Presents have been wrapped, ready for Father Christmas to take and deliver later.I'm very pleased with how the pressies look this year. Each one has been wrapped in five or six layers of tissue paper the colour of sugared almonds, and tied with a simple ribbon. Some have been decorated with vintage style millinery flowers, some with paper flowers, the ones for my nephews with candy canes. Each one has one of my semi-homemade gift tags attached. The layers of tissue give each present a luxurious feel, I'm so pleased I decided to do it this year, I almost bottled out.
I thought my favourite would be the pink tissue paper, but I absolutley love the pale green, it looks like the pressies have been wrapped by Fortnum & Mason. I have to be in the mood to gift wrap, or they will end up a total mess. Back in the day, when I was a window dresser, I used to spend the last two weeks of November perfectly wrapping empty boxes for the window displays. A few years after that I worked in a perfume shop, and wrapped hundreds of bottles of perfume over the festive season. Luckily it's something I've always enjoyed, but you always get better results on days when you are in the mood to do so. Oranges studded with cloves and accented with bay leaves, and nuts in their shells shout 'Christmas' to me, and it doesn't feel that Christmas has started until I have them in the house. I like to have candy canes in a glass too, which I hand out to anyone who visits.
Don't ask me why I can give this pearl of wisdom, because I'm not telling, but a word of advice when opening walnuts is to NOT use a knife to do so. Walnuts are best opened via a twist through the base. You can buy special teeny little walnut openers for this procedure. If you don't have this little gadget, whatever you do, don't use a knife that you assume is blunt enough to be safe, but when slips is actually pretty dangerous and leaves you lucky not to have caused a cut deep enough to need stitches. Only a total nitwit would know this, so take it from a nitwit and DON'T do it!!!! An abudance of perfume. Particularly a bottle of Trésor de Lancôme or Coco Chanel.
Now, I am a teensy bit naughty and like to open pressies early! (Darylynn, don't you roll your eyes as you read this!) Last Saturday my MIL handed me my pressie, which of course I opened on the way home. It was a gift voucher which I then took into town to spend on Sunday. I had to buy perfume. Trésor was a must (Father Christmas is taking care of the Chanel this year), 'First' by Van Cleef and Arpels is a classic, and I couldn't resist. Some people hate getting perfume or bubble baths for Christmas pressies, but I just love it. At this time of year I always have a glut of perfume that lasts me into the spring. I couldn't survive without it!Something new to wear on Christmas Day is vital ..
(I should admit that I bought these last week, as a gift to self to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary, but I'm planning on wearing them on CD).And it really, REALLY feels like Christmas when Dudley the cat takes up his favourite festive cosy place. Perched atop the sofa in front of the tree, as close to the tree as he can possibly get.
++ added on the 16th And how festive is this? This is our back garden right now. It is snowing (reasonably, not too lightly), but it didn't show up very well when I took the photo, so I've added a little bit extra.
Now I really feel festive!:o)