Festive Finds

I am a Christmas FREAK! I get excited for months beforehand, playing Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You", watching the Budweiser Clydesdale Horses Christmas ad on Youtube (they don't show it here in Australia) and of course my new favourite Christmas movie "Love Actually".

I yearn someday to make a mega-haul of fabulous brightly coloured vintage mercury glass ornaments still in their boxes like almost everybody else in blogland seems to be doing but for now I am happy with these little festive finds...

These funky cards were $1 for five, haven't been able to bring myself to send them yet.

I LOVE these ice-cube trays, they cost 50 cents, it's such fun having Santa and tree-shaped ice, even though they will probably melt within seconds in the Sydney heat!

Hello Deer (or is he a moose)? Either way for $2 I wasn't passing this cutie up. S and D love him, he's the perfect size for their little hands to clutch and push around.

This assortment of Christmas baubles were $1. I love these old threaded ornaments, they remind me of when I was little and Dad was putting up the tree, we would go through all the decorations and I loved fidgeting with them and pushing the thread apart and back together.

Christmas glasses for 20 cents each.

What could be more festive than red snowflake pyrex?

One of my few gripes about Australia initially was how much less festive Christmas was here for us at first, I was used to the Northern Hemisphere where Christmas means cold nights, evenings spent huddled around roaring fires, Christmas lights twinkling on short days and the possibility of snow (the only white Christmas in my lifetime in Dublin was the year we left Ireland, typical!) However, whilst I still have the occasional twinge for a cold Chrimbo I am now almost fully acclimatised and love the Aussie Christmas, I think having kids does that - the wonder and excitement of Santa is back, buying stocking fillers, making lists...

I digress, this book was a great find for $3, it's the Aussie angle on a Christmas feast, featuring beach buffets, bbq tips as well as incorporating the traditional turkey and ham feast (which we Paddies still insist on preparing every year).

This was the motherload of Christmas hauls, not strictly thrifted as they are from Myer but too good a bargain not to share. It was last January at the very end of the sales and they had 90% off the already marked down prices, when I brought $180 worth of decorations to the cash-desk expecting to pay $18 for them they charged me $1.80 with a rather haughty sales assistant assuring me it was 90% off the initial 90%, who was I to argue? Yaay!

I think even in the hot Summer evening sun I may be tempted to partake in some traditional mulled wine heated up in this gorgeous enamel stove-top jug which I picked up for $1.50

Only 16 days to go...