Christmas Advent Bunting - Part One

When I was a kid I used to love my Advent calendar.  That day by day countdown to Christmas day with a chocolate each day.  Simply the best thing a kid could wish for.

Not with allergies though.  There are many advent calendars on the market - some nut free, but they contain dairy, some dairy free, but may contain traces of nuts, so in reality none that we can get for Em.   So we have always created our own, sometimes sticker charts, we bought one a few years ago, where you just move the tag along each day.  We would have fun things to do some days, stories to read, movies to watch, things to bake, activities to do.

This morning Emma announced she wanted to do some art.  I have been trying to encourage her creativity but she wasnt sure exactly what she wanted to draw or paint.  I suggested she do something Christmas so we could put it up and enjoy it for a while.  She and Bear suggested they make the advent calendar this year.

After consulting Mr Google, they settled on Christmas bunting.    Em found an idea of putting pegs on the bottom with a treat or activity written on it.  I thought it sounded like a fantastic idea.  Today they busily created 24 individual pieces of bunting.

A selection of their favourites.

So now they are trying to come up with 24 Xmas things to attach to each of them.

We plan to have Christmas at home this year so I'm sure the Xmas bunting will be a great addition to the Christmas feel of our house.

Christmas Truffles

Christmas is the time we allergy mums have to go all out to make it special for our kids.  We cant just pop out and buy treats, pretty much everything needs to be made with extra love and attention.

Here is the first of the lovely treats I have made for Emma this year.

Truffles

I absolutely love these truffles and they are so easy to make.

Firstly soak 1 C of dried fruit in about 1/4 cup of liquid.  I used ginger beer for this one but have successfully used juice and brandy before.

Then you need 2.5 C of cake crumbs - I use Crazy Cake because it has some yummy spices in it to add some extra flavour.

Next melt 125g of chocolate.  I use Pam's dark Choc Chips.

Then add the melted chocolate to the cake crumbs and then add the fruit and the liquid.

Then comes the fun part - get in with your hands and mix it all together and then form into small balls.  Pop in the fridge until hard.

Once truffles are firm, melt some white chocolate (I used Sweet William) and pour over the truffles.  I added a dried cranberry to each and a sprig of mint to make them look nice and christmasy.

They are a hit with all who try them.

Enjoy.

Barbs x.