December 2022 - PLAYWORKEATREPEAT

Happy New Year!

Hi, friends I just wanted to jump on the blog quickly to wish you all a very Happy New Year! I have really enjoyed linking up with Andrea and Erika and joining in the Friday Favourites linkup each week. And I always appreciate you guys stopping by to have a read. I would also like to say a huge thank you for your lovely comments. They always make my heart sing! However, you are ringing in the New Year. Whether you are out partying, staying at home in your PJs in front of the TV or blissfully asleep. I hope that you have a wonderful evening and I pray that in 2023 you will be blessed with peace, joy and happiness. As well as faith, strength and perseverance through any challenging times that may come ahead. I’ll leave you today with a few thoughts about the New Year and I look forward to being back here on Monday. Happy Friday and Happy New Year!

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Goals For The New Year

15 Comments / Beauty and Self Care

One of the nice things about being on summer holiday is that I have more time to do things that I enjoy. Such as blogging as well as reading other blogs too. It’s the best feeling not to have to squeeze in these two fun things between working full-time and doing all the things. So today I’m excited to be joining the Monthly Musings linkup with Holly and Patty where the topic is Goals For The New Year. To be honest I have been counting down the days until 2022 is over. I thought 2020 and 2021 were tough. But for us as a family, I would definitely say that 2022 has been way harder. I am so ready for a fresh new start and I am actually excited for a brand new year. So let’s begin with our first question which is… Goals For The New Year DO YOU MAKE RESOLUTIONS/GOALS FOR THE NEW YEAR In the past, I have been super vague about any resolutions and goals. Maybe about ten minutes before the new year rings in is usually the time when I have started thinking about goals for the new year (not very intentional of me!). But not this year. This year I feel completely different and I have been really reflecting on some things that I want to change/improve or stop doing. I want to be much more hopeful and excited about the gift of a new year. I guess this is what happens when you get kicked to the ground by a bad year. DO YOU HAVE DIET/EXERCISE GOALS I started walking to and from work last year. And it has been great for my mental health as well as for some exercise. I also went along to a dance class towards the end of the year which I really enjoyed. So I’m hoping to go regularly next year. Dancing is my favourite type of exercise because it’s so much fun that it doesn’t feel like exercise at all! DO YOU HAVE PERSONAL/PROFESSIONAL GOALS FOR 2023 One of my personal goals for this year is to go to bed earlier. I am such a night owl! But I really need to get more sleep both for the sake of my well-being and to eliminate that full set of luggage that I have under my eyes! As far as professional goals for next year I really want to get on top of how we document the development and progress of the children at preschool. Up until this year, documentation was not really a big part of my role at preschool. But that all changed this year and going into next year I will be doing more. I’m totally up for the challenge now that I am getting my head around the process. DO YOU USE A PLANNER? PAPER? ELECTRONIC? COMBO? For me, it’s a planner all the way! I love planners (or diaries as we call them here). My super sweet and thoughtful bestie gave me a Twigseeds 2023 diary. This gorgeous diary is illustrated by Kate Knapp who is an Australian artist and author. She uses pencil, ink and watercolour for her beautiful illustrations. I have started writing things inside my diary. It brings me so much joy every time I open it! The cute images always make me smile and the quotes are just so inspiring. It’s a happy diary for a happy new year! DO YOU HAVE A WORD OR PHRASE FOR 2023 My word for 2023 is RING IN THE NEW YEAR OR ASLEEP BY 10 PM For as long as I can remember I have always stayed up to ring in the new year. And for the past few years, my husband has had to work so I stayed up with my mum and my son. We would always wait for midnight and say “Happy New Year” then watch the midnight fireworks on television followed by the movie starring the Village People “Can’t Stop The Music”. I’m not sure why but they always play this movie on TV after the midnight fireworks but they do. This year things are different and so I’m going to go to bed by 10 pm. I want to get on top of my personal goal of going to bed early from day one 😉 FAVOURITE THING TO DO ON NEW YEAR’S DAY I don’t have a favourite activity or tradition for new years day. To be honest I kind of feel a bit down on new years day. Because after so many weeks of anticipation it means that all the festivities are over. So I’m looking forward to any ideas and suggestions. ANY TRAVEL PLANS FOR 2023 Other than a few overnights stays here and there to celebrate anniversaries and birthdays. Nope, we don’t have any travel plans. THINGS/EVENTS YOU ARE MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO IN 2023 2022 was a year of changes and endings. So I’m looking forward to new beginnings in 2023. My son finished high school and he will be starting uni next year. He’s so excited about getting his license, getting a part-time job and studying for his chosen career. So I’m excited for him, a bit nervous (ok…a lot nervous about the licence bit anyway) but I’m excited too…..really I am 😬 WILL YOU BE WATCHING ANY BOWL GAMES ON NEW YEAR’S OR AROUND NEW YEAR’S? American football isn’t televised here in Australia. I think that you can only watch it on paid sports streaming services. I have caught a few bits and pieces of the game on the news, documentaries and movies. It fascinates me to see all the gear that the players wear for protection. Here in Australia, we have rugby league and the players don’t wear helmets, padding or anything. I’m pretty sure that they only wear mouthguards. I’m not a fan of this sport but my husband is. I always cringe when the players smack into each other…..shudder!! That wraps up the fun topic of

