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Happy New Year!

I thought I'd start by sharing one of my favourite creations from Christmas 2011. I love to do a glazed fruit and nut topping on my christmas cake and I was particularly pleased with this year's version. It tasted pretty good too! 

For me the start of Advent coincided with an un-planned blog break. Its good to be back and I thought I would update you on some of our creative preparations for Christmas. I'm really looking forward to sharing lots of children's beautiful artwork I've been working with but as many of the notecards ordered are destined to be gifts I will have to be patient and tell you more after Christmas. 

This beautifully worked train has heralded the start of my Advent since I was a little girl. My Mum originally made it for my sister and when I came along 2 sets of little parcels were hung on every day's loop. Now we are both grown and have children of our own we take turns to share the fun of this heirloom with our families. This year it is Master M's turn to enjoy the anticipation of opening a parcel each day and, as he discovered on the 1st, this year I have also added a fun innovation to the usual sweetie treat. 

A few weeks ago Master M was inspired to begin hatching a plan to raise money for Children in Need by taking part in the Blue Peter Bake a Difference Bake Sale. Every year on his birthday he takes number butter biscuits into school to share with his class mates. Knowing how much the children like the biscuits, Master M decided that selling these at school would be a great money spinner.

Together we refined a plan that involved sending out order forms to all 600 children at school, giving them the choice of star or heart-shaped biscuits in packs of 6 or 12. Whilst we waited for orders to (hopefully) flood in, Master M wrote to several of our local supermarkets to ask for support for our endeavours. All the preparation was worth the effort and we had a fantastic response in both orders and donated ingredients.

So, at the weekend the baking began.......and continued for a few days!