Advent Activities

Day two and I'm very pleased to say S was feeling fine once again and back at school. I work until 6.30pm on a Tuesday and so for Day 2 we needed something which was quick and fun to do.
The pack of Christmas snap cards we have had since T was small proved ideal. We had a couple of games with S and then a game of pairs. S was amazing at this game when she was little and would regularly beat me without me trying to lose!

We then spent a very hectic half an hour playing racing games with these mini cars. 

Two simple ideas but such good fun.

Today was card writing day. From previous years I have learned to do this earlier rather than later with S. She has already received 4 cards from friends at school and I knew she would be keen to start writing hers.

Mince pies and nibbles were set on the table, to help keep the energy levels up during this strenuous task don't you know.

A girl after my own heart, before S began writing in the cards she wrote out a list.

I love a list. I seem to have several on the go myself just now, as I'm sure most others do too.

I made a start on my cards but still have a fair few to go. The ones I wrote this evening have been stashed in my new bag where they will be kept until all are complete and ready for the off.

I just couldn't resist the little robin stamp motif.

Let The Countdown Begin

G and I had a child free day out in Chichester on Saturday as both T and S were staying over with friends . G is always looking to add to his vinyl collection and had been recommended a couple of record shops to try which came up trumps for him.

There was one shop which I wanted to go in, good old CK of course. And something was purchased there too, but it has been spirited away and I'll get to see it again Christmas day.

Keeping me going until then is a stack of 24 presents from my sister T, one to open each day in the advent countdown.
One evening at my sisters way back in January we each put our names into a pot. My sister T drew out my name, I drew out C's and C therefore had T's. We decided we would buy 18 small gifts and 6 others which could be food or drink based.
We also bought a further 8 gifts each for mum so she would have a set of advent gifts too, but we didn't tell her about it. 
We all went to see mum yesterday afternoon and surprised her with her basket of goodies and swapped our gifts too which we had put into pillowcases. We chose pillowcases as when we were little this is what we used to put at the end of our bed on Christmas eve.

This is what C opened this morning. I just love how cute he looks! My first present was a mini chocolate Father Christmas.

These are three of my favourite things from the rest of her haul which she'll be opening over the next couple of weeks.

Last year S and I kept busy from 1st December until Christmas with our advent countdown. I've prepared another for this year and today was 'put up the tree'. It wasn't going to be but S was sick during the night and so didn't go to school today. Decorating the tree this afternoon was just the ticket for cheering up a poorly girl. Thankfully she is fine again now so fingers crossed it's back to school tomorrow.

I Have Been.......

......Wishing I could have forced myself through the little gap in the back of this snowman so I could have had my photo taken. Probably best I didn't as I wouldn't have looked even half as cute as Little Miss S.

...... On a shopping trip to IKEA with my sister. Wisely we timed our arrival nice and early so we could have a cuppa and a bacon roll before we mooched around the store. Very little was purchased but I was extremely pleased to find a new doormat. Not the most exciting purchase for the home but we had had our previous one for 17 years, it was from PastTimes and had been a wedding present from G's brother. The pattern of three potted geraniums had all but disappeared and I have been on the lookout for a replacement for most of the year. I love the pattern on this one.

......Admiring S's handiwork on her latest Sylvanian t-shirt. Once she had coloured in the little critters she asked if she could draw a heart round them and write on it. Do with it as you please I answered, it's your creation to design and wear. When she had drawn round them she decided it was more of a Christmas bauble shape. I also like the addition of the words Happy Family.

...... Cooking some new meals from a cookbook given to me by my sister which she no longer wanted. So far I have cooked webbed cheese pasta, mozzarella rosemary chicken thighs and the latest one is ginger chicken. I'm glad to say all were well received.

...... Wearing my new, to me, boots. I have written before about my traffic wardenesque legs and to find a practically brand new pair of boots in a charity shop at the weekend which I could get the zip up on and still feel comfortable was a delight. They were only £3.99  and what made it even lovelier still was when G said he would buy them for me. What a lucky girl.

......Busy on the jigsaw front again. We found this a couple of weeks ago and managed to complete the border fairly easily and then it languished for a week or so before we found the time to go back to it. This was a treat to do, interesting to look at all the names which have disappeared along with the ones still around on our supermarket shelves today.

A Very Cherry Christmas

This is the first of a couple of gift ideas I wanted to share with you as you know I like a bit of a theme when it comes to gift giving.

This may be too early a post for some who refuse to start thinking about Christmas until the beginning of December but equally it may help prompt some ideas for others.

As the title of the post suggests it's all items are cherry based.

All of these gifts will be individually wrapped and placed in a gift bag or box for the friend they are intended for and the label will wish her

A Very Cherry Christmas. 

I also plan to sketch of a pair of cherries on the tag and make them nice and sparkly with a healthy dose of green and red glitter.

