Welcoming the festive season to our home

 I am acutely aware that November is drawing to a close & Winter & the festive season is approaching. I always welcome Winter, the frosts that make everything glisten & glow, the feeling that the garden is resting, the approach to the festive season, the feeling of community when neighbours are out & about, dropping cards through letterboxes, the anticipation of time with nearest & dearest ....  

This has been such an upside down year that I wanted to bring light, warmth & hope in to my space. I have made a start to the decorations about the home, a gentle rhythm moving things in to place in an unhurried, purposeful way, aware that Covid_19 has taken so much away from us this year already so we have to do what we can do to keep an even keel. 

I love the warmth of candle & fairy lights & the glow from the warm colours of winter - the metallics, greens, reds, gold. I bring in winter foliage too - the traditional holly & ivy as immortalised in the carol, as well as while hellebores, also known as Christmas roses - these herald winter time. 

Many of you will know from previous years, that one of my Elective Home Ed Mums has made & gifted me a front door wreath / garland for years. I always really look forward to its arrival because it is a welcoming sign that it is time to prepare for the season ahead. 

A second one for the back garden, it is on the chimnea & it can be seen from the conservatory, the dining room & kitchen. I am so blessed to have two gorgeous ones ... 

I used some of the extra holly branches to prepare a tray for my Advent candles - 4 candles, 1 for each Sunday in the run up to Christmas. Holly & Ivy - so traditional ... 

I am so blessed to have these wonderful handmade gifts again. It feels festive. I will be misting them regularly with water to keep them looking good & once a week, the front door one is taken off & placed on the lawn where it is watered then put back on. I find this keeps it looking fresh for weeks ... 

Have you started your preparations or are you trying to stay traditional & waiting for at least Advent? Tell all ... 

Thank you for your company, each & every visit & comment is much appreciated, 

Dee ~💕~

Warm heather & berry colours for our winter decor

 One of my winter jobs is to change the dining room curtains for the heavier tartan ones because they make it feel warm & cosy. 

Over the summer, I bought some lovely light heather coloured ones to use at the door to the conservatory. I have only just opened them & put them up & are so pleased with how well they go with the tartan. They are light enough to allow light through but tie in beautifully with the pure wool tartan ones.

The living room usually just has its cream curtains but earlier this year, I saw these curtains online & just had to have them because it is a pattern I have long loved. They too have been folded up & I decided it was time to do both rooms. 

The colours go well with my proteas too & those are my favourite colour combinations ... 

I love this corner ... 

These beaded proteas that I bought in South Africa at a market I visited with my late Mother on several occasions, are very special & they give me pleasure to look at them. They are also the perfect colours to match the new curtains ... 

I love the new curtains - they are just perfect 

This corner is just so warm & cosy when the lamp goes on at night ...

Corners of my home in my favourite colours. What is your favourite colour palette? Do you change things around with the different seasons? Tell all ... 

Thank you for your company, each & every visit & comment is much appreciated, 

Dee ~💕~

240 days of lockdown & thinking festively ...

240 days of lockdown today ... 

A national newspaper has helpfully kept a headline tally of the days since our Covid Lockdown began - 240 days today. Somehow the big numbers give a reality check. 

Hubby & I have stuck to the guidelines & the latest National lockdown has deprived us of visits by the new grandson & his family while their major house renovations are going on. We have a daily FaceTime chat which is lovely, even when he grabs their phones & kisses the screen we are on. We miss his cuddles & development. 

While the vaccine news is encouraging, ministers are still planning the way our Christmases will look with Covid still lurking in the sidelines. It does not feel right that we have so little control over our own lives & how we live them. 

On Monday, a free morning prompted me to open our loft & to poke around in the many Xmas storage boxes. I hope many of you are like me with various themes, colours & bits up there which tracks how we celebrate Christmas. 

Some years it is woodland / deer themes which I love but they are staying up there.  I do not feel like bringing down all the beautiful glass ornaments that need special care - they are fragile yet so pretty. Red is out because I changed the curtains in the living room & dining room to the winter purples / berry colours which are warm & cosy. What to use? 

GOLD - I spy the box (yes, I colour code boxes to make it easier) of the various gold decorations & that decides my colour. 

The golds (matt, shiny, reflective, large, small, glittery, various shapes) will do just fine as they add the warmth & light. 

I KNOW, it is not even the first Sunday of Advent but this year has been so incredibly trying that I think we can wing it & be far more random. I always light candles on the four Sundays of Advent leading up to Christmas & my decorations usually go up after early December but with shops closed, it is not easy to just pop out for anything so more planning is needed. 

I have started on the sideboard in the conservatory - it always contains the things we will use like our lovely Christmas china .... a sneak preview 

I bought this length of fabric ages ago & have only just hemmed it as a rather colourful Xmas cloth. What do you think? 

