Christmas eve

I decided at lunch time today that I wanted to go back to the church where we celebrated Michael's funeral, and be among his friends there again. There was a Crib Service with Carols at four o'clock which would be just the thing, as it is a service for the small children, who dress up and make a nativity tableau. Michael so loved the children.

He loved to sing, and had a voice which would easily rise above everyone else's, sometimes quite embarrassingly! I remembered how much it annoyed him when people did not come in strongly on the first note each verse, but lagged behind the organist. So I did my best to hit these notes on his behalf, though I have no voice at all, and could only reach half of them anyway.

I noticed this morning that most unusually, the holly tree in my garden still had berries on it, so I decided to cut some to decorate the house. When I reached the tree with my secateurs and basket I thought: "I'll leave the ones I can see from the house, I'll cut from round the back". Surprise, surprise, there were no berries at all at the back ! A freak of growth, do you suppose, or a kindly gesture of the birds?