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Another Year Of Christmas Cheer

16 Comments / Christmas

Hi, friends It’s a wrap for another year of Christmas cheer! Can you believe it’s all over already? I know that I can’t! After so many weeks of prepping and planning. As well as panicking a little (maybe a lot) about leaving some things until the last minute. BOOM! Christmas came and went. And today I’m back here in full holiday mode not knowing what time or day it is to recap our fun Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve Our family follows the South American tradition of celebrating Christmas on Christmas Eve. This year my lovely cousin hosted all of us and she did such a brilliant job! It’s not easy hosting so many people! Christmas Margaritas We kicked off the evening with some refreshing margaritas. My cousin’s husband played bartender for a while. Even though he broke his left hand a few weeks ago he still managed to shake up some spectacular margaritas for us. So Much Delicious Food! Everyone brought a dish or two and we had so much delicious Christmas food. One of my cousin’s brought this amazing cheese platter. My aunty supplied some empanadas and they were gone in a flash. We had so many yummy salads to go with the turkey, pork and ham. After weeks and weeks of cool to cold temps. Summer finally showed up this weekend in a big way! So the salads were perfect. I love a traditional roast with potatoes and veggies. But it’s just too hot here in December so we just do the salad thing. Karaoke After dinner, we pulled out the karaoke machine that I borrowed from preschool. It’s so fun to sing even when you can’t sing! Games! My cousin asked me to organise some games for our Christmas Eve festivities. A few years ago I introduced some minute to win it style party games for our Christmas Eve celebrations and they were such a big hit. Then for some reason or another, we didn’t do them last year. But this year they were back on and oh my goodness we had such a blast!! I didn’t realise how competitive my family is!! And I think that next year I might need to enlist a referee because there might have been a bit of cheating going on! So I wouldn’t get all confused I made up some cards with instructions for the games that we were playing. And I made sure to put all the props etc that I needed in individual bags. This way I could keep the games flowing along smoothly. We split up into two teams and each team chose a name which I won’t mention here because they may or may not have been slightly inappropriate hehe. I also used the karaoke machine to blast out some fun music after I called READY SET GO! We had the song by The Vengaboys ‘We Like To Party’ on full blast while the games were going on. Everyone was so pumped and my two youngest cousins who are 12 and 10 just about lost their minds with excitement! Here Is A List Of Some Of The Games That We Played 1. Shake That Box This is where you tie an empty tissue box filled with some jingle bells to your waist with a belt. Then you have to shake and wiggle until all the bells are out of the box. The first player to empty their box wins! 2. Don’t Look Back Each team has two players going head to head. One player holds a party hat while the other player throws cotton balls over their shoulder for their team member to catch. The team with the most cotton balls in their hat is the winner. 3. Hot Dog Challenge This game requires one player from each team. And it’s definitely not about how many hotdogs you can eat! You need a hotdog tied to a long piece of string and each player has to tie the string around their waist. The hotdog needs to be behind them and the string has to be long enough so that the hotdog dangles just above the player’s knees. Oh yes, I forgot to mention that you also need two rolls of toilet paper. The players need to spin around 4 or 5 times and then aim to crouch down and place their hotdog inside the toilet roll. The first player to do so wins! 4. Unwrapping Hershey Kisses Did you know that you can only find Hershey Kisses in specialty candy stores here in Australia? And I paid $9.00 for this bag! But I have to say that it was most definitely money well spent for this fun game. All you need to do is unwrap Hershey kisses ONLY using a toothpick. No fingers! Everyone played and the team with the most unwrapped Hershey Kisses after a minute won. There was so much cheating going on with this one that in the end both teams scored equally! Naughty naughty!!😂 5. Marshmellow Stack This one was nice and easy because all you need is a bag of big marshmallows. Then a player from each team has to try and stack a tower of marshmallows. The highest tower wins! It’s much harder than it sounds because they topple over so easily. 6. Ping Pong Santa Hat You need a lot of ping pong balls, a table and Santa hats. For this game, you have two teams and one person from each team will be at each end of a table. One person holds a Santa hat and the other player bounces a ping pong ball on a table and their team member needs to catch the ping pong ball in the hat. The team with the most balls wins 7. Tortilla Slap Another easy game that only requires a packet of tortillas. A player from each time has to battle it out by playing scissors, paper rock. The winner then gets to slap the loser with a tortilla! Best of

