HAVING AN EASY TIME AND A VERY NICE CHRISTMAS

I’m having a very nice Christmas.

Not that it’s Christmas yet; we don’t decorate till the 24th so it’s very calm in our house - but there are Christmassy things under way.

What won’t be obvious

to most readers is that I’m posting (intermittently) from bed. Scheduling is handy. It means I can work in my sleep.

Life stops and starts.

I rested a few days before

going to London, had a wonderful time while there - walks by the Thames in the sun and the dark . . . new experiences . . . interesting people. Even after we came home I had a little burst of activity before, inevitably, I keeled over. We knew I would and factored it in. We’d have an easy Christmas. One thing exchanged for another.

I’ve bought presents on line

for the first time and parcels have been arriving for a fortnight - so I’ve been opening everyone else’s presents before they do, ready for wrapping and sending on. I hadn’t realised how exciting this would be. Several times a day, there’s a banging on the door. (Our bell’s broken.) More parcel deliveries. It’s like the old days before the Post Office gave up. Dickens would have loved it. I love it!

Another difference

is that we decided to buy Christmas cards this year instead of making them. I can’t remember when I last did this. In fact, I can’t remember EVER having bought Christmas cards! (Though I suppose I must have done . . . or, maybe . . . not.)

Making is expensive

and time consuming. Our Advent is usually marked with swathes of paper spread over every surface while paint dries and glue sets. There are generally a few false starts because designs rarely ‘work’ first time and the floor and tables turn white with guillotine shavings. (Some years, it must be admitted, the results are better than others!) The ease of buying cards is like coming up for air. You just choose which ones, sign them, address them - and there you are! Done! We’ve even abandoned our usual practice of writing personal letters to all our friends. This year, we simply say ‘Love from us’ and that’s it! This has led to a spectacular (for us) achievement - we have written and sent something to everyone. Generally, we have time only for one half of the alphabet, or (if we are feeling specially imaginative) the middle.

Yesterday, I got up,

parcel wrapped for the afternoon - and keeled over. (Life as a wan Edwardian maiden - sort of!) - which means another three days of walking slowly and stopping here and starting there. (I even slept in my clothes. Standing up to take them off was too much effort and I’d fallen asleep before I had time to wriggle out of them under the covers.)

This

(knowing that I won’t be up to full muster for a few days) along with plans for friends who will be visiting at the weekend . . . means I had to whisper to my husband that I have been so concentrating on things for the post,  I have hardly anything for him . . .

So he’ll have fun buying his own presents -

and that, of course, will mean he has a very happy Christmas too. He really will be able to say (with surprise, of course, because by the 25^th he’ll have forgotten all about it) ‘How wonderful, these things are the things I’ve always wanted!’

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