Poncetastic Christmas 2014

[HopeAndStories]

(Posting FellatioNelson's OP from previous years )
_

OK, first of all, I know it's still September by we need to start this thread now because as you all know, having a truly Poncetastic Christmas involves precision planning, strategy, bravery, heroics, and frequently martyrdom. A bit like the war in Afghanistan, only with nicer food and sparkly shoes.

So, if you, like me, actually want to make the next twelve weeks of your life a misery by hand-crafting your cards, finding a huge bucket for Nigella's turkey in brine, pickling pears, shrivelling oranges in a low oven for those rustic au naturel decorations, dragging half a holly bush back from the woods, and just generally being a smug annoying jobsworth ponce, join me on this thread.

Feel free to post photos of previous tree-trimming, cake icing or table centrepiece triumphs, discuss this year's bauble colour themes, debate the merits of Delia versus Gordon, road-test a selection of canapes and cocktails, (all in the line of duty) and link to lovely inspirational photos/craft ideas for a truly Poncetastic Christmas.

Warning: If your idea of a good Christmas involves Pizza, ITV, gravy granules or anything with 'Aunt Bessies' on the packet, this is not the thread for you.

I can't remember higher up the thread who struggled with gravy, but I LOVE Jamie's gravy, you can make it now and freeze it, its gorgeous.

www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/chicken-recipes/get-ahead-gravy

Trixy, you can use fresh ivy for garlands but don't put them up early as they dry out in about a week. Central heating does them in, homes tend to be hot at Christmas. You can get little plastic 'test tubes' with a lid that you fill with water and push the stem end into, but you'd need to remember to re-fill them and find a way to secrete them in your garland because they're not very pretty. Or you could just make a new garland every few days with fresh ivy trails!

Mantel decorations are easier to keep fresh as you can put the ends of the stems in wet florists foam and keep it wet. This will mean doing some sort of arrangement with the foam in a plastic tray, and other foliage. You can add in other festive decorations to the arrangement, baubles, ribbon bows etc. If you have a wooden mantel, put some cling film on the surface before you put the wet arrangement on it, to prevent any water marks spoiling it. The arrangement will hide the film.

Marking place. I have just moved house and we have a fireplace so lots of poncetastic decorating can be centred around that.

I'm starting a new job though, so not sure how much poncing I will be able to do - I'll do my best though!

Can I enquire how one actually assembles a garland please
In my mind I will get some thick wire and snake it through my banisters then attach the bits to it- in my amateur mind that seems easier than trying to twirl it once it's assembled?
In other news my rusty buckets advent string has arrived today :)

Oh dear Umlauf! If it helps I think all of your recipes sound delicious apart from the chicken and blueberry pie . In my head blueberries aren't as summery as strawberries so you might get away with it. What if you fully embraced it and went for a bluey/purple, white and silver themed Christmas? That way your food and cocktails will fully compliment your decor and you will look uber amazing!

The easiest way to assemble a garland is to have a cord or something to attach it to. When we did fir garland at Floristry we had a thin rope and attached bits of foliage with a long reel of wire, winding it tightly around as we added each small bunch, along the length of the cord. You attach the end of the wire to the end of the cord before you start. You can attach the finished article to the bannister by tying sections on with ribbon, so no need to wind in and out of the spindles. This adds to the decorative effect. So that people can actually hold the top rail it is best to attach at the base of the spindles.

Try to get some branches of non drop types of Christmas tree (the blue spruce is fab), snip off the small sprigs ( referred to as hands) and attach them overlapping slightly so that you cover the stalks. This will dry up over time, but with the needles still on and smells very festive. You can decorate with all sorts of things, just attach with wire.

I hope this makes sense!

Hmm. I think it might be time for a confession. I'm a buyer in of poncetastic-ness. I love going all out with decorating the house and I make my cake and most of the food but I'm not really crafty. Just reading the instructions for making garlands makes my mind boggle!

I do love the idea of the Brussels sprout wreath though - may attempt that. And I'm going to try to crochet.

One year I made Xmas chutney and home made cranberry sauce and mince meat. Ended up throwing it all away in the summer!

Please don't expel me!

Cider I'm with you. Poncetastic as in a bit posh. Very little crafting will be done.

