We are a whole week into January so it is definitely time for me to jot down what I got up to in December. Naturally this will be rather Christmas-heavy.

What I have read

I embraced the Christmas romance novel this month, mostly thanks to Kindle unlimited, and decided to up my reading goal to 150, which I made, just.

What I have read:

• The Ordeal of the Haunted Room (The Chronicles of St Mary’s #11.5) – Jodi Taylor
• A Bookshop Christmas – Rachel Burton
• Christmas at Corner Cottage – Sarah Hope
• Thank You for Listening – Julia Whelan
• Five Get Into Trouble 
• The Perfect Christmas Village – Bella Osborne
• A Witch’s Guide to Fake Dating a Demon (Glimmer Falls #1) – Sarah Hawley
• The Oddest Little Cornish Christmas Shop – Beth Good
• Adrift: The Curious Case of the Lego Lost at Sea – Tracey Williams
• Christmas Pie (The Chronicles of St Mary’s #14.5) – Jodi Taylor
• Christmas Secrets in the Scottish Highlands – Donna Ashcroft
• A Child is Born (Nightingales #3.5) – Donna Douglas
• Five Fall Into Adventure
• Gender Rebels – Anneka Harry

And I’m still working on:

• Why Mummy Drinks at Christmas (Why Mummy #5) – Gill Sims

What I have watched

• I carried on with The Simpsons season 12, and we also watched ER series 1 and 2 and Only Connect (including the Christmas specials)
• Our Tuesday night movies were Love Hard, Last Christmas and Best Christmas Ever!
• As we were off work and school we had time for plenty of movies, many of them Christmas-themed. Brodie chose Home Alone 1 & 2 and The Grinch, all of which he has seen before. We also watched the first three Harry Potter films and Chicken Run 2.
• On Christmas Day we watched the classic Wallace and Grommet episodes, A Grand Day Out, The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave.
• I also managed to watch both episodes of the Malory Towers Christmas special and review them – part one and part two.

What I have done

• We kept up our annual traditions – visiting a local country park for Christmas crafts, a walk to find the hidden reindeer, visiting Santa and having hot chocolate – visiting a nearby cafe and Christmas tree farm to have more hot chocolate and look at all the ornaments and lights, and to post Brodie’s letter to Santa.
• Elf made his daily visit to check on Brodie
• We had a couple of days of snow over the first weekend of December so we decided to take Brodie sledging instead of ice-skating, and I took along a hot chocolate in my travel mug to keep me warm as I watched.
• For my birthday I decided on a trip to an antique centre for a wander and lunch – I did not buy anything though, not even the Noddy things I found. But lunch was very nice! I also got tickets for The Little Mermaid on Ice at our local ice arena. It was a mix of competitive and amateur skaters, including some pretty young kids but it was very entertaining and there was some incredible skating.
• We checked out the Christmas activities in the city centre, though they were pretty poor. Brodie did some colouring and had a ride on a little carousel.
• I went to see Brodie’s school’s Christmas concert, held at a local church as the school can’t hold a big enough audience (it was built in the 1870s), and there was a Christmas party at the library that evening too.
• Between my birthday and my Christmas I got five Harry Potter Lego sets so I built four of them in December, and also did one of my new jigsaws.
• We also got together with family over Christmas and the week after, lots of food, lots of card and board games, lots of fun.

How was your December?