25 June 2012

Midwinter Christmas mash up

This weekend was a right royal mash up of fun and activities.

It started with the most glorious of sunrises. No matter how long I live in this house, I hope I never take for granted the unusual and unique start to the day we are privileged to be invited to each and every morning.





Not long after this sun rise (which felt awfully late at 7.30am), Daddy and Noah headed off to football where Noah scored 2 goals and got player of the day - Dad was there to watch whilst Mylo and I played football, golf, basketball and motorbike crashes at home. They were pretty lucky to get their game in as by 9.30am the rain had started and the wind was beginning to really get going and it didn't let up all day.

After a quick coffee and change of clothes we headed over to the other side of town to Chocolate Fish cafe for brunch. I couldn't tell you the last time just the four of us went out to a cafe for lunch so it was rather nice. We'd also never (shamefully) eaten at the Mark II version of the cafe (it used to be round the other side of the headland in Seatoun). It's a funky setting, and I've always loved the eclectic chairs and artwork they have scattered around the place. Having reinvented themselves upon re-opening, their speciality is now BBQ sammies - Mark had a corn fritter sammie with mint yoghurt and bacon, while I went for the parmesan crusted pork with greens, aoli and apple sauce. Golly me they were good! Oh and there was the odd chocolate fish served up with the kid's meals - of course!



We will definitely be back in the summer when Mark's parents are here to enjoy the lovely setting in (hopefully) more settled weather!


The mini Interislander ferry outside provided a quick bit of entertainment before we popped across the road to enjoy a self-guided tour during one of Westside Studios rare open days - where all manner of fantastic scenes awaited us.


There were some immediately recognisable scene rooms such as Finding Nemo and the Simpsons.


Even so, the spaceman and NASA rocket quite took my fancy.


But as you can imagine the Star Wars figures were by far the biggest hit with my boys (all 3 of them!)


And the weekend wouldn't have been complete without all the mid-winter Christmas festivities, which we could barely wait to get into! As soon as we were home from school pick-up on Friday we got stuck into decorating the tree to the tunes of The Wiggles - Christmas. That was until Noah told me if he heard Feliz Navidad one more time he was going to go nuts so I duly switched over to some more upbeat Christmas pop songs. Here's some of the fun we had that afternoon....








Friday night we kicked off festivities with lasagne by candlelight, then on Saturday we cooked one of our all-time favourite meals Sticky Maple Chicken (recipe here) and ate it while watching We Bought A Zoo together - a very heartwarming movie. Sunday was the main event though, roast chicken followed by my first ever attempt at making Red Velvet Cupcakes for dessert.

I'd been wanting to make them for AGES, and decided that with the red Christmas theme and a gorgeous new cake stand to display them on, I could wait no longer. They took a bit of extra effort to make (especially with the cream cheese frosting) but I think they looked pretty festive.


We ended our weekend of festivities with a green bath filled with paper snowflakes. And that reminds me, I still have a pile of pulp to go and clean up from the empty bath! 




A very Happy and Toasty Midwinter to you all!



 





8 comments :

Unknown said...

What a HUGE weekend. The food looked sooooo good. The snowflakes and awesome family time together is inspiring. Have a great week. Sarann xxx

PaisleyJade said...

Looks like you guys had so much fun! What a great idea - love the sky shots and the bath and especially loving your red velvet cupcakes!!

Julie said...

What a wonderful winter weekend! Have just bought cream cheese to try Marian Keyes' red velvet cupcakes recipe!

Simoney said...

What FUN!!!
That Studio looks AMAZING - my boys would love it too
xx

Sammy said...

Pure awesome-ness. Happy Mid winter Christmas!

Catching the Magic said...

Such a beautiful weekend and photographs, so magic. I love that movie place opposite the Chocolate Fish - it's been ages since I've been and there seem to be lots of new things since I last went.

Love the green bath and snow flakes - and those cup cakes! Wow! x

Anonymous said...

Mmmm those cupcakes look amazing! Sounds like you had a wonderful weekend!

Anonymous said...

what a super awesome weekend, I had been contemplating a mid-winter/Christmas meal but with hubby working weekends at the moment I didnt think I would be able to fit it in.....maybe I might look into it next month though......

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