christmas ramblings...

Sorry to all my lovely readers for leaving you alone and abandoned in the wilderness of the interweb for the past week. I have such a backlog of stuff to blog about that I'm feeling somewhat bewildered - I don't really know where to start and this post is liable to ramble along in a haphazard misshapen fashion much like a sweater that has begun to unravel in the washing machine. Where to begin?

My quest to create the ultimate Christmas has somewhat got the better of me. I had grand plans for a completely hand-made christmas but the universe seems to have other ideas. I think we must have left an umbrella up somewhere inside the house or broken a mirror without realising. Just as I was beginning to feel like life was getting back under control after all my neck issues we have been hit with a series of injuries in the household. Within the fortnight my husband has been bitten by a blue ringed octopus, had a white tail spider bite, and had to have a biopsy of a suspected skin cancer. Before anyone gets too worried, he is fine, just largely useless around the house and feeling decidedly sorry for himself. And just to make life even more interesting Turi snapped my glasses clean in two, so I am now have the choice of being blind or wearing contact lenses.

Enough whinge.

I have managed to get a fair bit of sewing done despite all the dramas (most of which I can't share yet as they are gifts). I made this little outfit for Minty to wear to an upcoming wedding. I used some of the precious liberty fabric for the skirt, and the top is a total and complete rip off of one I saw at Heavenly Creatures (I'm too poor/tight to buy the real thing- so if you like it go there and buy one because no doubt it's better than mine!!) I attached the wings down a bit too low, and because I used a press stud to attach them (they are removable for washing purposes) I can't move them. Just thinking about it makes me want to cry and give up sewing. When I realised what I had done I told my husband I had lost the will to live. He said that was surely a little dramatic… maybe, but I'm nothing if not dramatic.

We have been chugging along with the advent calendar (apart from a few slack days when frankly I couldn't face any more christmas activities with my overtired and fractious kiddlets). I won't bore you with a complete blow by blow, day by day account but instead here is a cliff notes version - the highlights and lowlights…

Lowlight

We made Christmas cards. I cut out little christmas tree shapes which Minty decorated by gluing on sequins with homemade glue. All very cute and we had grand plans of posting these to all the relies. However I left Minty with her dad for an hour and when I returned she had picked every sequin off because apparently they didn't appeal to her design aesthetic. So we were left with a batch of wrinkly discoloured paper christmas trees. Frankly I couldn't fagged starting again so we chucked them and gave up. Sorry to any of you who were expecting to receive a card from us this year. Do not wait by your mail boxes… there is no card on its way.

Highlight (kind of)

We went to San Remo for a night of Christmas fun. There was a jumping castle, face painting (we gave up on waiting as the line was too long), lucky dip, an appearance by the fat man himself and much to my delight we decorated our own gingerbread house. For $18 the local bakery provided an undecorated gingerbread house, a piping bag of icing and enough lollies to make all your Hansel and Gretel dreams come true. Everyone ate far too many lollies, there were some tears and an announcement by someone small that 'I didn't have any fun' - so I think we can clock that day as a resounding success.

In which Minty decides mince pies aren't worth all the hype...

Advent Day 8 - we eat a mince pie

In which it snows on Hannibal...

Today's advent activity was to make Christmas decorations. This wasn't a particularly well thought out plan since when I woke up at 5:30 this morning I realised I hadn't figured out anything to put in the calendar and hastily had to come up with an idea. So I thought I'd keep things ridiculously simple and just make paper chains with the kids. Which would have been fabulous except that then I realised we didn't have any paper to make paper chains with… we didn't even have a single piece of A4 printer paper left.

So I thought laterally and found an old novel that was due to go to the op shop. We ripped pages out and used these to make our chains with. Minty quickly got bored with the prescriptive method of chain making and decided to just do free 'snipping' instead. She cut out 'mountain tops', 'bees' and all sorts of other things. This left me free to cut out paper snowflakes. We spent the next two hours happily snipping away together and then, much to Minty's delight, hung the snowflakes from the ceiling of her room, as she exclaimed 'wow it's snowing!!'. You can kind of see the (short) paper chains draped over the picture frames.

In case anyone was thinking it was all sugarplums and mistletoe at our house I just thought I'd reveal that we are currently struggling with a little two-year-old violent streak. This afternoon I found a perfect imprint on 'someone's' teeth on 'someone' else's arm.

I'm off now to try and restore some semblance of order to my house… it is beginning to look as though we live in New Orleans post Katrina...

In which Minty is overcome and falls off the couch...

Amazing birthday sponge made by my mum

We're currently busy little elves putting together Christmas gifts. Sadly I won't be able to share most of our projects with you until later in the month seeing as most of the people receiving the gifts read the blog (hi peeps!), so in the mean time I'll share with you a little gift we made for my sister's birthday this week...

Minty and I put together some home made bath salts. This is a great project to do with kids seeing as they can do most of it themselves (though I really wouldn't recommend letting very small children drop in the oils or food colouring unless you want a disaster of epic proportions on your hands!).

Bath salts

1 cup epsom salts (you can buy these at some supermarkets, chemists or your local health food store)

1 cup sea salt

3 tablespoons baking soda

food colouring (we used about 5 drops)

essential oils

Mix everything together thoroughly and package.

