Childhood Christmas Books...

Christmas books of times past...

Do you remember the books you read as a child? The ones you couldn't wait to read aloud or maybe ones your parents read to you? Beautiful illustrations that you sat for hours looking at....The ones you never forget, that to this day still have the same affect they did all those years ago.......

I also have those such books, which I have been enjoying recently.For many a year I have had these books put away in storage, in bed drawers, in boxes....... then last year they moved to my new home . This year they sit amongst my Christmas decor, where they belong, to be enjoyed once more!

Merry Christmas Ernest and Celestine.

A sweet story about a little girl mouse and her best friend. Ernest helps Celestine prepare for a Christmas party, that she would love so much, Ernest becomes Santa to please is little friend, and together they make the most wonderful Christmas story book...

I love the illustrations in all these books...So much detail. My mum used to read aloud Ernest and Celestine, and it brings back many good memories! Enlarge the images for a better look, I hope you enjoy them!

Notice Ernest making the Santa costume in secret ... Here they are getting ready for the party,


Another book I love is called Tilly's Rescue.

The illustrations in this book are my favourite.

Tilly is a wooden doll and her friend is a teddy bear named Edward, Tilly cant find her friend and looks all over for him, the images portray just how small she is in our big world. I always used to think how realistic our world is depicted in the images! So, so much detail!


Tilly carefully escaping human feet!
Looking or Edward. Just look at the Green Grocer's shop, it looks like one in my local village ha,ha
First page of the book, Tilly decorating her home for Christmas with bits and bobs she has found,all she needs is a Christmas tree which Edward says he will help her find....

I have some other books I would love to share with you, I will talk about them in another post as this one is getting long! Can you tell how much I adore these books... I hope you have enjoyed them also, I wish I could copy each page and every image to share with you!

I leave you know with best wishes for Christmas, I hope you are all ready for the big day! Thank you to everyone who wished me a Happy Birthday! I had a great time and received some lovely pressies (which I hope to Blog soon!)See you all again soon

Priscilla x

My 30th Birthday Today!

Today the 10th December is my 30th Birthday! My, My how time flys by! I will be spending today seeing friends and family....and my mum is doing some baking instead of me, ha,ha and making a trifle.... as we have always enjoyed over the years,

Thank you dear friends for the Birthday wishes in the post below...... See you all soon

Priscilla xx

Christmas Fair...'Guess the weight of the cake'

It's that time of year again....The Christmas fair at my local church. Two year ago I joined the church drama/theatre group, and last year was my first visit to the fair and helping them raise funds. Since I decorate cakes I made a cake for the 'Guess The Weight Of The Cake' , I enjoyed it so much I offered to help this year too. A friend always likes to bake the fruitcake, and I choose to do the decorating, she couldn't make it to the fair this year, but still made the cake....

The fair was on the 30 Nov and I spent the previous week doing the decorations.... I thought I would share with you how it turned out.

I also helped set up the day before, and what a day! Lots of goodies there to buy, I did treat myself to a book and bought my mum a cross stitch frame! And my dad got some D.I.Y books! ha,ha
Cookies for Santa..

A visit from Santa.. was my idea behind the cake. When as a child, you leave cookies or mince with pies a glass of milk and maybe a carrot for Rudolph. Santa hop's down the chimney reads your letter takes a bite and back up the chimney into the night.....

Straight away I had cookies in mind, and thought about using regular size cookie cutters.The thing is when I think of cake I always imagine the cake to be huge like 12inch! But of course the cake was a lot smaller 8 inch so my cookie cutters had to shrink!!

I managed to find tiny cutters and that is what I used. The decorations were cut out, iced with royal icing jut like regular cookies.(With a sprinkle of edible glitter on the snowflake) I decided to put them on a sugar plate and make a letter to Santa...it reads

Dear Santa..

Enjoy the cookies!

