Party time

This weekend saw us going to a couple of parties. Friday's was held by mjg59 and Daf. Aside from tap-dancing horses and helicopters, there was much caipirinha, mince pies, nuts (our contribution), other goodies, and the usual crowd of chattering geeks.

On Saturday we held our own party, with mulled wine, mulled apple juice, mince pies, and various contributions from other people (such as puff pastry baked with goats' cheese and leek - yum). I had to go out in the afternoon to buy missing cooking ingredients, and I thought that we should be properly festive so I got some decorations too, plus some extra tumblers. We now have lights and tinsel hung up around the front room (with masking tape!) and a tiny table-top "tree". For the party I also lit some candles stuck in the empty wine bottles. I think it all worked out reasonably well despite the rather late preparation and lack of experience with mulling. I'm not sure wholemeal pastry for mince pies was all that popular though - perhaps we should go half-and-half instead.