More Christmas Thrift and Gingerbread

This year I am trying to do a completely home made Christmas, have you ever tried that?! I've never tried it before but i thought it would be fun...plus it must save money...surely?! i've knitted some decorations and this week i've been baking....my Christmas pudding.

I've never made our Christmas pudding before, but this year our local church was doing a Christmas pud making evening. It was great fun. All we had to take was a bowl, a spoon and a £5 note.

We went from table to table with our recipe, adding cups of this and that, a bit of booze, some chopping and grating, and then we got a lovely bag with a tag on to take it home in. Met some lovely people too :o)

It was easier than i thought. We even have the recipe to use again next year. Yesterday I steamed it for 8 hrs which was easier than i thought too...the only difficult thing will be to not eat it before Christmas!! hee hee! It smells delicious.

Check out your local church/ scout group/W.I. /village group for a "stir up" evening, or make a "stir up" group with your neighbours.

 While the pud was steaming away I thought I'd make our ginger bread for this year. In our house we have a tradition of decorating gingerbread on Christmas eve. Its great fun and keeps the kids distracted from the coming excitement. Usually we buy our ginger bread, but i'm sure home made will be more yummy.

 Munchkin no. 2 had great fun helping me out, and got rewarded with one of these for her efforts!

We used this recipe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/gingerbread_men_99096. It made 35 men.

The rest of them are in the freezer waiting to be decorated with icing and sweets! Oh i LOVE this time of year!

On another note, presents wise, this year I am trying NOT to buy things from big on line super chains. Have you ever tried that?

In an effort to support our local shops and retailers I have bought everything locally. It has taken me more time, but it has actually been more fun. I've chosen a different couple of shops each week and bought from them. I've been to 6 or 7 shops so far and come back with some lovely things i wouldn't have otherwise noticed by trawling the internet in the middle of the night. Also, i was surprised to find i got things cheaper in the shops than on line...sometimes half the price. Something i was not expecting.

More Christmas updates soon. I'm linking up with Gina at Cold Tea:  http://www.coldteaandsmellynappies.co.uk/ with this post.

x

Christmas mail

Happy Thursday everyone, i hope your week is going well. My daughter and i seem to be having a week full of play dates which is lovely...tomorrow i really must catch up on all those jobs!

The other night i was tinkering away in the craft room, and came up with this!

It was such a special time with my kids, writing to Father Christmas, so magical that i couldn't wait any longer to scrap it! no sketches or challenges used, just me , myself and my ideas.

Hopefully Father Christmas will have received his letter by now and will bring a nice toy on Christmas eve :o)

I  really must write my Christmas list now, to include things like a hand held hoover for the car, a veg steamer for the kitchen, a mini sewing machine for my layouts or a new mixer for baking...all highly exciting...but would make my day lol! oh, plus the spa, Ferrari, cruise round the world...!

what do you want for Christmas?!!

preparations

Hello and welcome to my new members :o), I will pop over and see your space too, I love linking up with people!

We love getting ready for Christmas in our house. It is almost more fun than the day itself. The anticipation, the yearly family traditions, the school nativity, and of course Father Christmas himself, HO HO HO!
With only 5 1/2 weeks to go & one pay day to go, this is what we have been up to these last two weeks...

The munchkins have written their letters to Father Christmas...very important if we don't want them to change their minds on present ideas 3 days before the event. That did happen last year!! One wants pink peppa wellies, the other a pirate ship...can you guess which is which lol! This yr was the first year my son actually wrote his letter without any help, so cute,  one for the scrapbook! ...(watch this space!). We posted our letters to the North Pole and believe they will have arrived by now for the elves to start making their toy.

On a more crafty note, my son has finished his entry to the school "Christmas colouring competition"...no peeking! I will put up his marvellous pic (i'm not biased obviously) after the event.

We have had our Christmas photo shoot, courtesy of moi, ready to go on the front of our Christmas Cards (watch this space). Can you guess what she is yet?!

And ....I am also in the middle of knitting our Christmas decorations. Very thrifty of me I thought, coldteaandsmellynappies.co.uk  would be impressed don't you think?!

