The Way of the Wombat

There is a programme on TV sometime over this week that asks what happened to Jesus' foreskin? Was it preserved? Is it preserved somewhere as a relic?

Well I've just heard of something that would certainly out-do that as a relic...


I visited my Mum today and she told me of a conversation yesterday with a friend.

Her friend's daughter is studying childcare and is on a placement in a nursery at the moment. They had their traditional Nativity last week and Chloe had the following conversation with a very small girl of about 3 or 4.

VSG; "What happened to the shell?"

Chloe; "Shell? Um - what shell?"

VSG; "Jesus's shell."

Chloe; "???"

VSG; "From his egg."

Chloe; "???"

VSG; "You know... we just sung a song about it. Mary laid him in the manger. So what happened to the shell?"
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I guess it could be another all-penguin AU?

Well, I'm keeping up so far...

This was a joyous celebration of a joyous event -



And I have written, um... four Christmas cards tonight - well, it's a start.

I'm afraid they are charity cards rather than home-made ones, this year - I've been too busy sorting out stuff to make cards with the children at church to actually make any myself.

I do have another excuse, too - the next epic story in the Returnverse is now three chapters long and I should be able to start posting it once we get Christmas over - or possibly even before, but I think people may be too busy before Christmas to read.

I haven't updated properly for over a week - bad wombat!

So - Daughter-dear is home, she looks well, seems to have avoided Fresher's weight gain, and whilst happy to be home misses the new, York, friends. This is good - it just confirms for me that she is happy there, and doing well. It is lovely to have her home, but also lovely to not have to worry about her when she goes back. She is doing well academically, gaining good marks for her essays, and soaking up the lectures like a little sponge.

I must have missed my LJ 2 year anniversary, because I remember that my first entry was about the Church Nativity Service, and we had this year's on Sunday.

As usual it went well, everyone said 'What a lovely service,' - and as usual that was only what could be seen from the congregation! In fact 18 year old Slightly-Goth niece arrived just nano-seconds before the minister came in, and she was doing one of the readings, and the 18 year old who was to be Joseph had been at a party the night before, and was rather hung-over. He still managed to get to church, and get his costume on, but during the first carol had to dash out to be sick!

Realising what was happening, one of the men in the congregation went to check on him - and when we first started to tell the story of Gabriel appearing to Mary, as I looked down from the sanctuary there was no 'Joseph' in Church! But during the carol before he was to take his place in the tableau a figure came in, in the costume, and I realised that it was Kevin, the man who had gone to check on Max - he had taken over!

It was absolutely fine - he is a tall man in his early forties, and looked fine behind my 15 year old 'Mary' - and as it was a tableau rather than a spoken play, very few people actually twigged that the 'Joseph' in front of them was not the one who had come into Church in the costume 15 minutes earlier! Max made it in to sit and watch the rest of the service.

None of the photos I took are any good - I had knocked my camera off 'automatic' onto 'manual' without noticing, and they were all out of focus. I will see if I can get copies from someone - my friend Alison was taking some - she ended up being the only member of her family not in the tableau as one of her daughters was an angel, the other a shepherd, and her husband is the aforementioned quick-witted Kevin.

I am still at work, all week, and have baking and stuff still to do, presents to wrap, and a chapter of Access All Areas to finish before Christmas Day!

So thanks to everyone who has sent cards and e-cards (Love that cat, 'Tales' - and when I opened it and the sound track started our cat sat bolt upright and gave the computer a 'hard stare'). I apologise for skimming the FL a bit, if I haven't commented where I should please accept apologies!

So hello! After much nagging from husband (S to C) I have finally got my own livejournal. After listing things in interests I realise that to a large extent I am currently too busy doing Christmas to do almost anything else. Have just spent about an hour and a half with Katherine (teenage daughter) browsing Australian gift sites to send Christmas things to in-laws. Definitly the easiest way to do it - wrapping things up so that they get there safely not my strong point!

Husband finally stood over me and forced me to open livejournal after I told him something that happened in Church this morning - he thought you'd all enjoy it, but he has finally decided that my excuse that there is no use having an author and doing your own writing was not good enough.

So - visualise scene - Sunday School group currently consists of 3 over 10's and about six 4-7s, plus a creche group, all older children now having 'graduated' to Church. Then everyone over age of 7 decides that they will be away on the Sunday before Christmas, when we traditionally do a Nativity in Church - so cast all below waist height!

We are talking about costumes - Daniel, who is to be Joseph, (as he is the oldest boy in the cast at five and a half!) asks 'Do I have anything to carry?' I answer that I haven't got anything at the moment, (thinking 'possibly a lantern?'). 'Well should I have a rolled up piece of carpet then?' asks Daniel. I am puzzled into silence. (A Carpet? Perhaps in the School Nativity he has just told me about they had a piece of carpet for Mary and Joseph to sit on?) After waiting for my non-existent answer, he continues 'Because Joseph was a Carpeter wasn't he?' !!! Will you ever be able to see a Nativity Play again without wondering where Joseph's carpet is?