Probably the thing that I love and look forward to most at Christmas is spending time with family. For some people that thought fills them with dread but I'm lucky in that us five - my parents, brother, Ben and I are a really close family and have lots of fun together. I love the week between Christmas and New Year so much, when everybody has a couple of weeks off work and can just enjoy watching Christmas TV, films, eating, drinking, seeing friends, going to neighbour's and going on long dog walks. The build up to Christmas is always pretty hectic with lots going on but the best time really begins on Christmas Eve when we all gather at my parents and spend most of the next week there, the days just merge into one with no clock watching. I'd love to share a few photos of my parent's beautiful barn conversion where we spend our magical Christmases every year. 

After today's post about last Sunday at Somerset House, I thought I'd share some other photos taken around London at Christmas time this year and from a few previous years with some must see's if you're in the city this December. Christmas light porn basically. Starting with Selfridges and their famous window displays. 

Somerset House is always gorgeous at Christmas with a big tree and ice rink but this year Fortnum and Mason have sponsored it and it's the best yet I think. Last Sunday Ben and I went to Columbia Road for our annual Christmas trip and then headed over to Somerset House and it was gorgeous. So so Christmassy!!

I love decorating the house for Christmas, things seem to sneak out of the loft earlier and earlier every year. Last year was our first Christmas in our house so I didn't really know where to put everything but this year I had a plan and ordered a few new bits to fill the spaces that looked bare last year. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. I'm sure you've seen a few of these photos on Instagram already but here's a look at how our house is looking right now. My very own winter wonderland, there's nowhere else I'd rather be for the next couple of weeks! <3 

Wrapping. Do you love or hate it? I love it until I'm about half way through with an achey back from sitting on the floor for hours and there's chaos surrounding me. You end up losing your pen or your tape, or your scissors or you cut a bit of ribbon just ever so slightly too short. Or you can't find the end of the sellotape for the fiftieth time. Every year I vow to buy those wrist tape dispensers but every year forget. BUT it's a good job done when you've finished it all and have a pile of pretty looking gifts all ready to go. Everyone thinks I'm mad wrapping in the first week of December but I just can't stand the shops near Christmas so try and get everything done early. I do get a few funny looks from Ben when I start discussing Christmas presents at the end of October but it's worth it in the end. So this is a post all about wrapping and a few gift ideas for those hard to buy for people...

For the past four years, apart from that one I missed when I was in Africa, my girlfriends and I get together and cook a huge Christmas dinner and all wear our festive jumpers. Last year it was held at my house, and will be again this year. We all club together buying lots of food and then get cooking! It's always so much fun and we've set the date for this year's annual jumper dinner already.

Am I allowed to say that I really don't like mince pies? They symbolise Christmas in this county but I hate them. In fact I dislike pastry in general, and marzipan, citrus things, candied peel or the taste of strong alcohol; which pretty much rules out a load of things filling the shops that most people love at this time of year. No Christmas pudding for me, I'll pass on the Stollen, Pannatone is nothing special, you won't have to guard your brandy sauce etc. BUT I'm absolutely addicted to gingerbread at Christmas, and in love with Lebukchen. You will have to guard these with your life around me right now, I've already gone through a pack of chocolate covered lebukchen and made a start on a pack of 30 mini gingerbread shapes that snuck themselves onto the Sainsburys order today. And Christmas is all about chocolate too so when I pass on a mince pie, I'll make up for it in chocolate {Mum I hope you've got the annual tin of celebrations ready??}. So for the past three, or maybe four Christmases, around the second weekend of December Ben and I have baked and constructed a gingerbread house. I love baking, he loves making things so it's the perfect combination. We both also happen to love eating it afterwards. Scroll down for some Christmas baking photos from last year, recipes and the best thing of all - edible glitter!!

At the end of 2011, a couple of days after Christmas Ben and I planned a few nights away to Bath and the Cotswolds. It's a lovely time of year to go away, we'd had a few big family filled Christmassy days and to counter that flatness you sometimes get just before New Year when you can't eat anymore turkey sandwiches or watch another film it was good to have something to look forward to. We went to Bath first, at the time it was my first visit there and I loved it. Such a beautiful city with great shopping. We stayed at The Queensberry, a beautiful boutique hotel located just a five minute walk from the centre of Bath and then came the best part, staying at Barnsley House in Cirencester which was so so heavenly. 

Last year, about a week before Christmas Ben and I had an afternoon out at Bicester Village before stopping at Waddesdon Manor to see their Christmas display at dusk. I was blown away by it, how beautiful does it look lined with trees all lit up? 

