Merry Christmas!

Hi

Here are a few photos of this year's decorations.  I can't believe this year's holidays are already upon us.  One day there were 125 days to go and now there are 2 days left.  What I love the most about our decorations is that they all come from different parts of the world.  Whenever we are on holiday we try to find a decoration for the tree or the house from abroad.  Every angle of the tree brings back lovely memories.  We don't colour coordinate & just go with it.  I also have all of the decorations from the ornament swap & my lovely friend Mandie on the tree this year so it is very spacial.

Also if you have had a long day & want a laugh, read THIS story about a turkey I cooked a couple of years a go.  I'm sure it will put a smile on your face.

I want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year, wherever you are.


Happy Holidays my new friends.

Wish you all the best,

Lily

Bannister

New Nutcracker

Advent Calendar

Bannister unlit

Welcome :)

Dinner table almost set

Lamp on the front door

Kitchen, cookie jar & hot chocolate mugs

Village Scene

Extra stockings

Christmas Snow Globes

• Centre piece that I made as I didn't want a candles on the table. 

Train to go around the tree

Tea light holder, looks cute when lit at night

Our Tree

Hand made Wreath

Decorations from a trip to Malta & Denmark

I... "Believe".. Hope you do too :)

Add caption

Mr & Mrs Gingers

Holiday Cheer with Frosty

This is a video of one of our newest Christmas decorations.  It makes me smile all the time.  I'm going to have to find an excuse to keep him hanging on the door all year long ;)

I thought I'd share it with you so he can spread some holiday cheer to you too.

Hope you all are having a great day.

Happy Holidays

Lily

Frosty

12 days to go

Only 12 days to go :)

I am so excited.  I will be posting more exciting posts soon, promise.  Do any of you have any particular family/holiday traditions round about this time of the year? 

This is a picture of our fireplace display this year.  Spending lots of quality time with each other is definitely a tradition at this small corner of the world.

Hope you all are having a great time getting ready for the holidays :)

Lily

Santa's Sleigh

Hope you have all had a great weekend.  I have. We are celebrating an early Christmas with my in-laws (whom I love).  We try to meet up around the holidays each year.  They live faraway from us & it is lovely each time we meet up. Now:  

I have a question for you guys :)

As you know I watch Christmas movies all year long and have a great collection but there is one thing I do not understand so I am hoping that you'll be able to help Please.

What is the "Sleigh crash of 1964"?  It is referred to in lots of movies.  Is it some childhood myth I missed or is it made up?

I f you think you might know the answer, please write.

Have a lovely week.

Lily

Love this new Santa

Lights festival

A few days ago we had a festival & a parade in our city.  It happens every year :)  There is a little parade with Santa Claus & lots of funfair rides for little ones.  There also is live music and drinks and food.  My lovely husband & I went out that day for an early Christmas meal & some drinks and some Christmas shopping.  I thought I'll share some photos with you.

Lily

The Standing Order. A lovely pub with affordable meals and drinks :) This pub used to be a bank.

Inside the pub

High Street

Christmas Ale

Festive menu at the pub

Traditional English Christmas dinner

Parade

Parade

Candy stand

Florist Shop window

Funfair rides for little ones

White Christmas

It seems like we are in for a white Christmas. Temperatures haven't been this cold in November/December since 1919.  Thousands of schools and business's have been closed including my university.  Am enjoying a hot cup of coffee with Andy Williams singing in the background while looking out to the back garden.  Snow is falling as big as pop corn :)  About 10 inches of snow so far but we may get more.  We usually get a sprinkle end of January so the entire country is in a shock.  Had a white Christmas last year but this is unbelievable.  I took a stroll in the neighbourhood yesterday & took some photos to share with you.  Do you always get a White Christmas?

Merry White Christmas :)

Lily

Back garden

Tree in the back garden

Another neighbour's front garden

That huge pile of snow in the corner is the neighbour's car!