So I may be hosting my whole family (dpx2 plus 3 dbros) plus my dpil plus having 2 yr old twins. And my family will stay for at least 3 full days. I really need to get cooking.

Jamie gravy is excellent btw. Use less star anise as it can be a bit overwhelming. Might order a load of chicken wings and get that one on the go actually.

Ooh thank you girly :)
I have made wreaths in the past so the whole garland assembly isn't as daunting as it could be
Last years wreath had shotgun cartridges and pheasant feathers on and was commented on by most of our neighbours. Not sure how I could ponce a sprout wreath up to such levels

Almond bark and toffee popcorn bark....going to try both of those!! Thank you

I'm another non crafting poncer. I'm not known for my creativity and I'm afraid Christmas would be tattastic if I didn't buy my decorations in

What I lack in Christmas crafting, I make up for in the kitchen though. Promise!

Out. Get out, Cider

I couldn't find any other Christmas planners that I liked so I've ordered 2 CK notebooks to make my own. One to keep for best and one that I can take to the shops with me with lots of lists in. I'm excited to make them all pretty

And you others, get out

I jest.

I won't be doing as much craft stuff this year as I'm not doing food hampers but I will be making lots of lovely food as it's the first time I'll be cooking on the day itself, and the fact that I've been on a diet for over a year and I'm going to want a lot of yummy stuff

Talk to me about Christmas planners! What do you do with them? What goes inside? Is it just lists of what you need to buy etc?

Card lists (addresses), to do lists, recipes, presents to buy/bought etc. Great for feeling organised :)

Just found out that MIL has pulled a three line whip and is hosting Christmas this year as she hasn't done it for about 7years. This means I have to endure Christmas dinner with SIL which I haven't done for about 7 years as she's a bloody nightmare!

It also means that most of my poncing will be craft related as she will be doing food.

At least I can make up for the non-crafters on here!

UMLAUF thank you so much what a brilliant answer. When you say cookie cutter for cutting the cakes what do you mean I have different shaped cutters but they are flat.

Any good cake recipes? Going to look through the thread again for good recipes to try.

Thanks for tips about markets for fabric and will definitely look in the range.
I could never chat in real life about things like this so this is brilliant.

Scoob I cook my cake in an 8" square tin and then cut it into 4 (by eye) to give me four approximately 4" square mini cakes. This year I'll be making 8 mini cakes as I donate some to school for the Christmas fair. I only cut it just before I marzipan it so that it stays as moist as possible. I use cupcake boxes from the pound shop - if you take the cardboard liner thingy out the cake sits beautifully.

Tesco had small round springform tins in last year (about 5" round) but I figure that you would need at least 4 of them cooking at the same time to avoid a waste of electricity/gas keeping the oven on for ages.

I bought a set of star cookie cutters in Wilko's a couple of years ago and use them for stacked star cookie trees - much cheaper than the Lakeland set for poncers on a budget

I LOOOOVe this thread! Have so many ideas but not sure that I am clever enough to actually do them!
Think my first plan is to get pressies sorted to leave dec free for poncing!
First question- how do you attach wreaths (sprouts or otherwise!) To doors? i have a very unponcey upvc door so lacking lovely door knocker/fixings!

I use a suction cup on the glass of my upvc door. It slides down a bit on the first day or two but stays in place subsequently - even in the storms we had last December.

My miniature poncing last year was to make my SIL a sterling silver Christmas pudding charm collection.

When I'm at my PC I'll find the supplier but it was one of the main ones on Google.

They supply a put together selection of themed charms, but it was sold out and I pick n mixed personal ones.

(Must be sterling silver because that's food safe)

I also bought food safe ribbon and a little red velvet gift bag.

From memory came to about £20.

I do the same with the glass on my door. Suction cups are fab.

I got mine in the local pound shop and they're great.

I was given a wreath hanger from Lakeland, it lasted gale force winds and was hidden by the wreath. I also had a less poncy wreath on the inner door too which was hung on ribbon

Glad I'm not the only one!

Can I just go on naughty step please rather than out totally?

I have a few notebooks not in use so I think I will just convert one into a Xmas planner.

I feel a bit disorganised this year. Tomorrow I will check what I have in for Xmas cake and buy whatever I still need.

Good idea to make the gravy.

Time to make lists!