Raindrops on Roses - March

It's nearly the end of March, time to join in with Jo and list a few
of my favourite things this month:

My flowering cactus. It's only tiny but it has flowered four times over
the past year. There are always several buds emerging at the same time and it
takes over three or four weeks for them all to bloom, so I get to enjoy its dark
pink flowers for quite a long time. It's pretty low-maintenance too and this really
suits me because I'm not green-fingered at all. A sunny spot and a drop of water
occasionally (once a month over winter) and it's happy. So am I.

Sunshine. I like that the days are getting longer and we are getting more sunshine.
Last weekend was glorious and most of last week was sunny as well. I really enjoy
sitting outside when it's warm enough and the girls can spend most of the afternoons
after school playing in the garden. It's such a lovely change from being cooped up
indoors over most of the winter months. Today it's grey and a bit nippy again but
hopefully we'll have less and less of this sort of weather as the weeks progress.
I'm so ready for spring's mild, sunshiny days.

Flowers everywhere! I'm loving all the spring blooms - crocuses, daffodils, all of them.
It's the earth waking up from its winter sleep and smiling again. Just brilliant!

A visit to the Emma Bridgewater factory in Stoke-on-Trent. It was only a very short
stop, about an hour or so, but it was enough to wander around the courtyard, browse
at the gift shop and factory shop, and enjoy some Staffordshire oatcakes for lunch
at the café.

I like Emma's colourful and playful designs and it was great to see them showcased
 as well as the limited edition ones she had created for various special events and
occasions over the years.

I have to say though that my absolute favourite was the display along one wall of
the café of framed tea towels designed by her mother-in-law, Pat Albeck. If they
were selling replicas of these at the shops, I'd be first in the queue.

Sadly, we didn't have enough time to join the factory tour but I'm hoping that
we can go back at another time and visit there again, as well as the other pottery
factories around the area. It would be interesting to learn more about British pottery,
its history, and see how it's all made.


Another favourite this March is a radio play - Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte,
dramatized on Radio Four. The only book I've read of the Bronte sisters is Jane Eyre
but I enjoyed this so much, I've looked and found a copy of the novel and it's the next
 one I'll read after I've finished my current book The Trouble with Goats and Sheep
by Joanna Cannon. I've also found out today that there's a two-part series of one of
 Alexander McCall Smith's The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency stories, also on
Radio Four. It will be a great companion while I do the ironing this afternoon.


Those are some of my favourites this month, I'll see what April has to offer.
I hope you've had a good weekend and wishing you sunshine and good things
for the week ahead. See you soon!

Saturday Sunshine

charity shop books to add to my reading pile

making fairy potions

my little cactus is flowering again!

Hello. It's Sunday morning here, I hope you're having a nice weekend.
We had sunshine and blue skies here yesterday, so Spring-like. We spent
a couple of hours outside after lunch - a rare treat in early February. I did
a bit of hand sewing, finishing another motif in my sampler. It was so good
to work in strong, clear natural light. I get by on grey days by sitting next
to the window and under a lamp in the evenings, but nothing beats good
old Mr. Sunlight. I hope we'll have more of him in the coming days and
weeks.

The girls played while I sewed, their games peppered with squabbles as
per usual. Then they had the brilliant idea to make what they call 'fairy
potions'. Lulu had made it last Friday with her woodland club at school and
was keen to show her sister how this magical concoction is made.
So, basic ingredients: leaves, tiny sprigs of rosemary or whatever herbs
are available, an acorn if there's any, plus glitter. Empty snail shells are
 optional. Put them all in an empty jam jar, add water and a bit of mud
(muddy wellies are a good source), stir with a stick, put the lid on the jar and
ta-dah! the potion is made. It's like a muddy, weird slow globe when
you shake it. You can pour a bit of it in your garden and the fairies will
come visit your house at night. We haven't tried this yet but I've been
assured that it works.

I'll leave you with that for now. I hope we'll have sunshine again today.
We're planning to go for a walk somewhere nice this afternoon. Whatever you
have planned for today I hope you have a good day, too. Happy Sunday!

Raindrops on Roses - January

I enjoyed reading Jo's post last week about her favourite things. It made me think
of the things I liked and enjoyed best throughout January and I thought I'd share
some of them here with you.

My morning walks. I wouldn't have considered walking on cold, grey January
mornings as particularly enjoyable a year ago but as I've mentioned in my previous
post, it's a great way to start the day, I get some exercise, and it's been a brilliant
tonic for the post-holiday winter blues.

