
Chopping the washing line in half really wasn’t part of my plan when I went out to cut the honeysuckle back!
Chopping the washing line in half really wasn’t part of my plan when I went out to cut the honeysuckle back!
On Friday I was called into school. Wren had put something up her nose. The way Wren told it, her teacher had clocked her across the classroom mid-deed. Hats off to Miss L, I’m not sure I’d have noticed a patient doing something similar in a crowded hospital bay. Probably it’s a teacher superpower. I wouldn’t be surprised – they seem to have many. Anyhow, unable to see where the foreign object was, exactly, up Wren’s nose, but pretty certain it hadn’t come back out, Miss L gave me a call.
It was Mr E, the wonderful, and very worn-out looking Head who brought Wren out to me in the playground. Most of us can only hazard a guess at how awful last week was for head teachers, re-jigging their schools for a new lockdown last minute. He shook his head at me with a jaded laugh, “Just when I thought my week couldn’t get any more bizarre, Wren is brought to my office!”
Fortunately the combined might of a pen-torch, and a particularly vicious pair of tweezers from my nursing bag proved effective in removing the object from Wren’s nasal passages, so a trip to A&E was avoided. What came out looked like the bottom end of a blunted screw. I have no idea what it actually was. When we asked her about it, Wren just grinned smugly, and wouldn’t tell us a thing, so we are none the wiser. I hope your lockdown is going as swimmingly as ours so far!
On Sunday morning I trundled out on my rounds, listening to Sunday Worship on Radio 4. The service came from St David’s in Pembrokeshire. After all the bad news of recent days it was comforting to hear Welsh words spoken, memories of so many trips to Wales, and St David’s, flooding my mind’s eye. I even understood something! “Pob Bendith” – “Every blessing”.
Lunchtime carols at the cathedral are cancelled this year, likewise the twinkling light display at the local National Trust property we like to visit. We attended a family nativity service via Zoom. Looking back at last year, and how it had felt such a mad rush of over-consumption getting to Christmas, I can’t help wonder if it’s all bad. Yet it felt really Christmassy listening to the choir in the car, the low winter sun reflecting in my wing mirrors, so I do hope the lunchtime carols will be back next year. Sometimes I wonder if it is more about being spectacularly organised for Christmas, knowing in advance the events and activities that we want to prioritise, those that will add to the sense of the season, rather than reactively agreeing to every invitation for Christmas drinks here, and ‘pop in for a mince pie’ there.
As Sunday drew on, I drove through narrow lanes, more like streams than roads after the heavy rainfall. Patients wished me Merry Christmas from cosy kitchens where support stockings steamed over old stoves, and garden birds flocked around well-filled bird feeders. Up, out, of the city the sky was bright blue, and I thought to myself, we are nearly there, nearly at the turning of the year when I will begin to put together my seed orders, and spot the first spring bulbs popping up. On Monday morning I received an email from my manager. Wearily filling in a Clinical Incident form last thing on Sunday for a patient who had developed a pressure ulcer, I had only populated the form with my own details! She was reassured to know the skin on my bottom was indeed intact.
I hope your plans for Christmas are not too disrupted by the government’s announcements, and that you will be able to feel the festive spirit despite restrictions. As always at this time of year, my thanks goes out to all of you who follow this blog, and keep up with my news and ramblings. I am hugely honoured by your support, and patience! Have a wonderful Christmas, and peaceful New Year. I will be back in January. Pob Bendith.
This year, instead of sending Christmas cards, we are giving a donation to Devon-based charity ARC. ARC is a homelessness and addiction charity. Big Dreamer is a trustee for them so we can say, hand on heart, with insider knowledge, this charity is a lean machine, ferociously passionate about transforming lives. You can find out more about their work via their website: https://arcinspire.co.uk.
Happy Christmas all! xxx
In the absence of all the usual activities leading up to Christmas, we have been searching out other options to get us in the festive mood. A local garden centre is famed for its Christmas lights so we headed there on Sunday. After a mince pie and a coffee, we strolled around the glittering displays. Some of it was for a more adult audience – here’s Santa in a hot tub to amuse you!