First item is Carmex Cherry lip balm. Mine came from Superdrug.

Also from Superdrug is a bottle of Cherry and Almond bath creme and a tub of cherry and macademia body butter.

Cherry and strawberry patterned socks from Store 21. The present would work equally as well with all of these items in a strawberry 'flavour' and the gift labelled as A Very Berry Christmas should cherries not float your boat.

Cherry and Vanilla Yankee candle from Tesco.

A small bottle of tangy cherry hand gel from Primark. The friend this gift was bought for is never without a bottle of hand gel in her handbag so this isn't as strange an item to include as you may think!

She is a cider drinker so a bottle of cherry cider will be welcome. Mine was bought from Sainsburys.

Lastly a bag of jelly cherry sweets purchased from Wilkinsons.

Maybe a few of these items popped into a gift bag with the addition of a pretty glittery cherry label could make a good Secret Santa gift too, just a thought.

All the trees are brown

apart from the green fabric ones.

Who doesn't love a helter skelter?
We spotted this in Salisbury on Saturday as we made our way to our lunch date.
It's my mother-in-law's birthday today and we all met up in Salisbury for lunch. 
And very nice it was too.

I Have .......

.......... finished this month's book club selection in record time ahead of our next meet up. I found the storyline of Tideline quite disturbing and it made for a very uncomfortable read which is why I wanted to get it read and out the way. 

Saying that it was a good book and I'm sure will provoke much chatter for our group.

........... been in love with Marilyn Monroe since I was a young teenager and have watched many of her films and read stacks of books about her life and untimely death. Earlier this year G and I watched My Week with Marilyn and I have just started to read the book the movie was based on, a birthday gift back in July from G.

.......... received a parcel in the post this week from a fellow blogger. I bought a beautiful crocheted poppy from Mitzi who has been busily working away and raised a fantastic amount of money for the Royal British Legion.

.......... watched something I originally recorded from the TV in September 2013. Quite why it took us so long to watch The Wipers Times I'm not sure. If you didn't see it and it gets repeated then try and watch it, you won't be disappointed. An added bonus for me is that one of the leading actors was Julian Rhind-Tutt, swoon.

.......... been enjoying wearing my new (to me) red shoes. A local church held an autumn fayre a couple of weekends ago and I paid £2.00 for these. I have since found something very similar on line for £45.00 so I'm pleased with that bargain.

 And they are very comfy.

.......... picked up the latest free magazine from the Co-op and decided we need to try the chocolate mince pies. I'm not a huge fan of mince pies but surely with the addition of chocolate these have got to be a winner?

Activites

As well as being preoccupied with leaving one job and starting another and all the other things which were happening which kept me away from blogging we were busy doing some fun things too.

One Sunday me, G and S went for a little explore in a copse we have driven past umpteen times but never investigated.

We were delighted to find an oversized chair

and table. G is 6ft 5'' so that should give some idea of how big these two items of furniture are.

When I was little this whole area was trees and fields but has since been built on with a relatively new housing estate, it must be handy if you live there now having this copse on your doorstep. A green space to go and stretch your legs in and do a spot of squirrel spotting, we saw loads of them scampering around.

This is just one of the jigsaws we've completed recently. On the days when getting outside isn't an option a jigsaw is a good indoor activity.

Not an activity but an event from September, my nephew's 21st birthday. 
What to buy was a mystery. 
Pinterest provided the solution.
I bought a black umbrella from the local 99p shop and packaged up £1 and £2 coins totalling £21 in pieces of paper and attached them to the umbrella with lengths of cotton. I then wrote on a tag Save for a Rainy Day. 
He was a bit bemused when I gave him his gift but pretty pleased with it once the penny dropped.

S and I have been to our first ballet performance, we went to see Coppelia.
It was billed as the ideal family introduction to ballet and it was indeed perfect. The ballet is in three acts and during each intermission we discussed what had been happening in the story. It took a lot of concentrating for S and I think her attention would have wandered with anything more in depth. The costumes were beautiful and the grace and elegance, not to mention strength, of the dancers made it a spectacular experience.
We had booked the tickets months ago and originally we planned it would be me, G and S who would be going. 
G didn't join us in the end because he took T to Norwich instead.
The end of October is his brother L's birthday.
T, G, L's adopted mum and T's birth siblings met up at the crematorium as they wanted to take L some flowers. T had been wrought with anxiety about the visit for a couple of weeks beforehand but G described the day as being filled with a few tears and lots of laughter as everyone supported each other.

Last week being half term meant it was time for our annual trip to the country park for their Halloween trail. T didn't join us this year as he has been volunteering in a charity shop on a Sunday afternoon for the past few weeks and he offered to do extra shifts whilst he was off. S bought a friend along with her and neither of them liked the huge spider hiding in one of the trees!