SO HOW was it for you? The festivities are over for another year and now we are faced with the task of removing all the twinkly tat from our homes and getting back to some sort of normality.

This Christmas period has been largely about journeys for me.

Before you panic, I am not talking spiritual journeys here, but actual journeys, over physical distances.

It all began the Monday before Christmas, when we were off to Southampton to stay with my brother for a few days.

There had already been the usual row about how much we were taking and whether it was going to fit in the car... blah, blah, blah.

It was one of those situations where everyone had something under their feet and on their lap and there was zero chance of seeing anything out of the back window.

Anyway, the sun was shining, everyone was (finally) in good spirits, the Christmas songs were cranked up and we were on our way.

Until we got to Arundel that is.

Suddenly I was hit by that cold, sick feeling you get when you realise you have forgotten something vital.

Something so vital Christmas Day would have been utterly ruined for our seven-year-old without it, and Santa would have never spoken to me again.

I knew if I did not go back, I would be on the naughty list for the rest of my life.

Considering our son was in the car it was not an easy conversation to have, but I managed to convey the urgency of the situation to my other half via the medium of mime and he chucked me out at Arundel station.

There was no point in turning around.

The traffic back into Brighton was horrific with last-minute shoppers and we were due to attend a pantomime in Southampton at 2pm.

So I became a woman on a mission and, after a few tears at the ticket desk, I was on my way back to Hove.

Four trains and three cab rides later, I just made it back in time to see Darren Day burst onto stage at the Mayflower theatre. My nerves were completely shot, but Christmas was saved at least.

Come Boxing Day, we had to pack up again, drive home, unpack, wash everything and repack the cases in preparation for our new year trip, all taking place within a 24 hour window. Well, when I say we…that would be the royal “we.”As you can imagine, that process happened completely smoothly without anyone losing their rag, huffing, puffing, sulking or slamming any doors.

We just about kept it together though and, after dropping the mum-in-law home in Guildford, we were on our way once again. For some reason we thought it a brilliant idea to head out on the roads on December 27, along with the rest of the United Kingdom’s population. Not only that, but we had decided to make that journey an epic 300-mile trip as we were going to north Wales for the week. We are actually still here and due to drive home tomorrow and I am already feeling the fear.

Our drive down here was nothing short of horrific. The Satnav taunted us by claiming we would reach our destination in five hours, 20 minutes so we estimated, with a stop or two, it might be six to six and a half hours at a push. Fine. We can deal with that. The car was loaded with snacks and the required amount of devices to keep a kid entertained in the back of the car for a good while, so we thought we were well prepared. Sadly neither the M25, the M40 nor the M6 agreed with us as apparently every single major road in England last Friday resembled one of those massive long-stay car parks at Gatwick.

We watched in horror as our projected arrival time slowly but surely crept up and up on the now despised map app in front of us. Six hours in, we had not even reached Birmingham so stopped for food at the services. Big. Mistake. Yet more queuing to get in only to discover the mini Waitrose looked like it had been ram-raided. The shelves were virtually bare leaving us no choice but to scrape together the ingredients for a dry cheese sarnie, which we had to construct ourselves back in the car.

At least now the rest of the journey looked incident free, so we set off with renewed positivity. We had no idea that, once we had crossed the Welsh border, we would be plunging into fog so dense we could only see one cat’s eye at a time in front of us.

“Mummy, I’m a bit scared,” came a little voice from the back as we crawled over hills and round hairpin bends though the soupy mist. I did not dare admit to our boy I was absolutely terrified too... it was horrific. But we made it - nine and a half hours after we left Hove. And tomorrow, we do it all again.