Author: Roseanne's Blog

I'm Roseanne :) 33. Married to Tim 💗 I'm a Harry Potter fanatic ⚡ and a Bookworm 📚 I started this blog to document our wedding planning and its grown from there!

Blogmas Day Twenty Two: More Christmas decorating…❄️

Hi guys 👋🏼

So, I obviously did a post at the beginning of Blogmas showcasing some of our decorations, our tree and some of our tree decorations…well…

… I may have bought some more when I went into town this week!

I thought I would share them with you as they are a different theme to our other more traditional decorations.

In our hallway/entrance room we usually have a sort of winter vibe, but this year I could only find a few bits amongst our decs ( I have no idea what’s happened to the other stuff) so I thought I would add some more stuff to make it a bit better.

One of the things I took inspo from is the escape room we did a few weeks ago… random I know, but they had baubles on the ceiling… and they looked so cool, so I took the idea and fitted it into the winter theme…

I went into Wilko this week and they had a big pack of giant baubles in whites, silvers and light blue… perfect for a winter theme… and half price!

I added white lights which go along the wall. We have had these up before but they go really well with the theme in this room as all the other lights we have are warm lights.

And of course tinsel! Light blue, silver and white.

Also from Wilko I got some hanging snowflake garlands…. these are white and silver and look very nice hanging in the doorway to the lounge.

I also grabbed a little fake Mistletoe hanging decoration as it looked cute 😗 and went well with everything else (white berries & glitter!!)

And my little winter friends to top it all off. They always go perfectly in here, but even more so this year.

❄️ What do you think? ❄️

What is your favourite colour scheme for Christmas?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

Only 3 days to go!!! Ahhh so close now.

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Blogmas Day Twenty One: Christmas Hampers 🎁

Hi guys 👋🏼

So another nice little DIY Christmas gift I like to out together are Christmas hampers.

Now of course you can theme them however you like, depending on who they are for, but the ones that I usually do are foodie hampers.

Lets have a look!

I like to go for a good mix of different things:

  • Typical seasonal items such as Pannetone, Christmas pudding, mince pies etc
  • New Christmas/festive themed bits that are out that particular year, such as new flavours of crisps, nuts, different cakes.
  • Specific things that you know they like eg a chocolate orange, certain chocolate, fave sweets etc

And I usually do a mixture of both sweet and savoury.

I start picking up bits for these in late November, early December so that when I visit different shops you get a good variety and choice, and you often find different bits depending on where you go.

Most of the stuff that I pick up for these hampers is the sort of thing that has a long life but I am always sure to check as sometimes I get carried away and then remember I need to be careful or the things will be out of date before they’ve received it 😅

I think these hampers make such a nice little gift, with lots of little suprised and interesting bits to look through and taste.

They are one of my favourite bits to out together! I often find it hard to stop once I start buying the bits for them as there are alot of delicious treats out there.

Have you made Hampers before? What sort of hampers do you like?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

4 days to go!

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Blogmas Day Twenty: Christmas Eve Boxes 📦 ♥️

Hi guys 👋🏼

Every year I make Christmas eve boxes for my two nephews (who are brothers) and my niece. They arrived aged between 5 – 8 so still nice and easy to cater for this year.

So, I thought I would share with you the sorts of things that I have got to put into their boxes this year.

Let’s take a look!

We started off with Colouring/Colour by number/puzzle books…

Followed by some fun Christmas craft activities…

This year I go Christmas Scratch art, Christmas characters and a paint your own Santa ornament.

These ranged from £1 – £2 in Wilko so super affordable.

I also added in some funny little novelty ‘Elf Racers’ for them to play with, as well as some tasty treats including chocolate coins (Classic!) and a hot chocolate bomb.

Finally, I added a Christmassy book to each box…

The Works do 3 books for £5 which is awesome when there are three little ones to buy for haha!

Lots of fun and treats to keep them occupied during Christmas eve and the following days.

And a great way to get into the festive spirit and make Christmas eve special.

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

5 days until Christmas!

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Blogmas Day Nineteen: Winter Photography 📸 ❄️

Hi guys 👋🏼

Winter is one of my favourite seasons and at its frostiest it is the most beautiful.

Here are some photos that my family and friends have allowed me to share, that they have taken, over the course of December.

❄️❄️❄️

📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Carol Rumsey
📸 Sarah Parker
📸 Sarah Parker
📸 Sarah Parker
📸 Sarah Parker
📸 Steph Wiley
📸 Steph Wiey
📸 Wes Stankiewicz
📸 Demi Abbott
📸 Neil Gillingham
📸 Neil Gillingham
📸 Roseanne Byford
📸 Roseanne Byford
📸 Roseanne Byford
📸 Roseanne Byford
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Blogmas Day Eighteen: Our final book club meeting of 2022 📚

Hi guys 👋🏼

So on Thursday (15th Dec) we had our final book club meeting of 2022.

It was a smaller affair than usual as lots of the usual group were ill 🤒

The four of us carried on and I chaired the meeting on Sarah’s behalf.

Keepin’ it festive 🎄

We enjoyed discussing Novembers book… ‘The Girls Who Disappeared by Claire Douglas’

I thoroughly enjoyed this boom and it is up there with one of my favourites from the year.

It’s a Thriller about Olivia Rutherford and her friends who are involved in a car accident and when she wakes up they have disappeared and are still missing 20 years later.

I really enjoyed the twists, turns and audible gasps that escaped me as the story started to unfold. It was a very enjoyable and easy read and with lovely short chapters it took me just under two days to read.