I will reveal more soon but I feel a bit happier having some special things around again,  with lots of candles to bring light in to the darkness of winter. Stay safe, stay sane, stay alert ... 

Thank you for your company, each & every visit & comment is much appreciated, 

Dee ~💕~

200 days of lockdown ...

The whole world is still in an altered state of reality, this year has been the most peculiar one I have known because Covid-19 is not done with us yet, it still intrudes on our daily life & we are aware that we ignore it at our peril .... 

I have chartered this progress with these posts: 

Living with social distancing & uncertainty

We are in the same storm, not the same boat

Lockdown - day 75

100 days of lockdown

As we approach 200 days of life changing times, many people are of the opinion that things are back to normal, the idea that some are invincible is evident on the high street. It is hard for several neighbours who are still shielding with health problems that put them in a vulnerable group. They have formed a little cocoon at home, away from people who might be carriers & for them, normal life is now their space. 

"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." --Albert Einstein

200 days later, there is still so much we don’t understand about Covid-19 & we still don’t know why some healthy people end up on a ventilator, & why some barely have any symptoms,  yet can pass it on. The pressing issue of many scientists is to find a vaccine to protect us from this insidious disease. Only a vaccine can eliminate the fear that exists. We need to be better prepared for a future pandemic, both personally & nationally. 

Many of us have used lockdown to reset our busy lives; the expression of what normal is worth returning to has been a topic of conversation as we evaluate our time. 

Lockdown has been a fertile time for creativity in all its forms because the luxury of time has been valuable to learn new skills.  

I have learnt how to work safely as an Elective Home Education Tutor in the homes of my students - it is a different way, with a risk assessment drawn up to protect us all. My pupils have got used to seeing my various clear visors, the wiping down of surfaces where I work (the parents graciously accepting that I have to clean it myself); the incessant sanitising between students, the digital thermometer I carry in case someone is flushed, the double checks to make sure all are well, the social distance & unable to share stationery etc - it is a new way of doing things but we are making it work for us. 

We are more conscious of the routines we need to keep ourselves & others safe, but for many it is a rare time to reflect on separations from friends & family. We had tentatively planned a trip to South Africa this November to introduce him to his new great grandson, born in lockdown. However, with flights severely restricted to South Africa, this cannot happen. We are all influenced by circumstances & we must bear it as well as we can by keeping up with phone calls several times a day. Dad’s phone fills up with cute photos so he doesn’t miss out at all, precious times when we must reflect & be grateful for modern phones that contact so much easier. 

So as this marks 200 days since we have faced lockdown in various forms in the UK, I send love, light & blessings for all my followers wherever you are .... 

Thank you for your company, each & every visit & comment is much appreciated, 

Dee ~💕~

Apple & cherry tart

 Hi all, 

Do you sometimes find the best recipes come from when you 'wing' it? I had Godsons coming for supper on a very wet Shropshire day & was thinking what to do for pudding.  

I opened the fridge & found two Bramley cooking apples & some tart Braeburn ones too, along with a punnet of fresh cherries that were very ripe. I hate waste so I used a ready made sweet tart case I had & decided on fruit tart.

I peeled & cut the Bramleys in to slices, left the lovely red skin on the Braeburns & then stewed them briefly in a sugar syrup made with dark sugar, cloves & cinnamon - the kitchen smelt absolutely heavenly with the scent of the spices. 

I drained the apple slices over a sieve to reserve the sugar syrup & added a bit more sugar to it & left it to reduce & thicken on the stove. 

I layered the apples in rounds along the edges of two tart cases alternating with the red skins between to give it contrast, then came the hard bit - taking the pips out of each & every cherry. I know you can get a gadget to stone the cherries, but since I do not have one,  I cut each & pulled the pip out. My hands turned a crimson red because the ripe cherries were so juicy. 

I arranged the halved cherries on top of the apple slices then warmed some apricot jam with a few spoons of the sugar syrup & brushed that all over the top. 

The tarts were then baked for about 20 minutes at 180C until the cherries collapsed slightly as they cooked. 

Apple & cherry tart with a thick spicy sugar syrup on the sideboard, ready for us ... 

Sugar syrup in a saved maple syrup bottle - perfect ... 

The tarts were cooled & one was used for supper with a choice of thick cream or ice-cream & a drizzle of the sugar syrup over it - it went down an absolute treat & I have another tart ready for visitors expected tonight. 

Supper in the conservatory while some thunder rumbled overhead; a socially distanced supper with friends to just catch up on life. 

My conservatory is my favourite room at home with doors straight on to the patio & the garden & beautiful light all the time. It was good to hear how the Godsons are doing & their hopes as they get ready to start a whole new school year again. We do not know what challenges this one will bring, but that is out of our hands. 

Thank you for your company, each & every visit & comment is much appreciated, 

Dee ~💕~