For as long as I can remember now, one of our family traditions to start the festive season off is going to a fir tree farm in Sarratt, Hertfordshire just up the road from where we live and choosing a fresh Christmas Tree! It's a big family event, my parents live in a barn conversion that has super tall ceilings so they need a 14ft tree which is hard to find in your typical Garden Centre. We just need an 8ft tree but it's so much more fun to go and choose it while it's still in the ground and cutting it so fresh means it will last for weeks without dropping needles. Bringing a real life tree into your house and decorating it is such a good tradition, don't you think? Slightly crazy when you think of it but so magical. {It's Christmas tree choosing time tomorrow!! And I'm so excited as I'm writing this post}

You might have seen this post about how much I love Columbia Road flower market {in East London} year round. Last year Ben and I visited at Christmas for the first time and I think it will become one of our annual traditions one Sunday morning every December.

For the last few years we've always hosted an informal festive get together just before Christmas for friends, family and neighbours to make sure we get to see everybody in the run up to such a busy few days. The company changes slightly depending on who's around but the food and drink tends to stay the same:

Every year since we've been together, Ben and I have loved going up to London in December to see the Christmas lights, have dinner in one of our favourite restaurants, window shop and start feeling festive. Back in 2010, four years ago already?!, we were madly in love with London before we moved there in 2011 and decided to book a night in the Soho Hotel, somewhere I'd always dreamed of going. It's part of the Firmdale luxury boutique group, and I lust over their style. I have them to thank for the idea of our framed Penguin Postcards in our lounge before they became super popular. This post is going back in time a little and I can't work out if we look a lot younger or not in the photos? But I thought it was too festive not to share at this time of year and The Soho Hotel will always be a classic...

Welcome to the start of the Christmas takeover! A couple of weeks featuring Christmas traditions with photos from the past couple of years. There will be a real mixture with posts full of decorations, baking, festive days out, nights away and some of my friends and family. These posts are essentially what Christmas means to me. I hope you'll enjoy and start feeling super festive, the countdown is on...  You'll find the number of days to go and a daily Christmas video at the bottom of each post <3 

First up: Have you been to the Country Living Christmas fair or the Spirit of Christmas? For the past four years now my Mum and I have been to one of them, usually with my two Auntie's. We've done the Country Living for three and the Spirit just once but I love them both. We didn't go this year for various reasons, I don't think you need to go every year as it can be a bit samey but we'll probably go again next year. So which one would I recommend?

Friday already, the weeks are flying by again which means we're less than five weeks away from Christmas now! Five weeks! How was your week? I got back from sunny Jamaica on Monday and it's been cold and grey here ever since. I love being home though and when I accepted I'd be swapping my bikini and sandals for warm jumpers and slipper socks I've embraced wrapping up warm and getting cosy. Scroll down for some weekend musings and an outline of a few changes to the blog over the next few weeks...

I love chocolate brownies so much but I have one rule, they must be super gooey otherwise they are a cake and not a brownie. What I love even more though is a raspberry cheesecake brownie with white chocolate chunks. Such a scrummy combination and they're really easy to make.

Part Two of our Balinese adventure, pure relaxation at the Tembok Spa Village on the Northern side of the island. {I know it's not a Tuesday when most of my usual travel posts are but didn't want to stretch out this trip over three weeks}

I posted the above photo back in July when I was making thank-you cards and I promised a couple of you that I'd do a blog post about it. Sorry it's taken so long, I was trying to search for the photos. It's not a groundbreaking idea, I just decided to make my own thank-you cards after seeing how cheesy and overpriced ones on the web are. Plus, when guests have been so so generous, it's nice to spend a bit of time making cards to send back to them that they'll appreciate more than a glossy impersonal card ordered online. These are so easy to make:

After our time in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, we couldn't wait to get to Bali. Before booking the trip, we were looking into a range of South-East Asian beach resorts that were easily accessible from either city. We considered Langkawi or the Thai islands but in the end Bali seemed to have the best weather at that time of year {September} and had an amazing choice of resorts. I was clear to travel agents that I wanted to stay well away from Bali's notorious party towns and they suggested a few nights in Ubud, the spiritual home of Bali located amongst the rice paddies {and setting for Eat, Pray Love}. We had three nights here, at the Uma by Como Hotel followed by four nights in a spa hotel by the beach. I started writing this post and quickly realised I have far too much to share about both places so I'll start with Ubud today and follow with the second part on Thursday.

