storbarnsförälder

Today Niamh went back to Dublin. She travelled to the airport alone, because frankly £30 is a lot of money. We saw her off onto her train to Bristol and then headed into town. It felt... blank, dead, and empty. So we went shopping in the sales.

We got a cutlery tray for our kitchen drawer, and I got a pair of green corduroy trousers. There were some amazong purple tie-dyed trousers, too, but none of them would close over my hips, so I had to give up. The green ones gape a bit at the waist, and are too long, but I love them anyway. They're not black, grey or blue! Wow, what a colour-change for me... I haven't owned cords for ages.

I also got a purple satin water-padded bra, which is a bit odd but definitely adds cleavage. Then we phoned Niamh to make sure she was ok; she was, she had got to the airport without incident. The house feels stragenly empty without her, though it is lovely to have it to ourselves again, just the two of us. And the cat.

Boxing Day? Not where I come from. Today we vegged quite seriously and ate food. Darrell and Becky came over in the evening and helped us eat leftover potatos and carrots-and-parsnips and turkey and ham and trifle and pudding and chocolate and biscuits and they also as well in addition gave us a disposable camera that we'd given them. They'd taken pictures of our new kittens with it; two females, to arrive in January, and two of their siblings that are going elsewhere. Mmm, cats. They're so cute!

I can't remember what else, if anything, we did. Slept, I imagine.

We ate. We ate vast mountains of food, and small hillocks, and drank Amé and water and apple juice. We pulled crackers and wore silly hats, and eventually we gathered to open presents.

From our eldest sister, Niamh and I got mugs. They say "To the World's Greatest Auntie". Wow. The shock almost killed us.

Janice got a pair of purple dungarees from us.

Purple dungarees

When I was 15 and depressed and running away from home and refusing to go to school and being generally miserable, my sister Gráinne brought me out to Dublin's Temple Bar (a pedestrian area that used to be full of wonderful poor-student alternative-lifestyle places and is now yuppified) and told me solemnly: "There comes a time in every woman's life when she needs a pair of purple dungarees." Then she bought me some; I still have them.

When my sister Niamh was 16 or so and being horribly bullied at school and going through a similarly awful period of her life, I told her the same thing, and bought her a pair of purple dungarees. She got her life sorted out and stopped needing them, so I have them now.

A friend in New Zealand had a teenage daughter going through a tough time. I emailed her some sage advice, and her mother bought a pair of purple dungarees.

Janice is now officially a member of the Purple Dungarees Family. I think she was pleased. She's had a tough 18 months or so.

So we opened the rest of our gifts, which took a while (one gift at a time is our tradition, so that everyone gets to see what everyone has). Rob got slippers and pyjamas, among other things. I got some lovely clothes, which I'm very pleased about, as I have been getting incredibly tired of the ones I have. My old clothes were all terribly respectable.

Midnight Mass, C of E style

The local C of E church had a midnight mass at midnight, and it's a pretty building, so we went.

Wow, those guys are religious! I mean, I was brought up Irish Roman Catholic, and I have never seen pomp and piety like these guys did it. The incense permeated the church and our larynxes, which made singing a little difficult; my voice dropped a register during the service. They chanted or badly sang the first reading. They put their hats on, they took their hats off. It took 90 minutes. Communion was brief, though. The congregation was at least 25 strong, and only 6 went for communion.

We sang carols though, and there was a great sermon about how Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings and Narnia are all basically about Good and Love and things, and that their message - now showing at a cinema near YOU - was important to all humanity and things. Er, there was a bit about Jesus, too. And things.

Two priests shook hands with us on our way out. We felt very churched, and thoroughly religionned.

Santa Claus

We (me and Niamh) sent Rob and Janice to bed and then we got ready to Be Santa. We had the stockings all ready (Niamh and I have red stockings with teddy bear heads at the tops, and Rob and Janice had the green ones Mum made ages ago. The cat's one was a little one from Niamh's Christmas in Cork, so lots of sentimental value was lying around looking like goodie-bags) and the gifts in various plastic bags - mostly wrapped gifts, this year, to make secrecy easier.

First we did Rob's and Janice's and the cat's stockings, and then we split up to do each other's. Then we bounced up and down a bit and squealed in excitement and hugged and it was lovely. For the first time in ages, Christmas was really exciting. Then I found Niamh a book and a candle to read it by, and left her to sleep on the inflatable bed in the dining room (Janice was in the spare room for Christmas).

