7 Dec 2009 - The Christmas Tuba

This is the space in our hall where the Christmas Tuba used to live.

One of the joys of being married to the Bandmaster is the chance to share your house with the Christmas Tuba. The poor tuba gets passed from player to player - depending on who's available for each gig - but generally ends up going home with the Bandmaster.

Of course the privilege of housing the tuba is no longer mine - but I'm glad to tell you that my sister-in-law Mary is enjoying that role now.

6 Dec 2009

Think I need to adjust the settings on my camera as everything has a bluish tone.

Sunday was a busy day with a Toy service in the morning, lunch at the hall, more Christmas prep and a Fanfara rehearsal. Fanfara: the band formerly know as Neil's Band or Friday Band.

This is them rehearsing for an NSPCC Carol Service in Southport next week.

The toys collected at the toy service have been given to the local Action for Children (formerly) NCH) centre in Walton. More about them here.

As I'm in the mood, here's another bonus picture. Not very Christmassy on the face of it - but part of the stuff I've been helping prepare for the Carol Service.

If trouble finds you,

this is my prayer -

may peace guard your hearts and make you strong.

And I wish you love

the kind to last all year long.

I guess you need to hear the music too.

Maybe - or maybe you just need to know that I prayed this for you.

5 Dec 2009 - Saturday

Another trip out today - all the excitement of Tesco today. Can tell I'm still feeling under the weather as I couldn't be bothered to mooch around for Christmas presents and stuff. Didn't even buy any additional Christmas decs or lights.

Bumped into Dad at the till so popped into the local garden centre for coffee and a chat.

Just to be clear, that's Dad in the centre of the picture and a giant, inflatable, waving Santa to the right.

4 Dec 2009

When you're stuck at home with a bad chest a hot bath is probably the highlight of the day.

However, I ventured out this evening to visit friends and to get some prep done for the Carol Service. An evening with friends, chinese food, three well behaved kids and Christmas prep done - now that is a highlight.

Feeling more Christmas now - so you get a bonus picture today.

3 Dec 2009

Christmas cards and news letters are arriving now.

Haven't decided yet how many we'll send. I am generally hopeless with cards so we'll probably send most of our greetings electronically. With of course, a note pointing to the blog!

Starting to feel a bit Christmassy now.

2 Dec 2009

Feeling a bit better today.

Up long enought to make homemade soup. That is cabbage - not a sea monster.

Sorry not very Christmassy yet.

1 Dec 2009

Having started the half term holiday with a bad cold and asthma I thought it would have gone away by December. Sadly not.

The cold having progressed via a throat infection to a chest infection meant the first few days of Dec in bed with daytime TV.

Advent blogging 2009

This year will be the fourth year I've set out to blog regularly throughout Advent.

As it's now Dec 6 I have a bit of catching up to do.

In case your interested you can review my December writing for 2006, 07 and 08 by following the links on the right hand bar. (Sorry can't make the hyper links work.)

I'll post most of my Christmas pictures on Facebook but will share one a day here.

I've started with our Christmas theme picture for 2009.

Remembrance

It's ages and ages since I've blogged - for a few reasons - but that's for another day.

Thought you might like to see some of the pictures I took today.

You can see them all on Facebook here.

I happened to be in London for a work meeting just up the road from the Cenotaph. So I made a minor detour to take some pictures.

It was a lovely autumn day - cloudy but with occasional bursts of warm sunshine.

I don't know why, but I slightly surprised to see so many people and a couple of TV cameras.

I was struck by how the The London buses and poppy wreaths made great splashes of colour in the otherwise grey tones of Whithall.

I noticed the chalk marks on the floor. Circles, numbers and straight lines that I guessed, were there to tell people where to stand and where to lay the wreaths - nothing left to chance. No room for confusion or disorder here.

I took a few pictures and then I looked around at the other people I was standing with, catching snippets of conversation. Some were taking pictures, some wandering around observing what was going on, and some looking out for wreaths laid by specific organisations.

Being a people watcher I stood for a while and wondered who they were - curious passers by, or people who had made specify journeys to be there. I noticd how the cameramen were clearly focused on doing their jobs and saw how the tourists in silly hats looked ridiculously out of place.

And then I spotted the men who were clearly moved to be there - maybe thinking of family or friends or paying their respects to old comrades. Who knows.

It was interesting to see the range of organisations who leave the wreaths - obviously military and voluntary groups connected with supporting troops, but Govt departments and bizarrely (I thought) The Amalgamation of Racing Pigeons.

I didn't expect to see so many hand written notes and was really moved to read the dedications to soldiers who had died so recently.

I'm grateful for the chance to remember those who gave so much to allow us to live in freedom.

I'm grateful too for the reminder to pray for peace.

Family friendly thoughts

I been thinking (you know I do it too much) about family friendly Church. As always my thoughts go off in all directions and I've ended up thinking more about families than Church.

At the moment my latest 'obsesion' is a Facebook group I've created for 'The Cook Family' - that's the relatives of my Granny and Granpa.

This is them with their eight children. My Dad is the youngest - sitting down at the front.

Their children, grandchildren and great grandchild live round the world - USA, Austraila, New Zealand, England and of course Scotland.

It's been faciating to 'meet' cousins on Facebook and share family photos - getting to know people who are part of my family even tho we've never met.

This is one of my favourites from the early 70s - it's my Grandpa arriving in New Zealand as he sees one of his sons for the first time in 20 years.

I found it really moving to see this for the first time - there's such a lovely look on his face.

And as Kev pointed out - how amazing to capture that precise moment on camera.