Murder at Christmas

The Hospice charity shop near us had a big display of Christmas books for sale but most of them are chick lit happy ever after books, I'd read a couple of the Trisha Ashley ones but not really my favourite sort of reading, although there seem to be lots published each year.
A quick look on Amazon and I saw Christmas at little Beach Street Bakery; Christmas at Lilac Cottage; Christmas at the Wedding Shop; Christmas Under the Stars; The Cosy Christmas Teashop and The Christmas Promise - all new this year. 

 I really prefer a bit of crime, but hadn't really come across any Christmas crime until a couple of years ago when British Library Crime Classics re-printed  the 1930's book Mystery in White.

 Since then other publishers have joined in and I have these two from the library for my Christmas reading. On the right a book of short stories including some from modern authors, on the left another gem from the past - first published in 1947. Although I was amused to see that when first out it didn't have the word Christmas in the title.

Back Tomorrow,  as entirely unintentionally I seem to have slipped in daily advent photo mode, just like  LAST YEAR

Sue

Lost - One Advent calendar

On THIS post a couple of weeks ago I said we wouldn't be bothering with an advent calendar this year, then I found the comment by Barbara M who has a better memory than me

I remember that you had a lovely advent calendar last year from the National Trust and I imagine that you can use it again this year. I buy a $1 advent calendar with teeny, tiny chocolate pieces from Aldi.

 This is it from last year with all doors open, each little picture is a Christmassy photo from various NT houses.

 I thought it would be in the Christmas decorations box.....................but No

Then I had a brainwave, I must have put it in the big family bible to press the doors shut.

Where's the big family bible?

Somewhere in one of the 16 boxes of books under the bed I guess.

Will we be having an advent calendar this year?

Maybe not.

Back Soon
Sue


PS
Many thanks for all the comments. I love the red Lindt Lindor Chocs but haven't had any for years and have never tried the white or dark chocolate AND I had a £5 Morrisons More voucher so they were in effect .....FREE
And the best news is Colin was never that keen on chocolate and they will be much too sweet for him :-)

Treats

December 1st

Just imagine if you always spent money on what you wanted all the time, and did  special stuff every day. Then these things wouldn't be a treat

I found the big box of mixed Lindor chocs on the reduced shelf because the box is squashed, the coffee is something I've not tried before. Both of these have been popped in the cupboard for Christmas. While the pretty winter cup and saucer were found in a charity shop about 3 years ago and I use it for the month of December - just for a change.

Back Soon
Sue

End of the month

First of all thank you all for the comments about our nasty shock regarding the cancer. It almost feels that we have wasted the whole year with chemo and hospital, but it had to be done and Col is better now than he was at the end of last year. Plus we now know that we don't like living in town, hate not being able to be even a little bit self-sufficient and I've become a confidant driver  so it's not all bad!

Anyway we've got to the end of  low spend/no spend November.
There are a few bits to be added
Spending at the Christmas Bazaar (charity) £3, Fresh fruit,vegetables,eggs,milk and things for lunches this week £13.50
Filled up with diesel again after our Surrey trip £30- should last most of December
Few more edible presents £5
Total November spend £591 + the phoneline and  broadband Direct Debit which goes out later today.
It's very handy having a month with no big bills!
Next month there is the electric/gas bill, car insurance and cash presents - No way can December be low spend. I'm extremely envious of people who can do Christmas for under £100 but with 3 children and their partners, 2 Grandchildren, 2 sisters and brothers in law, one Dad, one brother, 2 nephews and a niece, it's never going to happen here. Especially as I don't do the sort of crafts that make presents.

I shouldn't really be fiddling on the blog because there is a December job list to be written and I must start writing Christmas cards as the Ipswich Scout Post-boxes closes on December 8th, they have one at the Oncology out patients which is handy, we can pop them in next week when we go and speak to the Cancer specialist nurse, 25p a card this year so still under half the price of a proper stamp and I need to pop my repeat prescription form round the corner before it gets dark.

Thank you again for all the virtual support.......Onward and Upward

Back in a day or two
Sue

I think we are allowed to swear..............

..........................but there would be no point.

