Countdown to Christmas

I like to spread out a bit when I'm baking ...

When I went back to England for a holiday a couple of years ago, I brought back with me some dodgy CDs (mum had been collecting them from a daily newspaper!) and crammed our bags full to bursting with memorabilia from my youth.  Our baggage allowance was 100kg in total, and we reached 99kg.  (Stay with me on this, it is relevant) ...

Ready for the oven

Today I made my Christmas cake, just in time - better than last year when I made it 2 weeks before the big day!  Now I've heard it said that if you want to make a great cake, make it when you're in a good mood.  This is where my dodgy CDs came in!  I defy you not to make a good cake if you're listening to Bananarama!  Whatever you may think of them (if you even know who I'm talking about) their music is of the annoyingly catchy type, and I'll be humming 'Venus' and 'I heard a rumour' for the rest of the day!

Yum - finished - will go into storage until it's iced on Christmas Eve!

The scary part is I was a wee 16 year old when most of these songs were released.  Still I enjoyed my trip down memory lane and had a good boogie all by myself whilst making the cake!  And do you think I scraped the bowl clean with all that brandy that was in the mix?  You bet I did - why do you think I waited until the kids were at school before I made it?  :)