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Friday Every Day!

2 Comments / Friday Favourites

Hi, friends I am officially on summer holiday since Wednesday !!! And now it feels like it’s Friday every day! I think my husband must be sick of me asking him what day of the week it is haha! But because preschool finished on Tuesday it felt like a Friday and then the rest of the week felt like the weekend. I’m totally confused and will probably remain like this until I go back to work. Thanks so much for reading along and letting me share with you some highlights of all my Fridays this week hehe! Meetings Then Cleaning And Organising The children all finished preschool the week before. But the staff had two pupil-free days on Monday and Tuesday. We had a super long staff meeting on Monday. Then the rest of the day we got stuck into some cleaning and organising. We didn’t have any meetings on Tuesday. Because Tuesday was all about getting a long list of chores done before 3.40 hit and we were out of there! Thankfully our preschool is pretty organised. All the staff do an amazing job of keeping the cupboards etc tidy during the year. We also keep on top of washing and disinfecting toys. But at the end of every year, we do a big clean up of the classrooms, storeroom, office, kitchen and shed. It’s a big job! We leave the whole preschool looking pretty bare. All ready for some new crafts and works of art that will be displayed next year. My co-worker and I gave the shed a good tidying. I forgot to take a before pic but here it is all neat and organised. It’s nice to have a clear floor! Before this, there was a whole lot of equipment that needed a home other than the floor. At the end of the day, we all wished each other a Merry Christmas with cuddles and plans to get together for lunch or something in the new year. I work with such a great bunch of ladies! A Fun Overnight Stay About a month ago we went to a really fun wedding and because it was a bit far from where we lived. We decided to stay overnight at the Parkroyal in Parramatta. It was such a lovely hotel so my husband booked us a night’s stay to celebrate the first day of my holidays on Wednesday. Parramatta is a vibrant city with lots of history and a large multicultural community. There are so many trendy bars and restaurants buzzing with so many people. And I was amazed by all the huge buildings and big commercial areas. It also has a lovely riverside cycle path. So many old buildings like these ones. As well as some super modern ones like these. I don’t think that you would really call Parramatta a holiday destination. But it was so fun staying in a lovely hotel and relaxing after such a busy last few weeks. And I am also a big fan of being a tourist in my own backyard (I don’t have to get on an aeroplane and that’s a big win for me!!) A Delicious Dinner Wednesday night before dinner, we had a couple of drinks in the hotel bar and shared a small appetiser. Yummy crab croquettes! Then we walked around looking for a place to eat and we found a really nice pub. There were heaps of restaurants everywhere but they were so busy and we hadn’t booked anywhere. So we were happy to find a nice quiet place that just so happened to serve the most amazing food! Steve ordered a steak and it came with mash AND veggies. We were both laughing about my experience a couple of weeks ago at a fancy restaurant with ridiculous prices. Where I had to make a tough choice between chips and salad because they didn’t serve both. I had the beef ragu pasta and it was so good. I love how they gave me lots of parmesan cheese on the side too. For dessert, we shared a brownie and ice cream. Buffet Breakfast The next morning we enjoyed a buffet breakfast. But I wasn’t very hungry after such a big meal the previous night and all I could fit in was one plate of breakfast. I normally like to work my way around a buffet and try a bit of everything!! It’s Nearly Christmas!! This morning I went to the shops nice and early before the crowds got too crazy. And I picked up a whole lot of things from the two dollar shops for our Christmas eve party games. I have also borrowed a small karaoke machine from preschool. We are all looking forward to a fun night at my sweet cousin’s house tomorrow. So I better sign off now and finish organising all the last-minute things. I am also cooking a fall-apart roast pork to take for dinner tomorrow night. If you are looking for a delicious, juicy and flavoursome roast pork recipe you can find it here. I love this recipe, it’s a huge winner every time I make it. It has just the right amount of seasoning and the meat comes out all tender. Oooooh so good!! Merry Christmas! I would also like to take the opportunity to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. And say a huge thank you! Thank you so very much for stopping by to read my blog. I truly appreciate every single one of you. And I hope that you have a wonderful time with your loved ones this weekend as you celebrate together. Much love