Apologies if this post is a bit Hertfordshire biased but I thought I'd share one of my favourite places to spend a weekend morning since we've got a dog. Ashridge a large country estate owned by the National Trust with miles of great walks, the Bridgewater momument and Ashridge House. There are lots of nice pubs, {this one is our favourite} but for a mid morning snack, Brownlow's Cafe never disappoints! We tend to go once a month for a nice long walk throughout all seasons, these photos are from this past Sunday's visit.

You might have seen this post about our invites and save the dates and this about our table names and plan, this post is a kind of follow up with the stationery I made for our wedding day with, you've guessed it, more brown paper and red hearts. I'd love to share how I made our own order of services, menus and name tags and let you use them for your own day if you like the style. 

Last September, Ben and I took a two week trip to South East Asia. One of Ben's friends and his fiancee had moved to Singapore for work for eighteen months and it's a place that Ben has always wanted to visit so we thought it was good timing to go while James was out there. It's a long way to go just for a few nights in Singapore {and a city so well connected with the rest of Asia} so we combined our three nights there with two nights in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and then a week in Bali. If I'm being totally honest, I wasn't overly looking forward to the trip. We'd spent three weeks travelling around Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia a couple of years before and I felt like we'd 'done' S.E Asia and all the humidity, weird food and chaotic streets. Luckily I couldn't have been more wrong and we had an amazing time, Bali was definitely the most incredible part of the trip which I can't wait to share on next week's post but Singapore and Kuala Lumpur were worth a visit too if you'd like to see..

The loft had already been converted when we bought our house {but needed an interior overhaul}, it was a huge room that we didn't know what to do with straight away. We thought about having our bedroom up there but then we'd have two empty bedrooms on the first floor that we'd be walking past every night and the bathroom is on the middle floor too. It would make an amazing master bedroom and en-suite which we might do in the future or have a big nursery/play room one day but for now I love it as our study loft room that's super cosy in the winter and has amazing views.

November already! Hope you've had a good week and lots of fun with Halloween and Bonfire Night that have been and gone so quickly. I've really enjoyed this past week with an amazing Halloween party with the girls, a spontaneous Saturday afternoon at Blenheim enjoying the sunshine with Ben, on Tuesday I started my Christmas shopping before having an afternoon getting pampered, I tried out a new sushi and juice bar in Berkhamsted and enjoyed sausages and sparklers before watching the fireworks on Wednesday and then yesterday I was at The Savoy all day for an Olympus Wedding Experience day and then attended the Next S/S 15 press day for So You're Getting Married. {see photos on twitter @rebeccaSYGM}. What a week! Having some down time today and looking forward to the weekend ahead. Photos of some of the weeks highlights and more after the jump...

Soup is my favourite lunch in the Autumn and Winter, full of health, warmth and it keeps you full up without many calories. Making my own has got easier this year with the purchase of a Vitamix. I've been lusting over one for a while now tempted by it's crazy two horsepower powerful blender and the fact you can make hot soup within five minutes without losing any nutrients through conventional heating. It's all a bit technical, something to do with the blade spinning so fast it creates friction to heat or cool, you can also make ice cream or frozen yogurt within two minutes just by using frozen fruit. You can also blend your own flour just by using nuts or rice, smoothies are easy and you don't have to worry about seeds, pulp or skin as it will blend it all up super smooth meaning you get extra nutrients and it gets clean within 20 seconds by turning it on with water and a drop of washing up liquid. The only drawback is the price but I figured if we use it enough we'll get good value for money right?  Vitamix are guaranteed for seven years but most land up lasting for a lifetime anyway, they're built for commercial use. We ended up buying ours, a 'Total Nutrition Centre' from Costco on a special offer. I'd love to offer a few more thoughts and share the best soup recipe.

Have you heard about The Rex cinema in Berkhamsted? It's a 1938 art-deco style beautiful cinema which makes watching a film even more of a treat than your typical Vue or Odeon with their sticky seats and annoying teenagers. I guess it's similar to Everyman cinemas around London but this one is just ten minutes down the road from us. I'd been before a couple of times but that must have been a more than four years ago now. It's notoriously hard to get tickets and I guess I just forgot it was there. That changed last Monday though when I went to see Before I go To Sleep and fell back in love with The Rex experience. 

