Christmas and New Year's

It was a very nice Christmas holiday. I travelled by train and bus to Borås already on Dec 20. The shopping started the next day. My mother had spotted a newly opened outlet store selling my size of clothes. I ended up getting a few items there; a cardigan, a pair of jeans and a top. I also went to several of the thrift stores and vacuumed the shelves for books to my library. I'm looking for fact books from a specific publisher that never sent the depository copies to us. Over the weekend we decorated the (real) tree at my sister's place and had some glögg. On the Sunday I got a present early: we went to see the movie Bohemian Rhapsody. A very good choice, it was definitely worth seeing.

Monday the 24th was the celebration at my sister's house. We followed the usual routines with Disney clips on TV, tomten/Santa, presents, lots of great food and a board game (at which I excelled, of course). My presents included a bracelet, a wire stand my mother had made, a Christmas ornament my niece had made and a gift certificate for a spa treatment.

Thursday after Christmas I travelled by car with my mother and her boyfriend and my niece to the summerhouse in Skåne. It was pretty cold there but we got the heaters going rather quickly. On the Saturday my father and his girlfriend came to visit and helped us weed some dead branches and trees in the back yard. That same day the rest of the family from Borås also joined us. Sunday we went to the new shopping mall in Kristianstad, where several of us bought shoes on sale. We had Asian buffet for lunch and then we drove out to a hiking area. It was about 7 degrees and somewhat sunny. It was a nice excursion.

New Year's Eve was this Monday. We prepared a three course meal. My sister made toast with goat cheese for starters, my mother made a chicken dish for the main meal and I made chocolate mousse with strawberries for dessert. Very tasty, all of it. At midnight we stood on the sandy beach watching the fireworks both to the north and south of us. We can see most of Skåne's east coast from there. Since I had to work today I returned home yesterday.