Here at Dignity Lifestyle, everyone is busy preparing for the festival of lights. The old folk seem in a more festive mood than usual and everyone is wishing everyone else a Happy Diwali. The air today was ominously silent, but the firework fest has started this evening. Colourful rangolis have appeared outside all of the doors (except mine) today and there appears to be some friendly competition between the staff about whose is the best creation. Some people still do them freehand, with a handful of colourful powder channelled between a pinch, but new-fangled stencils have appeared too, which takes the fun out of it, I think. Not that I have the dexterity to do one.

This evening lanterns, fairylights and candles have appeared around the place. Have a look at how pretty everything is

We were frantically stringing marigolds together to make garlands and the staff even roped in some of the residents. My mum probably shouldn’t have decided to eat the marigolds.

And here is a demonstration (please ignore the edgy camera work – your photographer thought she was being cool) of how to do a rangoli: