6th December: the Feast of St Nicholas

St Nicholas, one of the main inspirations for the figure of Father Christmas or Santa Claus, is remembered for his generosity and random acts of kindness. No wonder that his Feast Day is full of Magic Moments then!

1. Our niece, Auri, was the king in her first ever Nativity play. She's only 3 but I hear her performance was excellent! 

2. The fabulous picture of the Moroccan team waving their manager in the air. It's on the BBC if you haven't seen it - and it's worth a look even if you're not a football fan. Pure joy and affection!

3. My class finally made some Christmas lanterns which I have had printed out since my probation year. The PSA who gave me the template passed away recently, so it was very moving to remember her. She absolutely loved Christmas and crafting!

4. Clem made a surprise dinner, which was really very tasty! When I hear the phrase "hearty vegetables" I tend to panic, but they were very good!

5. Skyping with a great friend tonight - the one person outside my family who I can really be myself with.

6. The light of the moon on a cold, cold evening. There may be snow coming but, for now, it is just stunning moonlight! 

Day 1 of Quotes - Words of Encouragement

Welcome back to our 300 Good Deeds blog!

This year we're sharing our favourite Christmas quotes from books, films, poems and songs. Hopefully, you'll be inspired by our quotes, and we'd love to hear some of your favourites too! You can comment with them at the bottom of this post.

Day One

"You see - little bits of things kept turning up!"

This is a favourite family quote from Mrs. Gatty's "Parables of Nature". The story is about a robin, full of hope, his relationship with the other creatures in the winter garden, and the two-way giving between the lonely man in the cottage and the robin who sang for him.

Day 8 - Biscuits and Non-Eatable Cuteness

This dog is something we're thankful for everyday!

Yes, he drives us barmy, but we love him so much!

After a shaky start, involving rock solid blocks of icing sugar and a little too much water we ended up with lots of icing puddles.

Judith ate surprisingly few of them. 

We are always grateful to have the opportunity to make (and eat!) our

Christmas biscuits - an important part of every Advent.

The best thing about wrapping present? Imagining people opening them!

Something to be really grateful for.

We are AMAZED and thankful for whoever invented eatable ink.

These have resulted in...

...Our range of fantastically decorated -cough- biscuits!

And we're thankful - no, really, we are - for Judith's obsessive neatness.

So here they are all orderly and tidy.

Pure Christmassy magic. No Christmas decorations are even on here, but the feeling it instills in us is something truly priceless!

Day Seven of Thankfulness:

It might not look like much, but it means a lot to wake up in the daylight at this time of year in north Scotland - definitely thankful for weekend lie-ins.

Thankful for all the years we've enjoyed making Christmas biscuits from the recipes in these books. More today!

This Christmas Cactus was given to us to rescue it from being left outside. It's always lovely to have its magnificent blooms at this time of the year.

The memories brought back by seeing treacle biscuits ready to go are just priceless!

I'm not sure if you can make this out, but we were behind a trailer with a Christmas tree on, coming back from our dog walk. Someone will be very excited and grateful to have that beautiful tree in their house 😍

"The Wise Men", performed by Out Of The Box at St John's, Wick, was a brilliant way to spend an evening! Thank you!

Clemency managed to finish her skirt on time for her staff Christmas dinner - that's right, she made it herself.