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Easy Eggnog Recipe

5 Comments / Recipes

Today I am excited to share with you a super easy eggnog recipe. I enjoy drinking eggnog every year during the festive season. But I had never actually made it myself before. That is until this year when I added ‘making eggnog’ to my bucket list as one of the things that I wanted to do this December. For some reason, eggnog sounded complicated to make. So I was always happy to buy my eggnog from the supermarket. And it tasted fine to me because I had never ever tasted homemade eggnog before. But this easy eggnog recipe is so delicious. Once you try it, you really won’t want to go back to the supermarket variety. This easy eggnog recipe is simply divine! Every time that you take a sip you will smell all the delicious aromas of vanilla, cinnamon and nutmeg. It’s like Christmas in a glass! Easy Eggnog Recipe Ingredients 1 1/2 cups of milk 1/2 cup cream 3 eggs, separated 2 cinnamon sticks 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg 2 tsp vanilla extract 1/3 cup white sugar 1/3 cup Brandy Instructions Combine milk, cream, cinnamon, vanilla and nutmeg in a saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Once the mixture is boiling then remove it from the heat. Allow to infuse and cool down slightly. In a large bowl beat the egg yolks and sugar until it is a light yellow colour and smooth consistency. Remove the cinnamon sticks from the milk. Slowly whisk in the milk to the egg yolk and sugar mixture and continue to mix until well combined. Add the brandy and stir. Place in the fridge to chill for 3-4 hours Notes For this easy eggnog recipe, you can use either full-cream milk or low-fat milk. I wouldn’t recommend skim milk. You can easily adjust the sugar and alcohol to your own taste Other types of alcohol that you can use instead of brandy are dark rum, cognac or whiskey. This delicious easy eggnog will taste great chilled for 3-4 hours but it tastes even more amazing if you leave it in the fridge overnight. This will allow all the flavours to come together and infuse. Giving the eggnog a richer flavour. The eggnog will keep in the fridge for 3 days. This recipe is for 4 people but you can easily double it to make it for 8. If doubling the recipe then use 5 egg yolks instead of 3. If you are interested in other fun and easy-to-make Christmas drinks recipes. Then you can find them here. 😊 If you are interested in other fun Christmas drinks recipes you can find them here.

