Calling "Time" on Christmas 2

Moving from Sheffield to East London, this is the roofspace of the Greenwich Indoor Market.

The market itself was disappointing on this occasion though, with only around half the usual number of stalls. I guess most traders were taking a break after the Christmas rush.

A short ride away is Canary Wharf, with its indoor shopping centre, featuring a bauble cluster theme on both ceilings and tree.

Outside, in Cabot Square, the trees around the fountains were lit up, overshadowed by the towering office blocks...

and at the end of the Wren Landing footbridge, the dockside railings were covered in brightly lit snowflakes.

I'm appreciating your comments from yesterday :)

Any likes or dislikes from today?

Calling "Time" on Christmas

Tradition says that all Christmas decorations should be down by 12th night, which is, I believe, Thursady, so I thought I would squeeze in two last posts of the Christmas decorations I have spotted on my wanderings - before it was too late.

Starting  in Sheffield, this is the Christmas tree in the Winter Gardens, by day...

and by dark.

Then there is the rather unusual 'tree' outside the Winter Gardens,

the bright white offerings outside the Anglican Cathedral

and the more traditional one outside the impressive Town Hall. 

We also spotted these...

and these.

 Tomorrow, I'll show you a small selection of offerings from parts of East London, but in the meantime I'm wondering, which of the Sheffield decorations do you favour? And are there any which you thoroughly dislike?

Peace on Earth

This is the backdrop to the nativity scene in my local church window. When I walked round to look, the sun was shining quite strongly and creating these reflections on the glass. It seemed a very approprite; Peace on Earth reflected into my local community.

Happy Christmas

And all the angels sang for him,
The bells of heaven rang for him,
For a boy was born;
King of all the world!

A Starry Night. Joy Webb

A very

Happy Christmas

to all!

(And thank you for a great first year of blogging!)

Not a creature was stirring

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house

Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse...

(Clement C Moore 1822)

Well, no, actually, let's rewind a bit, because that's not quite true. In fact, it's not true at all.

For starters, two teens were well and truly stirring; wide awake and active in that annoying way that teens have of being topsy turvey with their body clocks.

For second, Conker, our pet hamster, was grinding down her teeth on the bars of the cage; only pausing long enough to stuff a small piece of apple into her pouch.

And for third, the mouse was most definitely up and about.

Yes, really, I did say mouse; as in small rodent, big ears, likes cheese, multiplies extremely quickly...

Perhaps I should explain.

It all began on Tuesday at around 6.30am. I was lying in bed, all warm and snug and cosy and peaceful, rejoicing in the fact that I didn't have to get up and go to work, when I heard a rustling. It wasn't a very big rustling, but it was definitely a rustling; a sort of scratchy rustling; a sort of persistent scratchy rustling!

After quite a long time of trying to ignore said rustling, I reluctantly dragged myself out of the delicious warmth and snugness, into the freezing cold air of the bedroom and began to glue my ear against various bits of wall, floor, furniture, cupboard... definitely cupboard.

I opened the door and the rustling stopped.

OK, I know! It stopped because the thing making the rustling was now wondering what was letting in all the light and should it be afraid, but you have to understand that I was cold and the bed was still just about warm and snug and cosy, so I managed to persuade myself that the rustling was just the adjoining neighbour rooting in one of her cupboards at half past six in the morning and now she'd stopped and all was OK and I could go back to bed, immediately! So I did!

All was well until Wednesday morning, when I lay in bed all warm and snu... You get the picture!

Except this time, I couldn't persuade myself that Mrs K would be rootling in her cupboards at the crack of dawn AGAIN. Instead, I reluctantly decided that I had to empty MY cupboard. This is a pain! That particular cupboard is where the hot water tank used to live, so it is big and deep and it happens to be stuffed to the brim with books and papers, files and folders, photo albums and teaching resources, maps and music. Disgruntled, I unloaded it all onto the bedroom floor, the piles growing bigger and more unstable around me, until I pulled out a shoebox full of tourism leaflets and finally uncovered this...

It's a hole!; a hole which disappears into the cavity wall between my house and my neighbour.

And I didn't have to wait long before the source of the noise appeared. A small brown nose with long brown whiskers, small beady eyes and large round ears, poked out from the depths of the hole and studied me carefully. Then, with a whisk of his tail, he was gone.

The hole was easy to photograph. It took rather longer to capture the mouse, but...

I got him in the end.

Today, the hole gets sealed, and I start being able to walk around my bedroom again without falling over piles of stuff. Mr Mouse will have to find somewhere else to rustle and scratch.

Meanwhile, maybe we can get on with the poem. Now, what did I do with those stockings?

Christingle

It's gradually beginning to feel like Christmas is approaching. I'm typing this on Sunday afternoon and this evening will be our annual Carol Service, while this morning, we had our family Christingle.

My newly constructed Christingle has been added to the decorations in my living room and I will be burning the candle regularly, to get the benefit before the orange begins to decay.

The word Christingle is thought to originate from the German Christkindl meaning ‘Christ-child', although some sources translate it rather as 'Christ's fire'.

The practice of the Christingle service originated in the Moravian church in Germany in 1747, when Bishop Johannes de Watteville wrapped candles in red ribbon and gave them to the children of the church as a way of symbolising the love of Christ for them. Since then, Christingles have developed a little and the celebration has become more widespread. It was first introduced to the Anglican church in 1968 as a service to support The Children's Society, and quickly became part of the Christmas tradition in many churches, usually on this 4th Sunday in Advent. It isn't confined to churches though. It's not unusual for Christingles to be made in schools or community groups and I've just been told of a cafe where they are being made in a craft session as I type.

The heart of the Christingle is an orange, which represents the world. Wrapped around the world is a red ribbon, symbolising the blood of Jesus and making clear the link between Christmas and Easter; birth and death. Around the orange are four cocktail sticks, onto which are skewered either sweets or dried fruit. These symbolise the fruits of the world and the provision of God in all aspects of life. The four sticks can also represent the four seasons which cycle through the year in our temperate climate.

Finally is the candle which represents Jesus, the light of the world:

The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
John ch 1 v 9

All that is left is the silver foil which is interpreted variously; possibly just to catch the drips or possibly representing humankind.

It's a really good fun service for all ages and it was lovely to see all of the lit Christingles in church as we passed around the light, though I suspect our minister was slightly on edge at the thought of all those naked flames! Glad I wasn't in charge :)