Our walk around Chatsworth last week

Aside from my weekday morning walks, I've also enjoyed being outdoors

with the girls on weekends. We've been exploring the woods near our house,

finding something new and different every weekend. Lately we've seen green shoots
starting to show through the frosty ground. In the coming weeks and months
we'll get to see Spring unfold in and around the woods on these weekend walks.
I'm particularly looking forward to crocuses and daffodils blooming. There might
even be bluebells down there, that would be fantastic.

Crumpets. I used to love crumpets then I went off them for awhile but now
I'm loving them again. I toast them and use lots (and lots!) of salted butter. With
a cup of tea, they're perfectly yum!

Daffodils.  I like this time when you can buy bunches of daffs in supermarkets.
They are bright and cheery and I love the burst of colour they bring especially to dark
winter days. They also remind me of Springtime and that it's just around the corner-
what a happy thought.

Hot chocolate Filipino style. Traditional hot chocolate in the Philippines is made
from native cacao and comes in tablets which are melted in hot milk. A friend gave
me two packs of these chocolate tablets for Christmas and I've been making myself
hot chocolate drinks with them. It is very thick and it is to be spooned, rather than
drunk, from a cup. I have found that they are excellent for dunking strips of toasted
chocolate brioche. But making it, the melting and stirring, takes awhile and can
be a faff, so it's even more of a treat when I have them.

Stitching. I've written about this  here - this is a slow, relaxing and
enjoyable project. I love seeing the motifs take shape with the colours
I've chosen and how it's all coming together. Fingers crossed it will turn
out real nice.

Radio plays. The dramas and stories I've been listening to on Radio 4 are
fantastic - from The Story of a Name and Little Women to The Bird Tribunal
and the biography of Thomas Telford. I'm also now avidly listening to other
programmes like the comedy and quiz shows. I'm often laughing but also
learning at the same time, and also moved by the human stories. It's been
a very good discovery, Radio 4.


So those were some of my favourite last month - I now wonder what February
has in store for me!

I'm hoping to spend time visiting blogs this weekend so see you soon!
I'm leaving you with more photos of the fog.  These were from last Monday
morning walk. Enjoy!

Weekend Things

These are some of my favourite moments from last weekend. We didn't do anything
exciting or unusual, just the usual weekend things - chores, errands, homework. A walk
on Saturday afternoon and church on Sunday morning. I got a lot of things done but
I also had time to read my book, enjoy a cup of tea, listen to the radio. It was really nice.

There's a dramatization of the second of the Neopolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante
on Radio 4 and I listened to the first episode on Sunday. I've recently discovered
radio plays and I now find myself tuning in more and more often to Radio 4 instead of
Radio 2 especially now there's also the new Little Women serial on weekday mornings.
Sorry, Ken Bruce.

I'm cross stitching on linen for the first time. It is slow going; I'm still getting
used to working every stitch over two threads. Sometimes I miss the clear blocks
of aida fabric but I like how the stitches look so far and it is starting to get easier.
I'll keep going and show you more of it next time.

I hope you've all had a good start to the week.  Thank you for all your comments
on my crocheted buggy blanket. I'm glad you like it. I wasn't too sure about the
colours when I first started the project. I did a lot of toing and froing over stripes
and colour combinations but in the end just picked out the ones I liked from the
whole range. They seem to work together - phew! And thank you Christina
for the pom pom idea. I'll try it next time!

Counting the Days

With less than two weeks to go before Christmas, our Advent calendar is starting
to look a bit sparse. Nearly half of the envelopes have been opened, the treats inside
long gone. It is exciting to be getting closer to the big day but also a little bit alarming
that the days, especially this Advent, seem to just whizz by. Maybe it will all slow down
a bit when school breaks up and the holidays start. We don't have much planned for
next week and I'm really looking forward to having quiet, easy days at home with the
girls.There might even be a chance of a lie-in in the mornings - I am counting the days!

We are getting our tree this Saturday. Putting it up and getting out all the decorations
will be a whole afternoon affair. I'll make sure I have a g&t ready at the end of it.
For now, though, the only festive decorations we have are these red dala horses and our
Advent calendar. I'm not sure if dala horses are Christmas things but their colours are
festive so I'm counting them in. They were gifts from my mother-in-law and the girls
and I really, really love the small ones with the wooden dolls. I might make tiny
Christmassy garlands for them. They are so sweet.

