Deck the halls

Day 27

Sophie took today off work because I thought this would be my last day before going back to work tomorrow (the end of lockdown), and we had decided to put up all the Christmas decorations. She had an appointment at the GP's surgery at 9am so I went with her, and then we headed to Beckworth to do a little bit of shopping. My Mum had asked me to get her a small Christmas tree, but the prices were steep at Beckworth - £40 for a little undecorated tree, so I decided to get her one at Tesco!

The weather today has been gorgeous - a real first day of winter with clear blue skies, frost and sunshine. What a difference to the last few days! We ambled about in Beckworth and bought some treats, and then headed home for breakfast. Sophie made us a veggie sausage sandwich, and then it was time to get going! Keith and Mike had taken everything down from the garage eaves yesterday so I moved the chair in the living room to the window, hoovered the carpet, and Sophie started assembling the white tree. I moved into the conservatory, and Keith and I put up our little Scandanavian tree and attached the lights.

The house was in uproar for a few hours and Monty just wouldn't settle down, bless him. He hates change of any kind and kept wandering about and getting in our way. Sophie made a fantastic job of both trees while I hoovered and cleaned the downstairs of the house. We have put the conservatory tree in between the two sofas as there isn't really a lot of room in the corner, and Mike always knocks off the decorations when he sits down at the table!

By 1pm we were mostly finished so I went with Keith to get Mike from work, and then we headed home to sort out the outdoor lights. These were brand new (we'd cut through the old ones in the summer!) so it took both Sophie and I ages to unravel them all and put them onto the tree! At one point the lights were strung across the road, they were so long! It was very cold, and we stopped to chat to Graham who was walking Dennis, and also Vince and Sue. 

Again, Sophie made a great job of the lights, and we retired inside to the warmth and a mug of hot chocolate laced with cream, marshmallows and spiced rum! Just the ticket!

To make the day all the more Christmassy, we rented Christmas with the Kranks, and it was lovely sitting in the living room feeling cosy with the twinkling lights and the snowy scenes on the television!

Before we started on the dinner preparations (breaded pork escalopes) we walked up to see the lights on the green. As we'd had a day of sunshine, they were shining, and the front green looked lovely!