The Periwinkles' Second Christmas

During the next two or three posts I will be showing you all the other wonderful gifts that have been sent to Riverside, so the stone wall tutorial featuring Fudge's cottage will have to wait. 

Today I will tell you the story of the Periwinkles' second Christmas. It goes like this:

Christmas had long passed. Julie had just taken the ornaments off the tree when an enormous bunch of presents was delivered to their home.

Quickly, Julie attached some large bows to the tree to make it seem like a christmas tree again. She laid the presents underneath and called for James and Jemima.

Here is the envelope the presents came in. It was sent all the way from Finland by Sirkka and featured these amazing Moomin stamps. 

There were so many little presents inside that envelope. How exciting! And all, except for one, were for the Periwinkles.

 There was also this beautiful card of a snowy landscape.

After delivering the presents to our favourite rabbit family, I stayed and watched them unpack. Jemima and Quackie were so excited, they forgot to close their mouths and Julie and James were jumping from one foot to the other, giddy with joy. 

As you might know, the Periwinkles are the richest family in and around Riverside due to a lucky lottery ticket many years ago. (You can re-read the story here.)  Nevertheless, they are very down-to-earth rabbits and do not tend to spend a lot of money at all. The parents hardly ever receive any gifts from one another, as they prefer to spend their money on Jemima.

There was one present for all of them, so they decided Julie should unpack that one first. Quackie sat on top of the wrapping paper and peered at the elegant silver candle holders and the red candles that they had received. Also, there was a wonderful golden candle extinguisher. 

"How very thoughtful!" Julie said.

Now Julie was even more curious to see what was inside the other gifts and she opened the one from Siiri and Iivari. 

"Look at these wonderful red doilies!!" she said in amazement as Quackie and Jemima stared at the bag of biscuits.

Now there was no way to stop Julie. She unwrapped the final gift too, which was from Marianne, and laughed with happiness when she saw it was a beautiful fabric bag containing different coloured balls of wool.

"She remembered that I like to knit!" she said.

James couldn't take it any longer. He wanted to know what was inside the package from Tuomo. He started to unwrap it. Jemima, who was now sitting on the floor, was quietly telling Quackie to be patient. It would be their turn soon. Quackie was grinding her teeth together and it seemed like she was close to having a tantrum.

"Oh my!! Look at this elegant silver flask and two cups!" James said. And, being the considerate rabbit that he is, he posed for the camera and me.

Quackie did not have any patience left. Neither did Jemima. "Mommy, Daddy, I wanna unwapp too!!!" she squeaked and looked at her parents reproachfully. 

"Oh baby, I'm so sorry!" James replied. "Your Mommy and I hardly ever get gifts, so we got carried away!" 

"Go ahead and open your present from Emily, dear!" Julie said.

"Mommydaddy!!" Jemima squealed, "I got a perfume collection just like a BIG girl!"

"That's absolutely marvellous, dear!" her parents said, kissing her on top of her tiny rabbit head.

Julie kindly placed all the gifts on the kitchen table and chairs so we could have another look at them. 

And here is the one gift that was from Sirkka for me. 

What a fabulous silver pendant! Thank you, Sirkka!!!

James went upstairs to get the cats. They were probably asleep or they would not have missed an unwrapping. Julie laughed as Jemima and Quackie rolled around in the pile of wrapping paper. 

"You're so silly, my little rabbit!" she chuckled.

"No, Mommy, I'm not silly. I'm a big girl now - I got perfume!!" said Jemima.

THE END

Thank you all for reading this story and THANK YOU, SIRKKA, for all the wonderful and thoughtful gifts! 

You told me, you made all these by hand, which seems almost unbelievable to me, as they are so detailed and so beautiful! 

Thank you also very, very much to the generous Emily, Marianne, Tuomo, Siiri and Iivari!! 

 

Joyful Cottage

Hello, dear readers! Best wishes and Happy 2018 from me, Hester Hogwart!

Do you remember our Poltergeist ordeal in 2016? If you do, you might be aware that Nina never posted about what happened to our cottage after Santa and the angels came to help clean up and renovate on the evening of the 24th! It's not that she didn't want to, but Hamish and I asked her for some privacy. 

Now that we have been living happily inside our renovated home for over a year, I would like to finally show you the photos from Christmas Eve 2016 and tell you that we have renamed our home     💜Joyful Cottage💜. 

