Christmas Eve

This morning we drove over to the nearby village of Wing to drop off a Christmas card to friends. After standing at the end of their drive for a socially distanced chat we went for a walk through the village, past the church and through the fields beyond. At this point it stopped being a walk and became a squelch over mud and waterlogged ground. In the end we walked back along a road rather than battle more mud and water in more fields, doing a circuit of 3.5 miles. 

Wing Church is truly special, one of the most important surviving Anglo-Saxon churches in the country, with much of it dating back to the 10th century. The village was given by King Edgar to a kinswoman, Aelfgifu, who rebuilt what was probably originally a 7th or 8th century building.  It is thought that the crypt held relics which made it a place of pilgrimage. It would also have been a minster church, acting as a centre for a wider area than just the village. The picture below shows the apse, with rounded Anglo-Saxon arches and a much later window cut into the wall. Below the window you can see the top of an arched entrance leading to the crypt.  

After we got back from our walk it was time for a late lunch. H went out for a walk and to deliver presents to her boyfriend and his family, while I made some mince pies. A friend dropped round to bring us some home made sweets, so we had a socially distanced chat with her from the door step. We watched Paddington 2 on TV, then played a Christmas Eve board game (literally, The Christmas Eve Game). M an I went outside with the intention of singing carols with neighbours - our town usually has carol singing in the town centre on Christmas Eve which is attended by thousands, and this year the plan was to broadcast carols so that people could sing along on their doorstep. However, we couldn't make the music work so we ended up chatting outside for a while, with Christmas music on the car radio instead.  

After that we prepared vegetables ready for tomorrow and cooked pizzas, then watched Love Actually, which has become our traditional Christmas Eve movie. Altogether a good Christmas Eve.