Christmas ideas.....

Can you believe that we only have 30 days until Christmas???? Have I done any Christmas shopping? No. Have I given Christmas a thought? No. Until today. I suddenly had a 'let's get a few Christmas ideas' moment and have spent the last couple of hours trawling the "tinternet" (as my little angels call it) for some inspiration. Here's what I've found so far....

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Are these chairs not gorgeous? So simple yet so effective. If you don't have white chairs (as I don't with two young boys in the house!) you could always make or buy some slip covers. But even without the white chairs  I think the ribbon, cone and greenery would look just as good.

On the subject of the Christmas dinner table, I saw this place setting which I think is stunning.

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I'm not a huge fan of too much bling on the table and I think the simplicity of this setting defines its beauty. The tags you could easily find and print from the net and we can all find a bit of greenery. Tie this all together with a piece of natural twine and there you have it. Gorgeous.

Next up .... a little bit of Christmas magic .....

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..... a Santa key!!!! I thought this was a wonderful idea for those children who don't have a fireplace in their home. This triggered a whole scenario for me (being a preschool teacher)  where the child is given the key on Christmas Eve - naturally presented in a beautiful magical special box decorated with LOTS of glitter (I mean fairy dust....) - and is told to leave it outside the front or back door so that Santa can access the house and leave all the pressies! Can you imagine the excitement, the joy, the decision making process of exactly where to leave it so that Santa will find it???? I think I would have exploded with glee if my mom had given me this to leave outside.....perhaps DH will read this and make one for me to put outside on Christmas Eve even though we do have a fireplace.......

Moving on to all things wrapping, I'm always blown away by the diverse rolls of wrapping paper that are available. The patterns, the colours, the shininess (is there such a word?) of them all. I must admit to loving them but when I saw this I thought how simple and beautiful and natural the pressies look.

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I think its the combination of the plain paper with the green and red of the accessories. It speaks more to me of Christmas than many of the sparkly blingy (again, a new word!) wrapping papers that we can buy. I'm definitely doing this on our pressies this year! I also love the basket and the straw.....

And finally I found this -

I'm not a great lover of Advent calendars but this one is such a lovely idea. Each tag contains a thought for the day or an action and can be general for the whole family or aimed at children which I loved. I thought up a couple on the spur of the moment -

"Hug your dog three times today!" 

"Tell your teacher you love her!" (I wonder why I thought of that one)

"Draw a Christmas picture and send it in the post to your grandparents." 

What do you think? You could make them very specific to your child or your family or (even better) you could make one as a gift for someone but leave the tags blank, then they could fill them in themselves! I might make one for my classroom for next year but we'd have to do it through November as we always close at the end of November for our major Summer holiday! 

So that's what I've found so far. I'm by no means finished but have made a board on Pinterest so please feel free to pop over and have a look. Here's the link.

Til soon.

♥

Books from way back when....

I was delighted to read Elizabeth's latest post on Mrs Thomasina Tittlemouse in which she spoke enthusiastically about a fairytale book that she used to read as a child. It got me thinking about all the books I enjoyed and my mind settled on this one.....

Do you remember it? It is, of course, by the indomitable Enid Blyton and whilst she is not loved by all, she is certainly loved by me. She's had a bad press recently, particularly with the making of Enid (starring the fabulous Helena Bonham Carter) and although she was certainly an interesting person (to say the least) she was a terrific writer of children's fiction. Her reasons for writing her books and the deep rooted psychological traumas that caused her to escape into her magical worlds were of no consequence to me as a young child romping through her pages. My entire childhood is one long Blyton memory when I stop to think about it and besides The Magic Faraway Tree (and the others that followed), I can remember Noddy, The Wishing Chair, The Adventures of Binkle and Flip, The Secret Island, The Secret Seven, The Famous Five, Amelia Jane, Mister Meddle, Adventures of Pink Whistle, The Children of Willow Farm and, of course, the entire Mallory Towers series!

Now that I own a bookshop I am constantly amazed at how popular her books still are and not just to people of my age group who buy them from a purely sentimental aspect. Young parents buy them for their children to read now in this highly technological age of computers, mobile phones and playstations, and that fact pleases me immensely. I think Enid would have enjoyed it too.

I can remember distinctly being curled up on my bed avidly lost in stories of schoolgirls and pixies, goblins and magical lands and even if there had been daytime television back then (which there wasn't), I'm not sure I would have had it any other way. Enid Blyton was then and will always remain to me a loyal and trusted friend......

Til soon.
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