We started the day on the right note by going to St. Mary's for the 10am Christmas Day service.

I woke up at 7:45 and decided to get up and shower to get rid of some of the morning aches. To celebrate Christmas, I had a morning morphine tablet for the first time in a couple of weeks.

Chris came round just before 9:30. We met John at St. Mary's just before the start of the service at 10am. John had been working overnight at the O2 arena and had not had any sleep. He came to church straight from work.

It was really good being at church in a family group on Christmas Day. Although it was a family service, the message was a very straight forward message about Jesus Christ, rather than being watered down with elements of commercial Christmas and sentimental elements of the Nativity that don't actually appear in the bible, such as winter snow and Good King Wenceslas.

It was good to focus on 2 lines from the last verse of the carol, Once in Royal David's City,

"For that child, so dear and gentle,
is our Lord in heaven above".

After the service we had the chance to talk to lots of people and get updates on a number of people we have been praying for.

Back at home, we started the present exchange process, before it was time to prepare lunch. (I actually sat down and left it to others to get lunch.)

Lunch was traditional turkey with all the trimmings, followed by Christmas pudding. There were five of us for lunch, a good number. It seems a little unkind to mention that lunch was much more relaxed without having to worry about young children, but it was. (However, we would have been devastated to face a Christmas without our grandkids. This year we had the prospect of the best of both, with one quiet day and then 2 days with the youngsters around.)

After lunch we sat down for a while to watch the traditional Queen's speech and then to continue the exchange of presents. For the first time I can remember, the Queen's speech had an overtly Christian theme, without any attempt to add reference to other faiths to avoid criticism. Since the Queen is the head of the Church of England and "Defender of the Faith", this was entirely appropriate.

One of the joys of Christmas is the eclectic variety of presents. My presents included
- A framed drawing of a Meercat
- A book celebrating 50 years of the satirical magazine Private Eye
- A complete set of Carry On films on DVD
- A framed Lambert family crest

Before long it was time for more food. Our Christmas tea is typically a buffet with cooked meets, cheese, crackers, crisps etc.

The evening was quite relaxed, with time in front of the TV and some board games. We finished the evening watching the special Christmas Day edition of the soap East Enders. Why?

Actually Sue and I finished our evening with a prayer time, when everyone else had gone to bed.