Sew satisfying....

As someone who is an adequate but lazy sewer, I have to admit that the perfectly good sewing machine I have in the cupboard is rarely used these days! In days of yore, I have been known to whip up a cute little outfit for one of the children-but considering that the "children" are aged 28,25 & 18 it has been a while!

So when I read of a challenge on the Down to Earth Forum ( http://downtoearthforums.com/showthread.php?t=8505&p=115914#post115914 ) to handmake one item a month for 2012 I decided to sign up! The theme for January was " something for your kitchen" and I decided that I would make a heat resisant pot trivet and oven mitts.......................well, as January mosied along I was too busy to sit down & sew! I finally made it to today ( 30th January) and found some time to make my planned items.

I used some brightly coloured printed drill fabric which was left over from an outfit I made our youngest 16 years ago ( yep, that's right.. I still had the leftover fabric in the cupboard-I've carted it with us through 5 house moves!) and used some thermal batting picked up from Spotlight. I didn't want to buy a pattern- so I made it up as I went along! All things considered I'm happy with my efforts!

I really like the shot of colour they add to the kitchen!

Sweet,sweet sugar....

This season has been as relaxed as we could hope for! We are both back at work this week, but have enjoyed the seasonal break catching up with family and friends!

Last week, one of the Down to Earth Forum members posted a link to homemade sugar scrub-now, I have made this and salt scrub myself in the past......but this time I was intrigued to realise that I could make use of the leftover Christmas Candy Canes ( other than adding them to my hips that is!).

I crushed the candy canes in a blender:

Then I added some olive oil until I was happy with the consistency and voila! It is a pretty pink,peppermint scented sugar scrub!:

We also have celebrated our youngest grandson's 1st birthday. Unable to be with him on the actual day of his birthday, we celebrated here a couple of days later with some family (including his 93 yr old great-great grandmother!) and a cake I made for him:

Christmas on my mind.....

A couple of months ago I changed my working hours so that I would have Thursdays and Fridays off-giving me a four day weekend every week ( I have spinal arthritis, so this allows my body to recover from work..) and the past two weeks I have finally had the Fridays off!!! Still working on actually totally dropping the Thursday too...

Today has been very productive- I baked for His Lordship's work afternoon tea-it was his turn to provide it for the office again; then dropped the teenager at her VCE exam scheduled today. A bit of shopping for goodies for Christmas, then home to mow the orchard and potter in the garden. Fed some weeds to the hens-much to their delight!

The Christmas goodies were mainly ingredients as I'm planning on a lot of handmade gifts for the adults this year. So far I've decided on the following:
* Homemade coffee liquer
* Spiced Christmas cookies
* Individual Christmas cakes ( made in muffin tins)
* Mini "blocks" of chocolates
* Cookies in a Jar mixes
* Homemade soaps
* Jams & chutneys
* Christams truffles
* Fudge made in the microwave

For the younger kids I'll be using alphabet cookie cutters to bake each of their names, then wrapping each in a cellophane bag for gifting.

How's your Christmas planning coming along?