Officially winter has not yet begun, but if you look out our window, you can see that it is well and truly here.  We have had quite a few snowfalls with more storm warnings ahead  so a white Christmas looks certain.  The days are much shorter.  We find it hard to get out of bed in the dark and to turn on the lights at 4:30 in the afternoon.

The end of the the school term is near and we are eagerly looking forward to a few weeks holiday.  Each of the children have some academic tasks that they are trying to finish by Friday at the latest.  B8 amazed us all by deciding that he would like to finish earlier than Friday and to that end he completed three math problem sets on Monday then two plus a test on Tuesday.  This has never happened before! But now I know it is possible…

L14 is working on her last writing assignment for this year, a Christmas poem and A12 is finishing up a research paper on trench warfare.   Our Christmas preparations are well underway despite the need for school to continue.  On Monday night we picked up a Balsam fir tree which is looking beautiful in our lounge room. The other  night Andrew and I put up lights on our front porch.  It was minus 7 at the time so we kept going inside for a little thaw break.  All the hard work had to be done by Andrew, some on a ladder some on the snow covered rook.  I just stood and gave advice and wondered if the hedge would be enough to break his fall if he slipped off the roof.

Lately, the girls have had several opportunities to play violin in the community .  Today, along with their friends H and P they provided Christmas music for a Senior Christmas Dinner at H and P’s  Grandma’s church.  A couple of weeks ago they did the same for the seniors dinner at our church.  Last Sunday L14 and P performed  at our church’s  Youth banquet.

This time next week will be Christmas Day, which we will be spending with friends we made back in Wollongong when A12 was a baby.  They are in New York now and will arrive at our place on Christmas Eve.  Everyone is looking forward to their arrival.  Like us they have three children, very close in age to ours.  There will be fun and games for sure.