Wednesday 15 December 2010

Being in control of your life

Balwen Sheep: these are our local breed, as they originated in the Towy valley http://balwensheepsociety.com/ Apparently in the dreadful cold and snowy winter of 1947, the breed was almost wiped out completely, with only one ram surviving. I love them for their white markings - blazes and stars, socks and stockings, just like horses!


This year seems to have been one long period of everything being beyond my control. In consequence, I am now feeling quite pulled down by it all and I think I will have to watch White Christmas round the clock to get me in the mood for the Big Day.

Today or tomorrow we (eldest daughter and I) are going to gather some greenery for decorating the house and making this year's wreath.

Then it's meant to snow. Deep joy. Not. Fine when you can batten down the hatches and keep warm, but when we have the logistics of getting three folk into work and back, a different matter entirely. For fear of our offspring losing their jobs, we have to risk life, limb and vehicle to get them in because they will be sacked otherwise - plenty of others out there to step into their shoes. J&D in particular have a nowty boss who sees living in a rural area as a good reason to jettison staff if they cannot get in. Only Christmas Day is a non-working day in our household this year so we won't get much respite.

On the positive side, the Council have been out and topped up the grit bins with REAL grit and salt! Not just duff as is in the bottom of the bin.

I have had a lovely early Christmas present from my daughter's boyfriend's parents. His mum has been busy in the kitchen and made a big jar of boozy fruits for Christmas baking. It looks divine and more than makes up for my Rumtopf which went mouldy (so did the outside of the jar, so I do wonder if there weren't tiny cracks all the way through which I hadn't noticed).

My home-made mincemeat smells good too, so I shall have to get some Christmas baking done . . .

Perhaps we might even get the Christmas tree this week . . .

8 comments:

  1. Hope you manage to put your cares behind you and enjoy a lovely family Christmas and an upturn of fortune in the New Year.

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  2. I am sending you Christmas spirit to help with the droopy thoughts. It is hard BB, I am having the same issues here, very hard to get into the spirit. But I have been putting up a little decorations around the house but not so much that I cannot take it down and put it away, it is getting hard for me to stand and bend now. So Please enjoy your day, and week, BB.

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  3. Hope you have a lovely Christmas and things improve for you x

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  4. I know what you mean about having to risk life and limb to stay in work. I requested during the height of the last batch of snow that some of us who travel a long way could work from home. Simple answer was no. Which wouldn't have been so bad if we didn't have long-distance bosses who...... work from home!

    One of my colleagues has been driving four hours a day just to come to work when she could just as easily reach us by email from home.

    Ho hum. Hope the weather isn't too awful and that you all manage to get through the latest storm unscathed.

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  5. I hope things settle down for a lovely holiday for all of you. After many years of nursing in all kinds of weather and on many a holiday, I can certainly understand.

    Enjoy hanging the greens and decorating with the family. I'm thinking a white Christmas would be nice but in the Pacific Northwest where we live...rare.

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  6. This post has got me in the Christmas spirit already - let it snow (as long as there are plenty of boozy fruits around!)

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  7. Am sure your baking will make up for the shortness of your Christmas break - the ingredients sound really lush - 'boozy fruits'. Happy Christmas.

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  8. Busy Christmases are a 'bummer' as they say in California. The whole holiday thing has become so out of hand. Scaling back is not nearly so easy as one might think, with the Christmas sales hype hitting you 24 hours a day. I wish we could celebrate a religious Christmas (or family Christmas)say on January 6th and let all the hype go by. Even so, ours will be a quiet Christmas this year, I think. Have a happy, blessed and peaceful Christmas through it all.

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