'When I grow up' my tree has to look like a red & gold version of this. It looks like one out of Whoville (The Grinch)! 

Image from Trendy Tree

Big Happy Tears & Giggles

This is so funny and it managed to bring tears to my eyes - big happy Christmas tears.

The crew of the Royal Navy assault ship HMS Ocean sing to Mariah Carey's 1994 hit All I Want For Christmas Is You.

Utterly heart warming.

Jingle Baubles

Much the way that everybody thinks that their Mum’s spaghetti bolognaises is the best in the world, my tree is one of the best I’ve ever seen. I know I'm biased, but there is no other like it, totally one of a kind! No two baubles are the same and each individual bauble is epic. Most of them have come from the states since my grandparents used to go every year and bring back something beautiful, sometimes they symbolise something (for example the millennium bauble) or came from a special friend. If you look closely you can see the one my sister and I brought back from Disneyland Paris.  Anyway that’s enough bragging; I’m just so excited to get home and decorate the tree for Christmas 2011! My wee step brothers are helping too this year which makes it even better.

Have a lovely weekend everyone, hope you aren’t quite as cold as we are in Edinburgh!

Red baubles - http://fromme-toyou.tumblr.com/post/2133229599/martha-stewart-for-the-holidays, Noel Paper baubles from fleamarketstylemag.blogspot.com, buttons baubles from bonkersaboutbuttons1.blogspot.com, red baubles with stars on the surface - From publicdomainpictures.net, glittle gold baubles - From google.com, candy kane striped bauble - From hiphostess.blogspot.com

Let Them Eat (Christmas) Cake

It is officially my favourite time of year and (if we set aside the ever building family drama and the fact that I have no money for presents) all is well with the world. Very soon I will be driving home for Christmas with my wonderful man/partner/boyf/boy (I'm still deciding on what he should be referred to - ‘Partner’ drives him mad, so obviously it’s more tempting to use.)  It’s actually embarrassing how long I was looking forward to being able to do Christmas blog posts, but now the time has arrived I feel totally unprepared and as usual, I have little to no time to actually write anything!

Anyway, enough moaning about 4^th year. Christmas is coming! And what does that mean? It means advent calandars, Christmas songs, trees, baubles, tinsel, stockings (all of which my super star mum is waiting for my sister and I’s return to put up – bless her!), actually seeing my family and friends, snow in Yorkshire, and the food. Oh the food. So much food. 

 So. Much. Food.

I’ll start there then, specifically, Christmas cake. You can tell all I’ve eaten today is crisps. We’ve seen some absolute beauties in my house over the years from the Grandma’s, my Auntie and my Mum. One that really sticks out for me was my Mum’s creation. A standard white round Christmas cake, but on top were the cutest little clusters of marzipan presents you’ve ever seen. All of them were red and green with bows in alternate colours. I can’t imagine how much time it took making ribbon for all those little presents. And I can’t imagine the inner horror when my cousin Ben ate half the presents off the cake before anyone else even got to see it! True story, and it reminds me of one of my all-time favourite posts at Hyperbole and a Half which I seriously suggest you have a look at for a giggle.

So here’s to cake and to Christmas. If you are a regular you can expect a few more holiday posts over the next few weeks, I’ve got oodles of love for baubles which should make an appearance.

 

Red gingerbread man cake - From cakecentral.com, Xmas cake with holly and red ribbon - From google.ie, Ruffle white with trees - From iammommy.typepad.com, Big bow and robins xmas cake - http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/, Christmas tree cake - From familyfun.go.com, Snowman cake pops - From grinandbakeit.com