Christmas – Julia Chalkley

For Max

Today would have been Max’s nineteenth birthday. Two years ago today he and I walked up the garden together. He leapt up onto the raised beds, followed me around and ran back down the garden with his tail straight up in sheer joy. He hasn’t made it to nineteen. I left a lantern burning overContinue reading “For Max”

You know it’s all over when…

We play a word game along the lines of “You know it’s all over when…” While I was working, Christmas was all over when I went back to work, which would have been the day after Boxing Day (having packed up early on the afternoon of Christmas Eve). Having given up work (or on thoseContinue reading “You know it’s all over when…”

Happy Christmas, yer R’s

Even before waking this morning, I admit to a mood a bit more Scrooge than Santa. The local FaceBook page got me cross as early as the 15th, when a resident at the far end of our village posted a shot of the anonymous letter shoved through her door telling her how vile her outsideContinue reading “Happy Christmas, yer R’s”

Christmas Decoration

We spent yesterday painting one of the walls in the living room. The colour we finally chose looked completely different on each sample patch we painted, so in the end we chose the closest to what we wanted and slapped it on one of the walls. It looks good. On that wall, and that’s theContinue reading “Christmas Decoration”

The Winter Solstice, at last

We have just thawed out after an evening singing Christmas songs and carols around a bonfire in the community wood. It was a good evening. It started with us walking down to the wood with lanterns and lighters and stakes to help light the way from the gate to the bonfire site, and finding aContinue reading “The Winter Solstice, at last”

It’s the Little Things that Matter

I admit, the picture above is an image from the excellent site Pixabay. Nothing quite so festive exists in our house at the moment. We’ve stalled on progress on getting our living room into order; the carpenters who installed the new living room floor advised us to leave it a week to let the oilContinue reading “It’s the Little Things that Matter”