Happy Week

Hello dear friends, I hope you're having a lovely week - I most definitely am and have lots of lovely things to share with you :)

Yesterday my doorbell rang in the middle of the day - this is a rare occurrence as the only person ever to arrive unexpectedly is the postman and he always leaves parcels in the porch and never really rings the bell. Anyway I opened the door and was greeted by a lady holding a delivery of a gorgeous bouquet of flowers! Wow! And look, see, aren't they gorgeous .... such happy pretty colours :) 

... beautifully presented in a little spotty hessian bag. Flowers in a spotty. hessian. bag. Does it get any better than that ???!

So I bet you're wondering who they were from ? No, not Mr EC, and sadly not Bradley Cooper either (though - swoon - ), but from my lovely very sweet goddaughter/cousin. I'd seen her on Saturday (more on that in a bit) and mentioned I'd had a bad couple of days last week (autistic child related), so she sent me these to cheer me up :) Soooo thoughtful of her. We are very close, my cousin and I, though she is a good 16 years younger than me. Her Mum (my Auntie) is my godmother, so my Auntie chose me to be my cousin's godmother. I then chose my cousin to be godmother to Little Miss (are you keeping up), and if/when Lovely Cousin/Goddaughter has a baby she has said Little Miss will be godmother. In fact Lovely Cousin/Goddaughter is getting married next year and Little Miss is to be bridesmaid. When my Auntie got married, I was bridesmaid, then when I got married my Lovely Cousin/Goddaughter was bridesmaid, and now Little Miss is being my Lovely Cousin/Goddaughter's bridesmaid. Did you get all that ? I'll be asking quesions later ..... LOL

So the reason I had seen her on Saturday - I drove up to Abingdon (near Oxford and about an hour from where I live) to visit her and to go for afternoon tea and shopping :) We went to this really quaint little tearoom in Abingdon called Rosie's. It was really tiny, only about 6 tables and yet one of the tabes had a family round it with their little baby and associated buggy - how they got in and out still escapes me - and in the middle of proceedings the waitress came out with a little cake with one candle on it, and the whole place sang Happy Burthday To You to the baby - it was his first birthday ! Soooo cute! It felt like a very special moment to share in such an initmate little cafe.

Anyway, back to the afternoon tea. Lovely thick granary bread with smoked salmon and cream cheese. Still warm scones with clotted cream and strawberry jam. Coffee and walnut cake with walnuts all through the cake and not just on top. A large pot of English Breakfast Tea. Ooooo it was soooooo yummy. Really really good. I wish you all could have tasted just how good it all was, especially the cake - yum. We followed up with a wander round the shops, and I managed a few bits and pieces for the Little Peeps for Christmas, and also for the dog :)

I also treated myself to a few magazines. You all know I have an out-of-control a very small magazine addiction, and Christmas time brings out the worst in it. A couple of craft magazines, and good old Country Living. Leafing through the glossy pages you can't help but feel festive :)

I love all their sort of vignettes - I mean who wouldn't want their front door to look like this ....

.... instead mine has a half dead (okay mostly dead) pot plant, some stinky trainers, a load of dead leaves and cobwebs, and a recycling bin. I'd much rather have a log-store and a little wooden table of cuteness! Ah well, I can dream... (well actually I could get off my backside and spruce it up a bit ... another job for the to-do-list).

I've been sighing at all natural look crafts and decorations, I am not a minimalist and I do love a bit of sticks and paper and stuff .... might need to give the twig star a go ....

.... and I am DEFINITELY trying out this recipe. You know when you eat an orange and you chuck the peel away and it feels like a waste, well now you can use them to make sweetie things - candied peel I guess - eco friendly and tasty - everyone's a winner. To be honest it seems a bit of a faff but I reckon just the smell alone will make it worth while ..... lots of boiling of orange peel and sugar ... heavenly....

Country Living also comes with a "Christmas Calendar - Your Day-by-Day Guide to the Festive Season". Some "tasks" are really lovely but not in a million years could anyone, not even the likes of Kirsty Allsop, manage everything. Things like "Homemade Crackers" and "Dress Your Windows" probably won't happen here , but at least I will manage to "Decorate the Tree". Oh look, I've just noticed that I've picked another photo with a log-store. Hmmm ....

The other thing I picked up was a pot of hyacinth bulbs, just at the sprouting stage. They were in a basket thingy but I repotted them into a little spotty red bowl, to match the vase they are sitting next to. And if you look closely you can see my reflection in the vase LOL

And my final little bit of happy this week comes in the form of some Christmas colouring. I think everyone should by law do some colouring every day. Its so therapeutic to sit down, clear the mind and just be still and quiet with a colouring pencil or two. Bliss.

Thats all from me for now, I hope you are all having happy weeks too.

Til next time,
Jill
xxxxxxx