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Christmas

Christmas

Christmas Movies

Hot chocolate, a warm snuggly cardigan, fur lined slipper boots and a Christmas movie on the tv. These are my must have have items when settling down to wrap Christmas presents on a chilly November morning.

I must admit to being something of a Christmas movie addict and one day I plan to have every Christmas movie I’ve ever seen, on DVD. (I’ll be listening for Ant’s groan as he reads this!!)
For now I take my pick of Christmas movies that we have stored on the server or ones I’ve recorded on TiVo recently. Over the last couple of years I used the Virgin + to record every Christmas movie I could find then recorded them onto DVD and then onto the server.

I went through a phase about 3 winters ago, of waking up between 4-5am and not  being able to get back to sleep. I’d come downstairs, make a cup of hot chocolate and snuggle under the throw over on the sofa and watch a Christmas movie. Although I have no wish to be up at silly o’clock in the morning now, I must say I really enjoyed that quiet time before everyone woke up and the hustle and bustle of the morning routine began.

This morning, while waiting for some Christmas presents to be delivered, I watched The Christmas Gift starring John Denver.

I was sure I’d already seen it but I was very surprised to find it I hadn’t….Ant would probably say, once you’ve seen one Christmas movie, you’ve seen them all!

This basic story line of The Christmas Gift is….
man gets sent to town by big nasty development company
mans ends up liking town and falling love with pretty woman
woman gets angry because man lied
man + townspeople come together to win over the big developer
man and woman make up
everyone except big nasty developer lives happily ever after!

I enjoyed my relaxing morning and I’m off to check out the tv guide now to see what Christmas movies are on tomorrow 🙂

Christmas

KayCee & Ella – Christmas cards

The piles of goodies are growing, the wish lists are getting longer and the excitement is building. Anyone would think Christmas is the on the way!

The girls wanted to make a start on writing their Christmas cards last night and I knew it would keep them quiet amused for ages so I happily agreed!

KayCee made a list and they both sat on the floor working their way through it.
Ella just wrote her name in her cards, put them in the envelopes and put a Christmas sticker on the back of each one. KayCee wrote on the front of the envelopes and added them to the pile.
They worked really well together.

When they got in from school tonight, the first thing they asked, after they’d got changed, was whether they could write more of their cards.
We have a huge family and they have loads of school friends so I can see this activity taking the next few nights!

We have a few more Christmas activities in the pipeline when they’ve finished their Christmas cards.
We have to make the Christmas cake, some salt dough tree ornaments and we’re going to have a go at making some cake pops. We’ve never made them before and we need to practice before we take some to my mum’s on Boxing Day. We go for a buffet tea every year so I can see all my family 🙂

You can be sure I’ll be back with photos from each activity!

Christmas

Countdown to Christmas

Time to start a Christmas card list and as usual, mine is on a page in my Excel spreadsheet.
However, no matter how hard I try, I always forget to post the cards to family and friends who I won’t be seeing over Christmas. I end up relying on other family and friends to pass them on if they happen to see them!

So this year, I’m stocking up on stamps, I’m phoning my mum to get everyone’s address and I’m getting all my cards made, written and ready to go by the beginning of December 🙂

I bought a Forever Friends card making kit from Argos for £19.99. Obviously, it’s not as cheap as buying cards and to be honest, I do have loads of packs of cards in the Christmas stash in the loft but I really wanted to send nice, handmade cards this year 🙂

If you have any posts with handmade Christmas card designs on, I’d love to see them….I need some inspiration!

Check out 101 Days till Christmas for daily tips on how to get organized for Christmas.

I’m going to be joining in ‘Festive Friday’ with the lovely Chris at Thinly Spread. Click the picture if you want to check out everyone’s Christmassey posts and/or add your own 🙂

Christmas

68 Days to Christmas

Blimey….68 days already? (Well, nearly 67 now because I started this post this morning and haven’t been able to get it finished till just now…which is bedtime for me!)
Feels like I only did my ‘100 days to Christmas’ post a few days ago!

I haven’t been doing a post every day but I have been checking the daily tips and using them to help organise our celebrations this year.
I’ve bought some gifts, a big tin of Cadbury’s Roses and one of Mars Celebrations, some Shloer that was on a buy one get one free offer and some cheese footballs. Ant loves cheese footballs and every time I order them from Tesco or Asda in December, they’ve always sold out. When I saw them on offer in Tesco I snapped them up!
I got the kid’s advent calendars and some Santa and snowmen serving bowls.
I’m getting excited with each new purchase!

Today, the tip is to make a start on Autumn deep cleaning.
I did this last year, splitting each section to do on a different day so I didn’t feel overwhelmed.
It really helped to make a list and to tick off each job when it was done.

