A Birth day

Aria chuckled and smiled at Marcus " well thats one thing you can have this year" she said then chuckled at Angus knowing he ws right " I love turky crown stuffed with sage and onion stuffing , oh and and Yorkshire Pudding." she said listening to them more hearing he liked christmas pudding she nodded " with thick sherry cream. and lit with whisky, now thats something I haven't seen yet." she added then laughed at Angus's words along with Ruby.

Jack once the wolf cub was warm and moving picked it up again this time making sure it was secure as he ported to the main house and walked over to Kate " Kate got some one who needs help" he said taking out the small now shivering cub. " he's a runt and was left behind by his mother, but hes a fighter for sure." he opened up the scarf to sow her a grey and brown bundle with soft blue eyes looking at him in his arms.

"You've never seen a flaming pudding?" Edward asked Aria. "That's half the fun."

"Do you remember the pudding that Evan brought one year?" Angus asked Edward.

"Oh, God. I do," Edward said, shaking his head. "That was not one of Evan's best moments."

"Evan bought a pudding at a shop in London and brought it to Tuscany for Christmas one year, and he thought it looked way too dry. So, he poured more whiskey on it. Quite a lot. But he used a bottle of whiskey that was 190 proof," Angus said.

"Dear God," Marcus was wide eyed.

"Yeah. One either has a death wish or a lack of IQ points to try to light whiskey that's almost 200 proof," Angus said. "It flashed up and set his hair on fire."

"And the tablecloth, and his clothes, and melted a bowl of chocolates that ran all over the table, and a number of other things. He was lucky he didn't have more than a few burns and blisters on his face," Edward said.

"Yes, indeed, and the pudding really was delicious," Angus laughed.

"We've had a lot of wolf cubs now that we've had a handful move in," Kate said, looking at the cub. "Hang onto him--he is a he, right? Or is he a she? I'll make up some homemade formula for him and get a bottle for you. He's too little to be on meat yet. Cute little buggar. You going to put him with that wolf cub you and Jess own?"

Aria shook her ehad when asked if she'd seen a flaming pudding " nope" she simply said then listend to the escapades even got up to and could not help laugh " oh i shouldn't laugh, but it sounds funny" she said " just keep the booze and pudding away from that man." she then laughed as Angus said the pudding was nice. " oh dear what have aia come into" she said with a chuckle." Ruby laughed as well at the story.

Jack lat Kate take alook at the cub and then froze " you know at this age you can't realy tell might be a she, we'll have to wait and see when its older" he said then listened to Kate again " its younger than the other he's in the barn, almost ready to be released to the pack, I'll keep this little one with me and bottle feed it till its strong enough to stay there too." he told her .

"Give me half a tick," Kate said. She made a homemade formula from boiled water, evaporated milk, golden syrup, raw egg yolks, some plain yogurt, and a just a few drops of one of Robert's vitamin formulas for animal babies. She mixed it up, put some in a pet bottle and shook it to mix, and then heated it magically with a little warming charm and handed the bottle to him. "For his size, about four ounces or so of formula every two or three hours. There's enough formula to last you about 24 hours. I'll put it in a bottle in the fridge, and yes, I'll label it so nobody uses it as coffee creamer. He looks healthy, despite being left alone, but he is pretty thin. See how he does once he's warm and has a full belly. I bet he'll relax and sleep. he has to be exhausted. Robert could tell you for sure if its a he or a she. It definitely hard for us non healers to identify that, but he'll see it straight off. Oh, and since you missed supper, Michael left you a plate in the oven on warm. It's a lovely beef hotpot that he served on an orzo pilaf. And there's some bread and butter pudding for dessert for you too. Just help yourself." She poured herself and Robert each a mug of tea and started out of the kitchen and then turned back.

"Oh, and Jack, if you want, there is one of Angus's puppy slings hanging in the closet in his office. He uses it for abandoned kittens and puppies that need constant supervision. He just puts the in the sling and carries them with him like a human baby and tucks an enchanted bottle in his shirt pocket to be able to feed them when they get hungry," she told him.

She took the tea through to Robert.

Angus settled in with his new book, and Simone made a pot of fresh tea. Edward thought he was smelling Christmas spices.

"What am I smelling?" Edward asked.

"It's new. Do you like it?" she asked. "I bought a big tin of Christmas spice tea last week, and I've been keeping it til it got a bit closer to Christmas. This seems like a good evening to break it out. Anyone want a cup?"

Jack listened and watched as Kate made some animal formule and placed it in a bottle . On hearing about teh sling he smiled " that would be very useful" he said making not to fetch it so he could have the cub with him once he was warm and fed. " okay I'll ask Robert when I see him Im sure hes busy right now." Jack said as he looekd down at the cub as it sirred in his arms. Jack could smell the tea and chuckled " certaily starting to smell like christmas with that tea." he said taking the small bottle and offering it to the cub who latched on and began drinking in his arms.

Moving to sit down he soon found the cub had let go of the bottle and curled up in his arms now giving light snores . Jack lifted the bottle and looked at the amount missing from it , seeing exactly four ouzes had been drunk and he chukled " you were right four ounces " he said smiling.

Brian came down from upstairs, a hand towel over his shoulder, and he headed for the kitchen and found Jack there with a new wolf cub.