Our children each chose a new Christmas decoration for the tree. On passing the carnivorous plant display, Finch picked up one of those too (because you know, nothing says Christmas like a venus flytrap!). We were doing well, until we reached the checkout. I’m sure you might be able to imagine what happened, and if so, may be reading this from behind your hands. No the carnivorous plant did not devour the Christmas baubles, but it might as well have.
Finch dropped his bauble on the floor. There was a heart-wrenching crash, and tiny shards of glinting glass flew out in every direction. There were tears and a new bauble purchased. I think we survived. Oh the trauma of a festive family outing!
I left the towels on the line for three days before I gave in and brought them in to dry indoors. The days have been full of fog and mist down here in the South West. Yesterday we drove out in search of deep wooded combes and ridgeway views. High above the haze, the sun was determined to shine, casting the world in diffuse rays, glittering dewdrops, and long shadows. We always count a walk an especially good one if we stumble across a tyre swing. On this walk, we not only found a tyre swing but also a classic wooden tree swing, both hanging from the same oak tree. That makes this walk a great walk! We picnicked beneath a hedgerow on a sloping field, watching the sun burn away enough of the fog for the blues and greens of the sky and the fields to tint the shimmering white.
Back at home, still swathed in fog, dreary news filling the airwaves, we counted the Christmas trees which have been popping up in windows around us for days now. I am holding my ground against Little Owl’s persuasive efforts for us to get our tree up. It’s not even December yet. I suspect it will end up going the way of the towels.
Exciting news!!! The Spellbinding Secret of Avery Buckle has gone to print! It’s turning into a real book as we speak. Eeeekkkk! 🙂
Little Owl and I spent a morning on the allotment planting out strawberry runners on a bare patch and putting the dahlias to bed. None of the old chaps dig their dahlias up for the winter so we’ve followed their advice, cutting down the stems of ours after the first frost and covering them with a cosy blanket of manure. The last job I must fit in before the end of November is sowing my broad beans in the vague hope I’ll outwit the black fly next year.
Last week I joined the other PTA mums (sadly, we are only mums!) for a zoom meeting (remember when the verb ‘to zoom’ meant something totally different?!) to discuss Christmas. It’s strange thinking about December without a nativity, carol concerts, or the Christmas Fayre. We’ve been putting our heads together to think of ways to make it Christmassy for the children anyway, including a virtual Christmas party where one of the teachers puts on a disco in the hall which we beam into each of the class rooms. It could work!
I have yet to break the nativity news to Wren. As a reception child, this would have been her big year. With her halo of white blond curls she would have been a shoo-in for an angel. She’s been practicing hard for several of the nativity roles, prancing around the house in full fancy dress. Did you know one of the kings was actually Queen Elsa from Frozen? We only learned she had worn a pink frilly tutu under her uniform to school today because one of the TAs let us in on the secret having helped Wren in the loo!
At the weekend we had a fire in the back garden for Bonfire Night. As regular readers will know I love Bonfire Night. While I can’t say I’ve got much sympathy with the Catholic vs Protestant gunpowder plot origins, I love the pre-gunpowder tradition of lighting fires at this time of year to ward off the harshness of the coming winter. We usually gather with my family at my parents’ house to light a fire and dance around their garden with sparklers as fireworks fill the night sky above us. Then there is the PTA firework display at school, full of oohs and aahs, burgers and hot dogs, surrounded by many dear friends.
This year the latest lockdown meant it was just the five of us in our little garden. This summer we found a rusted chiminea (if you’re anything like me, you’ll have to look it up!) in the street, the bottom hanging off. Big Dreamer dragged it home, scrubbed it and rubbed it down, then sprayed it black. It was perfect for our bonfire this weekend, flames licking the top of the funnel when it really got going, much to Finch’s delight. We ate our baked potatoes, toasted our marshmallows and waved our sparklers, all the while thinking of our family and friends, sending them (and you too) sticky, sparkling love.