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It’s Monday

10 Comments / Hello Monday

Hi friends it’s Monday and the weekend sure went by way too fast!! Can you believe we are only days away from Christmas…DAYS!! Ok, I better stop saying that because I’m freaking myself out. I’m not as ready for Christmas as I would like to be and I still have a stack of things to do. Apart from this, I am so excited about this week because I finish work on Tuesday and then I’m officially on summer holidays! Woohoo!! Back To The City For More Christmas Shopping The weekend flew by but I was able to get some more Christmas shopping done which was great. I went into the city (again) this weekend and I was amazed by the size of the crowds. There were so many people everywhere!! I recently had covid so I think that I should be immune at least for a short while. But to make sure that I stayed safe I did wear my mask on the train and in the shops just in case. The city is so pretty at Christmas time. I especially love the Strand Arcade and so I took a couple of quick pics and then I kept ploughing through the crowds to get my shopping done. I really want to go back and see the big Christmas tree at Martin Place this week. It’s been two years since I have seen it and it’s on my December bucket list too! A Visit To Ikea I also made a quick trip to Ikea. There was nothing that I desperately needed to get but I love seeing their Christmas items. I did leave with a few things that I didn’t know I needed apart from the Christmas wrapping paper. It’s almost impossible to leave Ikea empty-handed. I bought this mulled fruit drink which is very sweet and delicious. The best part was that it was half-price. Normally they cost $7.00 a bottle so I only get one or two at the most. But this time I bought four bottles! I also bought this gingerbread house from Ikea and it was half price too! The Aldi gingerbread house kit that I usually buy was different this year. The house was already put together and ready to decorate. I didn’t think that this was much fun so I gave it a miss. I was happy to find this cute Ikea gingerbread house and I’m looking forward to putting it together and decorating it when I get a spare minute. (fingers crossed that I get a spare minute) Eggnog One of the things on my December bucket list is to make homemade eggnog. So this weekend I did just that and now I can tick this off my list as done. Friends, it was so delicious and super easy to make too. As much as I liked the supermarket one. This one is hands down so much better! I am going to share the recipe soon so stay tuned. Sam and I sipped our eggnog and watched ‘The Santa Clause’. It’s the first time that either of us had watched it and we both really enjoyed it! What’s Happened To Summer? And here it is….this week’s Sydney weather report. We are all seriously asking each other the same question. What has happened to summer???? It has been cloudy, rainy, and windy and the temps have only reached the low 20s during the day. At night it’s been even colder. We have had a handful of really beautiful days and that’s about it. But on the upside, I am still cooking comfort foods like this delicious and super easy lasagna. We have also been enjoying hot drinks like tea and hot chocolate. This just seems so crazy because December is typically a very hot month! Sunday Lunch After church, I went to my aunt and uncle’s house for lunch. I hadn’t seen them for a while and it was so great to catch up with them. I gave them a small gift of a poinsettia plant and a panettone. Panettones are originally from Italy but south Americans typically eat them during the Christmas season. I’m not a huge fan but I did like this particular brand that I tried last year for the first time. I remember that it also got a tick of approval from my mum who was a panettone connoisseur and a tough critic! hehe. Ok so that just about sums up my weekend. How was yours? I hope that it was a good one 😊 Thanks so much for being here today and I really hope that you have the best week. Happy Monday! Linking up with Holly and Sarah for today’s Hello Monday post

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End Of Year Favourites

8 Comments / Friday Favourites

Hi friends can you believe that we are only days away from Christmas!! It’s crazy how fast the days are flying by, isn’t it? I have so many fun end-of-year favourites for this week and as usual, I am linking up with Andrea and Erika for today’s post. My Energy’s Back! I finally feel like I have my energy back after being sick with covid about a month ago. I can’t believe that it’s taken this long for me to start feeling like my old self again. My symptoms all went away after a couple of weeks (except for an annoying cough that I still have!). But I was really lacking energy and oomph. Now I finally feel like I have turned a corner and that is a huge favourite!! Preschool Favourites The last week of the preschool year is always so much fun. And if ever I needed to have my energy back. This was definitely the week! It has been such a busy week with concert rehearsals right up until the day before the actual big events. We always have two concerts and Christmas parties because we have different children attending preschool at either end of the week. So that’s a whole lot of rehearsals!! But the kids were amazing and they did such a great job. I was so proud of them and I’m sad to see many of them go off to primary school. Thankfully we still have quite a few children who will be returning next year. I always joke with my little friends who are leaving and I say to them ” I’m going to miss you guys!! Who am I going to play with next year?” they always giggle and I usually get a Ruuuuth….. you’re so funny! Setting Up For The Big Day Before the concerts, there is a whole lot of lifting and moving furniture to get the preschool ready. We always joke that if we ever lost our jobs at preschool then we could always go into the furniture removal business! 25 Years Of Service During Tuesday’s concert, I was so surprised to be recognised for 25 years of service at the preschool. Wow, that’s a long time!! And the scary thing is that those years have gone by in a flash! Our parent committee along with our Director presented me with a beautiful framed certificate. As well as a lovely bunch of flowers and a very generous amount of gift certificates! I honestly did not expect any of this and it was so just such a lovely gesture. Back Stage Shenanigans For the Tuesday concert, we had to help the children with a few quick props and costume changes. So my fun colleagues and I hung out behind the curtain ready for action. Thankfully we had practised enough and we didn’t fumble around trying to find things (like we had many times before). By Tuesday we were on point with the props and costume changes haha! Backstage the three of us were dancing around singing and doing all the actions to the songs as the children performed for their parents. It was fun doing our own little concert with no one watching. Party Food The parents generously brought a plate of food to share and there was so much. Everyone enjoyed all the yummy party food. And it was so great to see everyone mingling and having the best time after two long years of concerts and parties on hold. Presents As I have mentioned before I am always so touched by the kindness and generosity of our lovely preschool families. I received many lovely gifts and cards. These most gorgeous Christmas ornaments went straight onto my tree as soon as I put the date and the name of my little student on the back with a sharpie. Then reading special cards such as this one will always make me cry happy tears. And this one too. It’s so special how these lovely mums have written what their beautiful kids have said. A New Diary I mentioned to my lovely friend that this year I was NOT going to buy a diary from Kikki.K my favourite stationery shop. I know that this is going to sound ridiculous but buying another diary from them just felt wrong after this year was so yuck. Instead, I had plans to buy a cheap one from Kmart or not buy one at all. But my bestie surprised me with this beautiful diary and I love it so much. So I’m sure that 2023 is going to be a great year. Every week there is an inspirational quote. And I am so ready to be showered with bucketloads of inspiration that’s for sure!! The pictures are so cute too and I’m excited to start writing in it soon. It was a fun week full of end-of-year favourites. I am looking forward to the weekend as I have a bit more shopping and a catch-up with some family on Sunday. Then next week I only have to go to work on Monday and Tuesday for a meeting and a big end-of-year cleanup. Then that’s it for the year! I hope you all have the best weekend, Happy Friday!

