I like on Hogmanay to look back over the year just ending as I take down the old calendar. Last year however I was disappointed, as all that seemed to be recorded were things like 'dentist 3.30' and 'car insurance due' and even 'feed lawn'. Surely, I thought, my year had been more interesting than this!

So my resolution for 2010 was to keep a diary of the best things, the fun bits and the happy times, so that I'd have something good to read on Hogmanay.

I kept it up on all but a few days, usually writing it last thing at night, and I'm so glad I did. 2010 was not without its difficulties and hard times, but there were many moments to treasure, and I may have forgotten them had I not written them down.
 
Simple things. Of course.

May you all have a year full of such joys and pleasures in 2011, and thank you so much for reading.

I'm off to read the diary....

This is from Gretchen Rubin's blog - www.happiness-project.com/ :


Choose one word to set the tone for next year.

I'm going for FITTER.


but still doing 'simply' of course....what will your word be?

You may have heard that, challenged to come up with a story in six words, Hemingway wrote:

                                        For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Six word challenges can be autobiographies, resolutions, memoirs, whatever...

Here are some I liked:

                                        Longed for him. Got him. Shit.        Margaret Atwood

                                        Computer, did we bring batteries? Computer?        Eileen Gunn

                                        Teaching 18-year-olds poetry, pray for me.

                                        I still make coffee for two.

It's a time of year for looking back, so here is a six word review of my 2010:

                                        There's more to simply than imagined.

Will you try it, and share?  Describe your 2010 in six words. (I'm starting to talk in American haiku!)

more at  www.smithmag.net and  www.dailylit.com

In a lazy post Christmas haze of warm fires and endless food and drink, I've had time to read Time To Think by Nancy Kline, published by Cassell. Sub titled Listening To Ignite The Human Mind, it is about creating what the author calls 'thinking environments' which encourage the kind of respectful listening which helps people think for themselves.

'Everything we do depends for its quality on the thinking we do first.'

'The quality of your attention determines the quality of other people's thinking.'

'Thinking for yourself is still a radical act.'

She says 'We think we listen, but we don't. We finish each other's sentences, we interrupt each other, we moan together, we fill in the pauses with our own stories, we look at our watched, we sigh, we frown, tap our finger, read the newspaper, or walk away.'

I was shocked to realise how often I do these things! And moved by this book to try to do them less often.

A Thinking Environment is a persuasive concept and the book a worthwhile read.


Thank you Lucy for that lovely image, and Julia for the kind comments (comments 19 and 18 December)

    'They get too much for Christmas'
    Said Gran, 'It's really shocking.
    In my young day you got
    A few nuts in your stocking,
    And an orange and an apple
    And a hanky from your Aunt
    And we were grateful for it,
    Not like modern kids who aren't.'
    So we put apples in her stocking
    As many as we could fit
    And was she grateful for it?
    No, she wasn't, not a bit.

                                                    An Old Fashioned Christmas Present from Funny Poems For Christmas

No more poems for a bit. Promise.

This is the start of one of the most evocative of seasonal poems: Journey of the Magi by T S Eliot


    'A cold coming we had of it.
    Just the worst time of the year
    For a journey, and such a long journey:
    The way was deep and the weather sharp,
    The very dead of winter.'


I'd simply like to thank you for reading and wish you a happy Christmas.




I'm going to take a wee blog holiday for a day or two.....

The weight of expectation we load onto this one day can be a great burden, so I'm determined to take it lightly.

On the day itself we like to make favourite foods that are tried and tested. We have starters about lunchtime, main course mid afternoon, and a dessert (or two) an hour (or two) later, with perhaps a walk in between courses. Drinks when we feel like it and a box of chocolates open on the side....I do indulge myself quite a bit but I can't be bothered with that stuffed feeling.


Can you take another poem from Funny Poems For Christmas?

This is the end of Saturday Night At The Bethlehem Arms  by Gareth Owen. The innkeeper decides against turning Mary and Joseph away:
                                                               'I told them,
                    They could rough it in the barn
                    If they didn't mind the cows and mules for company.
                    I know, I know. Soft, that's me.
                    I yawned, locked up, turned out the lights,
                    Rinsed my hands to lose the smell of beer.
                    Went up to bed.
                    A day like any other.
                    That's how it is.
                    Nothing much ever happens here.

                                                                        

                                                                                                                




Food cans, a hammer and a nail. Tealights.

The trick is to fill them with water and freeze them solid before you start punching the holes. I found it easiest to sit on the doorstep holding the can between my feet...easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Photo is a bit out of focus, but it was minus seven out there!



Are you getting excited yet?

I like to talk to children about the artists who illustrated their books. In The  Christmas Tree Tangle  for example I'll ask them 'How does the artist make it look like you are up in the tree looking down?' and 'How does the artist show that the lights are switched on?' In The Gift From St Nicholas  I'll say 'How has Maja Dusikova shown that St Nicholas is going very fast?'  Raymond Briggs The Snowman is of course brilliant for this kind of looking....'How does the artist show that they are even higher in the sky?'

