It’s been a hectic Christmas, and it’s passed way too quickly. On the 23rd (known in Norway as Little Christmas Eve), I went to my mum’s place quite early, meaning to help out with the Christmas tree. A few days before, my parents’ stove broke, and on the 23rd my mum was waiting for the new one to be delivered. This did not go according to plan. It was supposed to be delivered before 5pm. Instead it got there at ten to 7. Apparently, it had been forgotten back at the warehouse when the delivery person set out. As a result, the Christmas tree wasn’t brought up from the basement until a bit later, and no decorating was done on the 23rd as we usually do it.

Mum made some porridge, though, and Morten and I had some before we left, to head off to Morten’s parents’ place to help decorate their Christmas tree. My step-dad took us, and then stayed for a cup of coffee before heading back. It was very pleasant.

After watching the mandatory Little Christmas Eve TV entertainment, Grevinnen og hovmesteren (in English, Dinner for One aka The 90th Birthday, hardly known in Britain at all, so if you haven’t seen it, please do!) we had a taste of the Christmas rib, and then decorated the tree. Please note, if you will, the string of flags in the front. It’s over 100 years old and contains flags that haven’t been used since before WWI, including the old Finnish flag from back when it was part of Russia, the old Japanese sun flag and the flag of Austria-Hungary. We had a lovely time.

On Christmas Eve, Morten and I parted company. He was celebrating at his aunt and uncle’s, and I at my parents’ place, with them and my brother and his mum. We started out by visiting the cemetery and saying Merry Christmas to dad. We do this every year. Our ritual involves lighting a cigarette and having a toast in aquavite. Then we went to my parents’ where I finished decorating the tree, which they hadn’t quite had time to finish. We had a lovely Christmas dinner, and then opened our presents. It’s amazing how many gifts five adults can accumulate… Only five of us, and no kids, and still we could hardly fit them all under the tree. I dread to think how many presents there were at Morten’s Christmas celebration, where there were three kids present and more adults.

After gifts and dessert, we sat up talking for a long time. Morten showed up some time after midnight, when he was done with his family stuff.

Christmas Day was lovely and calm for me. We had breakfast all day at my mum’s. Sadly, Morten got a call from work at 8 am, asking him to come in as they were short staffed.

On Boxing Day, we had dinner at Morten’s parents’ place. His grandparents were there, and his uncle and three cousins. The kids are sweet, but rowdy and noisy and I won’t say I wasn’t somewhat relieved when they went home after dessert. We were served duck for dinner.

The 27th was our only day between Christmas and New Years we had to ourselves. We spent it at home, eating Spaghetti Carbonara and watching movies.

On the 28th we went to Morten’s parents’ again, for their annual Gnav-tournament with his mother’s side of the family. I’m not gonna get into the specifics, but suffice to say that Gnav is an awesome, very old game and we had lots of fun, and I won the last round. Yay!

The 29th, Morten went off to his annual Christmas stir-fry party with his old friends from upper secondary school, and I went with my parents’ to Tone, my brothers’ mum, and had turkey and played Monopoly. Got to see my niece, too. I don’t see her often since she moved to live with her mother. She seemed to be sad about something, but cheered up as the evening progressed a bit.

On the 30th, Morten’s parents came to dinner at my parents’ place. Morten and I were kind of nervous about it (especially Morten), because it makes stuff feel very official and real when your parents meet, but it went exceedingly well. Morten’s family is really “our kind of people”, so I’m not surprised they got along, but very happy and relieved all the same.

New Year’s Eve we went to a party at Tina’s. There were tapas, and I had beer and champagne and whisky, and we watched the fireworks and talked to people and stayed until nearly 6 am. No point in details; you had to be there. Suffice to say, I snogged a girl and Morten snogged a guy and all’s right with the world. I call that a good party! Then we called a cab and went to my parents’ place to check up on the cat who was alone since my parents were visiting friends out of town, and slept there.

Yesterday, Morten had work and I had dinner at my parents’ and watched How to Train Your Dragon and Fantasia with my mother. Home alone now, as Morten’s working this evening too. Gonna start thinking about dinner soon.

And now I leave you with this awesome photo I took of the moon in Walsall before I went home, with my awesome 55-200mm lens (this one’s slightly cropped so you can see the moon properly):

Happy New Year!