Month: December 2017

Life Sparkles

Christmas Eve.

Dawn - The Sparkle Diaries.4 Comments

I love Christmas Eve, for me it has always been the most magical day of the year. That sense of expectation, the birth of Jesus and the arrival of Father Christmas with lots of surprises. That childhood sense of wonder and awe changes as we grow older and we feel different emotions for different reasons. I’m doing my best this year to keep a sense of the magical, to give my parents a happy time. Things have changed so much in the past year. At the moment I’m sitting here hating that Mom feels I’m trying to hurt her or harm her simply by changing her clothes. I’m missing my sister so much today too; I cannot help but think that things would be easier if she were here but as she isn’t I have to just get on with things and hope that she is helping me from her heavenly abode.

However, there has been some happy times in the past week and I thought I’d share them with you before I wish you a Merry Christmas.

Lunch with one of my forever friends.

Girlie catch up Christmas lunch with my friend.

I dropped some items off for charity and had the Church to myself, so beautiful.

I loved the colour of these Roses and so bought them for Mam.

I definitely made the Hall and Porch sparkle this year.

A Christmas Cyclamen hanging basket and a very old Christmas wreath I hang outside every year.

I gave in a joined the phenomenon that is Snapchat. I haven’t got the hang of it yet but I have to say it has made me giggle at times I really haven’t felt like giggling. That has to be a good thing!

I just wanted to say a huge thank you to you all for being so supportive of me and my blog. I hope you all have a truly magical, peaceful, blessed not forgetting sparkling Christmas.

O Holy Night. Sparkling Star bless our world tonight.

Life Sparkles

Walking in a Winter Wonderland.

Dawn - The Sparkle Diaries.12 Comments

For the first time in eight years the UK has had a significant snow fall. Major disruption to transport, schools, health services and rural areas. The forecasters were spot on; it started snowing at 4:30 am Sunday morning and snowed continuously for twenty four hours. It settled quickly, that beautiful thick, clean, fresh deep snow. I love it. I had to get out for a walk in it even for half an hour. Here are some pictures I took whilst I was out and about in this unexpected and wonderful Winter day.

It was so good to hear children out making snowmen, families walking and laughing and hardly any cars at all. I’m very lucky that I live on the edge of the city yet bordering the countryside. It was a glorious half hour walk, I enjoyed every second.

Of course now we have ice, treacherous conditions and tonight it is raining, it was great whilst it lasted, fresh and lovely that first day of falling.

I’m very behind in catching up on your blogs, I’m so sorry. Between a continuous run of all nighters and Christmas preparations I’ve been very neglectful. I hope to have more time to blog and to catch up with your blogs very soon.

Sparkle always!

©️ @aurorasparkles 2017

Life Sparkles

Night Time Catch Up.

Dawn - The Sparkle Diaries.2 Comments

It’s been a quiet and settled kind of day. I made a small start on putting some Christmas decorations up. Mom and I always put them up together. This year is really the first time that Mom hasn’t really engaged with me in talking about putting them up. She’s more than happy to talk about Christmas, about family visiting, about sending Christmas cards but for all the discussion she doesn’t appear to be wanting to get actively involved. I have to be careful here; if I do too much too soon there is a chance that Mom will think she is in my house, not her own home and start saying she wants to go home. So slowly does it, keeping her involved, asking advice, asking her to check things. Yes I could do it myself much quicker but I can’t leave my fairy of a Mom out. She always included me when I was a little girl onwards to teenage years and even when I had my own house she would wait for me to be home with her and Dad to put the Christmas Tree up. My turn to do the same for Mom.

I bought a new garland which lights up for the stairs but it didn’t fit properly. Dad suggested the window sill and I have to admit, it looks great there with Mom’s old candle ornament.

Mom and I both love Roses, I buy her a bunch each week when I go shopping. We place them in the hallway, never fails to put a smile on our faces as we pass them.

I found a couple of small vases in a cupboard so I placed some Roses in one of them on the kitchen window. A simple small touch yet makes such a difference to the outlook plus Mom and Dad are enjoying looking at them. I told you… I’m turning “Stepford”.

Our local village tree is up and I love it. I take pictures when I get out and about to show Mom and Dad so that they are up to date and can see what is happening in the outside world, as they no longer get out there. For now it doesn’t appear to upset them. I know Dad especially misses going out and about. Mom no longer talks about going out and the times she has been out; as in our emergency dash to A & E a few months ago, she handled it extremely well, much much better than I had thought she would.

Since I started to write this blog post, we are up out of bed and back downstairs drinking tea. I had a feeling after such a settled day and bedtime being a bit unsettled, that we were in for an all nighter. Perhaps I’ll make a start on those Christmas cards after all…