Happy Christmas xxx

I added some sugar holly, and painted holly on the plate, I took the idea from last years Christmas cake and the porcelain saucer....here is last years cake post .. http://priscillascottage.blogspot.com/2007/12/christmas-cakechurch-fair.html

The Weight... I was so pleased with how well the cake did for the fair, there was just two of us and we were not pushy! ha,ha I asked a £1 a guess, and there was a choice of weights starting from 1 lb 1 oz to 9 lb 3 oz.

and we made....drum roll.... £ 43.00 !!! This is a good amount and we were so happy!! Last year at 50 p a guess we made around £25!!

The cake went to a lady who guessed just above the actual weight... 6 lb 4 oz

So that's it for this year, I look forward to making a cake again next year, but I am thinking we need to change the cake size or shape, as I am sure friends remember the weight of an 8 inch!

I hope you are all having a good week,

See you again soon

Priscilla x

Book Trail...Author meet

Hi everyone well christmas is on its way! but before this blog takes on a fluffy warm glow of the season I just wanted to tell you about my meeting with a famous Author! It was quite a surprise and not really planned...a friend of mine had stumbled upon a book at our local library, and reserved one for me back in September. She loved the book, it is a young adult book which I usually enjoy and although there were parts in this I did not like I enjoyed it all the same.....It turns out the book was been encouraged to read in libraries all over Lancashire!

The Spooks Apprentice - My friend read the first 3 before I had finished the first....and told me all about the tale, and that the characters in the book reside in Lancashire...where I live. Although in the book they had used the old traditional place names...We decided to visit one of the places on the trail, and spent the day at Beacon Fell. The above photo is me..taken in the woods at beacon fell, it is a place many people visit, and spend the day enjoying nature...This was back in September... Since then we heard news from our local library that the Author of the Spook Series was going to visit us in October on Halloween! Well we were rather excited ha,ha never had we had anyone of such importance in our little country village!!

It just so happens he was arriving the day of my friends halloween party 31st, and I was helping preparing the decorations,food and such...since she lives just over the road from the library it was easy to pop across to meet the author!! Of course my friend went in her costume....and her boyfriend came with us, when we arrived I realised it was the book clubs Monthly read!

THE AUTHOR...Joseph Delaney. As we arrived he came to sit in the circle with the book club, and we three joined them! My friends had brought all their copies of the book for him to sign......which I hoped to use a postcard! Postcards all gone I grabbed a book mark! He stayed for a good 2 hour, taking questions hearing peoples thoughts, taking photographs, It was fantastic! Although I did not totally enjoy the book I did enjoy all the experience, and i got my book mark signed!!.... A great Halloween! He was a really nice guy....and since he still lives in the village next to me, very grounded.

and since there are witches in the story...he thought nothing of my friend dressed as a witch!

I know it is VERY VERy late for Halloween photos, but I wanted to show you the witchy costumes, since they are in keeping with this post! I am to the left, my friend jen who loves the book to the right

I hope you all enjoyed coming along the trail with me, and hearing about my surprise meeting!

Priscilla x

Halloween Decor....

Hi everyone.... I hope you all had a great halloween. I am a little behind in my blogging but wanted to show you some of the decor around my house this month. This year has been unusually busy for me, especially October, there have been new people, new places, parties, and extra reasons to decorate!! On the 28th I had a few friends over for a Halloween Party......This is how my house looked...enlarge the photo for a better look.

This is the view to my living room front door......down the stairs, glowing jack o lanterns light your way!

Spooky candy, ready for the party.....solid chocolate shapes, and making use of an empty coffee jar!

I also bought table confetti, isn't it cute? Little pumpkins, ghosts, spiders, I used this on the table for the party, which ill share in another post,

This sweet fairy is new this year, I just love it. They also had them in white, but the gold shows up better against the white walls....... I call her my Autumn FairyI don't know about you but I don't want to take down the Halloween/autumn decor! I might leave some of the autumn items around for the next few days and then start to add touches of christmas...

I also carved a pumpkin, and went to a friends party on the 31st! Ill be back soon with more from this eventful month of October! I hope you all are having a great Halloween.......

Priscilla x

Post Spooky....Halloween Gifts,movies and decor!

Looky, Looky what I received!!! A Halloween surprise from my good Friend Linda over at somewhere in Time. I just love getting surprises in the mail............and what a amazing gift this was, take a look......

