Under the moon ...

The Posada figures have arrived in our house for the night. (If you're not familiar with the idea, which I believe originated in South America, you can see one English account of this tradition here) I had to put off all the lights in the room and in the hall in order to show the darkness outside, with the thin moon through a spatter of raindrops on the window). This is a fairly recent Advent activity in our congregation, and gave me a welcome respite from parcel-wrapping in the morning - well, nearer lunchtime - when our friend Paddy brought the figures round in their wickerwork basket and stayed for coffee, demonstrating perfectly the unifying nature of the "journey". Tomorrow, they move on to another house for the night.

I felt quite stressed this morning when I woke, thinking about all the tasks I'd sort of stopped thinking about in the run up to the carol service and which now clamour for my attention. I can't help noticing that I increase the stress by an inability just to get on with it, leaving myself with less time than I could have had. However, I've wrapped all the grandchildren's presents, rather more neatly than I've done in past panics; now I just have their parents' to finish. And I found some more paper ...

After lunch I decided that in view of the fairly dire weather in the forecast that we should have a walk despite all the waiting huvtaes, so we went south, to where the clouds looked slightly brighter, and though we drove through heavy rain we parked under a wonderfully other-worldly pink and grey sky, with a sudden searchlight gleam over Bute as the setting sun found a hole in the clouds. We walked a couple of miles without any rain at all and a wonderful changing sky overhead, making the sea glow pink before it all subsided into greyness.

Lastly, before dinner, we decided we had to do something about the tree. This necessitated several trips up to the loft (via a ladder that suddenly readjusts itself when you're halfway up) and the lowering with a rope of the heavier boxes down to the landing below. The lights had to have new batteries, two sets of them because when I bought new lights last year I underestimated how many I'd need; the star, which I made from fuse wire and tinsel for our very first tree 53 years ago (I'd forgotten to buy one), has lost its wire fixing and had to be tied on with tinsel and illuminated by the correct light (can't have a red star!);the lights had to be disposed elegantly and equally around the tree ... and by the time I'd done that, with Himself's assistance to speed things up, we were both weak with hunger and had to desist. Tomorrow is another day ...

...Though if I don't get to bed now, it'll be yet another day that starts too late to be useful.