A Heart Shaped Christmas

My 'Pay-It-Forward' gift has arrived from Diane at Heart Shaped. I can feel another Julie Andrew's moment coming on here. I love brown paper packages tied up with string....



The box was simply groaning under the weight of all the lovely goodies Diane had packed inside. She knows how much I adore Christmas so she very kindly themed my gifts around this; starting with a sweet Angel card.

I had that feeling you get on Christmas morning when you are a child and you get so excited that you do not know what to open first.

A sweet smelling snowy bag stitched in the same material as my wonderful new......

Christmas tote bag! I am taking this beauty to the St Martins markets next week and it shall also accompany me on a late night shopping jaunt into St Peter Port one evening once the Christmas lights have been turned on in Town.

Diane also made a brooch in the same denim as the tote with a heart shaped sparkly button in the centre. I have attached this to the corner of the tote for a little extra Christmas bling. Diane even stitched a 'B' button on the bag for Bumble Bee Cottage!

She included a bottle of her beloved Henderson's Relish. I will head off to the butcher for some steak to accompany the Relish relishing as the label states that it is good 'For that extra flavour with meat, fish, soups, pies,casseroles and vegetables.' Mr Bee will be please as it is also labelled 'The Spicy Yorkshire Relish' and he loves anything with a bit of kick.

But my absolute favourite things that Diane sent me were the little trio of felt Scottie dogs. They are gorgeous and have already made it onto my tree!

Once I took down all the Halloween and Autumn decorations Mr Bee ACTUALLY ASKED ME to put the Christmas decorations up early. Well you don't have to ask me twice, I can tell you. After I opened Diane's kind gifts I was so pleased that I did as the little doggies are already making themselves at home on the tree.

Our tree is themed red and gold (together with all manner of Bumble Bee'r creations - but that is for another post) so their tartan bows match in perfectly.

One Scottie has been given pride of place, just below the Christmas Angel, keeping my favourite Christmas kitty decoration company.

Thankyou so much Diane for all the hard work that you have put into these generous and considerate gifts. Wishing you and your family and early but heartfelt Merry Christmas,

Love from Bumble Bee Cottage

XXXXX

Guy Fawkes' Night

We went to celebrate Guy Fawkes' Night at the local Scout hut. B1 asked me if I thought it was the best £7.00 (the cost of the tickets) I had ever spent and that was even before we got there.

The Scout hut is in the lanes so there is NOWHERE to park as all the lanes are one car wide. A field nearby was set up as a car park by the organisers and the walk to the hut was beautifully lit with lights in the trees.

This was B1's Guy his group made; apparently Guy Fawkes was actually a green alien. Nothing really says party more than a group of small boys making an effigy to burn. There was a canteen open selling hot dogs, hot chips and, of course, bean jar. The Bumble Bee'rs were upset as they were not selling sparklers but I was secretly pleased about this as small children waving large sparklers (not the type we would put on a cake in Australia) about would result in a trip to A&E I think.

All of the 'Guys' were placed on the bonfire, which was ceremoniously lit with a blazing torch at 6.30pm. The Bumble Bee'rs were so excited. They have been dreaming about Guy Fawkes' Night for weeks, when they haven't been talking about Halloween that is.

It was quite windy and the flames were being blown up high into the night sky. After about half an hour the bonfire had burnt down enough for the fireworks to be lit.

The firework display went for about 40 minutes. You can see in this photo how windy it was as the fireworks are getting blown off course, so to speak. From where we were watching you could also see other displays at two different venues at the same time so it was as if we were surrounded by fireworks. The evening ended by 7.30pm.

Australia does not celebrate Guy Fawkes' Night anymore and the general public is not allowed to purchase fireworks. The fireworks go on sale in Guernsey the day after Halloween and are taken off the shelves on Guy Fawkes' Night. People are supposed to stop setting them off after Guy Fawkes' Night but we usually have a few more nights of it as people use up their supplies. Our neighbours across the road really go to town and it is akin to a war zone. They had some that were reminiscent of a missile launch as seen on the nightly news.