All wrapped up with tissue and bows! And there is that tasty yummy candy corn that we in the uk can not get!!!!!! Linda knows we dont have Halloween quite the same in the uk.....so I am really grateful to her for sharing with me such amazing goodies!!

Linda knitted the scarf! What a great piece of work....there is also a halloween magnet, witchy- T-towel, a cute orange halloween cocoa sachet, Witches hat T light holder and I am not done yet.......A pumpkin shaped jar and thread Heaven! I have opened the candy corn and enjoying it tremendously! ha,ha

A big thank you to Linda, you are so very kind, and I love it all! xxx

Now that i am all set and fully in a halloweeny mood, I have begun to gather old movies that I used to watch this time of year
I just found this old movie on Amazon uk.....It was on many many years ago when I was around 10!! Worst Witch the movie, took me straight back to those halloween's as a child, it was on tv one year and my mum taped it, I still know the words and songs today,ha,ha. If you get a chance to buy it I recommend it. I watched it last night after adding the final decorations to the house.

Here are a few of the decorations i'll show more later.....

The cat that lives here all year round, that I bought in Luxor Egypt.....He now wears a autunmy bow, and shares the space with a autumn fairy......Hope you like him!

Halloween Memories......Halloween 2004

This is my Parents house, and how I used to decorate their house when I still lived there, no one else on our street decorated at all.....so you can imagine the looks I got! The children liked it though

. I made the wood painted figures in the garden and the silhouettes at the windows, and carved the pumpkins! What a good year this was......I hope you like the little trip down memory lane...

See you again in a few days with more posting spooky!

Priscilla x

Posting Spooky....Halloween Spirit

I am finally posting my first 'Post Spooky'! Leume over at Beach Treasure is hosting this blog Event.....Posting spooky through October.

It is the perfect time for me to post as I have spent the last three weeks deeply involved in thoughts of Halloween..... a friend is having a party on the 31st and of course needed another girl friend around to help her choose all the party essentials, candy, table decor and the 'Black wig' or the 'white one'? And I myself have been dancing in the halloween spirit.......I spent this week indulging in old movies, adding my halloween decorations, searching out pumpkins......and buying candy for a mini party I am having on the 28th!



To set the scene I thought id share this photo with you, this is the 20 min walk to my parents house...which I walk often to visit them both........When the air is crisp and the leaves have fallen I know its time to think Halloween.....


Does anyone remember this?.......I started this stitching last year and never got around to finishing it, so here it is after I completed it! I am so happy I can now add it to the halloween decorations, and I quite like how it looks on the painted tv cabinet (Which I painted when I first moved in last year!) Its made from some cream cotton pillow case fabric and tea stained! I enjoyed making it and it was really simple to do....that I think I might make other sayings...Like 'The Witch is in' or 'Witches Kitchen'
Now that's part of the decorations covered, how about movies? I always enjoy a good film to get me into the spirit of the season........Last weekend was a blustery, chilly day, and so the perfect time to watch the Crucible.....I could hear the birds outside calling and the leaves rustle as I snuggled up with my Galaxy choc drink and watched....... After that, I knew there was no looking back.....Halloween is fast approaching!

Halloween Food? .....I know not particularly 'spooky' but their purpose is, this was my first attempt at home made sausage rolls! I am practising for a get-together I am having on the 28th.... I made the pastry myself, in the book its called 'Ruff-Puff' a lot like Puff Pastry without the hard work! and the sausage are skinless ones I actually like! (i am fussy with sausage!) ha,ha I was happy with the way they turned out, and my dad especially liked them! I made larger ones just for him....

I hope you all enjoyed coming along the spooky trail.......ill be posting more often this month! There should be food and decor, recipes, and maybe a spooky poem or two! I also have a friends party to help plan and my own.........so it is a busy month for me and great for 'Posting Spooky'! If you'd like to join hop on over to Beach Treasure...



I'd aslo like to say thank you for all the lovely comments on the halloween Cake!

Bye for now
Priscilla x