So here I sit

surrounded by pine needles.

I've finally removed the tree and have lost the will to clean. Carrying the tree out of the living room and through the hall has left most of the tree on the floor. The remaining twig is in the back garden and I need to sweep up the tree.

School is closed today due to the inclement weather. It's a bit brighter today, although we are getting an occasional snow flurry. So there is a cacophony symphony of children's voices upstairs. My grand plans have once again been foiled. I really need to get into the village today but I'm not walking 2.5 miles in deep snow with whinging delightful children. Lol, it's Squidge, she does not do cold feet. No amount of thick socks and wellies will protect her delicate little toes and after about 15 minutes she moves into auto-moan. And after another 15 minutes she starts skriking.

'Skriking' now there's a word. Pamela mentioned it in my comments the other day. It's a dialect word used round the Lancashire area, which means crying. "Stop tha' skriking tha's bein' a reet mard!" It's an Old Norse word, the language spoken during the Viking age. There were various settlements around the north-west of England and some words have stuck as dialect. Skriking in Norwegian also to mean to cry or shriek.

So, back to the snow. Here are some pics taken the other day when went out sledging:

Chatterbox setting her sledge up

Yesterday we had one of Chatterbox's friends over for tea. Her mum was telling me that they went sledging on this hill. Chatterbox's friend whizzed down and took her Dad clean off his feet, up into the air, and landed on his shoulder and ended up having to have a week off work. Lol - but a sympathy lol of course.

The canal

There's a couple who live in a canal boat who have visited our church a couple of times. I wonder how they're doing with the canal all frozen up?

So I must be away to vacuum and then the wise men are making their appearance.

They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the LORD.
Isaiah 60:6b (RSV)

Collect:
O God,
who by the leading of a star
manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth:
mercifully grant that we,
who know you now by faith,
may at last behold your glory face to face;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

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.

Happy Homemaker Monday

The weather in my neck of the woods:
Chilly. It was -9C this morning. Our boiler pipe keeps freezing up. Squidge hates the cold and gets very upset if her feet get cold - she whinged and whined all the way round the village today.

One of my simple pleasures:
Reading to my girls.

On my bedside table:
Far too many books. Including all listed here: I need to cull my book pile. I'm currently reading The Stripping of the Altars and Dulce Domum has said she's going to send me a copy of the sequel to Herb of Grace! Hurrah and huzzah!

On my TV:
Right now there's some mad battle going on between an animated 6 armed statue and Sinbad! It's the Golden Voyage of Sinbad. I'm also really into Dog Whisperer right now.

On the menu for tonight:
Steak pie, mash, sweetcorn and gravy. Gravy, oooh northern lasses looove graaavy.

On my To Do List:
Visit bookshop
Do some shopping
Ironing
Wash windows (partly done, done the bedroom windows)

New Recipe I tried last week:
No new recipes.

In the craft basket:
Nowt.

Looking forward to:
Getting back into some kind of routine!

Homemaking Tip for this week:
Sprinkle bicarbonate of soda onto carpets that have developed an odour from spills or other horrid events.

Favorite Blog Post of the week (mine or other):
This post by Cabcree: Santus Real, Forgiven. I've never heard of Sanctus Real, but the words are just beautiful.

Favorite photo from last week:

The girls dragging/pushing Daddy along in the sledge.

Lesson learned the past few days:
That what you think you know about God you probably don't.

Oh, and you really need to keep a cat that won't go out (due to snow) entertained or else she will start to destroy your house!

On my Prayer List:
Family, friends, and some friends of friends.

Devotionals, Scripture Reading, Key Verses:
What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father." So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. Galatians 4:1-7 (NIV)

Hosted by Sandra at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom.

Actor Cat is Talented

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

I seriously LOL'd loud at this picture.

New Year's Resolutions

Reads: May Your Troubles Last as Long as Your New Year's Resolutions
Allposters

So it's that time of the year, when I think to myself, "New Year, clean slate". These are my general resolutions - or in my case New Year 'hope to achieve but no doubt will slip up a gazillion times'. My main hopes n' dreams are mostly to do with growing closer to God, but if I'm being specific I'd say, prayer-life and Bible study/reading. I also want to read more (for me and the girls), exercise more and eat healthier, do something special with the kiddiwinks at least once a month. Nothing earth shattering there - and rah rah rah heard it all before, but we all need a dream don't we? :)

Prayer-life
With regard to my prayer-life that is just a case of making time and trying to set aside the first part of the day and leaning on God more throughout the day.

Bible Study/Reading plan
For Bible study, this year I plan to read through the Bible using the Anglican Book of Common Prayer's reading plan because it reads through the Old Testament once and the New twice. It also reads through all the Psalms each month. I thought it was a good plan to follow.

If you're interested:

Bible readings for each day of the month can be found here. It's listed as Morning and Evening, but as I am doing it in my own time I'll just read the lessons for the day.

Special readings for Sundays and Holy Days (Christmas, Easter, etc) can be found here.

The order for Psalms for daily reading can be found here.

