Quoting a long-dead relative, Auntie Mary says "when they comes, my arms is full, when they goes, my arms is empty." My arms is currently pretty empty. Laundry baskets don't count. The house is pretty quiet without three old babies and one large dog. The holiday didn't seem to be quite over until we heard that everyone was home safe, and they are, so today the tree came down. Why is that always a mummy job? Never mind, it just is. Probably because at this stage, it gives us a chance to reorganize a storage closet and weed out the most egregious of the plastic ornaments and then spend an inordinate amount of time hauling the tree out to the deck and securing homemade birdfeed suet pucks in the branches. Good thing I was trying to distract myself with trivia, and it's a good thing I don't have to go out to work. Those birds would be shit out of luck.

We had a very full Christmas: food, wine, games, so much family that we were dragging chairs out of the basement and lining the unfortunate younger folks on the hard bench for Christmas dinner. Here, have a pillow. Premium xmas crackers yielded the much-reviled binder clips, terrible jokes, coveted mini-tape-measures and gold paper hats. Randy got his on upside down and started a trend. And I've got to say that sharing around the cooking duties was brilliant. I had room to do all the veg and my sister brined and cooked a grand turkey that gave up his life for us at a farm about 10 miles down the road two days before the day. Damn, it was good. Turkey stock lived on in risotto a few days later. Wine arrived with guests, along with various yummy things that are all gone. We ate so well, here and at Laurie's in Port Maitland. My dad and Auntie Mary and all the cousins, Will, Hadley, Anna, Tom and Ian were together for the first time in yonks, and our cousins Jane and David were here too, so our arms and hearts were very full. And all dog people.

Ian's dog Zeus decided that this was heaven. I concur.

See below for lots and lots of photos. Happy new year to you all.