shewhomust | Christmas minus eight (and counting)

If we had been in London this weekend, as we planned, then tonight we would be at the Bears' Carol Evening, an annual event organised by my brother and sister-in-law, at which they invite as many of their friends as will fit into their large sitting room for an evening of carols - there is always food and drink and conversation, too, but the carols are the main point of the evening, and since space - and time - are limited, the company tends to be restricted to those who will play nicely.

How long have they been doing this? I don't know. Long enough to work out a programme of carols which fills the evening; long enough that shared songbooks gave way to duplicated sheets of words, and the looseleaf sheets gave way to bound collections, with illustrations by Francis (who is also responsible for preparing the mulled wine); long enough that Ann, who takes a different book each year, and corrects the mis-spellings and mis-punctuations, the "it's" in place of "its", as she sings, has worked her way through most of the collection; long enough that most of the dispiutes have been worked out, though there may be some rumblings about the choice of tune for In the Bleak Midwinter, a persistent minority singing "Adeste Fideles" rather than "Oh Come All Ye Faithful", and it usually proves necessary to sing While Shepherds Watched twice, once to the tune we learned in school and once to Cranbrook (also known as On Ilkley Moor baht'at).

There is mulled wine, and there are mince pies, and of late there has been a break (after We Wish You a Merry Christmas, with its demand for figgy pudding) for figgy pudding. Sometimes there are recorder players. There used to be more cats than there are now. But there are always the carols.

It's the event that, more than any other, makes me feel that Christmas is here, that the long build up will end and celebrations begin. And this year we can't be there.

Never mind: have a snowflake:

From Make-a-Flake (thanks to

sekhmets_song for the link.

All the cards that need posting are in the post; that just leaves cards for the neighbours to be written and hand-delivered. There's a big pile of cards that have arrived, and been opened and variously admired - time for the trick with the string and the bookcases, so they can be displayed. And a tree - we need to find a tree. But not tonight.