Christmas ended only on 5th January! This is my calendar for the Twelve Days of Christmas. Here also is my Advent Calendar 2012.

In March 2012 I retired from paid work. For about a year — until early 2013 — James and I are enjoying a sabbatical or 'gap year'. We've set aside some of our previous commitments and are taking time to think, talk and pray about what's next for us. We've also travelled.

After a long absence, posting to these webpages is now no longer on vacation. I also post to my Facebook page.

Chloe Annabelle McKinlay, first child of my niece Victoria, first grandchild of my sister Pauline, was born last Friday. She is my second great-niece and second great-grandchild of my father, John. John is visiting us in Canberra from his home in Hobart. Here he poses with James at the Floriade.

St Philip's Singers and CAMRA Inc. have presented Handel's glorious Messiah a few times.

The ABC's Limelight has a list, with videos, of 'epic fails' in classical music. Mostly slapstick, and not funny. This one made me chuckle, as the humour is in the sound. With the excellent Colin Forbes at the helm, this did NOT not happen to our Messiah (!?).

The descent into chaos of this rendition of "Hallelujah!" is something to do with a transpose button, apparently.

It's been long time since I posted here. My apologies, dear reader; I ran out of time, energy and inspiration for a while.

Not too much is the old family motto for the McKinlays.

I like Libenter excipe for my own motto. It's from the Prologue of the Rule of St Benedict and means "Freely receive".

I've used it as the name of my new site.