The Unfortunate Chicken..

So how was every ones New Years Celebrations? The Sprite family had a nice one over at friends. Sprite had more bubbly, and food, and cake! Cupcakes to be exact..
For dessert I made these little babies..

White-chocolate Mud cup cakes with white chocolate ganache topping and chocolate sprinkles! WOO! What a mouthful. (pun fully intended)

Anyway... I was not allowed to bring the remaining three home..that's how much they loved them...


You are perhaps wondering about the title of this post.. well....
For Christmas Hubby had planned his yummy chicken and bacon stuffed roast chicken.. He had prepared the stuffing before hand and frozen it in a log shape..thinking that it would be easier to "insert" into the chicken when the time came to cook it. After a bit of grunting and a lot of swearing I finally ventured into the kitchen to see what the problem was and was confronted with THIS...






...I warn you, it's NOT pretty..










....last chance to look away..





OK but I DID warn you...

YIKES!!!

Seems it is not such a good idea to freeze the stuffing and then try to shove it up a chickens butt.
You live and learn...




"Don't you dare blog this..." Hubby warned me...


"cause I won't Hun..." 

Post Christmas...

I am grumpily posting. Have a thumping headache, so not really in the right frame of mind to write anything noteworthy.. but anyways....
Christmas Day here on the beach was nice, well, nice indoors.. as we were receiving a bit of a walloping from the cyclone in the south. All of the beaches down the coast had to be closed due to the rough seas and all the erosion those said rough seas were creating. Saw some spectacular waves from our balcony though, of a size I'd never seen before.
After we opened our presents my parents arrived and we all stuffed ourselves with yummy lunch. We had home made potato salad, pasta salad, roast chicken, roast pork, smoked ham, Greek salad...washed down with lots of champagne..no wait that was just me... For desert I made a fiendishly yummy Cherry and White Chocolate Pavlova, with a cherry reduction sauce.  After my parents left we were going to go for the traditional Christmas Day Nanna Nap.. but ten minutes later Hubby's Dad and his GF arrived and we had to do it all over again.. especially the champagne and the pavlova. Couldn't let the Champagne go to waste no could I?...
Love my pressies. The recipe book I wanted, full of yummy macaroons, and chocolates and pastries.. and a little craft caddy filled with lollies. And Mum bought me a Terry's Chocolate Orange because she knows how much I love them :) Hubby's Dad gave us his traditional "card with money" gift :)  All in all it was a nice Christmas and Hubby got his wish of hosting. I was happy for him :)

MF this year..

Craft caddy from my son :)

recipe book from Hubby :)

Yummies made by me! those little tarts are white chocolate ganache tarts.

Cookie tree. Did NOT like the recipe on the box.. See the Karate Bread men?  I made them for my son...lol..

Cherry and White Chocolate Pavlova

with a cherry sauce reduction... mmmmm....

Jewel White...YUM! (I'd already drank the Pink..hehehe)

My Dads beer.. BROO! LOL!

So if your Post Christmas Day sales are anything like ours, you know what I mean when I say the shops were crazy busy! I went to my art shop and finally bought myself another easel. It's not the big free standing one I would have liked, because it would have been impractical in our apartment. I got instead the French Box easel I wanted.. a nice Winsor and Newton one for only $129, with three FREE canvas's. Artutopia! I also picked up a marked down "Do it Yourself" advent calendar. Which I will work on when I find the rest of my craft supplies..which means..yes..another trip into the garage..... 

ready to carry anywhere!

M**er F**er, the Christmas Tree.

Some years, I try to get into the Christmas mood.  I put on some carols and haul out my tree and decorations and have at it while belting out carols with gusto.

Sometimes though.... 

I fight with the tree who I have affectionately named M**er F**er, receiving a number of scrapes and booboos thanks to its wiry, slasher-like sticky out limbs and general un-cooperativeness. I always come out of it looking like I climbed into a bag full of angry cats. That’s also when I put on my “angry” music. Something like Offspring or Limp Bizkit...

Today is the first day of December and while Hubby isn’t interested in festive decorating, he IS a stickler for so-called rules and insists that the tree be put up. Today. So I am off, down to the garage to collect said evil MF tree and decoration box.

One thing I can say is that no Christmas for the past six years has ever been the same. Given that I have been living in a new home each time. I have loved the challenge of figuring out where the MF tree will go, and the lights and other christmasy things I like to put out. This year we are a little short on room, but our dining/lounge room opens out onto our balcony with huge glass doors, so I am thinking of putting the tree right at the front, and given that we are high up, the whole neighbourhood will be able to see our tree in all its sparkling, multicoloured twinkling glory. 

MF last year..