Merry Christmas to you all !!!

I like to wish you a merry Christmas !
With love Jacoline.

Christmas in Summer ??

I still can't get used to the idea of Christmas in the summer, but for us it is real.
In my shop is it really busy at this time of the year, everybody is in the Christmas mood, buying presents and decorations. At home the Christmas tree is decorated and the 750 little lights are burning every evening. But still it doesn't make sense to me to celebrate Christmas in the summer.

Every day I come back from my garden with fresh flowers. I love to pick flowers every day.

My little girl is the same. On the school route there are lots of flowers to pick and 9 out of 10 she is coming home with some flowers as well. She told me : Mum when I'm a bit down I always pick flowers and feel great afterwards. Isn't that sweet.

Here are some garden flowers on my kitchen table.

For all of you who are in the Christmas mood, enjoy!

Countdown till Christmas.

We always start our countdown till Christmas after Sinterklaas and this is how we do it this year. I made small houses and pinned them on a photo frame that I made myself as well. The girls are a bit older now but they still love there treat. And I love making things like this.

Sinterklaas.

We had a great "Sinterklaas evening" last Sunday. In the previous year my mum all ways send us a box with dutch "Sinterklaas " treats, but now she is not with us anymore I made them myself. It is so different to celebrate a dutch tradition so far from home because you don't get inspired by others. We had some great fun and some tears when we went over the last year.

I made the filling for the almond cake myself with ground almond. It turned out really well.

Can't wait till next year and maybe the girls bring some nice boys home this year so we can introduce them to a great evening of fun.

What is your favorite flower?

My favorite flower is definitely the Sweet Pea !
I love the colours.
I Love the smell.
And I love the idea, the more you pick the more you get !

This year they grow in my vegtable garden I love it to have flowers in my vegtable garden as well to give it some extra colour. This evening i picked several bunches and put the all over the place.

On my window sill in my kitchen. Don't you love the little vases. I bought them last weekend in Greytown.

In my bathroom.

The last bunch is for my bedside table.

Now I'm off to the kitchen, I'm making Taai Taai for Sinterklaas on Sunday. Never made it before so I have no idea what to expect, But I can tell you the smell is great.

More about our Sinterklaas evening in a later post.

Love Hearts for the garden.

Before you all starts to think that I only bake and eat cake I want to show you some love hearts that I made for the garden.
Living on the coast is living with wind , so I made these table cloth weight to prevent my table cloth flying off the table. You can buy the plastic ones but I don't like them so I made some love hears and filth them with rice. They do a great job.

And they look pretty in my garden room when we not having a outdoor dinner.

Are you a Chocolate fan ???

Are you a Chocolate fan ,than this is a great cake. I made it last week for my friend when we had a craft evening (it is always more talking than craft but we always have fun).

Here is the recipe, so easy and so good!

Add all these dry ingredients in a bowl and mix well,

2 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup cocoa

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

Add all the liquid ingredients and mix well,

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla essence

1heaped tsp of instant coffee in 1 cup of warm water

1 cup milk

1 cup canola oil

The mixture looks thin but that's ok, bake for 40 min on 180 degrees Celsius.

For the icing you need:

200 gram Nestle cooking chocolate

25 Gram butter

1/2 cup cream

Melt the chocolate and mix with the butter and cream.

DELICIOUS!!!

My day at the spa.

Last Monday I booked myself a day at the Spa Horrobin and Hodge (klik, klik) in Manakau, It was GREAT.
Just have a look yourself and I don't think I have to say any more.

Garden tour.

No words this time just a nice walk, enjoy!

Corners of my home.

Having a peek in other houses is what i really like so here a little peek in my house.

The suit cases are my bed site table and the love heart wall is an other corner in my bedroom. The love heart on my wardrobe is made from an old sugar sac and I stamped a 5 on it, we are a family of 5, that's why.

Here a little corner in my kitchen and as you can see I like to display lots of the same items together.

The book case is part of the living room ,so are the love heart on the nice hanger. Most of the items in my house are from garage sales or second hand shops, love to buy second hand so much better than new.

I made the birds from calico and a branch from my garden, the jug is a second hand one.

And here my favorite spot of my living room, the daybed with lots of cushions. We have sun here for most of the day and the doors to the veranda are most of the time open. Next time I take you into my garden for a garden tour.