I’ll be honest, this is not my greatest time of year. In my family I don’t have the best Christmas reputation – for spirit, for cheer, for presents. Yes, there have been comparisons to a certain Dickens character; no, not Samuel Pickwick. Thank heaven then for Kirstie’s Handmade Christmas (Channel 4) which I’m hoping will help, inspire, get me more in the mood and make me a better person.
Here’s Kirstie Allsopp, then, up a mountain in Saas-Fee in Switzerland. Ooh, now that, I think, I do approve of: a nice little pre-Christmas skiing holiday without the kids, with the money you’ve saved by not buying anything and only giving rubbish handmade presents …
No, that’s not the right attitude; and Kirstie is here to meet a Swiss lady who is going to show us how to make a stunning, show-stopping Christmas garland. (Since Bake Off everything has to stop shows, have you noticed?) They gather festive alpine fauna – holly, eucalyptus, light spruce – and stick it into a flower presentation block. I’m not sure we’ve got any of that round here, but there are brambles over the fence by the railway line; I’ll get some, for a pricklier, more urban garland. I think we might have come conkers left too, though they’ve lost some lustre.
Heidi (not her real name) and Kirstie’s garland only takes 45 minutes or so to put together. Factor in the mountain foraging, the varnishing of fir cones (would that work with the conkers?), spraying of artichokes etc, and you’re probably talking about all day. Totally worth it though – it will turn any room into a stunning winter wonderland.
Still in the Alps, Kirstie learns scherenschnitt, which you will know is the Swiss art of paper cutting. Basically, you cut out black shapes and stick them on white paper. Kirstie does one, a present for her eldest. An alpine scene in silhouette, with trees and deers: just what every nine-year-old boy wants. My eldest will also be receiving a locally inspired scherenschnitt this year, then, of Willesden bus garage. This is going well.
Saas-Fee, incidentally, is where Wham! made their Last Christmas video 30 years ago, back when George Michael was straight. Inspired by that – oh, I get it, 1980s cheese! – Kirstie makes a fondue. Mmmm, fondue.
Back in blighty, at Kirstie’s Christmas HQ, all sorts of crafty folk are busy crafting stuff, decorating, inspiring. I’m going to spend hours and hours sculpting icing to turn a Christmas cake into Disneyland. Like Holly here, a firearms police officer who has swapped her Glock for a piping bag. (Imagine if she took the wrong one to work: “Stop! Put your hands … oh.”)
I’ll be sewing my own Christmas stockings, and stuffing balloons with little treats for a balloon-popping advent calendar like Betsy’s. Or should I do Esther’s origami calendar, origami boxes with smaller origami inside, because everyone loves origami, don’t they? Hey, I know, I’ll do both, there’s plenty of time. We’ve all got loads of time for this stuff, right?
You buy your Christmas tree decorations?! You should be knitting your own. Seriously – crocheted baubles, like Matthew’s here. He spent 15 hours making his.
OK, but I need another present idea, for the other one. Here we go, you can make things of beauty out of discarded furniture, apparently. Perfect, someone’s been fly-tipping junk right outside my house; I’ll turn it into a present. A man called Jay is going to show me how. He gets an old bookcase, and then – with Kirstie’s help and using softwood tongue and groove planks – he makes doors for it. Kirsty paints the doors pink, Jay attaches them with hinges, and there you have it, yay Jay! But what is it, a bookcase with pink doors? No, a dolls’ house! Really?
OK, so the youngest gets a crappy old bookcase with new pink doors, his brother has the scheisseschnitt. Their mother? I’ll probably knit her a cake, or do her an origami duck or something. I thought I’d maybe do the tree on a Chapman brothers theme, with a lot of dismembered bodies and spray-on death. And then we’ll blast out Wham! to drown out the sobs as we weep into our festive fondues. Merry Christmas.
A lovely end to a lovely second series of Catastrophe (Channel 4) – even better, more confident than the first. Best exchange? Rob’s “Is your email address still impatientshithead@mean.jerk?” And then Sharon’s funnier riposte, which I won’t write here because it contains the c-word, and my editor might argue it isn’t absolutely necessary to repeat, in a family column. I’m still laughing though, dot c-word! Then he leaves, a trial separation that obviously doesn’t work because they are perfect together. That’s the winning combination – filthy, funny, with proper chemistry and warmth. More please.
