Sunny.

Quite sunny today though by the time I'd done the usual housework more clouds were appearing and there was even the hint of a few raindrops. It has been a bit colder but nothing like the dreadful storm affecting most of North America. Commiserations to any readers who are suffering from the extreme conditions. Climate change is making itself truly felt.

It was too nice a day to be stuck indoors (I've just seen our neighbours going down for a swim.) so I headed out for a beach walk. On the way down I noticed that Rudolf has finally made an appearance. He's a bit shaggier this year.

Not too many people on the beach, just a few surfers and several family groups exercising the children. Peter would usually be working but one of the family traditions I began, except when the weather was too poor, was to take the boys out for a walk on Christmas Eve. This was partly to burn off the children's energy but also to clear my head before the marathon of Christmas cooking. Going to Midnight Service was the logical follow-up after the the Christmas Eve meal. A pointer to the true meaning of Christmas and by the time we got home the boys would be ready to sleep as soon as they got to bed and I could creep round hanging their stockings on their bedroom door handles. Now I'll pick one of the Midnight services to watch on tv instead.

When returned I carried on making preparations for our Christmas Eve meal. The tradition is to have twelve dishes which I have done if I count each different item including the butter. I like to listen to the Festival of Nine Lessons from King's as I work in the kitchen but I have to say I find some of the highly priviliged accents jarring. Instead as now I blog I'm listening to Dead Ringers. Speedy has been fed early in the utility room so that I know he's safely away from the food out on the kitchen counter.

Another small job done was repairing my sheepskin slipper boots (much needed with the cold draughts sneaking in from the rooms that are still bare floorboards) where the uppers were coming unstitched from this year's soles. I think I've been repairing these slippers for at least 15 years. Even when I decided to splash out on a new pair I couldn't find any in the large size I need so I shall keep on repairing them and replacing the soles as needed.

I've returned to using the big camera as the mark doesn't show so much when I've used the zoom but the thought of 40x or 60x zoom is very tempting.