It's Christmas time all over the world (except in South America where it was done and dusted hours ago.....)

Happy Christmas.....

[Note to self: email someone high up in Argentina about them celebrating on the wrong day]

An incredible thing happened on Christmas Day considering we were in a house with four little people (well, three little people and Eliza who at 12 is incredibly articulate and grown up), Abby and I were the only people up at 9am and ready for breakfast!!

We'd woken up at about 8am and listened to The Carol Symphony and some carols and when we were both properly awake and feeling Christmassy we opened our presents... Father Christmas did not disappoint... I got a lovely scarf, a journal, pen, make-up, perfume, a bangle, chocolate, two vest tops, some suntan lotion and a pair of earrings which Abby stole from a very nice shop in Mendoza.

With no one else up we sat out on the veranda in the sunshine and after a few minutes Lilla and Maude came bouncing out of the house in their pyjamas and wished us a merry Christmas, 10 minutes later everyone was up and we were eating breakfast and once the children had unwrapped their presents it was time for our Christmas Day ride.

Me helping Lilla load her 'pez' machine

Christoval and Raul took us on a four hour round trip to visit Raul's other estancia. Riding with the children was the best fun, Archie and Eliza (an experienced rider) led, regularly leaving the rest of us to 'eat their dust', Lilla was frustrated by this and spent the entire ride trying every method to get her horse to accelerate with varying levels of success. The funniest thing to see though was Maude on a horse almost the same size as mine, with her Converse Allstars, camouflage pants and 'no sugar added' T-shirt on she looked like a titchy little modern day Thelwell character bouncing along in front of me, letting go of anything that was securing her to the horse so that she could turn around to show me the 'rein' snake and chomp its jaws at me......

Maude 

After lunch of chorizo steak with mashed butternut squash and sweet potato I didn't feel like a siesta and got talking to Daniele who also didn't want to go to bed, and so while the rest of the world slept we had a great afternoon talking about the estancia, his family (he has a little girl of five and a brand new baby girl who's only four months) and football. Two bottles of wine later and it was 8:20 pm and time for dinner!

A quick shower, some pasta and far too much more wine later it was time for bed.

Raine x