Some of you will know that we tried (and failed) recently to buy a house.  We were bitterly disappointed, as the house had modern fixtures and fittings and finally would have been our own (no intrusive inspections, no low-budget fixtures, no ancient carpets that are so full of grime and dirt that they make us cough etc).  It was a government scheme and we were about five people too late.  We got the approval but the scheme ran out of money allocation.  It is possible that we might get one in the new year, (still being built so we would move later on) but I am refusing to get my hopes up this time.

So here we are still, in a house that is cold, with wallpaper hanging off in every room because of part-decoration and because of damp.  But not in EVERY room….  My Christmas present from JT was a decorated dining room.  I started the dining room before my car crash but because of the whiplash injury, every time I tried to continue, it kicked off the neck pain and headache.  Apparently this should resolve in 6 months or so.

So I said to JT that instead of a Christmas present, I would like the dining room to be finished.  Look!

The walls are off-white and the alcoves have pink wallpaper with black and sparkly chandeliers on.  One day I will post how the theme runs around the downstairs.  The fireplace is still disastrous but not a lot we can do about that.  I have tried to balance out its offset style with some displaced pictures.  I sprayed up some cheap frames with black Plasti-coat and put some free postcards and 20p old sheet music in them.  We have not done the floor yet (so still a stained green shadow carpet for now!) as we were not quite sure what would happen with the house in the new year.  The landlady wants to sell ours and so I imagine it will only be a matter of time before her patience runs out, especially with housing prices set to fall in the new year (??!)  We also need different curtains as currently they are dark purple which clashes nicely with the wallpaper.

The mirror, sideboard and table match the black and white theme.  I constructed the table decoration from old bottles, garden foliage and a green metal candlestick.  Mark bought me a very cool glass coloured chandelier for Christmas.

I love it!

Merry Christmas all!  (Me off to a party in a room with wallpaper hanging off – doh!)

Well Christmas has been and gone, with many festivities in its wake…

The Trinity carol service at the Centaur always gets me in the mood for Christmas and this year was no exception.  It tends to give a break from the madness and bring in to focus what Christmas is all about.  Which leads me on to a  very special book that I have just read…

The book is probably aimed at children, but you know how sometimes a very simple principle gives you a slap in the face and shows you something that you have known for ages in a completely different light.  The book is called “The Christmas box”.

The synopsis is very simple.  An American family (husband, wife and small girl) who are very poor, move in to a large house with an old lady so that the wife can cook and clean for her.  The husband has started a suit rental business which is occupying most of his time.

He is troubled by some music that he hears at night, coming from a beautiful wooden box that they have found in the attic of their living quarters.  The box has a nativity carved into the top.  Eventually, curiosity gets the better of him and he opens the box.  He is astonished to find a series of letters, written by the old lady at Christmas to an unknown recipient (assumed to be her late husband).  They express a great love and a desire that the recipient should still be here.

One day it transpires that the old lady has become very ill.  She has a tumour in her head which cannot be operated on and so is dying.  The man is still working long hours and not seeing much of his small daughter, who becomes very close to the old lady.  One day she challenges him about the time he spends at work, asking if he really knows what is important in life.  She asks him a simple question.  “What was the very first Christmas gift?”  He doesn’t know, despite the family believing in God.

Eventually the old lady’s time is up and she goes into hospital.  The man is troubled and speaks to one of her neighbours.  It turns out that there is a secret garden behind her house, which shields a graveyard.  The old lady would go there every day, even in the pouring rain and lie face down on a grave crying her eyes out and digging her nails into the soil.  Upon further investigation they discover that the old lady had lost a child years ago and could not bear the separation.  She loved the child so much that she would cling to the grave crying and beating the ground.  Every Christmas she would write a letter to the child and place it in the Christmas box, stating how much she wished the child was still with her.
At the same time, a man comes into the suit rental shop and asks to buy a suit.  The owner tries to persuade him to rent the suit as children grow so quickly.  It is then that he says that the suit is to bury his little boy in.  This man too, is very sad.

When visiting the old lady in hospital as she dies, she is excited to be reunited with her child.  The man suddenly realises what the first Christmas gift was, the answer to the old lady’s question.  God, like the old lady, was so devastated to be separated from his children, so pained, and loved them so much, that He had to do something to be reunited with them.  The first gift of Christmas was a very great love.  The kind of love/pain that a parent feels for a child who has been taken away from them unjustly.

