Twelfth Night and Epiphany AND SNOW

Well as the night draws in we are entering Twelfth Night the eve of Epiphany*. It's traditionally the day to take down the decorations (since Victorian times anyway) but I'm not sure I'll get around to it today.

Tomorrow the wise men arrive at the Nativity, bringing their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. It is also traditional to leave the Nativity up until Candlemas, however, our cat who is incredibly bored keeps attacking it. Either sitting messing with it or launching herself at it from a great distance. I need to get a more sturdy Nativity next year.



Tomorrow we will share the story of the three wise men - the magi, and we will talk about the meaning of the gifts. There are various theories about the meaning of the gifts, I've chosen to share the following with the girls.

Gold

Gold is a precious metal – Jesus is the most precious gift ever given
Gold for a King – Jesus is the King of kings.
Gold for purity - the purer the gold the higher the value – Jesus is the purest who ever walked the earth and is more valuable than all the treasure on earth.

Frankincense

Incense for a priest - Jesus, He is our great High Priest in Heaven.
Incense for sacrifice – Jesus was the perfect sacrifice, He is the Lamb of God
Incense for prayers – Jesus was in the perfect relationship with God, He prayed without ceasing and only did and said what the Father told Him.

Myrrh

Myrrh is an anointing oil – Jesus is the Anointed One, the Messiah (Christ)
Myrrh is an embalming oil – reminding us that Jesus will die
Myrrh symbolises suffering – Jesus suffered for our sins

Well today I took the girls to school, the snow so deep it went right over Squidge's wellies. Hubs didn't set off for work until 12 noon because of the snow. At about 11.30 am the school website announced that school would be closing at 1.00 pm so off I trudged again, the snow nearly over MY wellies this time.

I do love the picturesque scenery, but it does rather make life difficult! I couldn't get to church this morning or the post office. But never mind because I did get some deep cleaning done and some ironing. So at least I was productive. The cold has been causing some problems, the boiler keeps leaking because the water drain pipe (it's a condensing boiler) keeps freezing up and so the water has nowhere to go and last night as I started to run the bath for the girls we discovered the drain pipe for the bath was frozen up outside. It took up two hours to unblock it, by that time it was too late. I had to drag myself out of bed early so they could be bathed this morning. My brain can't cope with getting up when it's dark! LOL.

The girls are upstairs playing with Chatterbox's friend from school who is staying for tea tonight. They're playing fashion models and keep coming downstairs in various outfits.

Hope it's not too snowy near you. Keep warm - unless you're reading from the southern hemisphere, in that case keep cool.

*I read the blog of an author called Kimberly Conway Ireton today and she had written some beautiful thoughts about Epiphany.