Although we plan to spend Christmas Day on our own,we will be doing a fair bit of entertaining over the holiday period, and wanted to be sure our dining table looked festive and welcoming. Hence a bit of a run through a few days before the holidays. We commissioned a table decoration from a florist locally, and this gave us chance to try it all together. Looks pretty good!
A few years ago, one of my granddaughters bought me this soft toy as a present, and each Christmas it comes out as part of the house decorations. It’s funny how we cling to family traditions, and there are certainly quite a few around the Christmas period…
Already, this month is heading for being one of the wettest Decembers on record in the UK, and today was another grim day. It pretty much rained all day, and although there has been no flooding around here, there was plenty of surface water to make driving difficult. A slow motion app on my phone allowed me to catch the ripples from the rain.
I’ve had a ‘vision board’ in my study at home for a while now, and use it for inspiration when I’m feeling a little ‘flat’. As well as some favourite photos it has sayings and memories of some of the people I admire. These are two of my all time favourites – Ansel Adams, the best landscape photographer ever, and Steve Jobs, who co-founded Apple and was the inspiration for products that have changed the world we live in…
It really does look like these ducks are walking on water – in fact it has been really cold over the last few days and there was a thick layer of ice just below the surface of this pool in Nantwich. The ducks were making the most of it!
I have this sign on my study door at home, and figure it’s a great metaphor for life.
We aren’t the greatest cooks, but really do enjoy trying something a little different. We had seen these biscotti biscuits made on the TV last week and decided to give it a go. Turned out to be very successful!
… and we now have all the Christmas decorations in place. We actually have 3 Christmas trees in the house – our usual large one in the kitchen, this smaller one in our sitting room, and a very small and special one in the hallway. Lots of twinkly light and baubles everywhere – wouldn’t be Christmas without them would it?
The dependence on food banks in the UK has seen a four fold increase in the last 5 years, and yesterday’s election win by the Conservatives will securely increase that. We made up two Christmas food parcels like this to help the less fortunate in our area – a mix of staple foods and some Christmas treats that will hopefully bring some cheer to disadvantaged families…
Not the first time I have taken a sunset photo from this point, but with sky colours like this I couldn’t resist it. Even more remarkable because it was actually raining at the time. In fact, it’s rained pretty much all day, and very heavy at that – lots of waterlogged fields…
