Someone turn the light on

Taking pictures in the dark is not so easy.

Here we are enjoying our local Christmas lights being turned on, with local fire fighters in attendance and the school choir leading us in carols well out of the vocal range of most grown ups!

Conor's nursery had a Christmas party this morning which several parents helped out at. I was one of them, I suspect I will be until Conor can be trusted to judge what might be liable to trigger some bizarre allergic reaction. An innocent comment to the head of the nursery about "oh that would make a lovely photo" ended with me being given the nursery camera and told to "take lots - there's another camera if that one gets full". I wish I could have used my camera, but that wouldn't have been allowed. The point and shoot compacts are great for the versatility they give you in such a small package - but the delay between pressing the button and the photo being taken is infuriating. Trying to predict 1.5 seconds in advance when the 3 year old is going to stop looking terrified of Santa, and give a big smile instead is... tricky.

On the countdown now to our trip away. We used to time things for the kids in terms of how many sleeps until the big event ("two sleeps till your birthday") so... one blip till we go. And still lots of Christmas cards to send, presents to wrap and send and, there was something else, oh, packing....