Photo diary: week 49, project 366

 Two weeks of school to go, and Christmas holidays will start. I'm absolutely unprepared - I have bought hardly any gifts. I have a food delivery booked for the 21st by miracle with Ocado, and still undecided what to cook as the main for Christmas lunch. Most likely we'll have a vegetarian main, but for the boys I will make pigs in blanket, and maybe a little ham. 

I was browsing Fortnum & Mason Christmas hampers (just for fun, I haven't actually bought anything), and saw their famous hamper for £6,000. It made me think that even if I won a lottery, I wouldn't spend this amount of money on a hamper. Don't think I could justify it to myself. I don't pontificate, if anything, I have always wanted a little F&M hamper as a gift. There are several competitions running at the moment where you can win one. Have you spotted the competition at Nigella.com, you need to find a pudding every day for 24 days to be entered in the draw. You can catch up on the previous days as well.

Talking of giveaways, don't miss a chance to win over 1,4kg of chocolate - I am running my annual 12 days of chocolate giveaway, and you still have a chance to win, just go through all the questions and answer in separate comments. And good luck! I have enjoyed choosing different chocolate bars for this giveaway.

Are you working on your advent comps? Any wins to report? Nothing here so far, but I'm ever hopeful.

The bleak beauty of naked trees - walking across the bridge over the Windrush river.

A lovely sunny morning... St Mary's Church and the Church Green.

As soon as the cafes were open after the second lockdown on the 2nd, I had a latte at Costa. It was lovely too. It was nice to see the familiar faces of the staff and have a quick chat. 

This month One More Chapter is running a book photo challenge, there are daily prompts and ideas. On the 3rd you had to choose a book with snow on the cover. I read The Girl Who Speaks Bear last year, and loved it. We even met Sophie Anderson in person last year (live book events, do you remember these things happening in the past life?!), and she signed a copy to Eddie. 

If you're looking for a great stocking filler for someone who enjoys YA/middle grade fiction, this is a fantastic story.

The Blue Boar has decorated its interior for Christmas. Even their boar head is wearing a Santa hat. It was nice and toasty indoors, with a roaring fire and a hot drink.

We braved the cold and ventured to the playground on the Leys, but I could just about endure half an hour before begging Eddie to leave. My fingers were so frozen, I couldn't even catch Pokemons.

We walked in town and admired all Christmas decorations. Someone has added a huge ribbon to the front door, it was very pretty (my second photo from Saturday, as on Monday I haven't done any pictures).

What else is "newsworthy"? We have set up our Christmas tree, it only needs a string of lights to be added. It's one of my favourite seasonal tasks, to take the ornaments from the box, unwrap them and lovingly place them on the branches. So many memories...

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