Belated Christmas post

I've left it a bit late to do a detailed Christmas post so I thought I would summarise some of the highlights through pictures.

We had a marvellous time. It was a bit of a food fest stretching over several days, kicking off with a dinner on Christmas eve. In all the excitement, I forgot to take pictures of the entire spread but on the dinner table was: roast lamb, honey and soy chicken wings, cider ham with a cranberry glaze, roasted vegetables, honey and fig damper, mushroom gravy, onion gravy, and my vegan contributions, walnut and lentil balls (courtesy of Oh She Glows) and pumpkin and spinach croquettes (based on vegiehead's recipe). As usual, I ate way too much but it was all worth it!

Croquettes and lentil ball goodness

Dessert consisted of many yummy things, but one of the highlights for me were these delicious dairy-free, gluten-free vanilla cupcakes my friend brought. AMAZING! (and just quietly, also delicious for Boxing Day breakfast....)

Christmas Day itself was full of presents and family time. This year Ellie discovered the joy of ripping paper, so she opened ALL the presents. It was lovely to see her face light up with it all, and I can safely say she had a marvellous time. She was also extremely spoilt, not by Mr Fork and I who stuck to our Ellie gift manifesto) but by friends and family who assure me they couldn't help it. This is her, dressed in Christmas finery heading to lunch with the family.

Those sunglasses! I die!

In our family, we do a secret santa for the adults and mine was sneakily also addressed to Ellie. This is what I got (ok, along with a gorgeous door hook thing), because every little girl needs a pink tennis dress right?! I don't even feel ripped off that Ellie got my present, so it must be love. Isn't it adorable!?

Pink tennis dress cuteness overload

Those pineapples I've been growing? Yeah, I cut those up. I don't want to toot my own horn but they were the best pineapples I've ever tasted (since the last one I grew anyway). Tiny, but so sweet and no acid in them at all. Ellie pretty much ate the lion share of them but I did get a morsel. I've saved the tops, so hopefully I can increase production!

Nothing beats home grown produce!

Christmas in QLD is hot, hot, hot, so we're also getting a lot of mileage out of the blow up pool, especially on Boxing Day. My little water dragon is such a water baby. This photo says it all. Mr Fork was filling up the pool with the hose and she insisted he spray her so she could dance in it. Look at that joyful expression!

Loves the water, just loves it

Speaking of dragon babies, I couldn't resist showing off this cool shirt the1337mum gave me as a present. Yes, it's a geeky Game of Thrones shirt, but it's also a nod to my little girl, who was born in the year of the dragon. Appropriate, no? I paired it with my Black Milk year of the snake leggings to keep with the theme. Eagle eyed readers have also made comments about my bean necklace. That was a Christmas present from Ellie to me (it makes me feel better about buying it when I say that). When I was pregnant, I always called her my little bean, and when we knew she was a girl and we'd decided her name, she was my Ellie bean. What better way to commemorate that than with a bean necklace? I love it!

Dragon, snake, bean

Hope you had a merry, happy Christmas!