So I'm somehow back already from my sweet six days in Cornwall and I can't for the life of me understand how time can move that fast! I spent most of my time lounging around in either my sister's house or at my parents place, and I've never felt more tired in my life...and the weather certainly gave me good reason to stay inside too!

During the winter months most of the sand is swept out to sea leaving us with a rocky beach that isn't as pleasant to sit on! But the wind and rain certainly gave us no reason for a pit stop while strolling around my village.

I'm used to waking up early, getting my work attire on and sitting at a desk all day, brain engaged, but for those six days, I woke up sometimes at the exact same time as I do for work, sometimes later, and sat on a sofa, engaged only with the television screens and the conversations in the room. It was relaxing to the point that I needed naps to rejuvenate myself, and I've barely napped since I was a student!

The first few days were spent catching up with my sister and her family, and giving some love to their very poorly pooch Pepper, who had come out of surgery a few days before and was thankfully on the mend. She needed the rest so we had her up beside us on the sofa whilst we watched Disney films and I held back my emotions.

On my second day home, I slumped up to my sister's bedroom and had a 5 hour nap whilst my niece bobbed in and out of the room to very kindly offer me popcorn. She also almost came to rouse me from my slumber when my sister sliced her thumb open. Bless my 7 year old niece for believing I was the responsible adult they so desperately needed in that situation; my sister thought otherwise and let me rest, tending to her wounds herself.

There was also a moment when my niece questioned if I'd ever seen Aladdin. Child, I said, you are not the first generation to watch these wonderful creations.

I bet she thinks she's cooler because her generation got Frozen.

Whilst I was missing my other half for the holidays, I had most of my family around me for the Christmas period which was lovely. My brother was absent having stayed in Stoke for the holidays, so we spent Christmas Day as the three musketeers: me, my mum and my dad.

We could barely be bothered to move all day and it was great. We had eggs Benedict/florentine for breakfast with a bottle of champagne opened early in the morning after we'd emptied out our stockings from Santa. Then after a breakfast clean up we slumped on the sofas and just basically relaxed. My Mum and Dad both work a lot in demanding roles at Care Homes that they are very devoted to. They work with people that they truly appreciate and care for, and it's lovely to see them in a job that they find very rewarding, I just wish they got a little more time to relax! So really, it was nice to be home and see them just sit down and lounge around. They worked the first three days I was home so we had to do a speedy food shop on Christmas Eve Eve missing out on buying the important things like cheese and alcohol. I wasn't too fussed that they'd worked these three days, because it certainly beat last year when my mum had to work on Christmas Day!

Dad faced some issues with his new biscuit pocket mug...

Mum and I prepped the lunch whilst Dad quite willingly watched Disney's Brave. We didn't go all traditional with the dinner this year as my Dad and I don't actually like turkey and my mum is a pescatarian, so instead, we got Dad two mini beef wellington's and Mum and I had a big fillet of salmon, of course, all the trimmings were included. Except Yorkshire puddings...as we had no eggs in the house, gutting.

We opened presents periodically - we're an unusual family when it comes to present opening. My parents have always wanted us, and themselves, to appreciate each and every present. We've always opened a couple of presents a day - one or two in the morning, a few after lunch and maybe another before bed, but I've never opened all my presents in one day. I like the way my parents do things. When we were younger we used to make our presents last all the way up to New Years Eve and then on New Years Day we'd open our tree presents. It made Christmas Day into Christmas week and don't recall any of us complaining about it, in fact we were so used to it that it seemed strange to discover people opened all theirs at once.

The day continued as it had started. We snacked on little things from our stockings and watched pretty much every Disney film available, later moving on to James Bond.

In all honesty though, Christmas TV was rubbish this year. I don't watch TV in Nottingham as we spend most of our time in our room favouring Netflix and Amazon Prime, or occasionally BBCi, so I always enjoy returning home to catch up on some good films at Christmas time, but Boxing Day was a huge disappointment in the evening television department. At one point we were watching the Paul Potts film and also a Shaun the Sheep short made an appearance - both of which weren't particularly entertaining.

Speaking of Boxing Day, that was a bigger family affair. We went over to my Grandma's house to spend the day with her, my auntie and my sister's family - minus my brother in law who sadly had to work. My Grandma lives in a small bungalow so you can imagine that six adults, two children and five dogs were a little short of space but we'd been there so many times for these kinds of gatherings that manoeuvring oneself about the place was second nature.

Grandma had cooked us up a lovely Boxing Day dinner and after we were stuffed we sat around her tree to open another lot of presents. Obviously, the kids really cleaned up here as they always do and somehow, my four year old nephew knew exactly what I'd got him for Christmas:

I turned to my nephew as he eyed this particular present, 'what do you think it is then A?', he pointed and excitedly announced 'A T-rex'. Damn, I said to myself, I thought I had him fooled.

Everyone was very pleased with their gifts and the kids were so well behaved despite the lack of space and the excitement of it all. After a while relaxing and chatting we all made our way home. We almost faced a disaster when my sister, after having joked with my mum that she had locked her keys in her house, discovered that she had in fact done exactly that. The worker came to the rescue - as we pulled up to their house my brother in law had arrived right on time with their other key. I know for a fact I would have been the one sent over the back fence if he hadn't!

After safely getting them all inside, dinosaur included, my parents and I headed home, jumped in our PJs and set out a cheeseboard before settling with another film and later, another James Bond.

I came back on the train yesterday, having given my family big hugs goodbye and also having chatted with my absent brother on Christmas day for a catch up. My journey seemed simple, with one long trip from Cornwall to Derby and then a change at Derby for Nottingham.

Having said that, my journeys back from Cornwall don't tend to go smoothly every time.

I arrived at Derby to discover my train to Nottingham had been replaced by a bus, for reasons unknown, that didn't show up. Eventually a driver for a stationary bus that had been sitting there for the whole 40 minutes I'd been outside the station decided to drive myself and four stranded strangers back to Nottingham. My boyfriend picked me up from the station and eventually, I made it back to Radcliffe at 11:30pm.

Would you believe that I left my house in Cornwall at 3pm? Got to love travelling, aye?

All in all, it was another lovely Christmas. I didn't feel the Christmas spirit as much as I once did but I don't know if that's something that comes with age. Working so close to Christmas, not attending university Christmas parties and singing Wham! and Mariah Carey at the top of my lungs after shots and pints at Keele's Student Union, and even doing Christmas shopping on my own, rather than with friends or my mum, disrupted the usual Christmas cheer I feel.

Though despite the lack of Christmas cheer, it was still a very lovely six day break with some of my family. I hope everyone else had a lovely Christmas too, let me know what you got up to by leaving links to your Christmas catch ups!