It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

With the impending OS trip, my family decided on a no presents year and Mr T and I decided that instead of Christmas gifts we'd treat ourselves to a night of decadent food and wines in the new year. Of course I'd bought a couple of gifts during the year before we'd made the arrangement, so there will be a present or two opened.

However in my household, no Christmas is complete without homemade food gifts. Beer & Chili peanut brittle and Irish Cream (sans almond essence).

I will not let the fact that on the eve of Christmas eve our olive tree was stolen for the third time (this time I reported it to the police). My neighbour noticed first thing this morning and gifted me another replacement tree.

Stick 'o Hot Choc

These have totally done the blog rounds, but I thought I'd have a crack, because I think they make a nice little gift. I breakfasted with my girls this morning, and while we did do a Kris Kringle I wanted to give something a little extra.

Of course I had to taste test too. It makes for a pretty decadent hot chocolate.
I'm looking forward to experimenting with a more flavour additions (I added vanilla extract) but wouldn't mind trying cinnamon, orange, coffee and most of all chili.

More bunting

Oh and a little bit more bunting for the tree. Made with floss and Japanese making tape.

My creative space

A longer than anticipated visit to Bunnings on the weekend saw me come out with a stack of paint chips. I spray painted the back of them silver and they've been turned into bunting for our tree.

Merry

The table is set and ready for feasting. May your Christmas be a merry one, however you spend it.

An early present

I won this post holder in Yardage girl's giveaway exactly 10 days ago. I should have blogged far earlier, but you know, that time of year. I particularly love the artichoke fabric. Christmas did indeed come early for me.

A week of things in the advent calendar - 05

This only appeared in the calendar this morning and by far it's a favourite. Because why shouldn't everything taste like bacon?

A week of things in the advent calendar - 04

Strangely enough, many of the gifts given haven't exactly fit in the 375mL jars I've been using - which probably goes against the whole grain of the advent calendar, but eh.
Little notes have been used to point Mr T in the right direction. This one downstairs to the coffee machine. I'm the functioning one in the morning, so I make coffee. Except for Fridays. I get the day off coffee duty, it's just kind of the unwritten rule that we both abide to. So the note wasn't unexpected, but the two bags of coffee were. We've only tasted the Espresso blend so far, and we're impressed. Makes a very nice cup indeed.

A week of things in the advent calendar - 03

Still with the travel theme, these accompanied a bigger present in the form of a travel pillow. There's a lot of train and plane travel to come.

A week of things in the advent calendar - 02

With our upcoming overseas jaunt, these toothbrushes were the perfect advent gift. Bonus that they came in green & red. Initially a nose was turned up, but once the practicality was fully appreciated they got a full thumbs up.

A week of things in the advent calendar

There are a lot of households in our street that hang lights come December. We indeed are one of them, our lights aren't nearly as impressive as our neighbours - seen above. But we've joined in nevertheless.

Ho ho ho

Photo: Courtesy of Variety Santa Fun Run

So this is what Mr T and I did last night - that's us at the very back, we were late. Surely no better way to make a running comeback in the pouring rain especially when charity's involved. Sign me up for next year. Too much fun.

My Creative Space

...has taken over the living room floor. I'm slowly finishing off our Christmas crackers. Come the 25th, it will be interesting to see if the snaps work, I fear they were glued in a little too enthusiastically.

Christmas crackers

This year Christmas is at our place. It will be a small gathering of my family and Mr T's parents. Previous years there had been talk of making our own Christmas crackers, but the sheer number of guests meant it was a bit daunting with everything else that needed to be done. Not this year though.

The crackers will be filled with chocolate, scratchies and jokes that made Mr T and myself laugh out loud.

Tasty treats

Last night I whipped up a batch of Smitten Kitchen's Pepita Brittle, it must be noted that I was conservative with the heat after a failed attempt at honeycomb earlier in the week, so it took a little longer to develop into a golden brown. But it was certainly worth being patient. This stuff is good!

I presented a couple of bags to the neighbours as a small thanks for hosting the pre-Christmas cheer get together last night. As a result there were additional requests. I'll be making deliveries tonight.

Sick of seeing the scalloped edge stickers yet? Unfortunately I'm not.

Advent Calendar

Mr T's advent calendar is good to go. All presents are actually present and accounted for as of this afternoon. Phew. And the stacked glasses seem to be holding! Double phew.

Paper planes

I just know the engineer in Mr T will like these paper plane ornaments for our tree. I've used the colours & circle shapes from the advent tags. They're to go with the simple garland and will make up the contents of one of the first advent jars.

Creative Space

It's a snowstorm of floss and round white stickers. This week I've been working on simple paper decorations and ornaments for our tree (read: a bunch of decorative sticks). I know, know, know it's early for Christmas, I'm just trying to get organised, because come December 1 Mr T's advent calendar comes into play. One of the first jars will be filled with decorations to adorn our "tree" so we can get into the festive spirit. I came across the idea last year and was drawn to the simplicity.

Visit Kirsty and a slew of creative spaces.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

It's a good thing Mr T doesn't pop by here. These are the tags for his advent calendar. I thought about sewing one, but really I wanted to make use of things we already have. The quilted mason jars I ordered for my party as extra drinking glasses will do nicely. I'll fill them with a small gift/trinket/in-joke/activity/or map to bigger present that doesn't fit in a 375mL jar. My Christmas shopping is well underway!