Click to find out more about Autumn deep cleaning

Christmas

Britmums personal prompt – Best day with family

I love the personal prompt this week, I mean, who doesn’t love writing about great times they’ve had with their family?
The first one that comes to mind, is one that I wrote about when I linked up to Magic Moments last month. The next day I can think of is Christmas. Not any one particular Christmas, just Christmas in general! To say I love Christmas would be an understatement and it’s a day that centres around family so is perfect for this prompt 🙂

On Christmas Eve, they each open one Christmas present which always contains new pajamas! (Aiden was at his Dad’s for Christmas last year, which is why he isn’t in the photo)

They sprinkle reindeer food (made from oats and glitter) on the garden to make sure the reindeer can see our house from the air then they come back inside to pour a drink of Baileys and put out a mince pie for Santa and some carrots for the reindeer.
They have a drink of hot chocolate with marshmallows and squirty cream before we go upstairs to read ‘The night before Christmas’.
They put their stockings on the bedroom door handle then stay awake as long as possible, hoping that they’ll see Santa go straight to sleep!

Christmas morning and most parents would now be telling you how ridiculously early their little darlings woke them up but our little darlings haven’t woken us yet on Christmas day! Ant or I have been the ones to wake up between 6-7am and we have to wake the kids because we’re I’m too excited to wait for them to wake on their own!

I love seeing the excitement on their faces as they come through the door and see their presents.

 

 

The girls always have a new party dress in December which they wear to Nanny and Jack’s Christmas party then again on Christmas day.

Daddy spends the morning opening packaging, inserting batteries and putting things together while I get dinner sorted.
I enjoy the whole process of getting Christmas dinner ready, from dressing the table to pouring the Shloer.
We sit together for our meals nearly every day but there’s something special about Christmas dinner.

After dinner, more playing and more food preparation!
We have Ant’s dad and children (well the ones who live close and haven’t already got plans) round for a buffet tea and they stay for a while, usually until the kids go to bed then Ant and I relax together for the rest of the evening.

The day usually goes too fast for me but I always go to bed happy and content that the children have had a magical day.

I’m now very excited about Christmas and can’t wait for it to get here!

So that’s one of the best days I spend with my family…..what’s your best day?

82 Days to Christmas

 I’ve been poorly for nearly a week and haven’t had the energy to do my countdown to Christmas posts for a few days.

I’m slowly getting better so I thought I’d get up to date with the tips on 101 Days to Christmas.

Today’s tip is to clear all the clutter from surfaces to help get ready for the decorating. Halloween isn’t far away although we won’t be decorating for it this year as we’ll only just be coming back from our half term holiday at Butlin’s.
My mum’s coming to house sit though so I want it to be as clean and as clutter free as possible for her when she gets here so I’ll be working on clearing it all as soon as I can breath properly again.

In other Christmas preparation news….I bought our Roses and Celebrations today for the treat trolley. They were on offer at Tesco so now all we have to do is resist the urge to open them before December!
I’m going to stock up on more treats each week with my grocery delivery so I can spread the cost.

I got that familiar feeling of excitement the other day when I heard a Christmas song on a TV show I was watching. I love that feeling, it transports me back to my childhood and the well of excitement you feel in your stomach as Christmas gets closer 🙂

It truly is ‘The most wonderful time of the year’, for me at least. Others may not agree!

Christmas

89 Days to Christmas

It’s time to start looking for stocking fillers now while they’re still relatively cheap.
I’ve ordered some Lindt chocolate reindeers today from Tesco as part of my grocery delivery because they’re on offer for 50p each.
Tesco have quite a few Christmas chocolates and goodies on offer already so it’s worth stocking up and saving money 🙂

 

Christmas

90 Days to Christmas

I’ve decided to make some of my Christmas gifts so today’s tip is for me.
I need to decide on the final gift ideas and work towards purchasing all the parts needed.
I’ve been scouring the web and nothing has jumped out at me yet so if you know of some great craft sites, please feel free to share!

Do you make your own gifts to give out at Christmas? Do you find it more satisfying knowing you’ve taken time and effort over your gifts rather than picking something from a shop just so you have something to give?

I’ve always liked the idea of giving homemade gifts but every time we’ve tried, they’ve never looked as nice as they do in the photos on the site!
Hopefully, this year, we’ll find something that looks stunning, doesn’t cost the earth and is fun to make!

Christmas

92 Days to Christmas

Oooh today’s tip sounds good…..go shopping! :o)
I then read further…..go shopping…at home. Not so much fun I first thought,
but then thinking about it in more detail, I’m going to enjoy making lists of everything I’ve got so far, matching person to present that’s already bought and listing what supplies I’m going to need when I go ‘proper’ shopping!
Only problem I foresee is that most of my supplies are in the loft and I have to get Ant to fetch things down for me. He’ll be reading this so he’ll now know that a trip to loft is imminent!
Sorry darling….and I do mean that before you ask! xx
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