Wishing you a Merry Hawkes Bay Christmas

Roses are flowering and the Christmas decorations are up.

The tree in Napier has lost its rugby balls and gained its Christmas decorations. Complete with golden angel.

If you are a fellow Dr Who fan you might have been a bit freaked to see the angel.

The farmers market is brimming over with produce of all kinds, especially fruit.

The pohutukawa trees are in full flower.

Carol singers appearing every where.

Merry Christmas to you all, thank you for reading my blog and have a peaceful and productive New Year.

Some Christmas stuff - another very late post

I still find it hard to feel Christmasey in the heat, sunshine and warm weather don't really bring out the festive spirit in me. But what is good about Christmas time in Hawkes Bay is the abundance of fruit. The farmers market is full of soft fruit and stone fruit, yum yum yum.
Our ugly plum tree provided us with three bowls full of the most delicious plums again this year. They are so yummy most of them get eaten out in the garden.
One big down side of the heat is I can't manage to make a nice Christmas wreath without it turning to brown dried up wrinkly stuff in a couple of hours. So each day I just keep adding to it with different leafs and plants to find something that will look good, most do for about 5 minutes then they just wilt away. The fennel on the one I did this year did smell lovely. Maybe I should add to my New Year's resolutions this year - dry out some hydrangeas and other stuff in Autumn and save them for next years Christmas wreath. Watch this space next Christmas, bet I forget all about it again.

Christmas Wreath Mark II

Christmas wreath Mark I had to go, it was dried up and looking very sad. While gardening I spotted some flowers on the fejoa tree. Perfect. I don't know how long they will last, but they look really good.

Christmas Part 4 - The Pressie

I am officially an old lady. Peter bought me a shopping trolley for my christmas, it is exactly what I wanted. It means I can buy even more goodies at the Farmers Market on Sunday mornings. We tried it out it out it last Sunday at the market, maybe not the right weekend, it was packed. And so was my shopping trolley.

Christmas Part 3 - The Table

Peter bought me a lovely new stripey red table cloth yesterday. He noticed it was half price and immediately thought I would like it. Strangely enough I had bought the exact same table cloth the previous day. To top it off I added my red spotty table runner. But it still looked a bit plain. Then I remembered the beautiful red and white bunting Keriann had shown me the previous day. So after half an hour with a pair of scissors, some red and white fabric and a lot of safety pins, I had some bunting. The kids thought I was mad, I think it looks brilliant. I think I will leave it up for the rest of the year. Some red roses in red spotty plastic mugs finished it all off. Well I was really pleased with the result.

And here it is all ready for us to sit down and eat. Picture courtesy of Peter.

It looks a bit slumped by the end of the afternoon. Don't we all.

Oh and by the way Merry Christmas.

Christmas Part 2 - Christmas Eve

Christmas shopping on Christmas Eve, almost to late and never again, but the sun is shining and the Jacaranda trees are in bloom.
The hall has been decked with Holly, well really ivy and herbs again, I thought the fennel flowers were particularly inspired.

More ivy and herbs over the dining table.

And the same on the mantelpiece.

The pressies are under the tree.

And the stockings are ready and waiting in front of the fire. Notice only four stockings, none for me, aww.

Christmas Part 1

The Amaryllis is flowering right on cue. Christmas has started to emerge all over the house.
My youngest and I put up the Christmas tree. Unfortunately Santa had to be relegated to the bottom of the tree as he made the top bend over.

The cards are hung under the mantelpiece.

And the holly........ sorry herb wreath has been hung on the door........... well not exactly on the door but beside it. The door is always open in the summer, so it would never be seen otherwise.

Now this is more like it ..........

My brother sent me a lovely box of Christmas goodies, which included mince pies and brandy butter. Now this is much better than boxes of leftover groceries. The best bit is this huge peice of goats cheese. I love goats cheese. And so far I have not found any really good goats cheese here in NZ. There must be some around somewhere. So again thank you Bryan, your gifts are really appreciated.

Mid Winter Christmas

A full christmas dinner is not great in the heat of the summer. So this winter we had some mates over and had a full Mid Winter Christmas dinner. Only 6 months late. We did the full thing complete with crackers and decorations. Sorry no picks of the meal, just of the remains the next day.

Today's Daisies #76 - The Christmas Pressie Saga

Peter bought me the above lovely necklace for my Christmas. As mentioned before it is almost too small, and felt like wearing sandpaper.

