festive fun in december

In true december fashion, it's been busy, particularly during the build-up to christmas. Yes, the last few days have been quiet but on the whole I've spent that time in my pjs, watching films (singin' in the rain is on as I write this) and eating my way through all the christmas leftovers - sweet and savoury. Bearing that in mind, my 4 things have taken a bit of a backseat this month...

De-clutter: Although I've still not taken the, now overflowing, bag to the charity shop, I did manage to clear out lots of my old stuff from my  old room at my parents' house.

Health: I can actually count the number of times I went to the gym this month on the fingers of one hand. Bad eh? Particularly as I've been quite merrily stuffing my face over the last three weeks.

Money: I'm not a big fan of sale shopping but having received a few vouchers for christmas I shall definitely be splurging on a couple of things - some new sports attire, fabric and clothes patterns :) Saving continues for the wedding which is now less than 8 months away (aaaaahhhhh).

Do More New: The biggest new thing, that eclipses all new things, this month was: hosting Christmas. I've cooked for large-ish groups of people before and Mitch is a master of roast dinners but cooking xmas dinner was a whole different ball game. Thankfully though almost everything went to plan and it didn't put me off doing it again :)

As you can see it wasn't an entirely successful month buuuut a pretty big change is taking place early next year which will have a huge positive impact on de-cluttering and money saving. More on that at a later date as there's only a few hours left of 2013 and I'm off to the supermarket to stock up for the celebrations this evening. Happy NYE everyone!

christmas bits + pieces

Earlier today, I returned from a very christmassy week long stay at my parents' place. A week of family, festive tv, cooking, pressies, card games and mountains of food. It was a very different Christmas this year - my parents were both away and so the responsibility of hosting and catering for the family on the big day fell to me and Mitch. Although it was a lot of fun, it was also absolutely knackering - clearly I'm just not used to being on my feet for 9 hours. I would have been completely buggered without the help of Mitch and my sister, mostly due to the fact that we decided to cook waaaay too much: turkey, pigs in blankets, stuffing, roast potatoes, carrots, parsnips, swede, green beans, squash and brussel sprouts. I also made bread (for the first time ever!) and served it with paté as a starter, and then made three different puddings: mincemeat and chocolate pudding with salted caramel and rum sauce, chocolate brownies (just in case the first pudding didn't work out, which it did) and a gluten-free white chocolate cheesecake for my sister. Obviously we were a little over ambitious. If we do xmas again I think I shall definitely make less. Of course the best thing about cooking too much on xmas day is that there's plenty of turkey and stuffing sandwiches to be had :) 

As I'm not back to work for another 5 days I shall be mostly lazing around the flat and getting on with a few crafty bits and pieces (thanks to a few christmas presents). Hope you all had lovely christmases and are enjoying some time off too! 

tree alternatives

This year Mitch suggested that we shouldn't get a tree. Outraged, I forcefully suggested we did. To cut a long story short,  I eventually (and grudgingly) acknowledged that Mitch's reasons for a tree-less Christmas made sense, namely that we'd be spending Christmas, boxing day and a few days either side at my parents' house. So, rather than condemn our little flat to a grinch-y/bah humbug type state, I set about putting up some festive alternatives... Fairy lights, a long piece of string from which to hang our christmas decorations as well as xmas cards and lastly, a paper tree (complete with paper decorations) which I stuck to the wall in the living room. To jazz it up I put a vase of fairy lights and all our wrapped presents underneath it. You can't beat a real tree but it's a pretty good and completely free alternative :)

In other news, today is my last day at work until 2014 - crazy, I know. I've not been given this much time off for christmas since I was in school! Obviously, I'm not complaining especially as it may very well turn into a half day depending on whether we come back after our christmas lunch at the pub...

Happy Friday!

happy birthday little fella

Today, Moriarty turns 1! 

(Ok, so I've never had a pet before which means acknowledging the hamster's birthday is happening.) 

The urge to knit moriarty a little xmas jumper is quite overwhelming but I just know that he'd hate it so instead, we opted to make him some new cage accessories. Hopefully, he'll like them.

That little video is actually from the summer but seeing as Moriarty tends to sleep all day and only wants be to sociable in the evenings (which in the winter means it's dark) this is probably the clearest footage of him. He's not changed much since June so I promise you're not missing anything - no radical hairstyles or neon dye jobs. 

When he came into our lives I was v.opposed to having a hamster. But now, I couldn't imagine being without him :) happy birthday little fella. 

festive film line-up

So this is just for starters.

We kicked off our Christmas movie viewing last Sunday with a couple of classics - Home Alone and It's a Wonderful Life - followed by two gems from the 80s... First up, Trading Places. Rich, snob, broker Dan Aykroyd finds his life turned upside down when his obnoxious bosses orchestrate a change of circumstances and swap Aykroyd's life of luxury with that of impoverished street hustler Eddie Murphy. Not only is the script great and the casting superb, it's also directed by John Landis of Blues Brothers and An American Werewolf in London fame. He also directed Michael Jackson's Thriller video.
Second 80s film - Scrooged. Bill Murray is in the Scrooge seat playing one hell of a jerk and tv network director. In standard Christmas Carol style he's visited by three spirits - past and future are pretty terrifying. Murray is perfect for the 'starts out bad, ends up good' character arc role (also see Groundhog day), and, although it's relatively new to my xmas film list (I only watched it for the first time last year), it'll probably be staying in my list for years to come purely for the entertainment factor.
Looking forward to the others especially: Bridget Jones's Diary - I've not seen it in years, The Muppet Christmas Carol - I might save this for Boxing Day, and The Snowman - for me, it's the oldest on my list, the one that really signifies christmas, probably because I've been watching it every year since I can remember. We had - still have - it on VHS, and on that version, David Bowie did an intro (I know, v.cool). In all of my 26 years I've not met anyone else who's seen this (and I think a few people thought I'd made it up) but! some v.helpful individual has put it on youtube so you can see it for yourself!

Also, in case you hadn't realised, it's a week till Christmas day!

picture credits: 1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 7 // 8 // 9 // 10