It's Bonfire Night! Did you see this post on Friday about it? Hope you enjoy some fireworks tonight. But as it's Wedding Wednesday I thought I'd share some floral prettiness and imagine it's summer and wedding season again. Or maybe you're planning your own wedding for next year. Favours are a funny thing at weddings, in essence they're a little token for guests to take something away from the wedding with them as a gift from the Bride and Groom. But some people choose not to have anything, or just donate to a charity instead. Personally I think they're fun and a little something extra to personalise your wedding day with. Our venue didn't allow any type of edible favour due to insurance reasons, I was thinking of having red heart cookies with each guest's initial at their place setting but when we heard we weren't allowed we scrapped that idea and came up with flowers to take home instead.

I was planning to post the kitchen transformation this week but I need to do that when I've got more time to sit down and do it justice. So for now, carrying on with the hallway art theme I thought our DIY bus blinds would be more suitable for today. Apologies for the blurred out line, I need to keep a bit of privacy but you get the main idea. A couple of years ago I discovered bus blinds, personalised canvases in the style of old bus blinds {or the rotating name part of a bus' destination} and loved the idea of creating our own with all of our favourite places. There were these available on Not on the High Street but what crazy prices for such small canvases. So, with Ben's admirable can-do attitude we thought we'd make our own version for a total fraction of the price. 

As I said in today's Bonfire post, this is such a great time of year. Christmas is just around the corner, it's Halloween today and Bonfire night on Wednesday. Autumn is in full swing with crunchy leaves everywhere yet it's still mild and we've had some gorgeous sunshine this week. Hope you've had a Pumpkin filled week! I love decorating my kitchen seasonally and it's been filled with orange lately, most of which we've grown at the allotment. I decided not to carve scary faces this year and instead created some girly stars, hearts and drilled flowers. I'm off to a friend's halloween party tonight, we're going all out with a prize for the best dress up outfit {I've got a skeleton dress but need to do some crazy make up and hair to go with it} and a prize for the best pumpkin so today will be spent baking lots of spooky cakes to take to the party later. 

This week's photos are mainly of pumpkins, with a few autumn leaves thrown in:

Happy Halloween! {Halloween themed post coming later today} How amazing is this time of year? Halloween and Bonfire Night are within a week of each other. I love both celebrations and can't wait to bake this gingerbread tray bake this weekend ready for Bonfire Night on Wednesday. It's an annual tradition, I think this will be my fourth year making it and such a nice recipe. Then on the 5th November, wrapping up in gloves and scarves we'll go to watch the fireworks and have sparklers in front of the bonfire. The dark evenings are still a novelty at the moment to cosy up and we all know what's just around the corner.. {*whispers* Christmas!} I thought I'd do this post early in case anyone wants to do some baking this weekend before it's past Bonfire Night although to be honest this yummy gingerbread cake will be perfect right up until Christmas.

The Primrose Bakery is my favourite cupcake shop in London, I've been there for Valentine's Days, had Birthday cupcakes from there and always love their seasonal displays. This post is a bit of a throwback to a last year at Halloween when Ben and I had an autumnal afternoon wandering around Primrose Hill. Have you been? It's one of my favourite places in London with views of the city ahead of you but with a more village feel about it.

One of the things I'm so pleased I decided on for our wedding was these LOVE letter marquee lights. I'd seen them on Pinterest and various wedding blogs but never considered them for our wedding for some reason until about three weeks before the day. Everything else had been booked months, even years ahead of time but the LOVE letters were an impulse. I had to have them! I started googling companies to hire them from and emailed for some quotes. Before most companies had even had a chance to reply, Ben had been out to Wickes buying MDF and decided to make them instead.. 

I've got a lot of inspiration for our house from my Auntie Karen, her house is a country dream. Literally it could be something out of Country Living magazine and I always love going to stay with her for the weekend, she couldn't have children so always says I'm like her surrogate daughter. In her hallway upstairs she has a collection of family wedding photographs through the ages and I loved the idea when I first saw it a few years ago. Ben and I are close with both sides of our families so wanted to recreate the idea in our hallway. 

I had two hen-party's before I got married, one was your traditional bunny-eared, L plate wearing fun night out with a big group of friends. I'll spare you the photos from that, but the second was slightly more sophisticated with afternoon tea at The Grove Hotel, one of my favourite places with my two bridesmaids and my Mum. This post will be all about cake, scones and peonies. What could be better?

From the start, one of my favourite parts of wedding planning was thinking of ways to personalise our day and have a couple of display tables in the entrance hall of our venue, Notley Abbey that reflected some of our favourite things and great loves. I'm a real faffer when it comes to displaying bits and bobs as you may have noticed by now, so I got great pleasure in planning all the pretty bits, where frames would sit amongst jam jars filled with flowers and a slightly vintage take on a guest book and card box.