christmas sweets

The annual 'get together and make the christmas sweets' event has been and gone for 2011. Four generations of women got together last friday and cooked/rolled our way through approx 8 batches of rumballs, 4 batches of gingernut balls, 2 trays of rocky road, and 2 trays of spiders (recipes are written out below - after the photo's in this blog post)..

My daughter, myself, my mother, my Nana and my mother in law spent the day together preparing for another festive season and enjoying one another's company. Lola is still a bit young to be of much help (even getting her to roll the rumballs in the coconut was a bit of a challenge), but maybe by next year she'll be a lot happier to join in.  However she did enjoy putting up Nana's christmas tree after the baking was done.  Andrew was there too of course, but he was happy crawling around and eating sultanas off the floor - so I didn't count him as one of the 'helpers'.

It really was a fun day, and I am so lucky to have such wonderful mothers in my life.

Nana Brown's rum balls

8 weetbix
1 cup mixed fruit
1 cup coconut
2 tablespoons of cocoa
1 tin of condensed milk
2 tablespoons of rum

Mix together, roll into small balls, roll in more coconut.

Gingernut balls

90g butter
2 tablespoons golden syrup
1/2 cup condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
250g packet of gingernut biscuits
1 cup sultanas
1 cup coconut

Melt butter in saucepan.
Add golden styrup and condensed milk.
Stir in vanilla, crushed up biscuits and sultanas over medium heat until well combined.
Cool to room temperature
Roll into small balls and toss in coconut.

Is it too late for a Christmas post?

I realise it's 5 days into the new year already, but I really wanted to do a post about my Christmas sewing project (that I finished on the night before the 1st December). I embarked on a mass-production challenge (as I tend to do) evidenced here and here. I decided that I'd like to give handmade Advent Calendars to some of my nearest and dearest friends.

The biggest challenge was deciding how to get the numbers 1 through 24 onto the fabric. In the end I went with hand sewing, and spent a crazy week hand stitching in the backyard, in the car (passenger seat only of course) and in the company of any poor soul who came to visit during that time (and yes - I did provide visitors with a spare needle and thread and their help was very much appreciated).

I (and my helpers) stitched up 6 sets of numbers, as I had intended to make 6 calendars. In the end though, I only made 3 (time was not on my side, and I will make up the remaining 3 some other time). One went to my favourite little Australian in Canada. Another went to a friend here in Brisbane. The other was for us.  All 3 were different (yes, photographing them before giving them away would have been a good idea - no, I didn't do that).  The only photographs I have are of the 'bunting' style one that I made for us.

We only put stickers in the pockets this year (Lola is too young for some of the great 'activity' ideas I found online, and we thought she'd be eating enough chocolate over the festive period).

But Simon has an idea of how to use the calendar better next year, and it will also tackle the problem of the kids having too many things to open on Christmas morning and losing interest in the process half way through (not a bad problem to have I realise).  We're going to use the calendar as a treasure hunt clue giver, and spread out most of the little Christmas presents over the month of December.  Well, that's the plan anyway. We've got plenty of time to work out the details. 360 days to be exact!

A little bit quiet..

Things have been a little bit quiet on the blog front and in our household lately. I'm starting to feel the true meaning of the term 'heavily' pregnant, and with only 6 weeks to go - it's starting to feel very real all of a sudden.

There has been a lot of transitioning going on for our little 2 year old lately as well. She's out of nappies and doing really well on the potty (not quite happy about using the 'big' toilet yet :)) and she's also started to sleep in her own room, in a big girls bed. Getting her out of our bed was something we felt we needed to do if we wanted to co-sleep with the new baby, and I think the change has been harder on us than her! She doesn't even want to come into our bed through the night anymore - but instead she wants Mummy to come sleep in her bed :) It's early days still though, and we're all learning together.

So there hasn't been a lot of sewing of late - but there has been some gift making and ideas going around..

Here's a dress from Heather Ross's "Weekend Sewing" book that I made sometime ago but has only just started to fit 'twirly' Lola..

And here's what the kids in my Mums group will be getting for Christmas:

Image from The Happy Home blog

I loved this blog post from Belinda last week - and went out to Spotlight yesterday to get my shapes to stick the magnets to. I'm going to let Lola loose with the paints on these. I think they'll be gorgeous little gifts.

Christmas eve sewing...

I woke up on the morning of Christmas eve wondering what Lola would wear for Christmas this year (it's a good sign that there's not more worrying things on my mind isn't it?). And because she had 2 christmas days to attend, I wanted something special that she could wear to both without being the same outfit. Brilliant idea - the reversible pinafore!!

So early afternoon, I made the dash to our closest fabric store to find some fabric that was Christmassy-without being 'Christmassy' (if that makes sense). I very happily found some green fabric with Ho Ho Ho print, and then a gorgeous red and white floral fabric.

That afternoon I washed and dried the fabric, ironed it - then sat down to start sewing around 9.30pm. I made a makeshift sewing table in the lounge room so I could watch the Christmas eve carols, and I had to sew super slowly so my makeshift table (aka ironing board) didn't wobble too much :)

I had a lovely time sewing and ironing, then sewing and ironing, then choosing buttons (hardest part?!) then sewing and ironing some more - all while my little family slept in the next room (yes, I've finally decided that ironing while sewing does make a huge difference to the end result).

By 12.30 on Christmas morning - the outfit was done (complete with a modified Bonds denim skirt which I sewed a row of broderie anglaise to make it christmassy).

Here's the little Christmas angel in her cousin Mikayla's bedroom on Christmas day number 1:


And here she is being 'centre of the universe' on Christmas day number 2



We had a lovely extended Christmas with our family, and we're looking forward to 2010. We hope to slow down in the new year, finish renovating and enjoy our little family and home.