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happy christmas!

The cookies are baked, and gifts that haven't been given yet all ready to wrap. The Reindeer Dust has been made and is waiting in stocking no. 24 (thanks so much Tiel for that genius idea). The tree cookies above are made from the christmas decoration recipe in Nigella's How to be a Domestic Goddess. For the first time ever, I managed to get the icing to a manageble consistency so it didn't ooze over the edges too much. A christmas miracle!

We're hosting Christmas lunch this year, thankfully with significant donations of food from relatives taking pity on my 34 week pregnant girth. So Audrey and I made the christmas crackers this afternoon. We printed out some of Camilla's lovely downloadable tags from last year and appropriated the pictures for our crackers - (thankyou Camilla!) Inside are a tiny wooden animal figurine (50c from a local toyshop - bargain), a chocolate santa and a naff joke. No idea why, but I am excited beyond proportion about these!

I'm going to take a week away from blogging, but I just wanted to thank everyone who has popped by this past year. Wishing a merry and safe Christmas to those to celebrate it, and a happy festive season to all. Cheers! xo

Beatrice

A sister for Bernice. Off in this morning's post to a young friend for Christmas.

The weather has been on the incline again here, so we are right in the thick of heat avoidance activities during the afternoons. To make a huge understatement, I'm so grateful for the internet. Audrey was completely entranced with decorating her small object paper doll for a hefty chunk of this afternoon (me too, can you tell?). Bless those kiddley archives!

it's beginning to look slightly like christmas

Touch wood, but after all the renovating/painting/baby preparations of the last few months, I think I'm finally starting to cross a few things off my christmas list. Today - christmas cakes, and a couple of handmade gifts (still in progress). As planned, I made Nigella's cakes and even though I'm not in a position to test them (the official tester will have to be set to work when he gets home from his proper job later), they smell wonderful. I'm loving these brown paper cupcake liners (with scalloped edges! found at The General Trader, local folk). I used the middle quantity listed here and it yielded about 25 cupcake sized cakes. They've been royally doused with sherry and I'm crossing my fingers the small size doesn't mean they'll dry out.

Audrey employed her best pasting & glitter applying skills to make these gift tags. And I was reminded yet again that a small amount of glitter goes a long way (like, everywhere).

For one of our advent activities the other day we used the instructions here to make a pom pom garland. This could be the lamest photo in existence, but they're festooned over our kitchen hutch which sits between two windows and is a right palaver to photograph.

All that's left to do now (disregarding the rest of the wrapping, baking, making and posting) is to crank up the christmas music and inhale the sherry-infused air while it lasts. ;)

Bernice

This is Bernice, a giraffe in a tutu. It was only a matter of time before a girl entered the giraffe-making frenzy here at the moment. She's made from wool that isn't exactly giraffe coloured, but I'm hoping the long neck is a giveaway to her intended species. She'll be over at etsy tomorrow night with a few friends - finally!

I had another appointment with my doctor today. The little guy is still measuring large and is still breech. There's plenty of time for him to wriggle around, but - and goodness only knows I could be wrong - I've a feeling he's found a comfy spot and will be reluctant to budge. Time will only tell!

advent day eleven

This morning's stocking yielded one rainbow pencil and one picture of a rainbow alien before Audrey darted out the door to kinder. The girl has been getting right into the spirit of the advent calendar. I've been trying to include a mix of activities and small gifts (mostly of the craft supply variety... sparkly pipe cleaners tomorrow, I think we might try to make some of these - thanks for the tip Cassie!) Two days we had no time and I put in a small chocolate santa. As much as I'm pretty sure she's loving the activities and craft, I should have known what she'd prefer to find each day. This is a small exchange we had this morning:

A: Mummy, do you remember sometimes the stockings have chocolate in them?
Me: Er, yes.
A: Do you think they could have that again?

So much for wholesome family good times.

At least I finished these three girls, but I think the shop update may be delayed until tomorrow night - there's someone else pushing in line to be included.