I would give it ☆☆☆☆☆ out of 5!

‘The Christmas Murder Game’ by Alexandra Benedict has been chosen as our December Christmas read.

It’s not your usual festive fair but I am looking forward to this as its different to all of the ‘domestic fiction’ easy reader, festive books that I have to read over the next few weeks and January.

What festive books are you currently reading ?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

ONE WEEK UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!

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Blogmas Day Seventeen: The ultimate hot chocolate 🍫

Hi guys 👋🏼

At Christmas time one of my favourite drinks to have is hot chocolate. Me ans my twin sister were visiting London this weekend so we thought we would try out the ultimate hot chocolate that London has to offer.

The cafe is called ‘Italian Bear Chocolate’ and they are a chocolate lovers heaven.

You cam choose your flavour of hot chocolate from milk, white or dark. We both went for milk chocolate. We also both went for a small (which was more than enough!!) As we wanted to try the chocolate cake.

We added ‘triple chocolate’ to both our hot chocolate and the cake, which is the drizzle you can see cascading down the side of the mug and the cake.

It was so rich, thick and decadent. It starts off like normal hot chocolate but definitely gets thicker as you get to the end. The triple chocolate drizzle is amazing too. You can taste to good quality of each type of chocolate.

This is the cake that we got to share. This was decadence with a capital D. We had to take at least half home with us. The chocolate ganache and fudgey filling were amazing.

It was so good.

What’s your favourite festive beverage?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

8 days until Christmas

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Blogmas Day Fifteen: A christmas booklover diy gift 📚

Hi guys 👋🏼

So this week we are having our last Book Club meeting before Christmas and the New Year, and I saw a really cute idea online that I thought was perfect to make everyone.

They are book baubles!

So I bought some clear baubles on Amazon, I then set about printing, cutting (lots of cutting) and laminating the tiny pictures of all of the books that we have read at Book Club this year.

I did them double sided so that they looked good inside the bauble from all angles. This did take a little while but I made them in an evening so it isn’t as time consuming as it looks.

These would make a great present for a book lover friend. If you know what they have read this year or maybe just make one with their favourite books in.

They are relatively easy and super effective.

I finished them off by writing ‘2022’ in a silver pen and adding a red ribbon to hang them up.

I know not everyone has a laminater but they looked really effective this way and I was really pleased with the finish.

I can’t wait to pop mine on my tree – what a great year for book club books it has been.

What have you read this year?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

10 DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!!

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Blogmas Day Fourteen: A Christmas Escape Room 🔐🦌

Hi guys 👋🏼

So at the weekend me, my husband, my twin sister, bestfriend and her husband did a little Christmas get together. We thought that this would be a nice idea instead of a gift, as it can often be hard to find time to all meet up together.

We started off by meeting for dinner at our local Wagamamas, which was delicious.

Me and my husband Tim both had the same.

We then moved on to our local Cosy Club for a drink and dessert.

After a good catch up it was finally time for our Escape Room slot.

The Escape room we chose to do was at a new franchise that has recently opened up, and to make things even better they did a Christmas themed one.

We knew we had to give that one a go. It’s called ‘Runaway Rudolph’ our mission: Find Rudolph and save Christmas!!

Team Cinnamon & Misery – Assemble!

The room was brilliant and super festive, as was our host.

We really enjoyed ourselves and I particularly liked that if you needed a hint you had to do a funny Elf task like sing ‘Jingle Bells’ which was hilarious.

We had a great time and we ESCAPED!!!

Our time was 50.02 – you get one hour to complete it so we had plenty of time left.

Escape rooms are really fun and I especially enjoyed this festive edition.

Have you done an Escape Room before?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

11 days until Christmas!

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Blogmas Day Thirteen: Festive Food 🍴🎅🏻

Hi guys 👋🏼

Food is one of my favourite things – I love trying new things.

Some of the best food is ‘festive food’ that surrounds the season… so let’s take a look at a few of my favourites in general (and so far, this year!)

Festive hot chocolate

My favourite way to make a hot chocolate is in my Hotel Chocolat Velvetiser. I use the Mint Hot Chocolate Sachets, topping it off with chocolate whipped cream (that I found in Asda) and Christmas sprinkles.

Mince Pies

Mince pies are one of my all time favourite festive treats. I am taste testing lots of different ones (for the good of the people of course) Sainburys have come out on top so far but I am yet to have one of my favourite COOP locally sourced ones so the jury is still out.

Crisps

You can get lots of delicious flavoured crisps at this time of year and these sounded insane – I cannot wait to try these.

Cheese

Cheese is always a winner in my eyes, but a cheeseboard or cheese and crackers just hits different at Christmas. I am also very partial to a camembert.

Party food

I always get very excited to see what ‘party’ goodies are available each year. I love all the mini versions of something of your favourite foods. We are very partial to the cheese options that are usually available – (popcorn Halloumi in the photo above) Mozzerella sticks etc. I also love the crispy/tempura prawn options.

Roasts

I try not to have too many roasts close to Christmas so that I am ready to fully enjoy the main event, but throughout late November and early December, when the supermarkets start stocking all the pigs in blankets and stuffing etc, I really start to fancy a roast. I picked up some bits so that we can have one later roast.

Christmas Dinner is a my absolute all time favourite meal so I am buzzing for it.

What is your favourite festive food item?

Until Next Time,

Roseanne 🙂

12 days until Christmas

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