I'm not entirely sure how I am going to use them yet...for the puddings I wondered about an afternoon game, (we have 9 for Christmas day) of "hunt the pud". They are hollow underneath so I could stuff them with a chocolate truffle or a little cling film wrap of sweets. The stockings are either the start of a garland for the fireplace or for on the tree to put chocolate coins in...

Next week is the Great British pudding bake off with my friends, when we'll make our own Christmas puds, yum! Well, how have you been getting ready for Christmas?

x

pumpkin madness

Hello Everyone!

Who had a great half term then? We did, and I didn't want it to end :o( !! We had just the right balance of catching up with jobs and having relaxing family time.

One of the fun things we did was a local pumpkin trail. We'd not been to one of these before. Most of the shops in the town had pumpkins in their windows and each had been given a name. The challenge was to find all the pumpkins, list the names and then enter a prize draw.

It was really good fun, the weather was sunny and the kids were on top form. The pumpkins were so creative, from Harry Potter to Humpty Dumpty.

I hope they do it again next year!

I am linking this layout up with http://www.lifepaperscrapbook.com/ as I used their fabulous sketch. Materials used: Bo Bunny Apple Cider collection and various stickers.

Hope you had a great half term too.

x

5 creative kids things for autumn half term

Heeeeelp, its half term soon!

Ok, so , i got up this morning and thought hooray! its the weekend. Don't you just love the weekend?! ...No rushing breakfast (what breakfast), no rushing to get dressed, no rushing to walk to school. Bliss, a whole day of chilling with the kids. Time with the kids is so precious now.

Then i thought i'd start planning half term - only 3 weeks to go, yey! What did we do last year for autumn half term? What did i used to do with the kids before the whole school chapter started?

So don't panic when it gets to half term because here are 5 creative things you can do with the kids.

1. Geocaching.

The kids and I love this. Check out the official website.  http://www.geocaching.com/ . It tells you more about it and will show you where there are caches local to you.

Basically you find where your local ones are, either on the website or download the app to your mobile phone. Then go out with your mobile phone which will direct you to them using the phones GPS signals. The caches to hunt for are all shapes and sizes, from the size of a finger nail to big lunch box size ones. They are hidden all over the place in towns , countryside , residential areas and holiday locations ...ALL OVER THE WORLD! So you will never be short of a cache to find. The large ones are best for kids as they have toys in to swap. The mini ones are great for adults as they are such a challenge to find.

Its a giant world wide treasure hunt.

 Look over there mummy - we've found the cache!!

Some of the geocaches are really cute for kids like this duck one!

Sneakiest we've seen...drilled into a fallen piece of bark!

smallest cache we've seen

2. Leaf printing pictures/autumn posters

Go and collect some gorgeous autumn coloured leaves and print stick and play with them. last year we made an autumn collage and learnt all about the seasons.

3. Go conker hunting to play conker games - 

This website has some great info about conkers and different games to play. my kids love hunting for conkers and then hiding them round the house for me to find.
http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/conkers.html

4. Apple days 

I have never been to a bad "apple day" ...not yet anyway. We've been to various ones over the years, but i think the best so far was by the National Trust at Killerton, Devon. http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/killerton/things-to-see-and-do/events/. This year it is on 19/20 October, if you get a chance do go along

We were able to make our own apple juice, do apple throwing games, buy apple and blackberry crumbles & apple sauces, listen to apple stories for the kids, take part in morris dancing, wood turning for the kids...it was excellent.

Look out for ones local to you.

Apple art

 Apple throwing games for the kids

Morris dancing

5. Pumpkin carving 

I've not actually done this with the kids yet, but I really want to try some of the kid friendly designs out there. Check out this one of Hello Kitty by pinkblondgittery. My daughter would love it. Plus I've always wanted to try a pumpkin soup or yummy recipe to warm the bones on a damp autumn evening,

http://pinkblondglitteryhellokittyobsession.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/hello-kitty-halloween-c.html

What creative ideas have you got for half term?
Have fun
x