Love

Our Edinburgh grandchildren came for a sleepover last night before going down to Worcester to their other grandparents for Christmas. Here they are having a lovely time bursting the bubbles in bubble wrap. I love their intent concentration on this important task.

They departed this morning and have arrived safely. They've now met their newest cousin - cousins are arriving thick and fast at the moment - on their daddy's side. This baby, born at the end of November, has now supplanted Littlest Granddaughter as their youngest cousin! (though he's not Littlest Granddaughter's cousin, if you follow.) Grandson was delighted to acquire his first boy cousin.

So today we went up north to visit Son and DIL and sweet Middle Granddaughter, the unbloggable one. As you can't see here, she has huge hazely-green eyes and is very pretty and perfectly adorable. We hadn't seen her for an unusually long time (mainly because we've been up and down to London to see Littlest Granddaughter; also because of my two choirs' carol concerts) and I thought she'd be very shy of us, but in fact she wasn't. Which was lovely. We should see her again in a couple of weeks so I hope she keeps remembering us.

Here she is having a walk in the park with her parents and us. Her hat had a red bobble.

Meanwhile, Littlest Granddaughter is with her parents and Nottingham grandparents for Christmas. These grandparents are both great knitters; here she is modelling the lastest creations. Now, that's a hat.

And our house is quiet, which is how it will remain till the first wanderers return on the 30th. Mr Life, who enjoys a bit of peace, is quite happy about this. I'm ... ok. Of course the children should see their other grandparents. We'll survive. In my ideal world, all grandchildren should live round the corner from all their grandparents and should see them every day. It would be a lot easier for their parents, too, I would think. Alas, the modern world isn't arranged like that.

Pathetically, I also miss my parents, somehow especially at Christmas. Dad died 10 years ago and Mum 5 years. How they would have loved to see the little ones.

And, as I've said before, it's so strange how fast the house empties - from the days not very long ago when it bulged at Christmas with parents and aunts and uncles (actually only one uncle) and their foreign friends - now all gone - and our children - now scattered. Next year it'll be full again at Christmas, I hope, with our descendants and also my brother and his family. It's like in Philip Larkin's "An Arundel Tomb" (such a good poem) - "the endless altered people came". Life goes on. We eventually don't.

However, grandchildren are such a joy, and WhatsApp photos keep us in touch with their doings when we can't see them so it could be A LOT WORSE!

Have a happy Christmas, everyone, particularly those who make the effort to comment  - and an especial hello to Avus - lovely to hear from you again!