Christmas baskets

Christmas chocolates & Baskets

December 10th 

Quality Street still going strong

We are most definitely a Quality Street family, none of your Roses, Heros or Celebrations. For us, it has to be Quality Street.  And we only open the box on Christmas Eve. This was an English tradition my parents adopted some 45 years ago and one which we have continued in our household.  Interestingly Quality Street began it's life under Mackintosh brand based in Halifax, here in the UK.  Being named after JM Barrie's (he of Peter Pan fame) play of the same name, Quality Street.  Mackintosh realised that chocolate was a luxury item that many could not afford so in 1936 decided to find a way of making cheaper chocolate and packaging as to be able to retail it at a cheaper price.  He and his wife created a new kind of sweet by mixing hard toffee with runny caramel which proved to be so popular that they are credited with opening the world's first toffee factory.  Traditionally sweets were packaged in layers and separated by more packaging (think chocolate box selections) Mackintosh needed to reduce the cost.  His inventive way of wrapping each chocolate in highly coloured foil papers was also a world first. He invented the first twist wrapping machine! who knew there was even such a thing!  The packaging was also revolutionary, not a cardboard box but a tin, ensuring that on first opening a wonderful strong chocolate aroma was sensed adding to the pleasure for all.  Even today on Christmas Eve, that smell and all that it represents for me, the last few weeks of baking and organising are now over when that tin is opened, it is time to relax and enjoy being with loved ones.

Unfortunately, I am not keen however on the current purple plastic tubs that Nestle has introduced since taking over the Macintosh brand and I tend after initial opening to transfer the chocolates into something else. Not having been satisfied with any vessels in the house, I decided this year to make my own.  Out came a 10mm hook (for you non-crocheters this is a large hook, seldom used), some t-shirt yarn, much thicker than normal wool and a phone call and some messages back and forth with the lovely Kate about the sort of base I would like for my basket and we had the makings of a perfect Quality Street Crochet Christmas Basket.

Initial design stage for the base

Kate was truly lovely and consulted me along the path of her designing my idea, a few tweaks were made here and there and she came up with the idea of personalising it for me too!

Adding in personalisation

Delivery of my bases!

Beautifully made basket baseboards by Kate

I began crocheting in earnest and in no time at all had whipped up a couple of baskets.

Already I could see how the basket would be and
began thinking up all sorts of other ideas off the back of this

The basket bug took over rather quickly!

From humble beginnings, I thought I might be onto something here and put out a post on my
face book page to see if anyone would also like to learn and make a basket.  The response was positive and a few weeks later a group of lovely ladies came and made themselves a basket ready to put their Quality Street into on Christmas Eve.

All set up with baseboards, wooden coasters to crochet,
 hook, t-shirt yarn and the all-important box of chocolates.  The personalisation on the
boards was a surprise that the ladies knew nothing about.

Within a short space of time and having mastered and conquered the difficult base
row, everyone achieved and created a basket in an evening.

End of the evening show and tell!

It appeared that the basket bug continued after the evening as I had made several since and the majority of the ladies have ordered their own t-shirt yarn and are, as you probably read this, constructing more baskets.  I'm thinking of holding another course in the new year and compiling kits to send out far and wide, would you be interested?

A nest of baskets

Nesting baskets in Advent and Christmas colours

One of the ideas that came from this was to create a wipeable base, so it could be used for a wider range of purposes, different shapes are also being considered.

A hexagonal basket

Acrylic base, wipable, very useful!

I may be going a little overboard, but it is such fun and the baskets are so versatile

And look at this from Helen who had not crocheted in ears and now feels she has her crafting groove back on, I should say she has nailed it with this drawstring project bag.

Oval baseboard and personalisation

Completed project bag by Helen

Do drop me a line here or by email to eclectichomeandlife@gmail.com if you would be interested in a basket making course in south Oxfordshire in the New Year or if you would be interested in a kit to make the baskets with written instructions from me!

♥  Do you find you end up making 

more than one of something?  ♥