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Hosting Holiday Parties

5 Comments / Entertaining, Planning and Hosting Tips

Hosting Holiday Parties –Hey friends I can hardly believe that this is the last ‘Let’s Look’ link-up for the year. It’s been so fun to be a part of this monthly link-up where we have explored so many interesting topics. I always enjoy reading these posts and collecting some great ideas along the way. Today I am joining Erika and Shay to talk about how we host holiday parties. This is a perfect topic for December because we are in full celebration, get-together and party mode. I have put together a bunch of tips for hosting holiday parties. Many of these tips have evolved from years of trial and error. I remember being a young mum and trying so hard to make everything perfect only to find myself hiding in the kitchen paralysed with anxiety because I was just so overwhelmed. (yes, this is totally true!!) Hosting Holiday Parties Keep It Simple This would have to be my number one tip for hosting holiday parties. I have learnt that it is totally ok not to cook everything from scratch…….outsource instead!! I honestly think that friends and family are just happy to be invited. They won’t even notice if you choose to serve premade salads or anything else that isn’t homemade for that matter. For last year’s Christmas Eve dinner, I bought some salads from a local deli. I also ordered some really delicious appetisers from a gourmet catering company. And outsourcing these two simple things just made everything so much easier. Accept Help Accepting any offers to bring a dish for a party is such a game-changer. Back in the day when I thought that I could and should do everything myself. I would decline any offers of help (what a goose!!). Now I am more than happy to let guests contribute. I am a huge fan of tradition and food always evokes so many amazing memories. So letting loved ones contribute to the meal is just so special. My wonderful uncle Bill always used to cook the turkey for our Christmas Eve dinner. He sadly passed away nine years ago but his wife (my aunty) kindly cooks the turkey every Christmas now. And the tradition of his amazing turkey recipe passed down from my grandmother (with the most divine stuffing) lives on! Make A Self Service Bar I find that it is so much easier to mingle with my family when I set up a self-service bar. My trick is to make sure I have a designated spot just for drinks with everything people might need. Such as plastic cups, wine glasses and even paper straws (because they look cute and festive). Another thing that I really like to add to the self-service bar is a big bowl of punch. I still have my mum’s punch bowl from the 1970s and it looks amazing when it is full of colourful delicious punch. I have a few great Christmas punch recipes here that you might like to try. Believe me when I tell you that a nice holiday punch will make your holiday party a smashing success. I always like to offer alcohol and non-alcohol punch choices. And I make labels to avoid any confusion! Create A Playlist You need a great variety of music for a fantastic holiday party. There are so many options when it comes to Christmas music. I like to create a playlist that has a nice selection of holiday hits. From the more mellow classic tunes to the more upbeat hits like Crazy Frog Christmas! Games!! This year my lovely cousin is hosting Christmas Eve at her house and she has asked me to be in charge of games. A few years ago I introduced some hilarious minute-to-win-it-style games and we had a blast. Honestly, we were screaming so loud that I’m surprised the neighbours didn’t call the police. So this year we are doing this again and I am in the middle of organising some games that we haven’t done before. Along with some favourite requests too. Stick To A Timeline Married to a chef means that I have been really lucky when it comes to sticking to a timeline for serving the food. My husband has these amazing skills where he can get food on the table hot and ready in a flash. Sadly, I don’t have these skills at all. Now that he works evenings and I host family dinners and holiday parties on my own a lot. I have to make sure that I write down a schedule of what needs to go in the oven and when. Then I have to make sure to stick to the plan so that we don’t eat at midnight!! Make Space In Your Home I love my home but I do wish that we had a better area for entertaining. We don’t so I have to always make sure that I maximise my space so that my guests feel comfortable. I will often move furniture around or store some in the converted garage. I wrote a post on How To Entertain In A Small Space where you can find some tips if you have a small place like mine. Give Guests A Gift To Take Home I love giving my guests a small gift to take home. It is never anything expensive or big. It’s just a little something to remember the fun time we had together. And I like to add a nice touch by making a personalised gift tag. These are a few tips that I have found to be helpful when it comes to hosting holiday parties. And so now I guess it’s a wrap for ‘Let’s Look 2022’! I hope that you all have an amazing time at your next holiday party. And if you are hosting then I hope that these tips will come in handy.

