Wishing on a Christmas Cake

A lovely warm, breezy November day.  

My Robin Hood family takes me to Forest Park archery range so that they can fire arrows into hay circles.  I am there to tackle any small people to the ground before they are wearing an arrow should they wander into harms way.


Firstly I get distracted by the horses at the Mounted Police stables. So, Bodhi and I go to chat to them and ignore the stern red signs warning us that the 'horses may bite'!  I love horses, feeding and petting only though, I have no desire to jump up there and canter off into the sunset.  I do remember sitting on a horse when I was little and thinking only 'this is very high up and I don't like it'.


I sat and watched the archery action, no tackling was required as my budding Merry Men twanged arrows at small paper targets.

 Robin Bodhi

Max Hood

Hark, do I smell a variety of raisins soaking in cheap (hey, it's going in a cake!) Brandy?  Why yes I do and that cake needs a'making.

The booze soaked fruit is revealed and the 2011 Christmas cake is mixed up.  By this time the boys have gone across to our neighbours to play soccer.  

I still follow the tradition of stirring the cake batter and making a wish (I think this is supposed to be a Christmas Pudding tradition, but we always use the cake for wishes and buy a pudding in a microwave ready pack!).  

Make a wish!

So at around 3.30 this afternoon I could be seen gracefully trotting across the road with a giant mixing bowl full of cake batter so that Max and Bodhi could stir and wish before the cake goes in the oven for many hours.  

Now I am making a wish that the darn cake turns out ok and not a fruity brick!  I always use my Mum's fruit cake recipe and it hasn't failed me yet.  At least my house will smell cakey and Christmassy all afternoon now.  Maybe I should run about with an empty bottle and catch me some lovely smell to save for future use....