Six weeks today it’ll be Christmas. That’s a scary thought. I’ve bought one present so far, but there are some presents we’re both giving that we’ve already thought out, and that don’t involve the shops at all.

Every time we’ve bottled or preserved something over the last few months, we’ve made a few extras for the neighbours. Not for now, but for a secret midnight raid we’re going to do, dropping off baskets of surprises on their doorsteps to be found on Christmas morning.

So, we have apple jelly using apples from the tree by the river at the end of the road, and tomato chutney using tomatoes from our own vines. We’ll drop in a bottle of the wine, assuming it turns out OK and isn’t undrinkable, some home-baked cookies, perhaps some toffee, and certainly some eggs from the chucks.

As soon as we syphon the wine out into bottles this weekend we’re going to start on brewing this winter’s batch of beer. It would have been nice to have included some of that, too, but I don’t think it will have proved in the bottles for long enough by then, which is a shame.

All in all, though, I’m quite pleased with the range of edible goodies we can put in the baskets this year, and I can’t wait until late at night on Christmas Eve when we can creep stealthily around the houses at our end of the street dropping off surprises on our neighbours’ doorsteps.

But there’s still time, so I would like to think of a few other things we could include, or perhaps swap out for what we’re already planning to put in. What would you leave on your neighours’ doorsteps on Christmas Eve? Leave your suggestions in the comments below.

Related posts:

1. Christmas hampers
2. Self-sufficient successes at Christmas
3. Most-viewed posts on Blagger from Nov 2008