'Twas the last blog before Christmas...

Nearly the end of the year and this is the last blog before Christmas, and depending on how the travelling goes next week, it could be the last of the year. England has had more snow than it can cope with on the roads, railways and at our airports which has been very sad for people trying to get home to be with friends and family for the festive period. I'm off to Kent first and then to Dartmouth for New Year so fingers crossed I get to both.... And I hope you get to where you want to be as well.

The last weeks of 2010 have been snow dominated which is really surprising for this time of year s we don't usually get this much snow until February and it's been colder than for many decades - global warning eh! London had a couple of major 'dumps' as they are called tho' it seems an odd word to me. So of course here are a set of photos from my locality including the biggest bus queue in London where at least 12 number 52s were stuck due to the smallest hill - poor show! See if you can spot the snowman...

Some of the best exhibitions are the small ones and I visited the Courtauld Gallery to see the Cezanne's Card Players series. He painted several of the same group in similar positions showing his appreciation of the peasants and their lives. It was wonderful and just this single room of paintings gave me a much deeper understanding of Cezanne. The Courtauld Gallery is a small gem which is packed full of great works and only £6 to get in!It is known for the its collection of impressionist and post impressionist masterpieces, thanks to the collector Samuel Courtauld It is the front part, the entrance gate, of the Somerset House complex which houses an ice rink at this time of year in its beautiful courtyard. I dropped in during a snow storm and it was good to see that this did not deter the brave skaters.

It's panto season so we booked into our local Notting Hill version of Sleeping Beauty which gave us the usual chaotic good fun show at the Tabernacle. It has plenty of improvisation (for which we mean - somewhat under-rehearsed!) and some great in-jokes and splendid acting from the tiniest of kids. We boo'd we hissed and chanted 'behind you' with the best of them and finished the show with full rendition of Slade's 'So here it is, merry Christmas'.... Very festive!

That's all for this year except to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a great 2011.

Bye for now,

Sue

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