My Gingerbread House

This is a bit of a late post, but before Christmas I made a Ginger Bread House!

& I'm so pleased with it and how cute it is!

I used this recipe from BBC Good Food, and you can do the same it's really so easy!

We even used it as a centre piece for the table on Christmas Day.

All you need is Icing Sugar, Plain Flour, Brown Muscovado Sugar, Ginger, Unsalted Butter, Baking Powder, 2 eggs and Golden Syrup... & Just pick whatever you want to decorate! I had shredded wheat, Dolly Mixture, Chocolate Buttons, Chocolate Fingers and Jelly Beans.

1. Melt the butter, sugar and golden syrup in a pan. 

2. Mix this mixture into the bowl of flour, ginger and bicarbonate of soda.

3. Roll out the ginger bread and cut out the shapes using the template.

4. Bake in the oven for 12 minutes

5. Let the ginger bread cool and make your icing, egg whites and icing sugar, and prepare for the making! This is the fun bit, and you can do it however you want! I have a pinterest folder of my favourite ginger bread houses that I have found on there.

[I made it on my mum's account on her iPad hence why it's not my disabledmabel account!]

Do it all section by section and wait for it to dry overnight when you put the walls and roof together! I used elastic bands incase it fell down but it would have been fine without I think.

Remember to be patient - it can be a little bit fiddly!

I'm so pleased with how my little gingerbread house came out!

Has anyone else made one this Christmas?

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Family Get-Togethers

As you get older, Christmas becomes more about spending time with loved ones and eating so much you're gonna burst than it is about the presents... although they're good too!
This post isn't the most exciting but here's how I spend my christmas and boxing day, with my favourite people.

We all had a lovely day,

Hope my lovely followers did too!

How did you spend your Christmas?

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It's Christmas Eveeeee!

Its Christmas Eve already?

Wow.

How has Christmas come around this fast?

In usual style; today is an extra busy day! I have so much to do but so little time, and I'm working tonight from 8pm - 1am ... Lucky me!

I spent this morning wrapping all my presents, I went for the silver and navy theme! Also I've been finishing my ginger bread house and tidying EVERYWHERE! Now I'm off to the shops to get myself a couple of outfits - wish me luck!

Hope everyone's having a great Christmas Eve!

How are you spending your day?

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5 Last Minute Thoughtful Gifts

It's not easy being 'on time' with Christmas shopping, especially when you're a student and have no money to buy anything... Suddenly christmas is upon you and you have to somehow save up in a few weeks to buy lots of gifts!

I've used sites where you can print off the voucher, or make up your own and put it in a card or wrap it in a creative way. This is quick and easy and means that whoever you're giving the gift to will have something to look forward to once Christmas is over!

Lady Dinah's Cat Emporium

This is one of my favourite things as a crazy cat lady, and perfect for a Christmas Gift as it is all booked up well in advance so it's not something you could just decide to do one day. It has to be planned.
Lady Dinah's; £5


Afternoon Tea for Two

Afternoon tea is something that is fancy and great for a day out together, but not too expensive. It's something that you usually wouldn't have time for - which makes it the perfect reason for it to be a great Christmas present!

Groupon; £32 

To Wrap:

Christmas Mug, Printer Voucher, Chocolates, Fancy Tea bags or Coffee

Cocktail Making

Cocktail making is a unique and fun experience, so having this as a christmas present is a fun and exclusive thing for someone to do! and something great for you to both do together.

Groupon; £9

To Wrap;

Cocktail Glass, Printed Voucher, Mini Alcohol Bottle

Prezzo Gift Card

It doesn't seem like much but a meal out is always something that people really enjoy. Prezzo's is a bit of a fancier place to give someone a gift voucher for but not so expensive that it will break your bank.

Tesco; £20

Theatre Tickets

There's something amazing about going to the theatre and seeing a show. Whether its The Lion King, Wicked, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or Matilda - they're all amazing! You can book tickets online and print off your own 'certificate' to tell someone where they're off to.
Boxoffice

Making Christmas Cards

Christmas Cards are something that just seem to be dying a slow death - I remember years ago our whole hallway would be completely covered in them, so much so that you could barely see the wallpaper.
Now, it seems to have wittled down - very few people seem to send them.
But those that do seem to prefer personalised ones; whether its personalised names and words, or photographs.

I decided to make our family Christmas Cards of our cat. Everyone loves him and already laughs at how photographed he is, you can see on mine and my mum's Instagram's that it's just covered in photos of our too loved cat... So I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to show them him again in an even cuter way!

It was quite difficult to get the photo I wanted because Sonny doesn't like to cooperate; he's the king and he does what he wants. He wouldn't even wear the cute little hat I wanted him to wear and he wouldn't let me put baubles around him! I'm glad I have photoshop!

I put this photo on the back of the card with May Simpson© underneath. This photo was taken of Sonny at Christmas when he was a kitten in 2009 just before he went missing. He was lost for 3 months before someone brought him home to us.

I used Truprint to order the cards. Unfortunately, I could not be more disappointed!

I was so excited to get them and to send them out to people, but they've done such a terrible job at printing them that I won't be sending them anywhere and Truprint will definitely be getting a complaint email!

