Echoes of a Dream

A little corner - forever English

The bluebells are finally out and I've spent most of the past week trying to find somewhere they are growing in abundance so that we can go and enjoy them.

Well it seems as if I was wishing a bit too hard because lo and behold I seem to have a carpet of them right under my nose. On Sunday I went to the wood beyond the house to gather kindling and I kept going to see how far I could get and look what I came upon:

A vast swathe of them:

Yesterday, Rohan had a friend round who suggested that they pick some flowers for their Mums and he came back with a huge armful of them. So now I have bluebells everywhere. On the table, on the mantelpiece, in the sitting room and on the nature table:

Poor Rohan he'd picked his Mum some flowers and the first thing she said was "Oh, thanks but you're not supposed to pick bluebells" in a slightly hysterical voice. Mum of friend came later to pick up her son and said the same thing and then Tom walked in from work and said "lovely bluebells but I thought you weren't supposed to pick them". I looked at Rohan and thought he was going to cry. There he was having picked his Mum some flowers and he'd committed the biggest crime against nature. Since then I've been going around saying how lovely the flowers are and what a nice thought it was. I can just see him married one day and his wife saying "you never give me flowers". It's my Mum's fault he'll say - the one time I gave her some flowers she ............... Well, that'll be one of the things he'll blame me for!

Did I ever tell you that I love old cars and buses. Especially the old Routemaster type buses that they had in London and that we grew up with in the Midlands.  The London ones were red, the country ones were green and in the Midlands we had very dark aubergine coloured ones. Anyway, there was a vintage bus day going on in these parts last Sunday which we took the boys to. There were old London buses:

When I lived in London in the late 80's I used to travel on the number 19 to Battersea and the 137 to Streatham to seem my sister. Those were the days.

There were green country Routemasters and this gorgeous little number built in the 50's:

We rode a few of them to various destinations and bought a few memorabilia and this little book that I'm reading at the moment:

I know all the arguments for getting rid of these buses in London but I do think it's sad. Very, very sad. You might be interested to see this that I found in a Google search.

Amber was right when she said "It's like taking yellow taxis out of New York. London isn't the same without the red buses". We're so sentimental, us lot .........................

Cooking up a treat

There is nothing like the casual, off the cuff invitation to some new friends to come over and sew one morning to get you to start frantically unpacking your craft stuff. This week I found myself inviting three gals over next Tuesday and when I got home I realised that I might just have to unpack some of my stuff if we're to achieve anything other than drinking tea and talking all morning.

Firstly, I moved the cookery books into the conservatory:

 

which freed up this cupboard on which I slowly started to dump some of my stuff:

Then I emptied the dresser bottom but didn't quite get around to moving anything in there. I did however, go through all of my boxes in the annexe and I retrieved what I might need in the short term and repacked other stuff. At one point I did wonder about chucking this 'other stuff' out because if I don't need it in the short term am I just hoarding it (and the answer sadly, is Yes).

That job took me a couple of hours over two mornings and I must say that it's nice to have some of my stuff in the main house. Should inspiration ever visit me again I will be ready.

Meanwhile I'm enjoying my non-crafting and little blogging life. Most days I've had supper started way before the children get back from school which means I can sit with them and catch up on their news, do jigsaw puzzles with Raj and look vaguely at Amber when she asks me Maths questions. All this happens after we've had tea of course and (sadly for my waist line) most days I've managed to do a spot of baking. On Monday it was muffins:

I kid myself that these are healthy because they have carrots in them but the icing more than makes up for their wholesomeness. It's Philadelphia, butter and icing sugar and even if you halve the ingredients in the recipe you still end up with enough to spread on digestives biscuits afterwards. As you can see we fight over these.

On Tuesday it was Cowboy Cookies - a recipe given to me by Jodi in PA. They are yummy. I love the mixture of oats, coconut and chocolate chips and luckily the mixture makes 36 biscuits so they can last a couple of days:

Today Amber came home and made Macaroons from a Nigella recipe which really are the best ones I have ever eaten. Why? Because they have cardamom in them and she cooks them at Gas mark 6 for ten minutes so that the outside is crisp and the centre chewy. They are divine:

Here's the recipe if you want to make some yourself. You'll need two large egg whites, 200g ground almonds, 200g caster sugar, about a quarter of a teaspoon of ground up cardamom pods (the inside black bits) and 2 tablespoons of rosewater.

Mix the almonds, sugar, cardamom and egg whites together and knead with your hands to make a thick paste (or use the flat beater of your mixer).

Sprinkle some rosewater on your hands and roll into little balls - size of smallish walnuts. Place on baking trays and squidge slightly. Stud the centre with whole blanched almonds if you wish. Bake for 10-12 minutes at gas 6/200C/400F.