So after a lot of internal debate I went to the gallery where I thought he said he bought it, and asked if they would exchange it. Only to find out to my great embarrassment that, he had only bought my earrings there and not the necklace.
Needless to say Peter thought this was hilarious, told me where he had bought the necklace, at the Wine Country Gallery in Havelock and even gave me the receipt so I could change it.
Being the impatient person I was down at the gallery to change it at 10pm on Tuesday morning. Only to find out the gallery is open every day but Tuesdays.
So this morning back I went to see if they would exchange the necklace. I spotted one I liked straight away. No worries they said, they exchanged my necklace for the one I liked and gave me some cash back as well. There are also some earrings which I think I will use the spare cash to buy.

Breakfast and my Christmas pressies

Breakfast this morning was fruit from the local farmers market. Strawberries, raspberries, nectarines, apricots and cherries, with yogurt. Yum, yum, yum. While I was eating I was reading the book that my youngest gave me for christmas. Nation by Terry Pratchett. I am a big Disc World fan and was unsure about this new one. It is set on a Pacific island after a big wave has crushed it. Sounds a bit dire. It wasn't, it was brilliant, I would recommend it to anyone. Thank you Terry Pratchett for another excellent read. And since I was on the subect of christmas pressies, here is another couple.

Cute earrings from Peter. He also gave me a nice necklace, which I am afraid is a bit to short, it fits ok, but is really really uncomfortable. Not sure what to do about that.

With my christmas money I bought this Silk Tree in a sale. It is not giving much shade yet but it will in a few years.

Christmas Dinner - Christmas Part Three

Christmas dinner this year was a bit of a mix up of everyone's favourites. We had a giant ham, which should last us till June. Turkey, stuffing (both sage and onion and apricot) and bread sauce. Green salad and a tomato and feta salad. Roast new potatoes, yes I really did roast new potatoes in their skins and they were delicious, and roast parsnip. Plus green beans and corn on the cob.

For dessert we had chocolate mud cake, my youngests favourite. And a very brilliant pavlova made by my eldest. I still have a christmas pud to eat some time once I have some appetite back again.

And here they all are, my merry men, enjoying their Christmas Dinner in the garden.

Today's Daisies #75 and My own little elf - Christmas part 2

My youngest has spent a number of days in the garage hammering and glueing and sawing and being very busy, singing christmas songs. He then used nearly all of my wrapping paper and appeared with a number of large pressies for under the tree.
He had made a pressie for each of us. A model toothbrush for his dad the dentist, a back scratcher for his eldest brother (no idea why), a machine gun for his other brother (slightly worrrying) and best of all he made the daisy picture above for me. He must have spent ages hammering in nails and then pulling them out again. I love it. I am going to treat it with oil and hang it on the wall to be treasured. Who could ask for more, a happy generous creative 8 year old son and a brilliant pressie.

Let it rain, let it rain, let it rain - Christmas Part 1

Christmas eve dawned wet and windy and dull. A big change, as we seem to have lovely sunshine for weeks and weeks. So the rain was very, very welcome. Also it made it seem a bit more christmasey.

This fennel grows outside my bedroom window, in an effort to stop the mosquitos.

Merry Christmas

I thought you might like to see a small slice of christmas in Hawkes Bay. I hope you all have a very merry christmas and that Santa Claus fetches you everything you wished for.
In case you are wondering who is under the Santa hat, it is Ranna the cat.

That Christmasey Feeling

Christmas time is here at last. I have been feeling very very un christmasey. I have had a stinkey cold, a major lack of energy and can't get motivated when the sun is shining and the garden is blooming (still can't get used to a southern hemisphere christmas, but I am working on it). I had bought no pressies and written no cards. My youngest put up the tree and decorations, singing all the time (very cute to sit back and watch). He is 8 and I think this is perhaps his last year of not being worldy wise, if you get my drift. Then yesterday morning my energy came back, even though christmas shopping with Peter drained it again. When we got home our annual hamper from my brother had arrived. Wonderful, an event I really look forward too. Nothing is wasted, the kids love to rummage around and see what delights are in the basket. I love the basket itself really useful for storing my ever increasing fabric stash. The ribbon from the wrapping goes in the ribbon box to be recycled later in the year. And lastly the packaging paper is used in the guinea pig hutches. Thank you Bryan for another lovely pressie.

Keriann and Ian came around for dinner yesterday evening and brought me another pressie. I love bonne maman jam. So Keriann had got me these tiny little ones. So cute. I will even treasure the little jars when the jam is finished, I am sure they are the right size for storing craft supplies.

Finished a UFO at Last

After 18 months and two Christmases I have finished my Christmas Quilt. Not sure I am happy with it yet, but by next Christmas I might be. In case you did not know, a UFO is an Unfinished Object. I have a lot of them. Maybe in the next couple of days I will post some pics of the UFOs I have outstanding.