The Covent Garden Christmas Tree is always beautifully decorated and placed within the market place. I love visiting it and seeing the lights and huge baubles on it. For the past few years I always seem to take a picture of it because I love it so much and always makes me feel festive. I love how simplistic their decorates are but they still make an impact. Inside the market they decorate the ceiling with these impressive glitter balls and mistletoe which become part of the market place. It also makes you look up and appreciate it and of course take a picture. It's lovely to wondering around while you shop or just look at the things for sale. My favourite place to go in Covent Garden is a shop called Sass & Bell. It is a vintage style, shabby chic store selling Christmas Decorations, Trinkets, Boxes, Bunting, Mugs etc. I love visiting there and I always come out with something. This time my sister kindly brought me a Flamingo Glasses Case for my spare glasses, two baubles - one shaped like a cloud and one shapes like a star and a box of heart shaped baubles filled with pink stars. I absolutely love them, they are already on display in my bedroom. It was a lovely trip there, experiencing the festive surroundings and enjoying looking at the window displays, handmade items and listening to the variety of music and performers. If you haven't been to Covent Garden, please go, its a great place to experience all year around. I have to say its one of my happy places in London. 
Lin-Manuel Miranda's hit American Musical telling the story of the less known founding father of America, Alexander Hamilton - has finally come to London, after wowing audiences in New York, Chicago and San Francisco. 
1. John Lewis Christmas Advert 2013: The Bear & The Hare 
I love this bear so much, that one a recent trip to Bath - which was catching the train from Paddington Station, there was no chance I wasn't passing up on going to the Paddington Bear Shop in order pick up some Paddington trinkets. But, another thing that is awesome about Paddington Station - they have statues of Paddington Bear around the station - seeing as it the Bear's namesake and where the inspiration of the story came from. This is me at the actual platform in the book where the Brown Family met Paddington for the first time. Of course I was trilled to see this statue and luckily my sister was willing to take pictures of me with it. There is also a plaque detailing where Michael Bond got the inspiration for the stories. 
I'm writing this to you from a Snowy Essex. It is so picturesque to see snow falling over my garden this morning. We do not get Snow a lot in the UK, due to the fact we are never extremely cold and we never get snow during the Festive Season. This morning we awoke to a downfall of snow! 
Now, we were not forecast to have snow - when I looked at the Met Office app last night before going to bed, we had a yellow warning for wind - not for snow! When I woke up this morning, that was a very different story. It was snowing, and it was quite heavy. And to quote the song - it didn't show signs of stopping. In a few hours the whole place was completely covered in snow and it only stopped snowing this afternoon. I love snow, I love the silence that comes from the snow. When I say silence, it's a special, kind of magical silence. It's the idea that the snow has come out of no where, everyone stays in their houses watching the snow fall outside the window. No cars, no people just silence. I love it. People seem to get on with their lives here, which is amazing but scary to see them driving their cars down the hill that I live on - extremely slowly. I do not go out in it like I use to when I was little - cause I'm always scared of falling over but I do love seeing parents take their little ones out to see the snow for the first time, groups of kids having snowball fights and of course the Dad's out clearing their pathways. My favourite is Dogs - they do not understand what has just happened. My own dog has only seen snow twice - this time was the first time that it had properly landed - so she whizzed around our garden, still not understanding what it was. She also barked at it a lot - which was hilarious to see. Our cat on the other hand - went outside, took one look at it and run back in. This might be the only time we see snow this year, and we might not see it again unless we get a really bad weather in January or February. 
We were up early to drive from Essex to London Paddington, where at 9:48am we caught the train to Bath Spa. It was a fast train and we got to Bath Spa within an hour and a half. The trains were also really comfortable. Once we arrived, we made sure our coats, hats and scarves were pulled tight as it was freezing in Bath, we then journey to get a cab to 1 Royal Crescent. 
During the visit to 1 Royal Crescent, we got to see inside several different areas, including the Study, Gentlemen's Retreat, Drawing Room, Dining Room, Bedroom but also the Kitchen and Scullery. Most of the room had a guide on stand by who welcomed you into the room and would happily give you information about the decor, how it was decorated for Christmas and to answer any questions you had. They were really helpful and the rooms were all decorated in a stunning way - I would happily spend Christmas there. I loved the added details for the festive season - for example in the Gentlemen's Retreat - there was a bottle and two glasses which were filled with Mulled Wine. The House, now being a Museum and quite a small place to be a museum - it made it feel quite cosy and with the added decorations made it feel really festive and Christmassy. In the Dining Room, the table was set for Dinner - but this being the Dessert portion of the Dinner Party. We discovered that a Dinner Party would last several hours and that the servants would lay the table with the food but the guests would be expected to help themselves. It was an amazing place to venture around, especially with it being somewhere I had never visited before. Everyone who worked there was so friendly and happy to help and give you as much information as possible. If you are planning to visit Bath, I think this should be your first stop! 
We then hopped on a local bus and made our way to the Bath Christmas Market. Now this made me feel really Christmassy. There was music, the smell of Mulled Wine, and fake snow being blasted now and again. It was also really busy, which was amazing to see, cause it gave you an understanding that it was popular and good. Each small business had a little shack where they were selling there good from. This included food stalls, handmade goods, sweets, clothes, christmas decorations etc. It was amazing to walk past the stores and see items that you would not usually come across in normal shops and stores. We picked up Cheese, a new hat, Fudge, a Christmas Pudding, a picture and a handmade rabbit necklace (thank you Katie!). It was so festive and a really good market to visit. I liked that not all the stalls were in the same place, they were all off of the town centre and down side streets - so they were around every corner! All the stall owners were really friendly and were happy to help and give you information, free samples and of course wish you a Merry Christmas. It was an incredible experience and one of the best Christmas Markets I have been too! While we were at the Market, we also came across a shop called December 25. This store is open all year and it sells amazing Christmas decorations. We cannot go to a new City and not pick up a bauble or two! We got five baubles all together that are now pride of place on our Christmas tree. 