It was grey and rainy throughout the weekend then at around four o'clock
on Sunday we had these spectacular colours in the sky. We see lots of brilliant
sunsets but this was something else. Fireballs at sundown. Amazing.

Then it was back to grey and wet from the start of the week plus thick,

heavy fog in hilly areas around the city. This was the park near school on Monday

morning. A short walk down the path is a duck pond and a line of trees but we couldn't

see anything. It was quite spooky, really. It made me think of gothic novels and the

ghastly 10 Rillington Place. I'm sure glad I wasn't walking on my own that morning.

I wasn't going to make any presents this Christmas but last week I decided

I'll make a blanket for a friend's baby. With barely a couple of weeks to go,

it's not a very clever idea but it's only a small blanket, something for the car seat

or buggy. I should get it finished on time, hopefully. I've got fingers, toes

and everything crossed.

We made mince pies for the first time last weekend. We used large mince pie

cases, much bigger than regular-sized mince pies that Lulu laughed and called them

'giant star pies'. She refused to try any but the rest of us rather liked them so I'm going

to make some more but smaller this time. She might give them a tasting chance if

they're a little bit more dainty. And find them less funny.

Thanks for the lovely things you said about our Christmas cards. I hope you're
all keeping well. I'll be back next time with Lulu's finished scarf.

Have a lovely, restful and healthy week!

Our Advent Calendar

This is our Advent calendar this year, my own take on the rustic calendar
featured in last month's Mollie Makes. I've also seen similar calendars online,
some using little envelopes like ours, some with small gift-wrapped parcels,
some using muslin bags with stamped or stencilled numbers. I like ours very much.
It is a chocolate-filled calendar for the girls that's also a Christmas decoration.
I think it's suitably festive in a simple, un-sparkly way, a lovely starting point
to most of our Christmas preparations.

It was very easy and didn't take very long to make. I used the envelopes left
over from making last year's calendar, a red pen and number stencils, a hole punch,
bakers twine, a branch and bit of foliage. Once all envelopes were numbered and
 we've made star-shaped holes on each of them, they were filled with little treats.
Then it was on to tying and hanging them all up on this tree branch I picked up
on one of my walks in Carr Wood.

I added a sprig of holly and that finished it off - our Advent calendar for 2016 is finished!

The girls know the envelopes have chocolates but they don't know whether
they're in the shape of Father Christmas, coins or other ornaments, and their
excitement is the same everyday. I enjoy watching them; it all adds to my own
anticipation and enjoyment of the festive season.

How about you, how are your festive preparations going? I'll start writing cards today
 and wrap up parcels for friends who live abroad. We have two separate nativity plays
from the girls this week and we're really looking forward to them. Lulu is one of the
Wise Men in hers and Markie is Mary in year two's play. First time ever in my
husband's family and mine that someone's got one of the bigger roles and this year
we have two! We're certainly very proud and we are going to enjoy.

Have a lovely, cosy week. See you soon!

A Walk in the Woods

This was our walk in nearby Carr Wood last Sunday. It was a bit of fresh air and
exercise for us four and also a little bit of exploring. We live just a short walk away but
we haven't known or seen much of this area until recently. We usually go uphill towards
the playgrounds when we're with the girls or we drive to one of the local parks or
to Derbyshire. So it's been a lovely surprise to discover what's right on our doorstep,
 and even more when we read up about its history and heritage.

Carr Wood is an ancient woodland, one of many dotted all over Sheffield
that have been around since or before the 1600's. Meers Brook, which you can see
in the bottom photo, flows through part of it and once formed the boundary
between two Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. It later formed part of the county boundary
between Yorkshire and Derbyshire. Of course, that has all changed now but it's all
very good and interesting to know. And so we are going to make up for our ignorance
and years of neglect and lack of appreciation with regular walks along its many
well trodden paths from now on. There are so much more to see and discover,
mushrooms and fallen logs to investigate, leaves to pick up and play with, things
to poke and inspect, games to play. Us grown ups fancy giving the Round Walk a go,
or even just a section of it. The girls reckon Meers Brook will be all right to paddle in
at summertime. Well, the only way they will find out is to get their feet wet and
come summer, they'll have the chance to know whether that's true or not.
How about you, do you like to go for walks, too? And where do you like to go?
I'd love to know.

Thanks for your lovely comments on all my latest projects. I have just finished
making a scarf and a hat. I'll show you next time. Till then, take care and
have a good rest of the week!