Christmas is my favourite time of the year, I just love it. The shopping, the food, kids off for the 2 weeks, my husband off work for a few days and then its my 9yr old sons 10th birthday on the 28th. Its a busy time of the year, so exciting.
I will put up the Christmas trees this weekend. I can't wait to see N's reaction to it. We are all talking about Christmas so much that she knows its a great thing but shes not too sure what its all about.
I have a lot of stuff bought, nothing wrapped, I'll do that when I have every ones pressies.
Christmas will be a bit different this year. My father-in-law won't be here.
My mother-in-law wants all her kids to have dinner together this year. I can really understand that. She is having a tough time dealing with her grief.
She has bought herself a locket to put her husbands picture and a piece of his hair into. My heart breaks for her, the poor divil
So this means that we will all go out to my sister-in-laws house for dinner, she lives in an extremely large house and will be well able to cope with 8 adults and 9 kids. We will each bake or cook something as this is the sister-in-law who is pregnant, so she'll need a lot of help.
She only lives about 10 mins away so will head out to her house at 2pm, have dinner and chill for a bit.
Later we will head over to my parents house, where all my family will congregate for a drinking and singing session. There will be 12 adults and 13kids, plus maybe a few neighbours will drop in. This tradition has been going on for years but hasn't happened in the past 2 years, so everyone is really looking forward to it this year.
As everywhere is closed on Christmas day and St Stephens day, every home in Ireland has loads of food and drink purchased weeks in advance. You'd think it was going out of fashion. Although from 6pm on the 24th ALL shops and business' will be closed(or opened at certain times) until January.
I do love this but in the middle of that week my son has his birthday. Its really difficult to buy a cake so in previous years I have bought on and stuck it in the freezer. This year he wants me to bake my chocolate cake, so that's grand, easy peasy!!
I have "met" 2 very creative ladies through this blog, http://http//thebaynhamfamily.blogspot.com/
http://http//crickleberrycottage.blogspot.com/
so I was wondering if either of you two very talented ladies could give me any ideas on what I could make to bring to my sister-in-laws home on Christmas Day, maybe a small gift or souvenir of the day. No pressure, I know you both have very busy lives. I hope you both don't mind me asking you in a post but really ladies, you two and my brother are my only readers!!
I may update again before Christmas. There are many things I would like to write here but I am still a bit wary of anyone I know in real life reading here, I know I am being a bit silly but jaysus if I did write what I wanted, there may be blood shed!!
Best wishes to you and yours.
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2 comments:
I love Christmas time too! Hope you have a beautiful Christmas. Yours sounds like it will be lovely.
Hi J!
Life has been crazy busy here and I havent had as much time to catch up on friends blogs as I would have liked. Thanks for the creative compliment! 3 homemade things we have made over the last few weeks make good "bring along with you" presents that the kids can be a part of the making are:
1: Clove oranges.
Get a nice juicy orange, tie a ribbon around it so it is divided into quarters with a bow on top. Get something sharp like a wooden toothpick and stick rows of holes into the orange and push a clove into each hole. In the end you get an orange that has no orange skin showing and it smells amazing. The kids love making them because it is sticky and messy and smells great. If they get bored and walk away I finish it on my knee while watching telly
2: Christmas biscuits.
Get any bikkie recipe and use a Christmas shaped cutter to stamp out tons of cookies. Bake, sprinkle with a bit of icing sugar and put on a plate on a red paper serviette.
3: Rocky road.
Get a block of chocolate, then get together a load of sweets and nuts that you like, Peanut M+Ms, Almonds, marshmallows, smarties, and a bit of dried coconut. Melt the chocolate bar and throw in everything else. Give it a stir. Pour in onto anything flat and let it set. Break lots of random chunks off and put them on a plate. We bought cheap plastic Christmas plates (bought from the pound shop) and put some clear crunchy cellophane (bought from the pound shop too!) tied in a big bow at the top. We gave these to the kids teachers as an end of term present (our kids finish up in school in Dec and start their new year at the end of Jan)
I hope that helps. Sorry it has taken me so long to reply. Off to work now at 6.30am and not a very happy bunny!
I hope you have a great Christmas. Keep up the blogging. I love how you write things as they really are!
G
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