It already feels like a distant memory but New Year’s Eve was only last Sunday. Did you stay up to say goodbye to 2017 and hello to 2018? And if so, what did you do?

This year we had a little communal get-together with some of our neighbours – six adults, seven kids. We kicked off in the early evening and finished the wrong side of 2am. The kids had dinner followed by a marathon Xbox session. Meanwhile, dinner for the adults was followed by something even more fun: cocktails.

I’m not entirely sure how but I have developed a reputation as the go-to cocktail maker across multiple friendship groups. I think it helps that I can still follow a recipe even after four or five rounds of … let’s call them industrial-strength cocktails rather than the watered-down imitations you get in most bars and restaurants. Literally, I don’t do things in half-measures.

It also helps that we have a well-stocked drinks cupboard. Having done an inventory of our hosts’ supplies, I popped back to our house and returned with a bag of 16 bottles including everything from tequila, white rum and Kahlua to blue Curaçao, grenadine and crème de cassis – plus the trusty cocktail bible that has served me well for 25 years.

If I do say so myself, I do make a mean piña colada (as Heather will testify).

Anyhow, liquor-based lubrication aside, we had a most pleasant evening. For the first time, all three of our kids made it all the way to midnight and our street fireworks. Indeed, they were still going when Heather ended up ushering them off to bed at 1am. (Mostly to avoid the embarrassment of them outlasting her, I suspect.)

So 2018 has already seen a family first. Our kids now have the stamina to see in the New Year. May it be only the first of many new family milestones this year.

I’ll drink to that.

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