Around here

Wow it's less than two weeks until Christmas and we haven't even got our Christmas Tree up.  Last year we put it up mid November after a crazy 2020 Covid year.  This year we have had other important things on like formals, graduation, schoolies and my sister went on holidays and we normally make an afternoon of it as our family tradition.  Both my kids have part time jobs and social lives so this year we haven't been able to get a time to suit everyone.  Hopefully we'll be putting it up today or tomorrow.  I have a few friends who were in the same boat that we were all late this year for the same reasons as us with the end of the school year and our kids graduating High School it's been a few full on weeks.  I also now have an 18 year old...sounds so weird even saying that however I am a very proud Mum that's for sure.

Preparing for Christmas lunch I will be making this wonderful savory pasta salad which we make at Christmas time.  I also make Chocolate Belgian Slice which was from a Woman's Weekly recipe about 30 years ago.  I make it once a year at Christmas time which is always a treat.  When I first started making it I didn't have a food processor and had to put the biscuits into a brown paper bag and bash it with a rolling pin which was quite difficult to get all the pieces the same.  Now it takes a couple of seconds in the Thermomix and makes a lovely biscuit base.

Here's a recipe to make home made Christmas ornaments which are super easy.  Here's some lovely Christmas Lights we visited in 2019 and some from 2020.

I have been following Gillian Roe from "Tales of a Happy House" for over a year now and her embroidery projects are amazing.  This year she did a "Stitch a Day" of thing in her life.  She has now completed November so take a look at her latest pictures and blog post.   In 2020 she did a "Lockdown Sampler" which you can read about here.  This was her family's trip to New York Sampler which she did before Covid arrived.  This was her earlier Holiday Sampler to France and her Summer Holiday Diary.  The reason I love all of these artworks is they are personal, it reminds her of the holiday and trips and it's also slow crafting so taking time to sit and embroider.  I just love her work and she does beautiful crochet and crafting.

I read this article on Motherhood which I thought was very interesting about how we see ourselves during the day.

We had Billy visiting last week as my friends went on holidays.  He comes every school holidays and he's such a good dog and this is like his second home and he's very comfortable here.

I haven't made any sourdough bread for over a month so refreshed my starter and made a loaf today.  You can read about the master recipe I use here.

Some home grown coriander [cilantro] as a gift for my friend instead of flowers.

Afternoon light in the lounge room.