Advent Calendar 2016

3rd December

Today's window reveals a rather androgynous looking fellow, wearing  an elf's jacket carrying a basket full of rather gender specific Christmas gifts.

Advent Calendar

2nd December

So today's window on our advent calendar reveals a nice sprig of holly, ancient celts among you will recognise this as a symbol of good luck, or if you swing the other way it can be symbolic of Christ's crown of thorns.

We're Back!

Yes we are back on this first day of December 2016 with an advent calendar and a recipe from the Tartist. 

This year we have bought ourselves a traditional advent calendar, not being big fans of the dodgy branded chocolate ones.

1st December 

Today's window reveals a couple of young bell ringers, presumably ringing in the season. Nothing says christmas more than a couple of roister-doisters ringing bells, sporting hats at jaunty angles. Except perhaps the birth of the messiah.

Now I'm no Delia Smith but...

I do know a thing or two about food.
Yesterday when I was having my haircut Nicky kept stopping the blow drying process to ask me what she could take to a friends for dinner party pudding. She wanted something she could make on Friday and take on Saturday night, straight after work with no hassle.
So we came up with Baileys Cheesecake and I promised to send her a recipe this morning. It's 5 am and I can't sleep so Nicky here it is:-


• You need about a 10" spring sided deep tin. I'm not sure what these are properly called but they are deep and have a hinge that opens to loosen the sides.
• Crush 8 oz digestive biscuits (or ginger, any biscuit really but I think chocolate might be a bit yuk with the butter ) Melt 3 oz butter and stir in the crushed biscuit. Use this to make a flat layer in the bottom of the tin. Stick this in the fridge until firm. 
• For the filling you need 400g cream cheese, 6 tablespoons of icing sugar, 2 cartons of double cream 
(I think they are about 300ml each) and about three tablespoons of Baileys. Stir the icing sugar into the cream cheese, pour in the cream and whisk until it thickens. It wants to be fairly thick so that it will set with the alcohol in it. Stir the Baileys in gently. Plop onto the biscuit base, smooth the top cover and pop back in the fridge.
• To make it look Christmassy you could make a stencil, with something like a margarine lid, and use edible glitter to write something or to do a Christmas Tree and holly.

December 24th

Well here it is, our final window no. 24. I really can't figure this one out at all, a bizarre little cherub wearing only red socks and gloves brandishing what looks to me like a sprig of good old Euphorbia Pulcherrima. Now if I could I would definately swap this one with December 17th but I can't so it just remains for me to wish you all a very Happy Christmas with love and peace for the coming new year!

December 23rd

Here we have our penultimate window, a sleepy winter scene of a red snow covered cabin with a fire alight set against a beautiful green(?)! sky.

December 19th, 20th, 21st, 22nd.

I'm beginning to think someone somewhere has an advent calendar with no santas at all because we've got more than is really necessary or desirable on ours. Anyway starting top left again (clockwise) we have December 19th, 20th, 21st and 22nd.

December 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th.

O.k. friends I've decided the only way to get to the end of this little flight of fancy at such a hectic time of year is to group together some windows. So here goes...Clockwise from top left, No. 14 brings us a right 'mish-mash' of an angel (could be Gabriel, I'm not certain), a Christmas tree with pre-fire regulations candles and the star of Bethlehem. No. 15 showing a most evil looking snowman. No. 16 reveals Santa planning his evenings work and No. 17 a very premature holy infant which if you ask me really should have been in window no.24.

December 13th

Window no.13, Santa Claus, Father Christmas, St. Nicholas etc. etc. etc. bringer of overnight gifts as if by magic to millions of children. I fell in love with Raymond Briggs depiction of him as a somewhat ill tempered old fella living in a normal house with a couple of reindeer and a cat and a dog, way back in the seventies. Interesting to note that we only ever see him now dressed in his red and white garb because of an advertising campaign made by Coca-Cola in the thirties.

December 12th

Window no.12

December 11th

Window no.11, sorry folks, yet more more schmaltzy victoriana.

December 10th

Window no.10, double figures, brings us what looks to me like a cerub or should that be cerubim? or indeed seruphim, I don't know, I should have listened more in my history of art lectures, that said, this one has been aflicted with ginger hair!

December 9th

Window No.9, a pre global warming image of a healthy young belle, probably having a nice skate around the frozen village lake. She's just stopped to change the song on her i-pod and remove the mistletoe that the illustrator has placed precariously on her muff!

December 8th

Window no.8, Euphorbia pulcherrima, Poinsettia to you and me.

December 7th

Window no.7. A bit of a mess this one, Santa is stuck up the chimney (nothing new there) and we finally get to see our toy trumpet but that's about as far as it goes, a bit of a dissapointing window.

December 6th

Window no.6 shows a Christmas tree. Bringing a fir tree indoors at Christmas was, if I'm not mistaken, one of prince Albert's bright ideas. I can only assume Victoria never minded all the needles dropping off on her carpet. The one in our picture is very definately 'old school' being illuminated with real candles...ahh.

December 5th

Window no.5, brings us the most kitsch image so far, good ole Father Christmas with the most ludicrously cherub-like infant tangled in his whiskers.

December 4th

Window no.4 reveals a bell and I have to say the tartist and I were both expecting a toy trumpet for some reason but never mind we have plenty of windows to go. You'll notice the the bell is inscribed with the word Noel which could be a nice little gesture to our Euro-cousins or more likely the word Christmas wouldn't fit. And what type of flowers could they be?

December 3rd

Window no.3 has all the right ingredients, three nice young ladies carol singing, some wispy snow flakes for good measure and a general warm yuletide glow. my first impression is that butter wouldn't melt in their mouths but I have a sneaky feeling the little girl on the left peeking round the fold might be deliberately singing the alternative 'naughty' lyrics to 'We three kings of orient are!'.

December 2nd

Window no.2 and bang on the money, a picture of Joseph and Mary already. I wasn't expecting them so soon, this is more like a window no.24 image if you ask me. You'll see I've included some surrounding glitter to put things in context, and the observant amongst you will notice that the tartist in her enthusiasm this morning has ripped the window giving a tantalising glimpse behind window no.11! Now, sorry to get picky but Joseph, Mary and the newborn baby 'J' seem to be heading east past the pyramids heading them wildly in the wrong direction, unless of course Herod has already popped his clogs in which case its a bit early for window no.2.

December 1st

Window no.1 in all it's splendour, a secular image to start the ball rolling, nothing too heavy, a snow man and woman in what appear to be 'dickensian' hats holding a candle each.