Homemade snowglobes...

The mantra that greets me every morning goes like this 'Mum, when are we putting the tree up? When is it Christmas? When is it December? When it's December can we put the tree up?

Don't worry I haven't buckled yet - there will be no Christmas trees in November. Instead I've opted for distraction and decoration by stealth! I've put our child labour to good use and employed the minis in the business of making their own decorations, and we started with ....snowglobes. 

Upside down jam jars and hot glue gun ready, we went in hunt of small festive things to decorate them with. We tracked down some cake decoration reindeers and model trees (fortunately BH is a model maker so we raided his supply!) with a bucket load of glitter we decorated the base and glued the figures in place. 

My girl lovingly created a winter snow scene that Disney would be proud of...

My boy decided that nothing says Christmas like WW2 soldiers gunning down Bambi...

I swear this is what happens when you go out of your way to ensure that your children's toys are non gender stereotyped - they go and do it anyway!

We're going to fill them with a mixture of water, glycerine and glitter and glue the lids on -  then we can give them a shake and let it snow....

Honeybun Poufs (of course!)

With a name like HoneyBun Poufs I couldn't resist trying this Amy Butler pattern. I'm not an accomplished seamstress by any stretch of the imagination but what I lack in skill I make up for in determination and the ability to find a good YouTube tutorial!

I wanted a gift for my friend - well my friends cat to be honest. She's a very pampered cat as you may summise by her name 'Peanut Buttercup'. She's gorgeous! And I'm not even a cat person so that tells you something!

My initial thought was 'how hard can a cushion be?' - well when I was still cutting out pieces of batting and backing long after the third or was it fourth episode of Law and Order, I started to realise it wasn't going to be a walk I'm the park - and when my quick assembly the next day started before breakfast and ended after lunch I had my answer. Thank goodness my children can feed themselves! 

        

        

I learned a lot along the way though - topstitching is cool and makes dodgy sewing look quite smart, concealed zips are the stuff of nightmares and the fun kids have filling a cushion with polystyrene beads more than makes up for the fact you'll be finding them in the Hoover for years!

        

         

And Peanut Buttercup liked it too...(I have it on good authority she won't nap anywhere else!)