It adds another dimension to the child's pleasure in the book, gives credit to the illustrator and lets the child know that there is such a job as book illustrator/artist.



Shirley Hughes, author and illustrator of more than 200 popular children's books, has written a delightful autobiography called, cleverly, A Life Drawing .
She made me laugh describing her younger self : 'Being Arty was an unthinkable social handicap, second only to being Brainy'.

What do you  like about Christmas?

I know you're busy with planning and shopping and cards and parcels and digging the car out.

And it is snowing again and the UK has closed down until further notice.

But I'd love to know what you like about Christmas....


After you've left your comment (just click at the top right of this post) do have a look at this clever little cartoon video of  17 Dec. www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/series/patrick-blowers-livedraw

I'm not a Christian and am only just getting over being told, by a not very charitable Christian, that I was a hypocrite for going to church on Christmas Eve (when I was fifteen!)

I like the fact that it has lasted so long. It's a very enduring story.

I respect the fact that it has a more profound meaning for religious people.

I like the fact that it is shared by so many millions of people around the world on that one day. That's unique and very special.

I like that it's essentially a mid-winter celebration for those of us in the northern hemisphere. How long winter would seem without it!

I like the focus on children and people in need.

I like the emphasis on family and sharing.

I like the twinkly lights

I like the theatre of it.

I like this poem by Edwin Morgan:

                  

                            jollymerry
                            hollyberry
                            jollyberry
                            merryholly
                            happyholly
                            jollyjelly
                            jellybelly
                            bellymerry
                            hollyheppy
                            jollymerry
                            marryJerry
                            merryHarry
                            hoppyBarry
                            heppyJarry
                            bobbyheppy
                            berryjorry
                            jorryjolly
                            moppyjelly
                            Mullymerry
                            Jerryjolly
                            bellyboppy
                            jorryhoppy
                            hollymoppy
                            Barrymerry
                            Jarryhappy
                            hollymoppy
                            happyboppy
                            boppyjolly
                            jollymerry
                            merrymerry
                            merrymerry
                            amerryasa
                            Chrismerry
                            asMERRYCHR
                            YSANTHEMUM

                                                                                         that was fun to type! 
                                                                                                       'The Computer's First Christmas Card'                 

I went back and bought the teaset, the glass and the decanter!

Do I need them? No.

Will they make my life simpler? No.

But on the way home yesterday it occurred to me I could borrow them, or as it were hire them, use them for Christmas and give them back to Oxfam  - who can sell them again. 

Win win!

Took bags and bags of books to Oxfam and managed not  to buy a really pretty 1940's teaset complete with sugar bowl, cream jug and cake plates, a glass engraved with the most delicate design, and a decanter!

Actually I think I'll go back for the decanter..

Agree to modest presents for each other's children and to give to the adults' favourite charity, with maybe a little edible treat or book or some such as well.

Whatever you do don't get into debt for it.

Indulge, but not too much.

Gently turn down invitations you don't really want to accept.

The house should be warm and cosy and a bit twinkly - candles do it for me. And white hyacinths.

Also, the Christmas tree has to be real - there's nothing like the smell of the real thing...

Some of the planned activities for the party didn't take place because everyone got so caught up in the first one, which was to vote for your favourites from the collection of Christmas books (see 7 Dec).

Silence reigned (!) for an hour or so as everyone, adults and children, started re-reading them all to decide which they really liked best. Some discussion followed and  a very complicated voting system began. But the final result was....ta daa -

No 1 Smudger The Dog Saves Christmas. This year's choice - a zany overexcited dog gets into all kinds of trouble, and the drawings of the reindeer are wonderful. By Lissa Evans and illustrated by Holly Surplice (Red Fox).

No 2 The Christmas Tree Tangle (see 5 and 10 Dec). A favourite in this house since I bought it an 1996.

No 3 Harvey Slumfenburger's Christmas Present purchased in 2009. An exhausted Father Christmas climbs into bed and then notices he's missed a present....for far away Harvey Slumfenburger. His reindeer are asleep and one of them is not very well. How will he get to Roly Poly Mountain? John Burningham is both writer and illustrator of this dramatic tale published by Walker Books

Silent Night by Sandy Turner of the New Yorker (Walker Books) has fabulous illustrations which appeal to adults as much as to children. You have to take a little time to figure out just what is happening on each page. It's not a book to be hurried. It has very few words: bark, woof, wuff and grrrrr and the odd yap, but they are repeated hundreds of times (you have to be patient!). Ross never tired of this book, and wanted it read over and over, we pointed to the words as I read, then I realised he was saying the words with me, and distinguishing between woof and wuff. I lowered my voice to a whisper and gradually stopped and he carried on. 'You're reading!' I said. 'Uh huh', he said, and turned the page.....magic moment.....

He also retitled it Noisy Night which we wrote on the title page.

It is my personal favourite.

Another delight, with snowy endpapers, is Wake Up, Dormouse, Santa Claus Is Here by Eleonore Schmid, North-South Books. Again the illustrations are gorgeous - the dormouse asleep in its nest surrounded by its store of nuts, the owl flying through the treetops in the moonlight.

