It’s fair to say we aren’t a religious family but I like both twinkly lights and Christmas so I booked for us to go to Sheffield Cathedral after work on a Friday to get into the festive spirit.

The understandable lack of trust in the 98 bus service, terrible traffic and weather, and children who were trying to get across to town in a short timeframe didn’t exactly make for a sweet Christmassy feeling.  Once my lovely friend had fought through traffic I stopped being quite so grumpy and we made for the cathedral, queuing to get in.

Dancing lights were projected onto the cathedral which musical accompaniment. It was quite lovely really and there was definitely a moment of calm. Inside the cathedral, however, it felt pretty eerie. Nice twinkly lights made you gasp on the way in but it was really dark, made even darker by the projected flapping angel above the altar that looked like he was going to smite me.

We walked about a bit the kids seemed keen to leave. When asked why (because it was genuinely quite pretty) my youngest said she didn’t like the men who kept following us. The men of course being the priests. I tried to point out that they were just trying to get us to go to a church service and it’s what they do for a living, but she was having none of it so we exited through the gift shop. Well actually we didn’t – we bought sweets in the gift shop then had to go back past the creepy flying Angel Gabriel and ominous priests to exit another way.

So, yes the outside stuff was fun and the lights were pretty – but overall I was glad to get home and collapse with a glass of mulled wine which felt a lot more festive. Next year I’ll pitch for a trip  to see Elf instead.