Day 342 - it's Christmas!

7Yay! It's Christmas!  At least that's how it feels once the tree is up. Today was Christmas Tree Day so it was all about the tree. We were going to try a tree in a pot this year but couldn't find any so we bought a lovely 5ft one instead. The man said that twice a year they have to prune the trees so that they look like Christmas trees in December. How odd. I assumed that they just grew that way. The boys mithered about wanting a taller one but as we always put the tree on a box a taller tree wouldn't fit. Before we could put it up we had to get the room ready. The first step was to empty out the build up of musical instruments and toys. The Christmas room doesn't need non-Christmas stuff. Next was get rid of the stinky sofa. Nobody wants to watch Christmas films whilst trying to pretend that they can't smell cat wee. Yuck. One of our old cats is too lazy to go outside all the time now and had started weeing on one end of it. Once it's seeped into the frame you can never get rid of it. We tried offering it to some charities and upcyclers but nobody would take it. The tip it was then. Next up was vacuuming shampooing the carpet. The stains are almost unnoticeable! Hurrah for rug doctor. The colour of the water which came out was vile. Once the room was ready the tree went up which reminds me - must water it. I'll be back!

...right, done. Decorating a tree is supposed to feel fun and christmassy. This time however it was slightly stressful, partly due to having small children trying to hang expensive delicate glass ornaments on a flimsy tree (whoever thought that was a good idea?), partly due to the kids leaving breakable decorations on the floor and stepping on them and partly because we were pressed for time because of the aforementioned cleaning.  The tree is now up and the kids are asleep so peace has returned. The onky problem now is that the fairy lights are so bright we think we may need to buy some less glarey ones,  they're verging on blinding!

Next up I can tell you about Pretend To Be A Time Traveller Day. This was fairly short and considered of sending some tweets and talking about it with the kids. I asked them what they thought a time traveller from the future would think about today. My eldest said that in the future they would beam themselves places rather than use cars so they would think our vehicles as funny. For me it feels like the Trump and Brexit era is a turning point which people from the future may want to  experience. You know how when studying Hitler's Germany you learn about the events which built up to the start of the war so that you can understand why it happened? It feels a bit like that.  Issues in the middle east,  conflict with Russia, the relationship with the USA is no longer as it was. It just feels like we are on the brink of something. It may turn out to be something good but that isn't the feel of the news reports. Only time will tell!

Lastly we have Gingerbread Decorating Day. This wasn't what I expected as tomorrow is our street Christmas party. There will be a yule log competition so my wife baked a gingerbread flavoured one following a Waitrose recipe. All the constituent parts worked although it took much more time and effort than it sounded. The decorating part consisted of putting on the meringue icing dusting it with gold shimmer powder. It looks and smells good, let's hope it bags us first place. My mince pies won five years ago and I've gone on about it ever since.

We're doing a car boot sale in the morning so must dash. See you tomorrow.