Waffle maker.Out of storage.
Fruit for breakfast.Cut and prepped.
Dishwasher.Empty and ready to be filled with tonight’s dishes.
Milk for Mary.Formula made up, in the fridge, and ready for her feed tonight.
Okay, I think I’m ready. Donning my festive oven-gloves with dancing Christmas puddings, I move the huge dish of lasagne to the trivet in the middle of the table and tweak the placement of a couple of the knives and forks so everything is perfectly symmetrical. The good thing about not being able to breastfeed anymore is that I can have a guilt-free glass of wine with dinner, which I definitely feellike I need. I take a deep breath in the solitude of my kitchen-diner before shouting, “Dinner’s ready!”
It’s like a stampede, the rumble of sock muffled footsteps coming up the hall before Lucas and Oscar are first through the door. “Oh, man,” Lucas groans. “I don’t like lasagne.”
I roll my eyes. “And yet, you’ll eat your dinner without a fuss because I’ve worked hard to make it for you.”
“If you’d made it for me, you wouldn’t have made lasagne,” he mumbles with all the attitude of the teenager he isn’t yet.
Before I can respond to that, Harry is behind our eldest and lightly flicks the back of his ear, startling him more than hurting him. “If I hear you cheek your mother again, you’ll be sent to bed with nothing but a stick of celery lining your stomach before we’ve played games. No one else here would get away with speaking to my wife like that, you are no different.” I don’t know what it is about Harry referring to me asyour motherto the boys, ormy wifein general, but it’s always done something to me, and I feel the flutters in my belly that only Harry gives me.
“Okay,” Lucas pouts.
“Apologise, please,” Harry rumbles quietly.
“Sorry, Mum,” Lucas says somewhat sheepishly.
“Thank you for apologising,” I say. “Now up to the table with you both.”
The boys run to their chairs opposite Rhiannon and Luke’s twins. Harry steps forward and kisses my cheek. “Everything looks great, babe. What can I do?”
“There’s a bottle of red on the table but we’ll likely need another one opened and I haven’t got the white from the garage.”
“I’m on it, sit down and relax a little, yeah?”
“Okay,” I smile up at him and he kisses the tip of my nose before disappearing toward the garage.
“Sweetheart, everything looks wonderful,” my dad says, beaming at me as I come to the head of the table.
“Thanks, Dad.”
“It smells even better,” Rhiannon adds, her hands resting on her small baby bump. “I’m starving.”
“Mummy’s always starving.” Margot giggles.
“She eats so much food,” Freddie adds with his own laugh.
“Sometimes there’s none left for the rest of us,” Luke says with wide eyes, conspiring with his children. Rhiannon sticks her tongue out at the three of them, making us all laugh.
Harry comes back in and starts filling glasses with wine, teasing Rhiannon by going to fill her glass and pulling away before the first drop can spill. She sticks her tongue out at him, too, earning herself a wink.
“So, Jake, Nel, have you two thought about the wedding you want?” my Aunt Hen, Rhiannon’s mum, asks.
“Well, we only got engaged yesterday,” Nel says by way of an answer.
“Nel seems to think we won’t be married by this time next year,” Jake says as though waiting for us all to contradict that thought.
Instead, Rhiannon and I make twin snorting sounds while my mum and aunt look at Jake like he’s an adorable child who’s just said something ridiculous but sweet. “Darlin’, you think you’re going to plan and pay for a wedding in less than twelve months?” I ask, fully amused.
“That’s what I said!” Nel holds her hand out toward me in an agreeable gesture.
“Dresses alone can take months to find and then order and then you’ve got to get it fitted,” Hen explains to our clueless Jake. “And Nel is a fashionista, she’ll want to find the perfect dress.”
