'Happiness can be found in the darkest of places if one remembers to turn on the light'
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!
Every year since they were born I have created Christmas Eve boxes for my nephews and niece, and its one of my favourite traditions 😊
It’s just a little christmassy box of goodies to enjoy on the eve of Christmas and I’ve included different things over the years!
Here’s what I will be including this year for KS2 aged children (why do they grow up so quickly 😭) its super fun getting things you know they’ll like.
I have included Prices and shops where possible.
Let’s take a look!
Giant Chocolate Coins – Flying Tiger Magic Snow, Build your own snowman – The Works £1.50Wall climbing Grinch – The Works £3Capybara Bath Bombs- Primark £1.30Gonk teddy – The Works £2Make your own Reindeer hat – The Works £2Christmas Bouncy Putty – The Works £2
Hopefully they’ll enjoy these fun little bits and bob’s.
Here are some fun, festive craft activities to keep the kiddies occupied this Christmas! Guaranteed to get you into the festive spirit ✨️
Painting
Reindeer Rudolph printing.Gingerbread printing.Christmas Wreaths.Handprint Christmas cards.Create their own festive masterpiece all wrapped up for family. A great present.
Festive fun
Design your own Christmas jumper.Finish the Christmas lights.Build a chimney for Santa.
I love Christmas lights so when my mother in law invited us along to our local light trail with herself and some of her friends, how could we say no!
And it was brilliant.
We actually went to this display last year for its inaugural year but it was in a different park in my hometown and it was very expensive. This year the trail was set up in a different park and the layout of the park worked much better for this event. It had a more natural trail with paths as apposed to last year when the lights were in big open areas, which wasn’t quite as effective. They have also made it much more affordable which is great!
There were loads more lights, lovely atmospheric music and smoke to add to the magical vibe. There was also a nice little food court in the middle which served delicious hot chocolates. My mint one was so yummy I had two 😋 🤣
I also liked that you could go around the trail more than once, so we did!
The only annoying thing was the torrential rain haha – not ideal! But it was so wet you kinda just had to get on with it by the end haha. It was still a lovely, festive evening.
So, without further ado, let’s take a look at the trail!
We’re back here for day two! And we can really get into some festive fun now.
Blogmas starts on December 1st and so does one of my favourite Christmas traditions… advent calendars!!
So, I thought I would share mine with you 😊
I crack my pop up Harry Potter advent calendar out every year! It’s so beautiful. I love the pop up tree and the lovely and festive great hall scene on the base. You open the little windows and get a little Harry Potter themed charm to hang on the tree.
The first charm for December 1st was Buckbeak the Hippogriff. Lovely.
My husband very kindly got me a Terry’s Chocolate Orange advent calendar. We always buy each other one. I bought him a Lindt one.
I also have a Dairy Milk one that my friend from work very kindly gave me. I’m keeping that one at work to treat myself each day when I get to work 😌
This super cute little traditional picture advent calendar was only £1.49 in a craft shop in town so I thought it would be cute to have this to open too.
And finally, when we were decorating I found this cute Harry Potter advent calendar, that you fill yourself. I bought this a few years ago. When my husband saw it he said he would fill it for me. 😊 Safe to say I won’t need to buy any chocolates in December with 3 little daily chocs available to me haha.
It’s that time of year guys, December has arrived and with it another month of festive blog posts – BLOGMAS 2025 IS HERE!!
For those of you who haven’t heard of ‘Blogmas’ before, its basically a blog post a day, every day, leading up to Christmas day. An advent of blog posts if you will. Very fun.
This is my 10th year!!! (WHAT 😱) of taking part in Blogmas and I am very much looking forward to sharing some of my festive plans with you, as well as some fun gift ideas, recipes and of course BOOKS.
I also have a little something different planned for one of my posts to mark the 10th year of me doing Blogmas! So keep your eyes peeled for that 👀
So, if like me you love Christmas and all things Christmassy then stick around 🙂
Pumpkin Picking with my sister and my niece.Halloween ((Bounce)) class – Byford Bats 🦇Halloweem film day, snacks & chilling out. Pumpking painting 🎃Crafty Bats 🦇 Learning about Bats and creating a bat metal embossed decoration.Halloween Light Trail ✨️Pumpkin Picking with the fam 🎃Decorating for Halloween 🎃 Halloween nails 💅🏻 👻🎃🖤🧡Making my bat lego 🦇Colchester Zoo trail of terror with Sarah & Tim 😱Watching Scary movies 🎬
Last weekend I attended the inaugural Ipswich Book Festival, Chapter One…here’s how it went…
1st Stop – 12pm Talk Author ‘Tim Sullivan’
‘ The Bookseller’
This was a brilliant and funny talk from Tim Sullivan, the author of the George Cross Mystery novels. It was so interesting to hear about the writing process, where he gets his ideas from and to hear his passion for the brilliant character of George Cross. George is great, and I’m glad I managed to pick up the latest in the series (signed 😃) as well as a few that I haven’t read yet.
The Cross novels are so enjoyable to read, and the subject of Neurodivergance is well researched and beautifully represented in these exciting and gripping novels.
Tim was very funny and witty, and the team interviewing were great, so it made for a really enjoyable talk.
2nd Stop – Lunch & a spot of reading 📚
My current Book Club read 📚
Stop 3 – Time for a bit of book browsing/shopping
I had to pop into one of my favourite shops in Ipswich, and our only independent book shop,’Dial Lane Books’, on Dial Lane.
I also popped into Waterstones to use a book voucher that I conveniently found that morning. I love their buy one get one half price deal!
Stop 4 – 4pm Talk Author Wendy Holden
‘The Teacher of Auschwitz’
This talk was beautifully moving, and it was so inspiring to hear their brave stories.
In the current world, it was wonderful to hear some courageous and self less stories about humans helping each other and putting others before themselves, even in the most unthinkable situations and conditions. These are stories that now more than ever need to be heard.
Stop 5 – 4.45pm Talk John Wark and Mark Prentice
‘He’s here, he’s there’
As a lifelong Ipswich town fan, I thoroughly enjoyed John Warks talk to round off a brilliant day.
Every Ipswich town fan knows who the legend John Wark is, but I have to admit I had no idea just how much of a mark he has made on the world of football, the stats and accolades are insane, awards and lists with some of the world’s most famous footballers – formidable in Europe and the highest leagues of football in his day, he really helped put little old Ipswich Town on the map.
It was a great way to end a fantastic day, and I for one cannot wait until next years festival.
Next year, the event is proposed for the first weekend of October 2026!
Roseanne Byford 