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Celebrations

9 Comments / Hello Monday

Hi friends, this weekend sure went by fast!! Wow, I had a very busy one with a couple of fun end-of-the-year celebrations. And it would have been so nice to have a day off from work to recover. But no such luck as I was back today and going at a hundred miles with all the end-of-year preschool stuff! Anyway, I’m on the countdown now as I only have six more days left before we finish up. Then it’s goodbye preschool 2022 and hello Summer holidays!! As usual, I am linking up with Holly and Sarah for today’s Hello Monday post. Thanks so much for being here today and letting me share with you a snapshot of what my weekend looked like. Staff Christmas Lunch On Saturday we had our highly anticipated staff Christmas lunch in the city and it was such a gloriously sunny day!! We went to a restaurant called 6 Head in The Rocks Sydney. This is the view from the restaurant and it was magnificent! We had such a fun time eating, talking and laughing. It was just so great to relax and enjoy the day!! I am so lucky to work with such a brilliant team who are like a second family to me. The menu was very pricey and I can’t say that the food blew me away. But the view, location and atmosphere are what it was mainly all about. I had a huge belly laugh when I made a goose of myself with the waitress. I ordered the steak and I thought I heard her say “with chips and salad” so I said “yes” with a big smile. Because every other restaurant I have been to always offers steak with either chips and salad or mashed potato and veggies. Makes sense right? She gave me a funny look and repeated herself and this time I heard her loud and clear. “Would you like your steak with chips OR salad? I went with the chips. After lunch, some of us kicked on and we went to an Irish pub where we had some drinks and then ended up enjoying a live band. It really was such a great day celebrating the end of another preschool year with such a fun bunch of ladies. Sunday On Sunday it was my husband’s swim club Christmas lunch. Talk about a weekend of celebrations!! I watched the swimming races and then afterwards it was time for some more Christmas fare!! It’s so funny how we are in summer over here and the other side of the world is all rugged up and cozy in chilly winter. I always think that it would be way more fun to have Christmas in the wintertime. Cold Christmas food for a warm day. Steve had to leave before the celebrations finished because he had to go to work. I had arranged to go Christmas shopping with my lovely bestie. She helped me pick out a few presents that I needed and now I’m nearly all done! I always have the best time with my lovely friend who is really more like a sister to me. I can chat with her about anything and everything. In between shops, we stopped off at a Japanese sushi place for a bite to eat. We had some sushi rolls and crispy crab things ( I can’t remember the name) but it was all delicious. I also had this green tea latte and I can honestly not stop thinking about it!! It was so sweet and refreshing. I want to go back for more!! When I Christmas shop I find it so hard not to get distracted looking for things that I want. Especially when I go to one of my favourite shops Muji. I got home around 8 pm and I was so tired from all the weekend fun. After I had a shower I plonked myself on the lounge and started watching the Netflix series “Harry and Meghan”. Is anyone else watching? I really enjoyed the first episode. But I had to force myself to turn it off and go to bed as it was getting so late. This week I will have to be better about going to bed at a decent time because we have so much happening at preschool. We have two Christmas parties and two concerts. Different children attend preschool at different ends of the week. So I will have to be on my A game and remember what I need to do as the concerts are not the same. I am so grateful that I finally feel like I have my energy back after being hit with covid a few weeks ago. I’m starting to feel like myself again which is great because I was so sick of dragging myself around in a funk. Anyway, I hope you all had a lovely weekend and are ready for a brand-new week. Eeeeks only 13 more days until Christmas. I can hardly believe it!! Let’s not panic!! Happy Monday friends!!

