Kirsty's Christmas Homemade Home

Crafty Kirstie Allsopp returns for a three-part special in which she creates the perfect homemade Christmas. I met Kirstie once, and ended up watching a firework display from her bedroom... but it's not as bad as it sounds. Honest!


Anyway, tune in to Channel 4 tomorrow (Tuesday 8 December) at 8.00pm. Apparently the series is a goldmine of creative ideas that viewers can replicate at home. Enjoy!

Happy St Nicholas Day!

Yes, that's right, today is the feast day of St Nicholas - a.k.a. Santa Claus!

In many countries around the world St Nicholas is the main gift giver. In some places he arrives in the middle of November and moves about the countryside, visiting schools and homes to find out if children have been good or bad. In others he comes in the night and finds carrots and hay for his horse or donkey along with children's wish lists. Small treats are also left in shoes or stockings so the children will know if he has been by the lack thereof in the morning.

In some countries it is St Nicholas' day that is the prominent gift-giving day and not Christmas itself. Parties may be held on the evening of 5 December with shoes or stockings being left out for the saint to fill when he visits during the night.

Did you know...?

Santa has approximately 31 hours in which to deliver all his gifts on Christmas Eve, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, and assuming that he travels from east to west.

You can find out more about the origins of one of the world's most popular saints in What is Myrrh Anyway? Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Christmas - available now!

Make yourself a Victorian Christmas

Fed up with the same old Yuletide gifts and festivities? Then why not take a trip to yesteryear and make yours a Victorian Christmas?


Just follow this link to the BBC's Victorian Farm page for a whole host of authentic Christmas recipes and activities dating from the Victorian era. There's everything from toy theatres and keepsake boxes to paper flowers and Wassail punch, with something new being revealed everyday.

Today it's mince pies made with real meat.

Babbacombe blizzard

The village of Babbacombe in Devon has been transformed into a picture-postcard winter wonderland after it received a covering of snow.


Looks great, doesn't it?


Accept that it's fake snow that's been sprayed onto a fake village. Yes, this is Babbacome Model Village, a popular Devon tourist attraction.


Visitors can enjoy the snowbound model village from Saturday 5 December 2009 to Sunday 3 January 2010. But what I want to know is, what'll they do if it really snows? There won't be anything to see!

Christmas carols - a fictional fantasy?

The Rt Rev Nick Baines, Bishop of Croydon, has branded Christmas carols as being nonsense - saying that adults should be embarrassed to sing them.

He also blasts nativity plays as "fictional fantasy" and claims that songs like Away In A Manger give children a "misleading" image of Jesus.

He says: "I find it bizarre when I see parents singing Away In A Manger as if it related to reality. I can understand little children being taken with the sort of baby of whom it can be said 'no crying he makes'. But how can adults sing this without embarrassment? If we sing nonsense, is it any surprise that children grow into adults and throw out the tearless baby Jesus with Father Christmas and other fantasy figures?"

Has he not heard of symbolism - something that is vital to the whole Christmas faith? I think he's treading on thin ice here. The Church needs its own to support it, not slate one of its most popular festivals which draws people in like at no other time in the year.

He also slates Once In Royal David's City for saying that children should be "mild" and "obedient", saying that "This sounds suspiciously like Victorian behaviour control." Well he would do, he's from Croydon.

His rant appears in his new book called Why Wish You a Merry Christmas? and you can pick up a copy here, if you'd like to read more.

Ding dong merrily online

Internet retailers dubbed Monday 30 November "Cyber Monday" thinking that it would be their busiest Christmas shopping day. In the run-up to last Christmas, we spent £4.67billion using the net. But the Centre For Retail Research (CRR) expects that figure to rise to £8.9BILLION this year - accounting for one in five of all UK sales.

You can read more about the phenomenon of Christmas shopping online here.

Christmas dinner for £1.83?

Apparently, the powers that be as ASDA believe they are offering Britain's best festive bargain... a full Christmas meal for £1.83 a head.

The luxury lunch has turkey, spuds, carrots, gravy, cranberry sauce and stuffing, followed by a Christmas pudding and six mince pies.

But if it looks anything like this, I'd personally think twice...