys the holiday stresses and family bickering, it's really nice to be around people you don't share DNA with, and can't scream blue murder at if they let the bin bag tip over and spew its contents on the floor. What.

Happy Holidays!