Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Chri - $%*"$%&*!!!

Things are getting well and truly Christmassy at Maison Squidge. The tree went up last Wednesday, we had flower arranging and carol services and Angel Delight sketches at church, I bought the last of the presents AND I even braved a trip to Morrisons today for the food shop.

(Incidentally - the busiest time of the year for our local store is apparently between 11am and 2pm on the 23rd December. Guess when we were there. *sigh* But I have to say that the spirit of Christmas was alive and well; the lady in the queue behind me kindly helped me to unload my trolley onto the checkout belt so I could whizz to the other end to start packing... Just a small gesture from her, but hugely appreciated on my part.)

The Angel Delight sketch was great fun - although I hold my hands up and admit that I was the only one to fluff their lines. Twice. The sketch was written by a member of our church congregation, Graham, who directs a faith-based theatre group here in Loughborough, called Grain. There were three angels; we had wings. And haloes, even though someone kindly told me afterwards I didn't really need one. I think they were talking about the silver hair, not my angelic demeanour!

Anyway, back to the Christmas Tree, the subject of this Christmas Eve blog.

We always plant the tree in a bucket and keep it well watered. Yesterday morning, I watered it...which might have been the reason why, yesterday evening, just after some friends had arrived for a flying visit, it toppled over! It's happened only once before, when the cat jumped up onto the windowsill behind the tree. This time, no-one touched it. As T put it "The tree has killed some of our baubles!"

We lost three, that's all - glass ones that shattered most spectacularly - and we filled a tray with the bits and pieces that fell off but weren't damaged.

Between us, we made sure the tree was secure and started to redecorate...only to have the flippin' thing tip again! Fortunately I was in the room and near it, so it didn't go very far, but Mr Squidge rushed in and sorted it all out. There's no way it's going to fall over again; we are probably the only household whose tree has indoor guy ropes attached to a bottle jack and is braced with a huge block of wood...

It's a pain when things like this happen - we want Christmas to be perfect in every respect, but it hardly ever achieves that because we live in a broken world and we are human.

Even the very first Christmas was far from perfect.

Four of the decorations I had to replace after the tree-falling incident were felt stars I'd made last year...and they sum up perfectly what I find in my Christian faith which helps me to deal with whatever life throws my way, whether it's something relatively minor in the scheme of things like a few broken decorations, or something more life changing, like a bereavement.

They also represent my wish for you - the readers of the Scribbles - too; whatever life may have thrown at you and yours in recent times, may you find Love, Joy, Hope and Peace during this festive season and into 2016.

With love, from Squidge xxx