Merry Christmas to Y'all

(Finally! But... Now I'm gonna have to find another project on which to work =T hmmm...)

Yesterday for me was spent in a baking/cooking frenzy! Baking as.. well, today is Christmas, cooking because baking in the morning meant anyone else in the kitchen would have made for intense irritation and so I took breakfast upon myself. All selfish motives, see. No cause for alarm.

The CAKE. Finally iced yesterday, had been working on for a couple of days before that.

Lemon Drizzle cake, a tad spur of the moment, in place of Rock Buns or Meringues, for a change. Pretty much jumped out of the tin at me, albeit in about five separate bits. Not impressed. =/

.... and my chocolate attempts. Would you believe that Papa is in the house, and there is still some left after pudding? Frankly, I'm not sure whether to be insulted, or just incredibly satisfied with the enormous amount of other tasty food we all managed to down at dinner. Well, more for me anyway. =D

I also made Rum Butter. OH YES.

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In other news, squint would seem to be the order of the day where Haddington Christmas trees are concerned.

Fig. 1.

Fig. 2.

Disclaimer: I had nothing to do with this!

...OR DID I?? :O

Woooh four days 'till Christmas Woooh

Suffering from a severe case of Present-Envy. Lev is wrapping all these awesome-looking parcels, and all mine seem meagre in comparison. Nawww....
Attempting to somewhat make up for this with epic wrapping SKILLS. Including cylindrical objects. BAM.

Not doing too badly though.

And (Papa and Sylwia, you shall be pleased to know) I have just taken the Christmas Cake out of the oven. However, Dodie convinced me to make it this year, so if you have any sense this should put you off eating it.

Fortunately for us, tomorrow is our last day of torture (torture? did I say torture? I meant school... oh, close enough). This comes at a good time (though 'Sooner' would also have been nice...); throughout the student population -or at least, 5th year- cracks have begun to show. The nearer you get to the end of term, the larger the portion of the class you notice either dozing or staring in a blank stupor at the board for the duration of any given lesson.
For instance, my entire contribution to Physics these last few lessons have been a series of exchanges with Ailish (a.k.a. Lish, Lishbabes, Physics Buddy) in the form of prolonged yawning, followed (incredibly articulately) by;

"So tired." 

"Knackered."

*more yawns* "Wannagotosleep."

"Plan." *head thunks desk*

- MR GRANT INTERVENTION: "OI!". -

Oh, the worst thing, everyone has colds at the moment. A week or two ago, double period R.M.P.S. and doing a NAB -National Assesment Bank- basic level pass for each section of a course- over breaktime. You're working in complete silence, head down over paper, with a cold and a runny nose. It was horrendous. Everyone else is in the same boat and therefore extremely understanding, but you're sniffing every two minutes so loudly people could be forgiven for imagining the classrom to harbour a small boar, leaning over your desk staring at a 10 mark question asking you about Samsaric rebirth and thinking 'I would care a lot more about this if only I could BREATHE ' *snorts*.

The school Christmas dance - this year rather ironically christened 'Dance Another Day' - was supposed to be happening on the 15th Dec., and has been postponed until something like the 17th Jan., for the second time. Really bad (and a tad baffling) choice of name. Oh well.

Gotta Go. (<--- alliteration. English win yaay!) Cake needs me.

Whapping out the Christmas tree

I wait for this all year. No day can be better than Christmas. I think I've already mentioned my plans for the creating of numerous Chrtismas decorations; I'm now halfway through a wreath (holly still needed- I intend to hijack some tomorrow, someone shall come home to find their hedge significantly reduced), and I spent most of yesterday:

a) Firstly galvanising the wee kids I look after at volunteering into a similar state of excitement over the impending celebrations, then prevailing on them to make everyone some things to hang on their trees (at this point I produce as if by magic: a pile of ribbon, pens, paper, pencils, etc., the lot).

and

b) Dashing straight from the Nungate Centre to the Library to help out with their lot of wee kids, all also threading newly-made Crimbo-tree decorations onto bits of ribbon and string.
I coloured in a candy-cane! *cheesing*, and this;

And then today.

Lyovka and I manoeuvred the muddy, wet ladder through the kitchen and scrambled up this into our lovely cobweb of an attic. Climbling over dead woodlice and spiders whilst crouching low enough to avoid spreading the grime from the rafters all over my T-shirt was the equivalent of attending an obstacle course.

Sensibly he then skedaddled off to Edinburgh; I was left to de-tangle the boxes of lights we had brought down. At least then I got to do the fun bit, I had the decorating of the tree left all to myself!

The Bead Shop Makes A FORTUNE

... mostly from me. I've had a NOTION. I want to make stuff for Christmas this year.
So, whapping out the three-year-old, slightly mouldy Bead Shop voucher, and going to buy a ton of stuff.

This was wednesday. Since God had granted us a strike (yaaay! Lie in.) I decided to make the best possible use of my spare time. Everyone else skedaddled off to Edinburgh. House to myself... and soup... unguarded... in the fridge... (not for long).

This must be as near as anyone can really get to absolute bliss. On go the All American Rejects, out come the pliers...

This is the start of a heart tree decoration (tree coming tomorrow- yaaay!). I've gone button-mad. We now have a tree-shaped one aswell.

Along with those, I've made a pile of earrings (enough to last through several birthdays, nevermind Christmas), the beginnings of a sizeable wreath (Dodie's missing a couple of coat hangers...) and a button snowman brooch. I have plans for soap and candles.

This is so far. I keep running out of crimps for the end of things so spending the vast majority of the time running back and forth from the Bead Shop -they're getting to know me really quite well in there-, getting yet another fifty or so... I should probably just buy a bigger batch. No doubt my brain ("your what?!" oh haha) shall reach that conclusion eventually. Meanwhile my fitness level peaks.

The problem still remains; what-a-to-get those of us who cannot/WILL NOT wear jewellry (Lyovka, I'm looking at you >:(  ). You present a challenge. Hmmm....

1st of December....

I can finally bring out my Christmas cards!!!

OH HOW I HAVE WAITED FOR THIS MOMENT.

(P.S. If we are in any way aquainted, beware.)

Counting down the days... 25...

Songs For Chrimbo!

I realise it is not yet even December. I don't care. It already feels Christmassy.
I also realise I have already posted today. I don't care. This has only just occurred to me.

I'm trawling my way through tons of Christmas songs over youtube (whenever I'm at my desk). I'm gonna post these up! This way I don't have to keep flicking through hundreds of different pages, and you can listen to them if you like. =)

We sang this as a class for the Christamas King's Meadow (Primary School) assembly, P6, I think it was. It was EPIC. But we were even better than this, naturally. ;)

No reason, just like it.

Pleeeeease let it snow!!!

The Kinks- Father Christmas.

We sang (and editied version of) this in choir for the Christmas concert in... S3? I know all the words *cheesin'*. =D

Hmmm... nice idea... won't start on the logistics of it though... lets just say good song!

"Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock..."

I have been singing along to this... all day... pity those I live with.

I think I'll leave it on that note (pun unintended, but very clever, haha =/ ). Night, night! Again...

Badly Brawn Boy

I'm feeling in rather a good, Christmassy mood today, probably something to do with a) it finally being socially acceptable to come into school under fifty layers of festive clothing (yaaay!), b) having just scoffed a sizeable roast and c) locating all my Christmas cards... this is despite a growing pile of Physics which should really have knocked me out of a mood for celebrating...

'About A Boy' is somehow a very Christmassy film, and by association that makes this a Christmassy song;

No peace for anyone living here tonight...