30th December 2007.
My brother and his fiancee were working nights on New Year's Eve, so we brought our festivities forward by 24 hours in order to see in the eve of New Year's Eve.
Bearing in mind that the last time (but one) that my brother saw us, Lara screamed for two hours until he left (she must have sensed the torment caused by her daddy's records being nailed to a tree and shot by his errant brother some 30 years ago), she behaved admirably. I'm not sure whether this was down to the presents (thanks Uncle Bobby / Auntie Jan), the presence of a dog and a cat to detract Lara's attention and provide tails to pull, or the continued (astounding) development of my little girl, but we did the whole dinner and grown-up conversation thing and remembered how it is to be adults again while Lali dreamed the night away, apart from being left to cry twice as we forgot the monitor (we only apply the traditional English method of torturing the child by ignoring her demands, all in the name of social-engineering, when the technology is not available).
So, a great time was had by all, and another year goes by. We were back home for New Year's Eve where we watched Little Britain, commented on the superiority of the London fireworks to the Sydney display (that we saw 'live' in our childless days), and gladly went to bed a little past midnight (oh, how things change). My daughter celebrated by being sweet, funny, beautiful, adorable etc during the day, and then going to bed at 9pm and staying there for 12 hours; what better present could parents receive?