Advent Day 24: Last minute Cranberry sauce

Merry Christmas Eve! It's nearly that day! We've had a busy few days travelling round visit people. Today though we had a lazy day, we popped to the shops (not as crazy as I thought but still hard to negotiate) and prepped all our food for tomorrow.

One of the things I prepped today was our Cranberry sauce, we love cranberry sauce and if we buy a jar we go through it at lightning speed! So I decided to try making some for our dinner!

So I thought I'd share the recipe with you as a little last minute addition to our table and maybe yours..

It's really simple and you'll need;

500g cranberries fresh or frozen,
200g sugar,
200ml orange juice.

Pop your orange sugar and sugar together in a pan and bring to the boil on a medium heat.

Once that is boiling slightly and all your sugar has dissolved add your cranberries.

If they are frozen they will take about 5 minutes to cook through, fresh ones around 10 minutes.

Once some of the cranberries have burst and your sauce is starting to thicken up turn off the heat and leave to cool on the hob.

This will last in your fridge for about 1 week but I know in our house it'll be more like a few days!

All our things are prepped and in their pans ready to go right in the oven tomorrow and we've got our chicken prepped and beef ready to go in the slow cooker. I'm very excited about our Christmas dinner!

Merry Christmas, I hope you have a lovely day with the people you love!

Katy x

Advent Day 15: Kitty Christmas DIYs!

I decided recently that I wasn't going to spend a fortune this Christmas on toys for the cat. I'm a sucker and a total cat person so it's hard for me not to spoil Lux, I headed over to the ever useful Pinterest to find some ideas. (Find me here!)

I started with a little stocking! Super simple but cute and of course everyone needs a stocking at Christmas!

Then I grabbed some red felt from my stash and cut out circle shapes to make mice!

I folded the felt in half and used a simple stitch to sew the sides, stuffing a little bit with wadding before I finished sewing. Then I added a little tail by plaiting some thread and sewing it to one end. Quick and simple toy that you won't mind being destroyed in 10 minutes.

Then I riffled through my scraps of fabric and picked out some material. I drew the outline of a fish and used my pinking sheers so I wouldn't have to do any edges. I sewed two fish shapes together and then added some ribbon so you can drag it along.

Last but not least some simple pom poms with a long enough string to be dragged and dangled.

The easiest way of doing this is to take two fingers and wrap a large amount of wool around them. Once you have enough take a length of string and wrap it around the middle of the wool and put tight, slip the wool off your fingers and tighten the thread as much as possible so it is secure. Cut around the outside of the wool through the loops until you have a pom pom!

My little monster cat is definitely excited for Christmas, she loves to try and pull down the tree and all it's decorations or drag away the already wrapped Christmas presents. I hope your kitties enjoy these!

Katy xx

Advent Day 9: Christmas Cookies

Hello, I love Christmas cookies and I thought I'd share my favourite recipe. I made these ready for Christmas tree decorating so I made cranberry and white chocolate for myself and fudge for G. 

Firstly the Cranberry and White Chocolate ones! 

Ingredients: 

135g unsalted butter

160g sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence 

190g plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

100g cranberries

60g white chocolate chips

To get you started cream together the sugar and butter until it's light and fluffy!

Slowly add the egg bit by bit making sure it's fully incorporated each time.

Next weigh out your flour, cinnamon, salt and bicarbonate of soda. Combine together and grab your sieve.

Sieve the flour mixture into butter, eggs and sugar slowly making sure it's incorporated and there are no lumps.

Last but not least stir in your cranberries and chocolate.

Then line a baking tray or pan with greaseproof paper and add small balls of dough onto the trays.
Bake at 170' for 15-20 minutes. Then leave them to cool, although they taste pretty delicious warm from the oven.

Next up Fudge cookies especially for G!

So I used the same basic recipe and took away and added a couple of things.

Ingredients: 

135g unsalted butter

160g sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence 

190g plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

100g fudge pieces

Again cream together butter and sugar in a bowl then add the egg.

Sieve in the flour, salt and bicarbonate.

Add the fudge then shape into small balls on a grease proofed tray.

Once again bake at 170' for 15-20 minutes or until they're nice and golden.

As you can see these went pretty quickly before I got the chance to photograph them. But I can definitely say that they taste so darn delicious! 

Enjoy! 

Katy xx

Advent Day 8: 'Merry Christmas' Banner!

Merry Christmas! Christmas has always been my favourite time of year and this year is no exception. I want to have Christmas spirit in every inch of my house so I decided to make some banners to do just that! 

This is nice and simple and uses things you'll likely have around the house. 

You'll need: 

Black card,

String, 

Scissors, 

White pencil or Chalk pen, 

Hole punch. 

I cut 16 circles using a small bowl to outline the shape. I also punched two holes in the top to thread the string through.

Next up I used a chalk pen to draw my letters on, you can use a white pen or pencil. My banner reads *Merry Christmas*.

Once I finished all my letters I grabbed some green string and threaded my letters together.
I've hung one in my living room above the Christmas tree which you might have seen in my Christmas decorations on Monday! And another in our bedroom above our bed.

I'm all about easy ways to spread the Christmas cheer and this is one of them.

I hope you enjoy making and I'd love to see your pictures if you do! Find my Instagram and Twitter in the side bar.

Katy xx

Advent Day 2: 'Comfort and Joy' cushion

In my recent post showing you my living room Christmas decorations I featured this 'Comfort and Joy' cushion I'd made. I thought I'd give a little tutorial on how I made it!

It's really simple and it all starts with my envelope cushion cover DIY which you can find here and use to create the main part of your cushion cover.

Once you've got your pieces of fabric, take your full front piece and sketch your design lightly with pencil.

You can choose any stitch you like but I went for a split stitch where your stitch comes up in the middle of the previous stitch creating a raised texture.

The simplest way to embroider is to use a embroidery hoop, I used quite a large one and moved it as I worked to accommodate whichever part I was stitching. 

This was an easy festive touch to add to our living room. As our cushions are pretty neutral all year round I've just thrown a few extra Christmassy bits in to bring it into the season. 

You could choose whichever phrase you like when designing your cushion and use thread which fits your theme. I love the traditional reds and greens at Christmas.

If you make this feel free to tag me on Twitter or Instagram I'd love to see what you make! The links are on the side bar!

I hope the holiday spirit making you feel all jolly!
Katy xx