Christmas Shopping

I finally had to admit that I could ignore Christmas approaching no longer (this was some time in November!). I had been moaning about the early Christmas displays in shops (no kidding, the first one I saw was at the end of August!) for weeks, or even months, but with the general hectic and being ill in November I then completely "forgot" to develop any sort of Christmas mood at all. I still haven't! It also wasn't until my friend dragged me out for some Christmas shopping at about the mid of November that I realised that it had indeed become time to think about presents and cards. I made a sluggish start on the latter and have to admit that any overseas ones will probably be late this year, but thanks to Eve at least I'm in good time on the presents front.
Just like every year, I was amazed by the extent of the Christmas displays and selections in some of the big shops over here, and thought that over the next days I could share some of the things I saw... Let's start with Notcutts, a big garden centre, where Eve and I did our first bit of shopping. They conveniently had put on a "Thursday Night Shopping" event at exactly the day we wanted to go. We enjoyed some delicious and enormous baked potatoes in their restaurant first (the food was great although the one-man-band they'd put on for that night was a bit of a nuisance) and then wandered through their various sections of Christmas decorations, delicacies and general gifts. This was more a feast for the eye as the prices were offputting... Here's the first instalment of piccies, taken in the traditional decorations section.

Credits: based on qp by Valinda J; tag by Alice Naylor

Credits: based on template by Amy Watson; kit by Sara Carling (this was a charity kit - do have a look on the site)