The Ups and Down in the Dower House

The Ups-
Yesterday’s meal was deemed a success despite the roast potatoes making a very late arrival at the table and the honeyed parsnips still in the freezer. Luca made a Nigella light gingerbread cake with lemon icing for dessert which we managed to do justice to.

My children have certainly had my food and drink consumption at heart.
I am well endowed with both for the foreseeable future, ranging from the basket of goodies from son#1 already blipped, through the bottle of rhubarb and ginger liqueur from Daughter #1 to the box featured in the blip containing a number of my favourite wafer biscuits from David and Luca, and the eye watering number of Söderberg vouchers from Daughter#2

There was also a lovely little book of hitherto unseen photos of HL and me taken over the years by David. I have added 2 of the photos to my blip- one taken on a windy Shatti Beach in Muscat in 2009 and the other one in Budapest in 2015.
Unfortunately the one person I want to show it to is no longer here.

The Downs-
I woke this morning to cold radiators. The Ferroli central heating boiler has let me down for the second Christmas running. They say lightning never strikes the same place twice- I beg to differ. I hope this breakdown will be fixed quickly, not like last year when we were without heating for about a month. If there is a plus to this sorry saga then it is the fact that the temperature outside today is 10°, positively balmy.