Hello
I had the loveliest weekend all round
Saturday afternoon MrGP took me to my favourite local cocktail bar for a festive drink then we went back home and I designed the cocktail menu for our at home Christmas pop up bar
I started this last year as we couldn't go out cos of the restrictions - I bought festive cocktail glasses, cocktail napkins, wrote out a menu of festive cocktails (basically put Cranberry in lots to make them red) and had a few cocktail nights at home pretending we were in a bar
It was fun so decided to do it again this year so ordered some new stationary etc for the menus so our cocktail bar is now ready to go! I had a couple over the weekend to test out some new additions to this year's menu
Then Saturday night I had my night out with my running friends which was lots of fun. It was the first time I had socialized with them apart from a quick coffee after a run so was a bit nervous but it was a lovely night. We went to a local brewery (which luckily have a full wine and cocktail list too) and had a few drinks and shared lots of yummy pizzas
Yesterday morning I got up early to start prep for dinner as we were doing a trial run of our Christmas Day dinner. Having roast beef, roast potatoes, yorkshire puddings and lots of gravy (and veg for Mr GP). I've only cooked that a few times and hadn't done it since last Christmas so wanted to trial it to make sure I got it right. So prepped the beef in the slow cooker first thing - I think it's unusual to do the beef in the slow cooker but I find it easier that way, the only time I did in the oven I dried it out too much.
Then we went into the city to meet a friend who was in town for the weekend and went for a walk and chat in Central Park so was lovely to catch up with her. Stopped on the way home at a food market type place and I got a mimosa and a strawberry nutella crepe
Then...... we got our Christmas tree!!!! I love getting and decorating the tree every year. We always get a real one and the price of the kind/size we usually get was ridiculous compared to last year so Mr GP was trying to persuade me to get a smaller/cheaper one but I wasn't having it - I told him that can be part of my Christmas present but I'm hoping he forgets that
So had a fun afternoon decorating the tree with Christmas music on and a couple of glasses of fizz.
Dinner was a bit stressful as our oven suddenly decided to stop working properly - it would heat up then as soon as it got to the set temperature it would start descending back down again! So we had to keep turning it off and back on again constantly and the timing of everything was then off. The roast potatoes ended up taking over 2 hours so had to try and keep everything else hot in the warming drawer while we were waiting on them. But anyways when it was finally all ready it was immense (if I do say so myself)!
Got someone in the see the oven today and guess what - it worked fine
Going to keep testing it over the next couple of days though in case it does happen again so we can get it fixed in time for Christmas Day.
Going out to a Christmas cocktail pop up bar (an actual one not our home one
) after work tonight. Feel like Monday's a bit of a crap one for a night out but it's the only day I could get a reservation this month so I'll put on my festive jumper and go make the most of it
Hope everyone's Monday has been ok