Round the corner from where I live

Frozen fountain

View from front door

Back garden

Our window display

ornament

A while ago I joined Marsha's ornament exchange.  My name was paired with Anitra and so we exchanged Christmas ornaments.  You can see the lovely and handmade ornament that Anitra sent to me HERE and here are a couple of photos of the ornament I sent to her.  She said that they have theme of "things that fly" on their tree.  The exchange was global I believe and I'll be linking this with Marsha's blog so if you'd like to see everyone's exchange stop by Here.

Happy 1st of December everyone.

Lily

Blog award :)

I am so touched that Tanya from has decided to give this award to my blog.  There really are so many wonderful people in the world :)  Thank you Tanya for including me in this, you are very kind.

(By the way please remember to send me your photos for the photo swap)



Tanya said that:
In order to accept this award, here are the rules:

Thank and link back to the person who awarded you this.
Share 7 things about yourself
Pay it forward to 10 bloggers whom you feel are deserving
Contact those bloggers and tell them about their award.

So here are the 7 things about me:

1. I love Christmas & get out twinkle lights on the fireplace when it rains & that happens a LOT in England :)
2. I love staying at home if I can to enjoy a Christmas film and a cuppa of cocoa. 
3. I never give any Christmas gifts to friends/family without ribbon and bows.
4. I am thinking about starting my own Christmas/festive decorations business where I'd get paid to decorate, would be absolute heaven.
5. I have found the best dieting method to be crafting so your fingers are busy creating rather than eating ;)
6. Blogging inspires me to be more creative.
7. I have just purchased a new sewing machine so I can start sewing pretty things soon. 

I'll now go and pass it on to 10 people :)


1. Maureen
2. Ann Nichols
3. Terri
4. Natasha
5. Wendy
6. Debbie
7. Melissa
8. Melissa Mander Jones
9. from beyond my kitchen window
10. http://ronjoewhite.blogspot.com/

I would have passed this on to so many other people as well as these 10 but they have already received this award from Tanya & others :)

Lily

Love Actually!

Hi all.  Hope you have all had a fab Thanksgiving with your love ones.

 Have any of you ever seen "Love Actually"?  Here is a trailer.  It is one the most popular HOLIDAY films over here.  It is very British on so many levels and captures the British humour very well.  It does make the American president not look so great but it is done in a very light hearted manner & no harm is intended by it, I'm sure.  If you haven't seen it then I can't recommend it enough and if you have, what did you think?

My wonderful husband & I watched this film this evening with a couple of glasses of mulled wine & with our Christmas Tree in the corner I ,must say that it is officially the holiday seasons :)  It is so nice to say that & for it to be so true (finally ;)  TeeHee )


Lily

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who celebrate it.  Hope you have a very lovely day.  Enjoy Ellen's Thanksgiving Monologue :)




Also enjoy "THIS" VERY FUNNY Ellen clip :)


Lily

Christmas Wreaths photos

Hi all

I had said that I will upload some photos of the wreath & here there are.  Hope you like them.  Only a few days to go now & we're putting the Tree up tomorrow :) I'm so excited, I can't wait.  The wreath video is also  "HERE" if you wish to see it. if you haven't seen it yet.  Also "HERE" is my mulled wine recipe, feel free to check it out.  It is lovely on a cold night, when you are decorating your Christmas Tree :)

This also reminds me of the Photo Swap.  Please send me up to 10 photos to christmasbelieve@yahoo.co.uk
It would be awesome if you could include a photo of your current Christmas Tree or a Tree from the previous years as well as all of the photos of the area you live in.  I have some photos from shops and street decorations.  If you can send them to me by the 28th of November that would be great.  If you need more time please let me know.  Also please include you blog details (name & web address) in the e-mail as well.  I am really lookimng forward to seeing how your city/town/village celebrates Christmas.

This is it finished & lit

This how I began with the wreath still plain

These are the sort of things I used on it

This how it looks if it is not lit

Please send me you photos.  Also a big THANK YOU to those of you who have e-mailed me or left comments of support recently.  It has all been very appreciated.

Happy Early Thanksgiving for those of you who celebrate ;)

Hugs

Lily