A major Landmark

One major landmark on the way to Christmas is Easter.  More about Easter preparations in a future post, but for now here are a few pictures of our Easter celebration preparations ...

This is the Easter door wreath I made for the porch to welcome people to our family celebration.  The basis is a wicker wreath I bought and then stripped down and re-assembled adding some extra items.  More on this in the future.

Generation after generation make these chocolate crispy cakes.  This year my niece made milk and white chocolate ones.

My younger nephew's contribution was the Easter cake.

Mixing the Seasons

Spring flowers are everywhere now; in gardens, by paths & roadsides and in the shops.  This makes it a bit difficult to be thinking of Christmas, but the planning goes on!

Every year, just before Christmas, my family gathers together for what we call The Sleigh Run.  It is the day when we meet to exchange the bags of presents we will be opening on Christmas Day. And, because our informal family motto is "where two or three are gathered together, there shall be a celebration", we have a special meal with fun, games and small table presents.  Come Christmas Day itself, we will be celebrating in a number of different homes, but this is the day we celebrate Christmas together.

Our festivities include some sort of activity or game to reflect our chosen theme and my mother has just proposed the one for this year.  Based on the traditional village hall beetle drive this will be a Christmas Pudding drive, with a race to add dish, pudding, custard, holly leaves, holly berries and currants.  She even had a sketch to show me - and bearing in mind that she has lost a lot of her sight, that was no mean feat! So her sketch and notes are in the file and another item has been ticked off the Master List, a highly satisfying feeling.

Deviation from Plan

I had planned to visit my first craft fair of 2014 last weekend but a minor family crisis, in the form of a gas leak at my mother's house, rather got in the way.  As a result I didn't make it to The Creative Craft Show, where I had been expecting to shop for some textile craft bits and pieces as well as look for inspiration and (no doubt) make a few spur of the moment purchases.

However, we did get some cupboards sorted out as a result of the upheaval in the kitchen. If they can only stay that way it will make all special occasion meals, and not just the Christmas ones, so much easier!

In the meantime I have been continuing to work on various Christmas Pudding designs and have nearly completed a blackwork one.

A Final Goodbye to Christmas 2013

Last night I finally put away my crib scene, which means that the last vestige of Christmas 2013 has now gone back in its box.  My justification for keeping it out until now is that in time gone by the Christmas season was held to last for 40 days and to end with Candlemas Day, the 2nd of February.  Although I have an all-in-one wooden crib scene today, I used to have a cheap plastic set of individual figures.  I would set it out in stages and the Kings were on the opposite side of the room from the manger until they "arrived" on 6th January, so putting it all away immediately seemed a bit rough on those Kings!

Looking forward to Christmas 2014 I have been shopping again, to the final days of the sales.  Supplies for Christmas puddings in various formats ...

I am also gathering together patterns and images for the various things I plan to make and I'm drawing up and charting my own designs.

Another of my February tasks is to be on the look out for good photo opportunities.  In previous years that has included taking snow photographs that I have used in cards.  Today's sun prompted me to take some of the rather beautiful berry-laden holly tree:

Starting the Countdown

It may be the end of January but this first post on the countdown to Christmas has to go back a few weeks.

In very early January, or possibly late December, we think about the theme for the next Christmas.  This means that I can search the post-Christmas sales for anything appropriate that fits the theme (along with any other things to be put aside for next year).  This Christmas the theme was snowflakes.  The hall was decorated with snowflakes cut from card and fabric, and many of the cards I made using various techniques had snowflakes in the design.

These snowflakes were cut on a Cricut machine, using a cartridge I'd purchased over the previous Christmas holidays. We had them suspended on cotton thread from fishing line that criss-crossed the hall.

Next year, well this year really, the theme is going to be Christmas Puddings.  I've already bought the paper napkins for use at the pre-Christmas family dinner - in the sale, of course! I have also sorted out various craft items that fit this theme (stamps, card blanks, relevant coloured card and patterns from magazines) and they are now in the box I use for the themed items.  I'll add to it as the year goes on and I find more things I'll need.

Also in early January comes Twelfth Night when, by tradition, all decorations are taken down.  The key for me at this point is making sure I know where everything goes away in order to avoid panic come December and this is especially important where various items have been lent to other family members for the season.  In practice, and by tradition, decorations may be left up a bit longer in my family. This is because my mother's birthday comes a few days after Twelfth Night and the decorations were always left for her party when she was a child.

I have also looked through all the Christmas cards I, and my mother, received this year.  Some of them will inspire those I make for Christmas 2014 and others I will use as templates.

During the winter months I find that I don't mind working on things for Christmas, but I know that as spring and Easter approaches I will lose the enthusiasm for it until well into the autumn.  For that reason I try to get a bit ahead now, while I'm in the mood.  My mother's disability means that I now take the lead in preparing the decoration for her house as well as mine, and I make most of her Christmas cards in addition to making almost all of my own.

Right, back to stamping Christmas puddings and colouring them for gift tags ...