I’ve been incredibly lucky this year to be on the receiving end of some truly wonderful gifts. Everyone has been really thoughtful and I honestly feel truly blessed to have such caring family and friends. I can’t think of one gift that I don’t love so this list isn’t exhaustive but I thought I’d give you a rundown of those that have been life changing…

My man bag
It’s just one of those things that I would never have bought. My old faithful has been in service for many years and was starting to look decidedly ‘homeless-chic’. The final straw was a leaking sharpie so hubby surprised me with this wonderful leather satchel for xmas.

Tom Kerridge’s latest cookbook
I have a little mancrush on Tom. Not in the phwoar sense you understand (he is decidedly hetero and we are both married, it would never work!) but there is something about his love of food, easy to follow recipes and general ‘couldn’t give a shit’ attitude that resonates with me. I’ve already made one recipe and am definitely going to be thumbing through his pages regularly.

Global knives
What can I say. I’ve been a fan of global knives since I got a set from my work colleagues at One.Tel for my 30th birthday. 14 years later and I’m still using them but this year I’ve finally been able to add not one, but two to my collection. This is a good thing. Although they are still brilliant after almost 15 years having a very sharp knife around has improved my slicing and dicing!!

My nutribullet
Out of all the gifts this year, this could end up being truly life changing. I will be totally honest here and state for the record that I’d got into a bad bacon butty habit at work.Thanks to the Dazzler I haven’t been to the sarnie shop for brekkie once this year and I’ve even discovered the delights of savoury smoothies, but that’s a whole other post!!

This morning I’m whizzing up a batch of Apple, kiwi, orange, banana, spinach and blueberry. It takes about 2 minutes and actually keeps me feeling full till well into lunch, something a bacon butty never did!!

Special mention to ALL of my mums surprise gifts

Every year my mum pulls us together a pillowcase of presents she thinks we would like. Occasionally these will be off mark (I stopped wearing roll necks long before my mum stopped buying me them) but these are always wonderful surprises.  This year however her gifts. whilst not life changing, were truly amazing. Her generosity knows no bounds and how she does it on a pension truly astounds me.

Not only did she give us an album of all the old pics of me she could find, and a gorgeous duvet cover that now sits pride of place on our bed but she also added in a wonderful bottle of extra virgin olive oil AND a grinder full of Himalayan salt, both of which have pride of place in the kitchen.  How she knew we had run out of both literally the week before Christmas scares me a little!! (I’m thinking either a webcam or witchcraft)

Lastly I cannot believe how many bottles of fizz we received this year. Anyone would think we had a drink problem ;0)

To all those of you who bought us presents and are reading this, THANK YOU, you are wonderful, wonderful people and I’m happy to have you in our lives xxxxxxx