On the Twelfth Day of Christmas

I found the drummers' drumsticks

The turkey drumsticks and carcass have been boiled up for stock, the dog has eaten the last scraps of meat and I have finished off all the biscuits, cakes and chocolates, in preparation for the NYD ( new year diet!!) starting on Monday.

Tomorrow I will have to clear the house of the following:

12 Partridges
22 Turtle Doves
30 French Hens
36 Calling Birds
40 Gold rings
42 Geese a laying
42 Swans a swimming
40 Maids a milking
36 Ladies dancing
30 Lords a leaping
22 Pipers piping
12 Drummers drumming.

That is 140 people and 184 variously sized birds. I've left the 40 cows that were being milked by the maids out in the garden, there just wasn't room indoors.

As for the 40 gold rings I may keep them, unless, as some historians think, the verse actually refers to pheasants, the gold ring being the coloured bands round their necks. If that is the case they will have to go too!!