Pither.com

I'm quite used to getting a Christmas tree out of box, unfolding the branches, positioning it in a relatively small, convenient location and adding decorations.

This year however I haven't been permitted such simplicity. Instead I've been "treated" to the joys of real Christmas tree. Lessons I have learnt:-

• the base of a real tree is roughly as wide as the tree is high
• even the ones that say they keep their needles, don't if you move, decorate, touch or just look at it the wrong way (see photo)
• real trees generally don't grow exactly straight
• they need watering every day
• a five foot high tree needs at least 80 lights
• for the first day the smell is so strong (in a small room anyway)
• once finished, they do look quite good :-)

Today, while on the way to return some curtains (a very exciting weekend!) we noticed a garden centre advertising an ice rink. Imagining something like the Somerset House rink and being surprised that a garden centre would have such an impressive winter entertainment, we decided to stop and investigate on our way back.

This turned out to be a very large garden centre and it took us a little while of wandering to locate the ice rink, not helped by the fact that it wasn't actually very large. The bigger shock though, was that it also wasn't actually ice! Not even a thin layer of ice, no refrigeration, nothing.

The floor of the "ice" rink was in fact made from white plastic tiles!!

Apparently this didn't bother too many children though, as there were quite a few happily making their way around the rink.

While the ice rink was a terrible disappointment, there were, thankfully, other attractions also present at the centre, just for winter, that made up for it...