Now I will share some "before and after" photos with you. This is what our entrance looked like before I left with the children to get some help. A real mess, wasn't it...

And this is what it looks like now!

The kitchen was also a mess and all our appliances were broken by Nellie, the poor little pixie that was trying to get our attention. Our pet frogs were frozen stiff on top of the oven. Dear Santa and his angels took the matter into their hands and when we came back home the kitchen looked like this:

Look at the beautiful new windows, the curtains, wallpaper and rug! I also love the red deer picture. The frogs were back in shape, hopping around the house and someone had made a meatloaf out of the minced meat and shaped it like a teddy bear!! (Ruff, our meat-eating pet plant, was over the moon...)

This is what my worktable looked like that day. We hadn't any magical ingredients left and Nellie had destroyed most of my utensils. We hadn't any food left either, except that packet of raw minced meat.

When the babies and I came home, the table looked like a royal buffet. There was everything one could wish for. Fresh fruit and vegetables, apple pie and chocolate cake, loaves of warm bread, carrot soup, butter and ham, apples with vanilla and cinnamon sauce fresh out of the oven, milk and orange juice to drink, vanilla pudding and cheeses for desert, a can of sardines, a jar of apricots and pickled cucumbers. What a feast!

"What about the children's cold and hard little cots?" you might ask. Where did they sleep that night? 

In case you don't remember, little Nellie had placed clothes moths on their blankets, and the maggots had slowly eaten up the bedding...

Well, that problem was also solved, as Santa gave my babies three cozy and warm woollen sleeping bags for their cots. From that night on my babies slept as comfortably as sausage rolls in an oven!!!

I do hope you enjoyed this little visit to Joyful Cottage. 

Kisses to all and come back soon!!

Gifts from Dandelion Creek!!!!

🎄 🎅 🎄

Hello everybody, this is Fudge writing again today, as Nina is very busy. Today, we received this amazing box all the way from Emily and the citizens of Dandelion Creek. 

Can you believe it?? Gifts all the way from NEW ZEALAND!! I think the Riversiders have never before received presents from so far away! 

Allow me to show you what was inside.

Wow! First of all, thank you Emily, for this wonderful, beautiful and handmade(!) card featuring some of the furry inhabitants of Dandelion Creek.

Mommy took out all the presents (there were so many!!) and placed them on the table. Immediately, some seashells fell out of the packaging. Seashells all the way from NZ. That is amazing! Thank you, Emily. 😄

We are so lucky this christmas, as we have already received seashells from another country and reader of this blog called Drora. 

Are you people trying to tell us something?? Are you hoping to see more posts about beaches? 😂

Okay, where was I? Oh yes! Here is a picture of all the presents after unpacking!!  

Everything has been unwrapped, except for me... *giggle* But then I was not a part of Emily's parcel... Instead, I have been wrapped warmly into Emily's

wonderful, fabulous, AMAZING handmade scarf and hat!!!  

Looks like Jemima would like to try some of the cookies the Macavaties sent! Her duck Quackie has hogged all of the Vanillekipferl (German vanilla flavoured Christmas cookies). And my little buddy Pickles is feeling very comfortable between the different flavoured candies and candy canes!

Do not worry, Emily, we will find someone interested in the chocolate Jaffas and the juicy looking jelly beans! I will probably take care of them myself... 

Oh, and one more thing, Emily... I know you wrote the hat was supposed to be for one of the rabbit children of Riverside... But, you know, since it fits me so well, and matches the beautiful scarf you made for me, and since my Mommy always squeals in delight when she sees me wearing it, could I please, please keep it for myself??

Dear Emily, THANK YOU so much for this wonderful and amazing parcel. You have put so much work into the gifts, even making sure to write tiny notes explaining each item. My Mommy is sooo happy, you really made her day. 😍

And to all of the other wonderful blog readers who have sent us Christmas cards and presents this year I would also like to say 💗thank you💗. Riverside has received such beautiful presents from all over the world, from Birgit, Cutata, Drora, Emily and Sarah and I do hope I did not forget to mention anyone... (And if I did, it's my Mommy's fault for not writing this entry herself... 😌)

Nina does not know whether she will be able to feature unpackings of all the parcels we have received, but please know that they are all very, very deeply appreciated, every single card, gift or sweet. (Especially the sweets... *ahem*)

Kind regards to all and to all a wonderful, fabulous and AMAZING 2018!!