We chose our essential oil blends especially to cater for a new mum (my sister just had a baby) but you can create one that is perfectly suited to your recipient. Just do a bit of aromatherapy googling if you need some ideas.

Goodbye baby blues bath salts - to relieve depression and enhance self-love

9 drops neroli

5 drops jasmine

3 drops rose

On the go bath salts - to energise and clear the mind

8 drops orange

6 drops neroli

4 drops peppermint

For those of you following along with the advent calendar…

On Saturday we 'sang' carols, which basically ended up as dancing wildly around the living room to christmas music, given that I was the only person who actually knew the words to any of the songs.

On Sunday we stayed up late to watch a Christmas movie on the big screen (we watched Elf), a raging success until Minty got a little too engrossed in the film and pitched forward off the couch, face planting on the floor.

And today the kids started making Christmas gifts (shh top secret!)

I'm dreaming of a candy coloured christmas...

For yesterday's advent activity we decorated the Christmas tree. This was a true exercise in the art of letting go. I am usually a completely anal retentive tree decorator, with nothing mismatching touching the tree and every decoration evenly spaced, with the best decorations in prime positions...

Minty on the other hand is a creative free spirit. She decided to concentrate 90% of the decorations in a small area at the bottom right hand side of the tree. She then decided the tree would benefit from a draping of tinsel around the lower branches and subsequently proceeded to wrap some of the branches in coloured tissue paper. At regular intervals she would stand back to admire her handiwork and then adjust things if she thought they didn't look quite right.

For the most part I have left things where she put them, though I have to admit I did remove the tissue paper (I am yet to reach a zen decorating state where these things don't bother me).

I made the felt decorations you can see in these pictures last year in an effort to make the tree child safe but this year negated the effort by using a whole heap of glass decorations as well. Frankly I'm a bit sick of our red and white decorating scheme and I'd like to do a complete tree overhaul next year. I'm dreaming of a candy coloured christmas... (similar to this). How about you?

Dear Santa, I can walk!

Turi took his first unassisted steps today! He took four little steps across the living room and I've honestly never seen anyone look so happy, or pleased with themselves in my whole life. Bless!

Today's advent activity was writing a letter to Santa and posting it. In her innocence Minty merely drew santa a picture that she thought he might like and picked him a daisy to post with it. When I asked her if she wanted to tell Santa about a toy she might like for Christmas she gave me a look that seemed to say that was the most ridiculous idea she had ever heard.

After popping it into the post box the three of us shared a paddle pop while we watched black storm clouds roll in over the horizon. I told Minty she had better get her fast legs on so we could run home before the rain set in. I set a cracking pace pushing Turi along in the stroller while Minty trotted along behind and I shouted encouragements like, 'quick the storm is nearly here!'. As the light began to fade and the thunder rumbled Minty started to weep and I realised she was completely terrified. Thankfully we made it home just as the first drops of rain began to fall but I feel fairly certain that despite trying to create a fun and positive Christmas memory for her, the one thing she took away from the day was a disproportionate fear of being caught in a thunder storm! She spent the remainder of the day sadly confiding in me that she was 'so scared mummy'.

And here are the requisite advent calendar tantrum shots from today. We are still unable to accept the concept of one window per day...

and so it begins...

Advent is finally upon us. The 'holidays' are my favourite time of year. I love the preparation - sweat shop sewing like it's 1999, baking with a rainbow of spices and dried fruit, and decking the 'halls' (read lounge) with boughs of something festive that isn't actually holly. I'm happiest listening to cheesy carols, surrounded by sparkly tinsel whilst nibbling gingerbread. I have to say though, this year I'm particularly aware of the threat of Christmas fatigue. I mean the shops seemed to get their decorations out some time in October, and it's hard to sustain a festive feeling for three months straight - even my stamina for merriment has a limit.

But you know what? I refuse to let rabid commercialism steal my Christmas spirit. The antidote is in family, tradition, intention, generosity, the handmade and watching an obscene amount of b-grade christmas telemovies. So strap yourselves in, and get ready for a series of heavily christmas themed posts.

Today of course we opened the first box of our advent calendar. Our calendar isn't particularly classy or attractive. I have plans to make a new more glam calendar next year but this year we are making do. Seeing as my children are very young (and too little to whinge about it), I'm filling each drawer with a 'christmas activity' rather than a chocolate or toy. Today's activity is a trip to the library to pick out Christmas stories (yes I am keeping it low key!!)

In case you're looking for activity ideas to fill you calendar with here are some more things that we'll be doing this year…

decorating the christmas tree

making christmas cards

baking cookies and other christmas treats

writing letters to santa

visiting santa

singing christmas carols

staying up to watch a christmas movie on the big screen

taking a drive to look at Christmas lights

choosing a toy for a needy child

making decorations

making christmas gifts

I'll elaborate more on our advent activities as the weeks progress.

Needless to say, so far the calendar has not run smoothly. There was a small riot when I explained that we only get to open one drawer per day...

In other non-christmas related matters - we had a little family birthday party for Turi on the weekend. Sadly there was some kind of glitch with my flash card and most of my photos came out looking like pop-art. I'm hoping to get some photos from some of the other cameras at the party at some stage and will share some more party details then.

Also happy birthday to my big sister Jen who is officially old today… 30!