We could jump up and down, stamp our feet and yell that it isn't fair...........but there would be no point in that either.
Why?

Because, Col's mantle-cell lymphoma hasn't gone , instead it's coming back. The results of the bone marrow sample taken a couple of weeks ago were not clear of it, the CT scan showed the spleen is enlarged.
We should have known really from the fact that the platelet count wasn't rising.

So after the shock we are straight onto plan B. A new, specially applied for and very expensive (another heart-felt thanks for having an NHS!) medication, new as in it's only been available for 2 years, but has shown good results. Then another stem cell transplant, this time from a donor and luckily one of Col's siblings is a match. This treatment will be based mainly at Addenbrookes in Cambridge so I envisage lots more traveling, but not quite in the way we had planned.  :-/

The tablets start immediately, and  have a mile long list of side effects so we have no idea how he will be feeling in a few days or even a few weeks time. Next week we meet with the specialist nurse for more information about time scales as we were almost too shocked to take in all that the doctor told us yesterday afternoon.

On a much more cheerful subject, this morning we've been over to see our beautiful granddaughter Florence, 7 weeks old today. Our youngest told us the best time to come to see her awake and we managed to make her smile several times. It will be lovely to see both grandchildren together at our son's wedding next month.

Back soon
Sue

Visiting our Grandson

We popped down to Surrey for the weekend to see our eldest, son in law and of course baby Jacob, 6 months old now - how did that happen?

Poor little man, red eyes and snuffly nose - a horrible cold

Our visit coincided with him having a grotty cough and cold, poor little fella, he's not keen on having his nose wiped that's for sure. I'm puzzling how we used to give Calpol on a spoon to poorly small people as now there is a clever syringe and even that's not easy when baby spits it all out!

We walked through the woodland to the village because there was a Christmas bazaar happening and I found this little cross stitch kit  for 50p on the Scout stall and won biscuits and buns on the WI tombola. My favourite sort of tombola - when every number wins a prize!

We ate the buns with a cuppa when we got back to H's house and I gave our neighbour the biscuits as a thank you for feeding the cat.

The car gave a strange hiccup followed by a puff of black exhaust smoke on the M25 not far into our journey home and I had awful visions of being broken down on the side of a motorway, but luckily there were no other symptoms and we got back without anything else happening.

Thanks for lots of comments and Hello to another new follower

Back Shortly
Sue

Some books have been borrowed and read

Came home from the library last week with these that I'd reserved online.

Thankfully the weather was eventually good enough for us to walk to the library,  as I was down to my last library book although I've always got a goodly amount of TBR of my own.
Also brought home a letter about more cuts needed to library funding to balance the books. We just hope they don't feel the need to start charging for reservations or, now we are moving back to the country, cut out mobile libraries completely.

I've not done any book reviews lately but this is what's been read in the last couple of weeks.

Marlene C Miller - Called to be Amish [Non Fiction 2015]. One of my own books.
Then 4 library books
Christopher St John Sprigg - Death of An Airman [British Library Crime Classics 2016 (originally 1934)]                         
George Bellairs - Death of a Busybody [British Library Crime Classics 2016 (originally published 1943)]
  Michael Foley - Ready for Anything, Essex at War [Non Fiction 2006]
Freeman Wills Crofts - Mystery in the Channel [British library Crime Classic 2016 originally 1931]

Also now read the book on the top of the library book pile - Thread of Evidence by Bernard Knight. Like the BLCC this is also crime fiction re-published from a while back. Between 1998 and 2010 Bernard Knight wrote a series of historical crime set in Exeter during the 12th Century and then  a trilogy set in the 1950's. Rather oddly the series  of 7 (Thread of Evidence is the 2nd)set in Wales written in the 1960's are not mentioned at all on Fantastic Fiction, I wonder if he wanted to keep quiet about them as they are not as well written as he more recent titles!

Yes, I do seem to read a lot of crime fiction. Why? Probably because they always have a proper ending which you don't always get with an ordinary fiction and they rarely reduce me to a blubbering wreck! And of course authors who write crime tend to write several.



Back Very Soon
Sue