I paid £11.98 for a set of 12, very good on price - but not good enough quality to justify even spending that much...

The colours were wrong and almost green, the quality is terrible and there is a big white gap at the bottom and now it's too late to get more done!

Such a shame, but will learn from my mistakes and not use Truprint next time!

These are a couple of other homemade Christmas Cards we got that could inspire you for your own!

{The quality of Photobox is so much better!}

My mum is a nanny for young and disabled children. One of the first children that she ever looked after was Alex, who has cerebral palsy. We have kept in contact with the family, and they sent us this photo card of alex enjoying his time in the christmas wrapping paper! Awww!

{Children's drawings are perfect as Christmas Cards because unlike photos, the quality doesn't matter as much}

At the school my little cousin, James, goes to each of the children draw out their own christmas card designs and have them made into christmas cards. These are adorable and the perfect keep sake. Last year he gave me a christmas minion one! So sweet!

Another Christmas Card tradition that our family now does, instead of us wasting time and money on christmas cards which only end up in the recycle bin - we make a donation to a charity that means something to us. We then post on Facebook to our friends and family informing them of which charity we have donated to for Christmas. Last year we donated to Down's Syndrome Association and this year we donated to Parkinson's UK. Just another good deed for Christmas.

Has anyone else tried to make their own cards?

Or do you donate instead too?!

Hope everyone's excited for Christmas!

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I've Been To See Cats!

{it's almost impossible to take sneaky pictures with an iPhone that are actually good quality}

When I was younger, Cats was one of my favourite things to see and to be very honest, the only musical I ever enjoyed. So when I found out that Cats was back for a limited amount of time I couldn't help but scream with excitement and rush to get tickets!

It was not only me that loved Cats but my two best childhood friends, Emily and Shannon. We are still very close now but don't get as much time to see each other as we would like. So we took this opportunity to have a Christmas evening out and relive our childhood going to see it!

Before we went to see it we couldn't resist the £2 lunch deal in Garfunkel's and we stuffed our face with nachos, cheesy garlic bread, chicken goujons, pizza and - of course - a chocolate fudge brownie sundae. We also had a little look round at Oxford Street's christmas lights, they're so pretty!

And then we made our way to the theatre..

The show was absolutely amazing, as good as I remember it being for almost everything, except for one of the biggest characters of the performance - the Rum Tum Tugger...

THEY ABSOLUTELY RUINED HIM, AND IT ALMOST RUINED MY CHILDHOOD.

As the door opened for the Rum Tum Tugger to return, I got very excited - he was always my favourite jellicle cat. But for some completely strange and unknown reason, it was not the amazing, quirky, sexy, cool Rum Tum Tugger that returned to the stage but a strange gangster, baggy trousered and chain wearing, rapping version of him.

Outrageous.

I couldn't help but film the monstrosity for everyone to see, so here you go...

I still can't get over them doing this now, almost 24 hours later. It's madness. 

I guess they tried to make it 'modern' - but they shouldn't of bothered. I miss the original tugger, you can watch him here if you have now been scarred by the new version. 

But apart from this, the rest of the show was still wicked and what was really amazing, was Nicole Sheringer's voice.

I know the video isn't amazing - but who knew she could really sing that well!

Constant rounds of applause for her! She actually almost brought a tear to my eye as she sang memories.

This was also one of my favourites - I love skimbleshanks the railway cat! 

Found myself singing and bobbing along like I was a child again! 

If you're in London and can get your hands on last minute tickets I would definitely recommend it, there's still a lot of availability left for January too...
If you already have tickets - have an amazing night! You're gonna love it!
If you've already been, let me know what you thought!

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P.S;
This is a picture of us 3 girls - and my brother - in 2004, the last time we went to see the show. We got our face painted like our favourite cat and got a limo down there with our parents as a Christmas treat for all of us!

Half Way Through Advent...

I didn't think going about posting what I open from my advent calendar every day was a great plan, that's too much effort and not enough stuff for a single post, so I'm posting my advent calendar in two parts!

Since we're half way through, now is a good time to post the first 12 doors...

My mum puts this all together herself every year and they're not all amazingly awesome things but what makes it special is that she's gone through the effort to make it for me. She does one for my brother too and I just think things like this are such a nice family tradition at Christmas.

Mum tries to spend a little amount on each, but still make them relatable to me...

1. Face Mask | 2. Cocktail Chocolates | 3. Santa Head Lipbalm | 4. Christmas Pudding Pants 

5. Cat Watch | 6. Softly Tissue Pack | 7. Camera Necklace | 8. Cat Cookie Cutter

9. Snowman Bath Bomb | 10. Snowman Chocolates | 11. Cat in a Box | 12. Glitter Nail Varnish

They're proper granny pannies but they're christmassy and awesome any way; my mum's obviously 'Crazy for Christmas Puds' too! Can't wait for the face mask and bath bomb...

These are my favourite 5 from the first 12 days.

Can't wait to be making cat cookies soon, may even make a christmas cat cookie somehow!

and the santa lip gloss is the funniest but greatest thing I've ever seen!

So what do you think of my advent?

Anyone else have one that they make themselves like this!?

Might not be as fancy as the rest of yours but I love it :)

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