I'm using it this year as inspiration for fun at the Christmas Tree Party. We'll read the book then get togged up and go for a walk into the forest and choose a tree to make into a Christmas tree for the animals (which in the book of course never eat each other, but in the true spirit of Christmas share all the nuts and fruit brought to them by Santa - though there is a slab of bacon there I notice, and a wild boar among the animals!).

So we will thread peanuts onto strings, grate cheese, shred cabbage, make breadcrubs, dip pinecones into fat and roll them in bird seed, tie up apples and carrots and coconut halves and hang them from the branches....

The Christmas Tree Tangle by Margaret Mahy (see 5 Dec) is a great favourite among the Christmas books for children. A bit of a tongue-twister with a lovely rhythm and charming story.

                    'But, horrakapotchkin! What do I see?
                    She's tangled her tail and can't pull free.
                    Oh, what terrible Christmas luck:
                    Help! Help! - for the cat is stuck.

One Christmas Tree Party the children made a little play from it...




   if you're buying books for children this Christmas....more to come

At the Christmas Tree Party we read Christmas books and funny poems, sing carols, and have silly competitions. Last year we had a competition for the best poem called 'The Cooker's Last Christmas' (Guess what, we still have the old cooker - can it really be a whole year since I said we'd get a new one? And will it last out the day?). The children put on shows, raise some money for charities selling us things they have made - marzipan sweets, cards and suchlike, we catch up on news, exchange Christmas cards, try to get all the presents passed to all the right people without the little ones seeing, feast on a splendid spread of food....same old things really, but that's what we like about it....

Among my favourites from Funny Poems For Christmas compiled by Paul Cookston and published by Scholastic (though it isn't very) are Santa Is A Biker Now which begins -

                    'Santa's got a helmet on
                    And rides a Harley Davidson'

and The Christmas Confessions of Tom Aged Ten which starts - 

                    'I'm Joseph in the nativity play
                    It's horrid and it's scary
                    But I'm in love with Amanda Blinks
                    And Amanda's being Mary.'

and then goes on for eighteen verses!

If it does thaw, this weekend we will have the Christmas Tree Party. Family and friends visit, bringing food. We pile into a convoy of cars and drive further into the Argyll Forest to choose our Christmas tree - singing all the way. The children take turns in choosing the tree (we always forget who chose it last year....). One year Ross asked the men who sell the trees if they would put him through the funnel they use to net them and he was carried home netted! The tree is brought in and we all help decorate it with lights, ginger biscuits and all the old favourite decorations. The youngest puts the fairy on top - though this year the youngest is only three months old so maybe not....

Each year I buy what I think is the best of that year's children's Christmas books. I look for a good story, beautiful illustrations.....and that extra something, that little bit of magic that makes it special. I try to recall how Christmas books looked to me when I was a child.

A beautiful endpaper is a lovely entrance into (and exit from) the other world that is a book.

The Christmas Tree Tangle has swirls of blue and green on very textured watercolour paper. Brian Wildsmith's A Christmas Story has gold endpapers - very special. A Gift From Saint Nicolas has a flurry of snowflakes on a pinky grey ground, and Silent Night has gold stars on a deep blue sky. It's nice to pause on the endpaper for a moment when reading to children....


The Christmas Tree Tangle is by Margaret Mahy, illustrated by Anthony Kerins, published by Puffin.
A Christmas Story by Brian Wildsmith is Oxford University Press
A Gift From Saint Nicholas by Dorothea Lachner, illustrated by Maja Dusikova is by North-South Books
Silent Night - Carols For Children with embroideries by Belinda Downse is by Methuen

I love Christmas.

I can ignore the hype, and the fact that in the commercial world it now starts before Hallow'een. That's the way it is, but I don't have to pay that any attention, and I'm certainly not going to let them spoil any of it for me. December is time enough.

And I don't fall for that 'Buy now at half price trick' on all the goodies! I know I'm not strong willed enough to keep them till Christmas, but will eat them and go back for more, thereby spending the same amount of money but eating twice as much sugar and fat as I meant to. Full price nearer the time will do just fine, and in the unlikely event that they will run out? There will be plenty more to choose from.......simply chill.

If you only want to check one thing books are definitely quicker than the internet.

Books never say 'sorry, not responding' or 'oops, an error has been found'.

Books are not fast sometimes and slow other times - they are perfectly matched to your own speed.

Books don't change when you're not looking.

Books don't flash advertisements or distressing charity appeals in your face when you are trying to concentrate on something else.

Books don't require an electricity supply. In fact books are what you turn to during a power cut.

Books don't get infected with viruses (silverfish are not the same).

Books stay the same. Of course that can be a drawback - websites are updated continuously - but it's comforting to pick up a book and know that the illustration I want to look at will be on the same page and in the same position as every other time I looked at it.

Books don't 'crash'. You can't lose all your books in an instant.

And ultimately, you can't curl  up in bed with a good computer......