Post Christmas post .....

On Christmas-eve i was allowed to open my present that i received from Hanne and Tone from Norway !! It was so exciting... i love unexpected presents !! This was ofcourse a special one, all the way from Scandinavia .....
It contained 3 fantastic Christmas-decorations; 2 angels and 1 star.

They were perfect for my little tree in the frontwindow. Dear Hanne and Tone: thank you so much, i am so happy with them...

Christmas-eve we spend with my mother .... this is her front-window seen from her garden. It's not a fine picture but i just wanted to show it because it looked so nice and cosy when we arrived. She is 70 years old and still enjoys it to decorate her Christmas-tree every year ! Her tree is full of angels which she collects...whenever we are abroad we try to find one for her :)

Before Christmas i had been baking....with help from Lynn from the blog Bun Mountain Cottage

i managed to make the original mince-pies. We bought them before, when we were in Great Britain and sometimes our friends from Wales did sent them and we all love them over here, they are so delicious !

They tasted just as nice as they looked !! Thanks again Lynn :)

This year we had a quite "international" afternoon-tea :) On the top-plate you see the German chocolatecookies which i bought and the cookies made from a recipe that i got from Tone from Norway !!

Do they look a bit familiar to yours, Tone ??

Anyway they all tasted wonderful and it was nice to bake them. Today my family and i have been baking again but that has to do with New Years Eve traditions and i'll tell you about it next time. For now there have been enough cookies, i think :)

Till next time,

Janneke.

Christmas time..........

Finally everyone has christmas holiday and we're really enjoying it....sitting a lot by the fire , reading, listening to music and watching old christmas-movies ! Last saturday we also bought our christmas-tree, indeed a small one :) so my collection of old christmasdeco would fit in.

Here you see 2 old pieces......

Normally i keep the old christmas stuff in this little hanging show-case on the top shelf as you can see :). I also put little religious objects in which i collect. If you might think that the red cup is an egg cup, you're wrong :) .... it's something they use in a Taiwanees temple.

And then today a big surprise !!! A parcel came all the way from Norway .... my friends Hanne and Tone did sent it ! I got quit excited because i love presents !!

Unfortunately i cannot open it yet :0 There's a strict rule that i can open it on Christmas-eve.

So i'll have to wait another day......and Hanne and Tone i really will.

Here it is, waiting for me in my christmas stocking.

This will be my last post before Christmas, so......

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR

to all of you out there in Blogland and i hope 2009 will become a beautiful blogyear again !!!

Till next time,

Janneke.

Christmas things .......

Last week i bought a few little Christmas things..... i went to see Bertina and her friend Erna who organised a sale with their handmade Christmas decorations. At their beautiful decorated fair i bought this picture frame you see above....inside a list with all the ingredients for a Christmas pudding ! So very nice for decorating the kitchen. By the way the teapot i've had for many years already.....i am always happy to get it out of the cupboard again :)

We also had an invitation of Johanna, a friend who travels to Norway a lot (how i envy her) and comes back with loads of nice things to sell. From her i bought this wooden cookie-mould, i was so lucky to find it !

Ofcourse she also had lots of norwegian glass jars for sale... she filled them with original "pepper kake" that she also brought back from her trip !

For my pinboard in the toilet i bought this little skate that Bertina and Erna made, it goes nice with the winter-theme that's going on in our toilet :).

The cornet i made myself and the cross i bought at www.theoldstuffshop.nl .

There's some more Christmas atmosphere in the livingroom now..... this year i just did not seem to get started...

.....but day by day a few more Christmas ornaments are to be seen.

While i am taking pictures Mara follows me and is watching all the time what i am doing.

A surprise came to me when a friend gave me two shoeboxes filled with christmastree decorations and said i could have it. She thought there could be some old stuff as well and she knows i collect old tree decorations.....so i was very excited.

After carefully unwrapping i indeed found some old things. You can, for example, recognise them because they have a much smaller "eye" wich you use for hanging them on the tree.

But best of all i liked this toadstool....i think it's so pretty ! I will try to decorate this years Christmas tree with my collection of old christmas tree decorations. I guess i have to buy a very small tree, hahaha.

Till next time, (promiss my tree will finally be there)

Janneke.

December..............

First of all i hope you had a nice 3th advent-sunday.... still one more candle to burn and then it's almost Christmas ! I tried to make a few "wintery"decorations through the house. It's not to Christmassy yet :)
We still have to buy a Christmas tree but i'll see to that next week.

In the hallway ....... the nice ribbon, around the cinnamon sticks, i bought at the shop from Gerda via www.webbutik-idemakeriet.blogspot.com

In the livingroom i've put a little fir-tree in an old pharmacy bottle.

Decorated with a selfmade label.

This is the "Christmas mirror" in the livingroom decorated with a chain with little bits and pieces.

On the window-sill, at the front window, i've put another tree that i planted in an old bucket. This tree was just growing underneath the big fir tree in our garden. Mara, the cat, was very willing to pose :) .

Little handmade heart decoration.....

Till next time,

Janneke.

The 5th of december .....

Finally, last friday-evening we had our Sinterklaas celebration. Actually it started on friday afternoon with our traditional cookie baking. Last few years we baked pepernoten but this year, as my niece is a bit older now, we did go for the speculaas-cookies.

My daughter used the bigger mold with the shape of a "Zwarte Piet".

And here you see my niece using the little one. It was so much fun !

They all turned out very well ..... they only had to be baked for 15 minutes so when we had a cup of tea later on, we could already taste them ..... the rest we kept for the actual celebration !

In the evening after singing lots of Sinterklaas-songs we heard a loud knocking on the door and a window and when we looked....yes, Sinterklaas had been there and we found bags full with presents !!

Here you see a few of the nice things that i received. I was so lucky because Sinterklaas knew exactly what i would like !!

We had a lovely evening with lots of laughter about the surprise-presents and the poems that went with all the gifts. We all were very much spoilt ! But mayby because we all behaved so well the last year :)

Till next time,

Janneke.

And the winner is............

Thank you so much for your response on my Sinterklaas give-away ! This afternoon when our daughter came from school she picked one name, out of all the names that participated ! As you can see we were in the real Sinterklaas mood with hot chocolate and speculaas-cookies.

And the winner is Pien from "Some things and more" !! Congratulations on this one, Pien !

Yes, it's december and more and more red appears in our house ! Like here under the stairs in the hallway. Just a cosy corner.

Also red stripes on the table ..... on the tablecloth that i made from dish-cloths.

Last months i have been making my own winter-potpourri ..... i collected very little pinecones and rosehips and later i added slices of dried oranges and apples, orange-peel, star-anise and cinnamon sticks.

On our trip to Great Britain i bought a special oil with orange- and clove fragrance .... i also added a few drops of the oil and mmmmm, what a lovely smell. Now i have put the mixture in a nice wrapping for the tray on the dinnertable, i really like the wintery touch it gives.

Till next time,

Janneke.