Fun Filled Festive Frivolities

What do you do when you start seeing your ex partner again after a year?

Go for a drink? Check.

Spend loads of time catching up, filling each other in on what each other has been up to over the year? Check.

Spend the best part of 3-4 days making mince pies, mulled wine, visiting a number of farm shops, baking cupcakes, buying fine wine from a wine merchant, have a meal in a very posh hotel,  book a holiday, decide to go to the annual ‘Cheese awards’, go to a classical music concert in London?

Erm.... Check?

The last few days have been awesome – For both of us, I think. Despite me having a very nasty cold, Jeff and I have been getting to know each other again and have done all manner of funky stuff.

When we were together, we used to go on loads of really cool holidays. We went to Prague and Berlin and did loads of really, really cool UK holidays such as visiting Northumberland, Scotland, Ipswich, Cornwall, Exeter, Oxford, Hertfordshire..... We always managed to find fun things to do and as we’re both National Trust nuts, it usually involved at least one castle or stately home.  Getting back in contact, we thought it might be nice to go on holiday somewhere else, somewhere new, so we can make some more memories. Being the ‘control freak’ in the partnership, I suggested to Jeff that I organise everything and he just turn up at the train station and I’ll tell him where we’re going and what we’re doing. So, on January 28th 2011, Jeff will be turning up at the train station and will be told where our mini weekend break will be! I’ve been having great fun organising everything and on the day we travel to our destination, will be giving Jeff an envelope with a number of clues in it, so he can guess where we’re going....

Saturday morning, Jeff picked me up in his 4 wheel car due to the snow issue – I do drive (and it’s an absolutely fantastic car), however Jeff’s handles better in the snow, so he drove to my house and off we went to the first farm shop. Neither of us had visited it before and we managed to buy quite a lot of ingredients to make ‘Venison and red wine casserole’ which was the plan on Saturday night. Unfortunately, I had come down with a very nasty chest infection, therefore there was a lot of coughing and nose blowing as well as the chattering nineteen to the dozen. We then headed to a supermarket to get all the rest of the ingredients and some cough mixture for me.

Everything seems rather surreal at the moment – The last time I was at that supermarket was when Jeff and I were together over a year ago – The last time we spoke on the phone, was when he dumped me, the last time we went out for a posh meal was the week before we split.... I know it will get easier, but it’s been a very odd few days.

Once armed with the food stuffs we headed back to Jeff’s house and started to make mince pies – I have to say, they turned out rather well considering we made some changes to the recipe. The casserole, we did later on in the day and again, it turned out incredibly well – We woofed it down with some lovely crusty rolls and then couldn’t really move for a few minutes. I think Jeff is planning on having the leftovers today for lunch. We made mulled wine ‘half properly’ and it tasted great – I think that’s another thing we have in common, we both like a drink :-)

Sunday was more farm shops and a lovely walk in the snow along a river. It was lovely just holding hands and everything being far less... complicated.  When I was working away from home, Jeff travelled to see me at least once a week and I didn’t see him at weekends as I was so busy trying to fit all my friends and family in – just ‘chilling’ and spending time together without having to worry about travelling back to work is something I’m still really happy about.  I taught Jeff another one of my recipes and the Lamb Byriani turned out exceptionally well – I think we’ll be the size of houses if we continue cooking every night, though.

Monday night was the night we had booked the posh meal – it was a tradition of ours to go to this hotel once a year at Christmas. Last Christmas we had just split up, therefore we obviously didn’t go, however when we got back in contact we decided that this was a tradition that we both enjoyed and therefore were willing to try again and risk damaging the memories.  I shouldn’t have worried, it was utterly, utterly perfect. Jeff looked absolutely gorgeous in a black suit and when I saw him come downstairs he literally took my breath away – It was snowing when we got to the hotel and sitting by the open log fire with a drink, a gorgeous man and snow outside was such a perfect evening. The meal was wonderful, the service was (as always) brilliant and it didn’t feel like we had been apart at all.

On Tuesday, we decided we would make cupcakes and go and investigate fine wines – Jeff knew of this brilliant Fine Wine shop and Wine merchants very close to his house so we decided to go there and investigate. It was fantastic! We got a few bottles of fine wine and had this really, really nice man recommend a sweet red to us (I’m pretty OK with white wines, don’t have a clue when it comes to red wine). Neither of us had been there before and it was nice to think that having only been in contact just over a month, we’d already found loads of amazing places and done loads of really fun things together. The cupcakes turned out brilliantly – we decorated them ourselves, I think Jeff should quit IT and go into the cupcake making business as I certainly think he has talent in that area!

Lunch time was a wonderfully European affair of cheese, meat and bread – one of the cheeses seemed to have won an award at the ‘annual cheese awards’ and this got me interested, so we Googled the awards and have no decided that due to our shared love of cheese, we will be going to the annual 2011 cheese awards – What relationship can fail if you both share a love of cheese?

Tonight is the classical music concert and I’m so excited. Jeff and I share a love of classical music and whilst I don’t profess to be very knowledgeable in that area, I do know I enjoy listening, learning and experiencing things with the man I never thought I would see again.

- Molly