Christmas pomanders

Orange and clove pomanders are a typical Christmas smell in our house. They can stay fragrant for months and are a delightful addition to your decorations.

Collect:-
Powdered cinnamon 100g
Powdered cloves 50g
Powdered all spice 15g
orris root powder 25g
large plastic or pottery bowl
Thin knitting needle
unblemished oranges with thin skins
100 g of cloves
cling film

1. Add all the spices together and mix with the orris root in the bowl.
2. Pierce a line of holes around half an orange and push the cloves in the holes. Repeat until the whole orange is covered. Keep close together but leave room for shrinkage.
3.Place the orange in the bowl with the spices tossing gently so that teh whole surface comes into contact with the spices. Covere the bowl tightly with cling film
4. Turn the oranges daily for one month . Then remove from the spices and use.

You can wrap them in muslin and two or three layers of gold and silver net tie with a ribbon and hang on the tree to scent the room . Or pack into boxes decorated with festive paper and give as scented gifts to others. At the top is a picture of the process just begun so you can see how to do it .

If you want to keep the children happy they can make these really easily BUT watch small fingers with sharp knitting needles- better for the older children this one! You can get loads of ideas for keeping them happy by making things follow this link:-

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Christmas decorations with pine cones

Scented cones piled high in a bowl makes a wonderful feature in your room . YOu can make gifts of them by lining a box with felt and filling it with the cones (collected free from the forest)

Method

collect:-
Pine cones
Large china mixing bowl
20 drops of pine or cedarwood oil
cling film
gift packaging ( optional)

1 Place the cones in the mixing bowl
2. Add the pine or cedarwood turning the cones as you do so to coat each one with the oil.
3. Cover tightly with clingfilm
4. Leave for one week
5 Place in a decoarative container

The oil will gradually evaporate into the room scenting the air as it does. Once it fades, simply repeat the process.

Our local garden centre is selling small bags of scented cones tied in muslin with pretty ribbon for £9.95 ! Think what you could do to present this on a market stall for little cost and maximum profit!

Christmas decorations

How many houses in your area decorate the whole of the outside for Christmas ? There are many in Norfolk where I live that really go overboard and the electricity bills must be enormous!
I would be interested to know what happens in other countries. One house locally collects for charity at the gate so I suppose it is a worthwhile cause . What are your views? I am doing a small survey on this to write a report for our local paper so would really welcome your comments and any pictures you may have.

Christmas spirit?

Have you yet collected any bits and pieces? Are you following my tips and recipes ?
Or are you already fed up with all the Christmas Hype in the shops? I generally feel very depressed with the long dark days and nights so try to cheer up with cooking and making decorations.

My family will not be having a very good time this year as my youngest has been left penniles with a small baby. The dad went off having emptied the joint bank account so we are all pulling together to try and help her.

I am hoping to purchase some toys on line at reasonable prices . DVDS and other electronic games and books and so on are always good for friends and relatives and if you click on the Amazon link at the side of this blog you will find some of these very cheaply.

Thats my tip for tonight - see you tomorrow!

Christmas cake

Ever made a BOILED christmas cake? Here is the recipe:-

500g mixed fruit , small tub of glace cherries, 250g sugar, 90g butter, 250ml water,280g flour, 2 tsp bicarbonate or saod, pinch salt, 1 egg - beaten, 4 tbsp BRANDY!

1. Heat oven to 150c
2 Boil all the fruit, sugar, butter and water together for about 10 minutes
3. Leave to cool
4. Stir in all the dry ingredients
5. POur in the egg and brandy all mixed up.
6. Line an 8 inch tin with two layers of greaseproof paper. Grease well and put the mixture in!
7 Bake for 1 1/2 hours. Test the centre of cake with a skewer . If ready the skewer will come out clean. Turn off oven and leave cake in it for a while to prevent sinking . Remove from oven
8. All to cool completely before taking out of the tin.
9. Sprinkle with brandy and seal with clingfilm. Allow to mature for at least two weeks . Sprinkle brandy once a month to keep moist!

EASY!

If you want LOADS of new ideas copy and paste this link into your browser:- YOu can download hundreds of recipes of your choice:

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Christmas table decoration 1

I hope you have been collecting all your bits and pieces for the first of many decorations. This one is really easy . Have you got any small fir cones wire and ribbon?

First , purchase a piece of oasis foam in the shape of a cone. Or buy a block and cut it into a cone shape so that it fits a small terracotta pot.

Items required:-
Florists wire
Small terracotta pot
pine cones
ribbon
spray paint - any colour you like but gold would be good at Christmas.
Lump of plasticine or florists clay
Florists holder. This is a plastic gadget you push into the plasticine and then place the foam cone on top!Costs about 15p

Method
Place the plasticine in the bottom of the pot
Place the plastic holder on top- push it hard in so the prongs are upwards.
Place the dry oasis cone on top of this. (Make sure your cone fits the diameter of the pot!)
Begin by wiring each small pine cone around the base leaving wire "legs" sticking out to stick into the cone shape , largest at the bottom and small at the top until you get a true cone tree effect and the oasis is completely covered.

Make small bows and put a piece of florists wire around leaving a "leg"of wire to push into the foam. Make sure all the foam is covered.Any gaps push in a wired bow.

You can spray the cone tree with paint or snow before you push the small bows in .

Tie a large bow around the pot - voila - a small or large table decoration depending on your pot size. YOu can even paint the pot first if you like or glue the ribbons with a glue gun.
It is really easy. I will make one and take a picture to publish later on in this blog!
Have a go!

Bye for now

Christmas pudding tips

This is the first of many tips and recipes I will be adding to this blog throughout the Christmas period. I so hope you are enjoying this and will add comments when you can.

It has been traditional to serve Christmas pudding with brandy sauce or worse - brandy butter. Our family has never liked either of those two options and short of using ordinary custard thought there was nothing really suitable. Well we have now, for years, been using brandy cream as an option. Not the stuff you buy in the supermarket but the real thing made at home in minutes.

Recipe:-

Ingredients;
* Whipping cream - light version if you wish or Elmlea - the cream alternative
* Brandy
* Caster sugar to taste ( we often use sugar substitute to "slightly" cut down the calories!)

Method:-

Whip the cream until nearly stiff.
Add the sugar or sugar substitute and a generous serving of brandy ( or rum if you prefer)
Continue whipping until stiff and spoon over the hot pudding just before serving.

WOW! Just watch that cream run down the hot pudding and taste the brandy in it - you really will NOT go back to custard or brandy butter.

Watch this space for more easy tips and recipes.

Also look at the list of treats and recipes at the link under here- paste and copy to view.
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