Then I went to bed and inflicted cold feet on Rob's warm shins.

I don't know what happened today. Dave left, and we discovered after he'd gone that he'd left us a present. We cooked a little and cleaned a little and probably went out and shopped a little. Was it today or yesterday we went to the HobbyCraft place and all ran riot?

HobbyCraft is wonderful. We bought coloured pipecleaners, beads, and glue. Essential Christmas fare, in other words. Also, we snuck arond buying things for each other in secret. Yay!

Other than that, we toddled around town admiring life and then started on the baking - sponge cakes for trifle. Janice had already bought the pudding at the Christmas market.

Today is the day Niamh arrives for her Christmas holiday. Our first Christmas in our new house, and Niamh's first Christmas without either of her parents there. She seems to be looking forward to it :)

I started by getting a train to Bristol Temple Meads in plenty time for the bus to the airport, so that Niamh wouldn't have to wait around for me. That was fine; I got my Young Persons Railcard discount and headed off. As we pulle dinto Bristol, the woman opposite me said "Wow, look at the sky!" and so I looked. What I could see between the buildings (prefabs, warehouses, factories and garages, mostly) was spectacular.

It was easy to find the bus stop outside the station, and I met a lady going to Ireland for Christmas. "Going home for Christmas?" I asked her. "No," she said. "I've been in England 40 years and this is my home now." It's lovely to meet someone who says that; so many Irish people abroad seem to spend their time lamenting their exile.

When I reached the airport, I was early for Niamh's flight, so I bought a book (Witch Child, which is actually much better than the title suggests) and a Radio Times and a cup of tea and a croissant. The tea was ok, the croissant was awful.

Niamh's flight got later and later. I finished the book and bought a horrible sandwich. Everywhere in the airport closed at 7 pm (half an hour after her flight was due to arrive) and the check-in/arrivals hall was cold. Oh, and the only smoking section closed at 7 pm too. So it was cold, and boring, and badly lit. Never travel to Bristol airport. I ended up making notes of possible good telly in my Visor, and reading the adverts in the Radio Times.

Eventually, she landed. 90 minutes late. When she finally came through the gates, I almost ran to give her a welcoming hug, and we immediately went outside for coffee and cigarettes. I called Railtrack to find out about travelling home. If the bus was on time, we could get home for about 10:30. Otherwise it'd be after 1 am.

The bus was on time. We got home without much ado, and even the queue for taxis was quite short. Niamh said how lovely the house was as soon as she got in the door, and Rob made us tea and toasted sandwiches. Ahh, recovery!

Emma left this morning - well, this afternoon.

After getting home late last night, sobering up while walking from Reading train station, and collapsing into bed after much forced rehydration, I woke comparatively early and headed to Janice's house to see Emma off. She is moving back to Canada to be a grownup instead of a student. Turned out I woke too early and woke her up, too. So we had tea and wandered around digging through some more of the stuff she wasn't bringing back with her.

That'd be the New Scientist with the Anthrax cover, a lipstick case that wasn't big enough for her Swiss Army knife, her bicycle, and some stationery.

Yes, a bicycle. It's a racer, and will probably fit Rob.

Janice came home from Slimelight at about 11, and then we all just, well, waited for Emma's friend to arrive to drive her to the airport. The morning was feeling somewhat surreal and distant at that stage, due to lack of sleep (Janice had been awake all night), so we bade her goodbye and staggered off to bed.

I have no recollection of what we did for the rest of the day.

The person I was supposed to see wasn't in. I have another appointment for next week.

So then I made a wreath. I'm told that you need a round base to work from, but I didn't have one, so I just wound the holly into a circle. I used cable ties for the initial structural fastening, and then thread and coloured cord for the adding-bits-so-it's-not-bare fastening. Then we tied on some lovely scarlet ribbon and hung it outside the door, where it is swaying and turning.

Janice arrived halfway thorugh the making process and was very useful at pointing out bare bits. Then we put the leftover holly around the dining room, apart from one glorious, dark, sharp and scarlet branch, which we propped up behind the nativity scene in the library.

We even have holly around the candlesticks (which I washed during our housework fest on Sunday; they look lovely now) which we got from Sweden. They're very dark blue, and the dark green looks wonderful. And Janice stuck some in an elegant, slim winebottle, and tied the remaining red satin ribbon around the neck of the bottle. It's all getting very festive downstairs.