This Christmas I thank God for that love and His gift of Jesus.  I also feel for all those who have lost children.

I re-discovered another phrase that people often get wrong today, which makes my skin crawl.  Other such phrases include “I’ll have an expresso please”, “I’ll mark this with an asterix”, “I have a pacific problem” etc.  Today’s is….  “Wipe that baby’s face with a muslim”.  REALLY??

On 21st December Simon (JT’s younger bro) and Sam got married!  It was a fantastic day at Cowley Manor, which looked beautiful covered in a centimetre or so of snow.  It was a great day for photographs, so I thought I would share a few that capture the essence of the day.

The beautiful bride

The rings

Cowley in the snow

The grounds

Christmassy!

Setting up the table

Table decoration

Interior shot

Simon

Simon and Ollie (best man)

brothers!

Catalogue shots(!)

Best man

Groom

Table decorations

Tribute

Sam

Sam

Sam with her Dad

Signing the register

The kiss which I missed earlier (ooops!)

Outside

Outside

Turners

Simon and Ollie

Rings

The cake!

I have to show you the latest Pink Sky acquisition…  It is BRILLIANT!!  A blue glitter virgin Mary money box.  Awesome!

It is always (I say “always”, this is the first time it has happened to me!) worrying when you find your parents carol singing  in town, but this is the scene:

I am not sure what they were charged with… Disturbing the peace?  Hmmm…  Haha!

There was a lady directly underneath our office who was doing crystal ball readings and tarot.  I was a bit unhappy about this, so I walked past her sign and prayed that she’d go away.  Imagine my surprise, the next day, when she disappeared!!  Completely.  She had actually moved out!  I know I shouldn’t have been astonished, but I was.  Never doubt the power of prayer.  She didn’t see that one coming in her crystal ball eh?  I did think that perhaps I should have prayed that I could have a conversation with her and tell her about Jesus but then, perhaps she should have seen Him in her toast or something?

Anyhow, I was feeling rather pleased with myself, until I met the new residents yesterday.  A large man waddled up the stairs in a movie T-shirt, jacket and jeans and introduced himself.  He said “Hi my name is Crockett”.  Thinking that he was joking, I laughed.   Then I realised he wasn’t joking.  He stood with a wispy looking lady with grey hair.  “What do you do?” I asked, recovering my composure.  “We’re healers” they said.  Oh marvellous.  Never doubt the power of prayer but question its motives.  I feel a conversation coming on.

Well we have spent the entire weekend finally decorating our dining room!  I was so sick of it being in tatters that I made a deal with JT.  We had all of the equipment, but I said that I don’t want a Christmas present this year, I just want a decorated dining room.  Every time I try to do it my neck injury kicks off. Unfortunately according to the physio, this will happen for 6-12 months.  Rubbish.  I did, however, do a load of painting on Friday night and paid for it on Saturday…. Oooops.  So I did the gloss instead.  Smell-tastic!

Anyhow, we are ready to put the floor down so I will show you when it is done.

On Sunday, Claire did her first craft fair with home made cards at the Exmouth Arms. She did very well and the stand looked great:

Later on, we put up our Christmas tree!  YAY!

I am starting a new series of images for the funny little men that you get in cobblers’ shops and key cutting shops that stand in the window moving their heads frm side to side and lifting a hammer up and down.  Often these little men get dressed up for the season (whether that is Halloween, Easter, Christmas etc).  I have always been fascinated by them.

This is what our garden looked like a week ago.  Everybody in the street was merrily excreting and we were reaping the consequences.  As you can see, the garden is under 3 inches or so of water, toilet paper and poo.  A man came round at 8am on Saturday morning to put a camera down the drain.  We heard nothing, which we thought a little odd, but assumed the landlady would call us Monday morning.  Instead, when I am eating my toast with a towel on my head, I hear a little knock on the dining room window.  There is drain man, large as life, about to dig up our garden!!  JT asked if there was any chance of ascertaining what was actually wrong and drain man said that a tree root has grown through the pipe, thus blocking the entire system.  He is digging up the offending root this morning, repairing the pipe and then no doubt leaving our garden looking like a building site.

When I left this morning he was in a hole in the ground.  Merry Christmas.