This recipe comes from her book 'Feast' which I received last Christmas. I decided last week that I was totally bored of cooking the same thing over and over again. Do you ever get like that? I love cooking but the chore of doing it every night gets you down sometimes. So I decided to try some new recipes from Feast. So far we've had Ritzy Chicken Nuggets which weren't that popular. One pan Sage-and-Onion-Chicken and Sausage was much better as was Meatballs and Couscous. Tomorrow it's going to be Blakean Fish Pie and sometime I'm keen to try her Involtini which is stuffed aubergine slices in a tomato sauce. I'm sure that last one will produce an "Ugh what's that?"

So, guess which dish got the thumbs up this last fortnight and the 'is there any more'? None of the above sadly but pancakes and bacon and maple syrup followed by cherry slice. Both of which took me minutes to produce. So why am I slaving over the stove each night ............

PS Amber wants me to point out that none of the above refers to her. She has a more sophisticated palate than her brothers.

Keeping fit ........before it's too late

Well, the children went back to school yesterday after a lovely three week holiday. We explored our new county, had cousins to stay and old friends from Gloucestershire. Amber and I shopped. The males played golf. We all played tennis (some of us very badly) and a good time was had by all.

I went off to a Yoga class yesterday morning and stretched parts of my body that I didn't know I had. It was hard work (because I haven't done any Yoga for twenty years) but definitely worth it. Then, keeping with the 'I must lose weight and take exercise before it's too late' mood I went for a brisk hour-and-a-half's walk this morning with a friend. We met at school and walked through the fields and along a disused railway line and it was so lovely. The bluebells were just coming out, the sun was shining and there was a slight chill in the air. It was bliss. Are you impressed? Bet you wouldn't have been if you'd seen me afterwards slumped on the sofa with my feet in a basin of lavender water.

It's funny, Amber has been asking me what sort of Mummy I'm going to be this time. Apparently I was an earth/waldorf/crafty Mum in Gloucestershire and she thinks I should reinvent myself here. She thinks I should go out more, have more dinner parties, glam it up a bit more I suppose. Maybe I'm going to be a fitness fanatic! (I've decided to see about tennis lessons as we have two courts over the road and it seems to be a good way to exercise plus it's a sociable sport).

On another note, do you remember aeons ago that Amber was given a book called 'Knitting for Peace", in which was mentioned the Mother Bear Project? Well, I made a couple of bears for it ages ago and got some Mums to join me and so far I've collected about half of them (the others are being finished off by various parties).

Here are the ones I have so far:

There are about twelve here and I'll be posting them off to Minneapolis in the next few days. From there they will go to orphan children in Africa. If you take a look at the link above you can see just who gets these bears and why. It's a great idea and a great project to support and I'm really pleased that we were able to participate in it. If you have any spare wool hanging around why not have a go yourself - the bears take hardly any time to knit (the pattern is on the website I believe).

Still finding my feet

A real, real quickie today because we have friends from Gloucestershire due in about an hour and I still have lunch to finish off, potatoes to put on the hotpot for this evening and Amber will be calling me in a while to bake blind the pastry case for the Raspberry Bakewell Tart she's making .......... huge intake of breath.

Sorry I haven't been around for a while but I was at my parents last week and then the w/end just went in a blur. Did you hear that it snowed on Sunday? It wasn't anything like the amount you get over the pond but it was quite a few inches which is a record for us. The garden and woods looked glorious:

The boys had their youngest cousin Ravi staying and the three of them spent hours in the garden. There was sledging, rolling down the hill, snowball fights and because that ended in tears many hours later they didn't get the chance to make a snowman. Never mind - they had fun anyway.

Yesterday I had to meet my sister halfway between her place and mine to hand over Ravi as it were. One of the best things about moving here has been the fact that I'm just over an hour away from my sister and I've already seen her more times than I had in the last few years. It's lovely for the children too.

Last night I did the first bit of crafting I've done in ages. It's one of Betz White's cupcake pincushions from her new book and I made it as a gift for this friend that's coming today. She was so helpful at our leaving party that I wanted to say thank you. I'm really pleased with result and the fact that it only took minutes:

Whilst I was sewing Rohan came up to me and recounted a conversation that he'd had with Raj earlier in the day:

Raj - "Rohan, why doesn't Mum go on the computer as much as she used to?

Rohan - "Because the computer was next to the kitchen before and now it's upstairs in the bedroom I suppose".

Raj - " I'm glad because I like it when she's downstairs".

Sooo sweet. It did give me some food for thought though. I know I was obsessively crafting and blogging before and my excuse for doing it in the daytime was that the children were busy playing. But it did take me away from the family I guess. Here I have no sewing room, my things are still unpacked and the computer is in our bedroom and it seems too much effort to go and use it. So it's turning into more family time for me now and hopefully more time for myself too but in a different way from before. I've been saying that I want to take more exercise for ages so I think I'll find a yoga class, walk more and try and lose some weight. I won't disappear from my blog though and I think you'll understand that I'm still trying to find my feet in this new phase of my life. Must get back to the kitchen first though ............