Seamus and shop stuff

It seems to be true - I am becoming addicted to making these. There are other things on my work table at the moment, though, so hopefully things won't become too giraffe-centric around here. This one is Seamus, by the way, and he will be heading to etsy either tomorrow or Wednesday (I'll send out a message to my email list when I have a better idea). Accompanying him will be 3 girl dolls and Harry, one of the other giraffes I posted about last week (Charlie has found alternative housing arrangements).

I couldn't keep up the pace of blogging every day late last week, and completely fell off the wagon over the weekend. It was a fun exercise, forcing me to take more photos and try to find something, er, 'creative' in every day (more often than not a real challenge!) But lots of other things fell by the wayside, not least of which was replying to emails. Hoping to catch up with those over the next week.

Oh, one other etsy related thing - because we're only 2 weeks out from December 25, I can't guarantee that the postal services of the world will unite and deliver internationally in time for Christmas. Just thought I should say.

Have a good Monday, peeps!

a very nigella christmas

Seeing Amy's post about christmas cookies yesterday, spurred me into action with my own festive baking. I usually bake a variety of biscuits or christmas cake for family & friends, but my current situation made me a little reluctant to dust off the cook books and read about all the sugary, carbo-filled goodness I need to stay away from this year. As soon as I opened up my copy of Nigella, though, my baking zeal returned. {A bit of an aside, but at the front of the cookie section there's a picture of a fantastic hand shaped cookie cutter that Audrey was really taken with. This afternoon, we ventured into a local baking/homewares store for some christmas cake suppiles, and lo and behold the very same hand shaped cutter was on the rack. And a foot one too. They had to come home with us.}

Anyway, so I think my baking will be very Nigella-heavy this year. I've never tried her christmas cake (I usually do the Stephanie Alexander one), but will be giving it a whirl this year. We'll also be repeating her christmas decoration recipe (who else has done these? they are so good!), her rocky road, and trying the pistachio and white chocolate cookies. Last, but defintiely not least though, will be Bill Grainger's orange and cardamom biscuits. These are our christmas staple & I can't recommend them enough - they smell and taste incredible. If anyone else has a christmas baking staple, please leave a comment, I'd to love hear it. :)

Harry & Charlie

This is Harry and his very good friend, Charlie.

Both born today, and already developing strong individual tastes in neckwear.

They'll be included in my next shop update, sometime over the next week. I can't make enough of these at the moment, I'm having such fun with them. I may have to sit on my hands before this becomes the giraffe blog.

giraffes, dolls and all the rest

I really shouldn't have said I would continue blogging every day whilst Matt was painting my work room. There's crap everywhere in here, and as a heavily pregnant woman I'm not that keen on hanging around wet paint (even if it is the no-fume variety). Thankfully, the weather was gorgeous today (and paint dry) so I opened up the windows and cut and sewed to my hearts content. That's three giraffes and three dolls in progress on my desk. I'm off to watch Enough Rope and start stuffing them soon.

I've been feeling slightly panicky lately about how on earth I'm going to manage caring for 2 children and get anything else done once the baby is born. I'm trying to just use and appreciate this time now, knowing from experience how babies have a tendency to turn things upside down. I'm determined to try to slow down and enjoy the very early months this time - it went by in such a confused blur first time around. But there's still that niggling question at the back of my mind... how long will it take us all to find our feet again? Will we?! Fortunately there's still enough time left (9 weeks!) for that panic to motivate rather than freak me out completely, but um, watch this space come January.

saturday

I have to be quick tonight because Matt is coming into my work room with a paintbrush as I type. This will be the last room to get a lick of paint in this most recent spate of work to the house. I can't wait for it to be a fresh shade of white and to start hanging pictures and to pack away all my sewing stuff.

Getting inspiration from a couple of places today - the inspiration boards blog, which has some lovely interviews with some well known crafters about their work and workspace. There's also some lovely craft space eye-candy at desire to inspire.

Thanks so much for your lovely words about the garland. Audrey was so excited to open the first one this morning, she was out of bed just after 5.30am. As much as I love her enthusiasm for advent, I'm hoping tomorrow isn't quite such an early start.

(The photo is unrelated - just some agapanthus from the garden).