* ~ Preparing for Christmas ~*

Wowzers, wheres the time gone?. Well, I feel like I should offer some sort of explanation as to what I've been doing the past few weeks. After my daughter started school, I decided that enough was enough and I needed to loose some weight and my incentive was that I wasnt allowed to do any sewing until I'd shifted that last half stone.(Shock horror!) Well, here I am almost a whole stone lighter so Im feeling much better about myself. However, Its not been without its efforts! Exercising 5 times a week, two hours at a time, and focusing on my diet leaves very little time for much else between housework and the school run.

Nevertheless I'm back, and raring to begin my mission on Christmas crafting! So the first thing I did was rustle these decorations up. Now I'm very finicky as to what gos on my tree each year. I have a strict Gisela Graham only rule with white, brown, gold and bronze on the tree and the round baubles have to be as big as possible!

So, these have been made for my daughter, Im going to get her, her very own tree this year, and what has inspired this decision?

None other then this magazine!




and this picture:




My daughter loves all things pink and this would be right up her street. The trouble is, im not sure if it would fit in her room, so I might have to find a smaller one.

Now what in here?



Fabric ofcourse!, not just any fabric, Christmas fabric, and I wont spoil it to much by showing you my stash, but I will say that I am making another quilt. Im not yet sure if it will be a mat that will be used to sit on whilst opening presents every year but the idea is that I want it to be featured in all my future Christmas photographs, so that when the children look back at them and still have the quilt, they will feel nostalgic and comforted, much like I am when my mother gets out my old baby blanket that always came out when I was lying on the sofa poorly and off school.

Right, well in between me writing this post, the Tescos man arrived and has brought me this:



Ooo I just love Christmas magazines! They really pick me up! so Im going to sit down with a cup of herbal tea and my favourite biscuits of all time (Foxes melts, incase you were wondering!) and get inspired!