"Another foundling, huh?" Brian smiled. "Well, in this weather, he's better in than out, that's for sure. He's a runt, isn't he?" He opened the freezer and wrapped an ice pack in the towel. "Just so you know, my father-in-law is a stubborn cuss, just in case you hadn't noticed. Nigel buggered back to New York before the storm hit, so now that Nigel's gone, Robert decided he could work out that buggared up leg. He did alright but now it's puffy and it aches. It held up better than I thought it would under the circumstances, but I'm going to try to get him to cool it for a bit and ice his leg before it gets completely unusable again. I did get him to start to give Suzanne some antidote but she's not tolerating it well. Apparently, she's actually allergic to some of the most important herbs in it, so he's having to give it to her in small doses and then try to counter the allergy symptoms. So it could be a few days before she's not teal and pink anymore. But she's not chucking up flobberworms, so I think, if I were in her shoes, that much would feel like immense relief. Still, I think Ruby and Angus will have Diamond for a few more days, maybe even across Christmas. It's hard to say. Hopefully, the outdoor crew will stay on their toes because I don't see the Geldings as a family to embrace the loss of a child across the holidays. I would expect them to retaliate if they hold true to form. Right now, they're still all behind bars, but I don't know how long that will last."

Jack fed the little cub and listened to Brian as he walked down the stairs to the kitchen " yep, mothr rejected him , so Im father , again" he said then chuckled as Brian continued telling him about what Robert had been up to and wtched him grab some ice in a bowl s he continued. " Robert can be that way" he said and chuckled again as he saw the cub stop drinking and yawn in his arms, he slipped the cub into the animal sling he had on and looked back to Brian as he finished " I'll tell the grounds crew once this one is settled some place warm for the night." he said "The cold dosn't bother me that much, Fenrir said it is our werewolf side that keeps us warm, well warmer than a normal person anyway." he said with a chuckle.

" Im glad Nigel got home befoe the storm hit, looks like a lot of snow will be on the ground tonight." he said loking at the heavy snow fall out side the window. " oh I put all the animals into the barn so they are nice and cosy with plenty of bedding and food." he told Brian " other than the normal reports , the grounds are secure, Ginger and Anise got off to Evens to start school o there good too."

"Good," Brian nodded. "So, for now, things are in really good shape. And, so you know, Kate moved the bowtruckle tree into the living room where it is a bit warmer. Fudge wants that little female bowtruckle to stay and share the tree, so Kate's enlarging the tree for them. That means Kate is probably going to have to find a supplier for woodlice for them. I presume she'll put some sort of a tank for them in the barn because nobody wants a tank of bugs in the house. If you do happen to find a few strays in the house, though, it is probably my child's fault. She got the idea that Fudge was hungry so she tried to open the jar to get a bug for him, and the damned bugs all crawled out. I think we got most of them. Oh, and just so you know, Shannon found one and used the term 'roly poly bug' with Abbey and Molly. Abbey thought the name was better than woodlice, so now they're roly polys to her. I called them pill bugs when I was a kid, but evidently the Americans call them roly polys."

Michael came into the kitchen with a paper bag with some large size dark chocolate candy bars from Honeydukes.

"You have enough chocolate there to stuff several stockings," Brian told him.

"Oh, no, no," Michael said. "I have a purpose for these. I'm going to make some Midnight Brownies."

"What are those?"

"Brownies that have so much dark chocolate in them that they're not brown brownies. They're black brownies," Michael grinned."

"You'd better be making a huge panful of those," Brian said. "This house makes dark chocolate completely disappear."

"That's why I have a lot of candy bars," Michael said. "I know I'm going to have to make at least a double batch--or more."

Jack nodded to Brian and listened more when he spoke of the bowtruckle tree " I was wondering if it had got bigger and been moved" he said glancing to where it now stood in the libing room " I agree with calling them roly polys rather than woodlice" he said and shivered " thats just sounds gross, never like the little buggers and pill makes it sound like you eat them." again he chuckled as the cub moved in the sling " okay I have to set something up for him to go potty in" he said.

Seeing Michael with a large bag that smelt deishius he smiled as he heard Michael say he was making black brownies. " wow not had those before" he said as the cub squirmed again.

"Well you haven't had these before because I haven't made them before," Michael said. "I got into a discussion with Jonathan Belby a few days ago, and he said that customers have been asking for some sort of a special brownie for Christmas. Apparently Claire has been working on it but hasn't been successful so I told her I would give it a go. They've supplied me with chocolate and some other candies, and if I manage to get it right for them, they'll give me free fudge for a year. And that definitely is worth it to me." He proceeded to put some dark chocolate candy bars in a double boiler to melt and set some espresso to brew, all while he began working on measuring and mixing dry ingredients.

"You know what regular cocoa powder looks like," Michael told him. "Look at this." He opened a tin and showed him a powder inside that was darker than charcoal. "This is the darkest cocoa on the planet. It's a wizarding formula. Muggles have something similar called Jet Black Cocoa powder. That name would mean nothing to most wizards since they don't know about jets. This is called, Dragon Ash. Foul name for something that should make such delicious things, but they wanted to make clear how much darker this is. We'll see how this works out. You lot might have to be my guinea pigs if this idea doesn't work out. It should work, but I really want to get it just right for Honeydukes. So I hate to disappoint you, but you lot might have to taste a lot of brownies until we get it right. If I get it right, I might make some black cookies. I have an idea for them. I think I'd get someone to make me a Krampus cookie cutter and call them Krampus cookies. What do you think?"