Of course some days it will be too much, so I'm going to endeavour not to make it a ENORMOUS issue if I miss a chapter on the 'correct' day. I know me, I'll get stressed out if I don't do it all, then get disenchanted with the whole idea. For example, the Psalms - it would be lovely to read through all the Psalms every month, but realistically it is likely not to be done every month.

Also, you might note, the Church of England does use the Apocrypha for some lessons (here is the view given by the CofE in their 39 articles on the Apocryphal books: "And the other Books (as Hierome saith) the Church doth read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet doth it not apply them to establish any doctrine"). My personal view of the Apocrypha is...well...I have no idea really. Some denominations say it's canon, some say it's useful but not canon and some reject it entirely. But it'll be interesting to read the snippets that the reading plan involves.

If you're wondering why the Book of Common Prayer, for those of you who don't know, I am not CofE although I used to be:

I was baptised as an infant Moravian
I was raised CofE and confirmed CofE
Was 'born-again' in a Venetian Roman Catholic chapel (it's a long story)
Was baptised as an adult in a non-denominational church

So I'm quite a smorgasbord Christian. Lol. Although I must say I have been a member of the same church (as in body of people) since I was 4. We used to be CofE but separated in 2001 - also a long story. I have a deep affection for the Anglican church and its liturgy, which is why I mention Anglican stuff on occasion.

Phew, I do rather over-explain things don't I! Are you bovvered? ;)

Books (for me and the girls)
I do want to read more books...but time doesn't always permit does it? I'm in the middle of a rather weighty tome entitled The Stripping of the Altars, I want to read more historical books, and some more Elizabeth Goudge because I LOVED The Herb of Grace that Dulce Domum lent me. I also plan to read Slow March Through Hell - which is written by a soldier (Douglas Swift) that served in my Granddad's regiment, they were prisoners of war and had to march across Europe. My Granddad doesn't remember Mr Swift, but my Granddad endured that awful march across Europe:

The gripping and harrowing personal account of a young Eastbourne Corporation gardener’s forced march through eastern Europe as a POW while his Nazi captors fled the Russian advance during the harsh winter of 1945.

Douglas Swift, of the Royal Sussex Regiment, was captured near Amiens in 1940.

He and his scandalously ill-equipped comrades had bravely tried to withstand General Guderian’s Panzers as they made their lightning advance through retreating French troops.

Shipped off to Poland with the few remaining survivors of his unit, Douglas Swift endured the hardships and brutalities of several Stalags, before the notorious Death March.

From this review.

With Chatterbox we are on the last book of the Malory Towers series, we also have some of the St Clares books to start and my Mum has bought her some of the Adventure books - these are all by Enid Blyton. I also want to read The Children of Green Knowe because I loved it so much as a child. Chatterbox has just bought with her Christmas money the set of C.S. Lewis stories The Chronicles of Narnia. We're also working our way through Grimm's Fairy Tales - warning these fairy tale versions are rather gruesome! I'd also like to find some good Christian books for Chatterbox. Chatterbox loves the Horrible Histories books too. She loves history, next term they're learning about World War II, so we'll have to pick up some good books about that.

For Squidge, we are reading through all the Mog books, we love the Gruffalo books and will read them again and again and also Stick Man and A Squash and a Squeeze also by Julia Donaldson. For Christian books we LOVE the Lost Sheep books. Squidge loves choosing books from the library, very often with a cat theme, one we recently borrowed that she has read over and over was Scaredy Cat and Boo no doubt I'll have to read that at least another 30 times before we return it! She also LOVES You Choose, so much so it's been banned for a while whilst me and hubs recover!

Exercise
Lots and lots of lovely walks I reckon, I'm not a big fan of jogging or aerobics.

Eating healthier (and perhaps a little more ethically)
More fruit and veg - make sure I and the kiddiwinks get our 5 a day at least (hubs takes tons of fruit to work for snacks so he's OK). I'm not a big fruit eater, I have to remind myself to eat it. I am going to continue to honour my pledge to eat only British pork products (I must admit though I did buy some German Bierwurst, ahem, but hubs likes German sausage because he was born there (another long story) so my pledge is, er, flexible), to try to buy fairtrade when I can, to buy organic (particularly eggs) where I can, to avoid too much junk food. Hubs is on a diet so I need to think about that too when I'm shopping and cooking.

Doing something special with the kiddiwinks - at least once a month
What I mean here is that we will go out as a family on a short trip at least once a month. Of course on a daily basis hopefully I will do fun things with the girls!

Oh, and I forgot, to try and save some money! This recession is going on and on and on...

So there you go...
xxx

Sledging!

Allposters

Has this chap not noticed that there is no snow? He could do with some wheels man.

Too much snow to go ice skating because we can't get the car out. But hurrah and huzzah we're going sledging! Squidge and Chatterbox very excited. Mummy very excited. Daddy bit grumpy hesitant because he thinks it'll be dark and very chilly soon, lol.

Allposters

How hubs imagines our sledging trip is going to turn out.

Oh, p.s., the last picture is of Captain Lyon, I think his 1820's expedition to find the North West Passage - scury and ice made him turn back (must have been quite a shock to find ice in the Arctic :P ). Read about it here: Captain Lyon's Private Journal

BIG Snow

Very BIG snow today.