Christmas faffing

Here's some of the stuff I've been faffing about doing in the lead up to Christmas...

Making cranberry & apple chutney.

Recipe from here. This is being paired with some cheese from here for US Christmas gifts.

Making Pistachio & Lemon Gems.

I used Martha Stewart's basic cookie recipe, added some pistachios and dotted some lemon curd in the middle. YUM!

Decorating the apartment. It's feeling nice and Christmas-y, especially with all the snow outside. I'm pretty pleased with my Christmas tree as well, which in a bout of stubborness I personally carried home (I wanted the tree now!)(yes, I did look like a crazy woman carrying a tree home) and made lolly garlands for. It's covered in lollies and candy canes and doileys (oh yeah) but strangely (??!) looks really gangly and naff in photos. Hence no photos of the tree, just our NZ wall and Christmas cards.


Making Christmas cards. These took ages and the bloomin' US postal service charged them as a parcel (but of course I wasn't going to lose the cute bells as suggested by helpful postal guy,) so fingers crossed they get there OK.