I think this is my favourite time of year in Guernsey with Halloween, Guy Fawkes' Night, Christmas markets, school Christmas plays, late night shopping (there is no late night shopping in Guernsey at any other time of year but the few weeks in December prior to Christmas), it is getting colder, the fire is lit nightly and the kids are on excitement overload as we skip through the weeks from event to event in the build up to Christmas.

I am so glad that Guernsey still celebrates Guy Fawkes', what a fabulous night!

Flowers from my Mum

Thankyou Mum. They were a lovely surprise and the kitchen smells like a florist shop.

I love you and miss you.

XX

Happy Halloween

I'll share a few scares from Guernsey with you this evening; wwwa hhhhaaaa, cue spooky music.



This disgusting little number made a sort of gurgling, slurping sound when you touched it

The witch cackled when you walked past and the gruesome looking chap below screamed.

This delightful tray of delicacies, in fact all these scary treasures could be found at our local garden centre amongst the potting mix and chicken poo??

We were out for a quick drive this morning and came across this fabulous display. I love the bigger white pumpkin eating the little orange one.

The Bumble Bee'rs have only just arrived home from Trick or Treating with Mr Bee as their escort. B1 was Dracula (complete with plastic teeth, which he was very impressed with), B2 was a witch's black cat and B3 was a witch. Mr Bee even condescended to were a pair of spunky bat head boopers.

The sweet haul this year was a little more modest, thank goodness, although I am sure that there are more than enough E numbers here to go around. We have already had about 12 groups visit tonight making up about 30 or so Trick or Treaters; all of them had very good manners for such a scary bunch. The night is still young so we may well have a few more ghosts and ghouls pay us a visit.

My pumpkin carving skills were met with approval from all the Bumble Bee'rs this year, compared to previous years. It was declared my scariest yet!

Happy Halloween from Bumble Bee Cottage.....

Autumn Walks

Mr Bee had Monday off work as he has been travelling over the weekend rather alot recently and they owed him the 'hours'. The kids were bouncing off the walls by 7.00am so we departed on a walk by 7.45am in the hope of burning off a little energy. We walked for about two and a quarter hours and covered about 5 miles/8 kilometers.

We wandered along aimlessly for a while and then I remembered the walk to Sausmarez Park I had gone on with some friends; none of the family had done this walk before so they Bumble Bee'rs were very excited to be going somewhere new.

This plant was growing up and down the stream. I do not know its name but it is used as a hedging plants all over the Island. It produces tiny white flowers which have such a strong perfume that it can be smelt from meters away.

We found a chestnut tree on our travels. I am 90% sure it is a sweet chestnut (the edible type) but after reading about how poisonous the Horse Chestnut is I was not prepared to risk getting my identification wrong.

All the leaves will be off the trees very soon and the days will close in, with the daylight hours shortened between 8.00am and 4.00pm (if we are lucky). I don't mind the cold anymore, I think I have acclimatised. The houses are built to cope with the cold in Guernsey, unlike in Brisbane where it can still get below 0*C some nights but the houses are built to keep heat out not in. The gas fire has already been switched on a few times but now we need to fight Tilly for the prime position in front of the fire.

The Spalsh Award

I would like to thanks Julie from KC's Court for giving me this award. This is the first award that I have ever received so it actually came as a bit of a shock (no weepy acceptance speech I promise).

I would love to pass "The Splash Award" to the following"alluring, amusing, inspiring, bewitching, and impressive blogs"

The rules are:

1. Post the award on your blog

2. Nominate up to 9 blogs

3. Let your nominees know they've won!

4. Link back to the person who gave it to you!

Diane from Heart Shaped

Elaine from The Kitsch and the Curious

Hen from Hen House

Jane from Posy

Jenn from Sweet Eye Candy Creations

Natasha from Artistic Creations by Natasha Burns

Mandii from Shabby Dreaming

Niki from Nostalgia at the Stone House

Joyce from Flour Power

Any of the ladies I have nominated should not feel compelled to participate in this award if they do not wish to. I was just so surprised to receive this from Julie that I thought I should pass it on to bloggers whose blogs I love; thankyou for making my morning coffee all the more enjoyable.

Walking the Dog Guernsey Style