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Christmas favourites

5 Comments / Christmas

Hi friends it’s lovely to be back today linking up with Andrea and Erika. I thought that it would be fun to chat about a few of this week’s Christmas favourites. This is always such a fun time of the year! But if you guys have been reading along. You will probably know that I’ve really struggled to get into the Christmas spirit this year. But I ploughed on and this week I put up my tree, decorated the house (a bit), listened to Christmas music and watched a couple of old favourite movies and shows. And I think that this helped me enormously. Christmas Tree On Wednesday night when the three of us were home. We all pitched in and put up the tree. Well nearly all three of us pitched in. Sam mainly lay on the lounge! But it was really nice to be all together. I ended up finding more of the cute gingerbread men decorations at another Bed Bath N’ Table store in the city on the weekend. This time I didn’t hesitate and I snapped them up. I think they look cute on the tree. I bought these nice non-blinking white string lights years ago from Ikea and they are my favourite. My Favourite Christmas Show While we decorated the tree on Wednesday night. We watched The Vicar Of Dibley-Christmas Lunch Incident on Amazon Prime. I know that I went on and on about this last year. But I can’t help it. It’s my absolute favourite episode. The funny thing is. I haven’t ever really watched many of the other Vicar Of Dibley episodes. But watching this Christmas episode is a must in our family. Beautiful Ornaments As I was decorating I took a trip down memory lane. Looking at some of the beautiful ornaments that the children from preschool have given me as presents over the years. I like to date them and write the name of my little student on the back with a permanent marker. Here is an ornament that Sam made for me when he was at preschool……..sigh! This gorgeous handmade angel was given to me by a little girl called Amy. Amy is now in her early 20s and I was lucky enough to catch up with her and her lovely mum earlier this year! Egg Nog Another of this week’s Christmas favourites is this delicious egg nog. I’m determined to make my own this year because it’s on my December bucket list!! But this egg nog was very good and we all enjoyed a nice glass with some Walkers shortbread biscuits after we finished decorating the tree. Christmas Treats! I am always so overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity of our lovely preschool parents. Earlier this week we received a huge box of decorated doughnuts. Another lovely parent also gave us some Christmas biscuits. We also received some chocolates, a box of cannolis and another box of pastries. I forgot to take any pics of these because I was too busy eating! A Lindt Chocolate Advent Calender I usually buy a simple Aldi advent calendar. But this year I splurged on a Lindt Chocolate Advent calendar (because it was half-price). I have banned Sam from eating them all in one day!! Community Christmas Events I’m sure that I took for granted all these fun Christmas community events in the past. But after two years of everything being cancelled, it’s so great that now they’re back! So last Saturday some friends and I went to the Carss Bush Park Magic Of Christmas Event. We had some food from the food trucks. Then we just hung around on a picnic blanket and had fun chatting and catching up. I was really happy to be with my lovely friends but sad that poor Steve missed out because he was at work. Christmas Candles I have loved burning lovely Christmas-scented candles like this one. It has honestly been so cold (here I go again with the weather report). I can’t remember summer ever being this cold and we are still wearing jumpers and jackets!! On the upside, it’s been really nice and cozy to have candles burning at this time of the year. Normally we are all sweltering in the unbearable Australian summer heat. So there we have it, eight Christmas favourites for this week! I’m excited that it’s the weekend because we have our staff Christmas lunch tomorrow. Then on Sunday, it’s Steve’s swim club Christmas BBQ. And Sunday afternoon I’m going Christmas shopping with my bestie. Another busy weekend and I’m totally up for it! I hope that you guys have the best weekend. We are really on a countdown now aren’t we!! Thanks so much for reading along. I’ll be back here on Monday. Take care friends and happy Friday!

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