Pffff.... my wife and I have been completely swamped over the last couple of months with music work and just staying on top of everything... and so, we have only just managed to get the Christmas tree up in the last week! I think that our kids had been starting wonder if Christmas was going to be a non-event in the house... but we did manage to find a tree, and get that up... and it stood proudly naked in our living room for a few days...

... and the little one was starting to ask every day if we would start decorating it... and on Friday, we got our large grant application in for our ensemble, and immediately started work on decorating the tree!

And it is a really good tree this year! I think that this is the first time that we have managed to keep the star firmly seated on the top... and the whole thing has a nice shape to it!

Thank goodness for online shopping... most of our present shopping is done, but we will still need to brave the shopping mall in a the next day or so for the last few things. The local post office people now recognise me and my wife quite easily... they know our box number and who we are... we have had a steady stream of deliveries!

... and the last things that will need to be done in the dying days of the year after Christmas is to put together my daughter's loft bed with a desk underneath! She's been really patient... I had planned to do it in a lull day... but she wanted to help build it, and my wife wanted to finish painting the wall before the bed went in.

So... it has been sitting in the hallway since late October... but as we speak, my wife is washing the walls in preparation for the painting, and the old bed is now given away and the little one is sleeping on the floor in her sister's room... so, it HAS to be done in the coming weeks, or we will have an awkward living and sleeping situation for the rest of the year!

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