Sigh, the last "14Days of Love" Post

Day 14
Love is a Many Splendored Thing
Who is the love of your life? Who makes your heart sing? Make this post a tribute to the love, or loves, of your life.


When I first saw the title of this very last subject, The Mamas and The Papas song " (This is) dedicated to the one I love" immediately sprang to mind. And has resided there ever since. Can I get that tune out of my head now? Nope, of course not, lol.

Of course, I dearly love all my family, my mum and step dad, whom I don't see nearly often enough as they live in Germany -
( this was on their last visit here in England in 2008 )

My parents-in-law, who are the most active 80somethings I have ever known -

My boys, all grown up now and in their twenties, how the heck did that happen?

DH, No.1 son and No.3 son, rare occasion, all suited up for Grace's Christening -

No.2 son and almost-daughter-in -law, cutting the christening cake

My beautiful granddaughters -


Our doggies, they are so much part of our family -

And then there is my DH, I really don't know how he has managed to stick with me and all my eccentricities and goofiness for 29 years.

This is a photo from our wedding day, it has faded over the years because it has always been out in a frame, but its still us -

Still as handsome as he was nearly 30 years ago, perhaps a little bit grey instead of blond, and perhaps a few more laughter lines, ahem, thats what they are, yep


building a cross to replace the one on our land in France which was struck by lightning 40 years ago

With our very first dog, Harry

and with our beautiful Bobbiegirl, who was such a funny character, in the garden in France, in his favourite place -

Never too old to make a complete fool of himself -
(DS No. 3 on left, DH on the right )

And proving that a 50something can enjoy the snow just as much as a kid

at the cottage in France -

and here in England, in the Firehills near Hastings -

I can't see us ever growing up and becoming "proper" adults, lolol, we have too much fun being completely bonkers.

xxx

Last but one "14-Days-of-Love" post

Plan Your Escape
We all dream of escaping to some sweet retreat. What is the most romantic getaway you've ever been on –or dreamed of?

That is the subject today. And I was really really torn between two places. You know all about our little cottage in France, which is the most perfect place for me, on top of a hill, miles from civilisation, with the most beautiful views and wonderful neighbours. It is a lovely romantic place and everytime we go there to spend a few days or weeks, it is like a dream come true.

But if we are talking going away on holiday, then the most romantic place we have ever been to is definitely Langkawi, but the Langkawi of almost 30 years ago. I was working for Lufthansa as a billingual secretary at the time, and therefore had access to cheap flights, so we decided to spend our honeymoon in Malaysia. We spent a few days on Penang, and then took a little 4-seater plane to Langkawi. OMG, that was terrifying! Langkawi is a group of 99 little islands and 30 years ago, only a couple of them were inhabited. The pilot of our little place flew so low over the islands, I could see the individual leaves on the trees. I don't like flying at the best of times, but that was pretty hair raising. And the landing strip, nightmare, lol, a little grass/earth strip with a wooden hut by the side!

But the Langkawi Country Club was a beautiful place to stay and the setting was the most romantic you can imagine. The bluest water, the whitest sand, the most intoxicating, colourful shrubs and flowers, and best of all, at the time we were there, only a handful of guests were staying in the place. Often we had the terrace or restaurant all to ourselves.

I could only find a couple of photos, I didn't have much time to search through my boxes, lol and they have faded somewhat over the last ( almost ) 30 years -


These photos I quickly pulled off google -

If Langkawi was still the same place we fell in love with nearly 30 years ago, then I would dearly love to return there. But, progress can't be halted, it seems, and our beautiful island paradise has been developed as well. I saw a programme on Langkawi a couple of years ago and it was unrecognisable. Thats the way it goes though.

So, that beautiful romantic retreat is firmly committed to memory, the jungle walks, the footsteps in the sand, which were still there undisturbed a week after we had visited an uninhabited island earlier for a romantic picnic, the evenings holding hands on the terrace looking out over the blue water to the distant islands. And our romantic retreat now is our little cottage in France. Are we allowed to still be romantic fools after nearly 30 years of marriage ( it will be our 29th wedding anniversary next month )?

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone.

The Perfect Gift

The perfect gift? Oh my goodness, today's theme really seemed quite difficult at first. You see, I am a hoarder and collector of all sorts of weird and wonderful things. Which makes it both easy and difficult. I am very easy to please because I love so many things, which makes it easy, but, because I collect so many different things, I would be impossible to chose one kind of collection over another, which makes it rather difficult. See?

There are all the usual Valentine's gifts of course. Beautiful diamonds and pearls
Hmm, I have never coveted real jewels, I would be far too scared of losing them or having them stolen. I prefer old Victorian/Edwardian/Art Deco paste.

Flowers are quite lovely, sure,
but I hate the fact that the prices are hiked up so ridiculously for Valentine's Day, so that a no no for me as well.

Chocolates, yummy, yes
but is it worth putting on 4 pounds or going on a diet for a month? Nope.

Romantic dinner for two?
yes, that would be great, because I do love good food, but it would mean leaving our doggies at home, and Hector would pine for me.......


Ah now, indulging me in my latest hobbies with packs of wonderful ephemera and bits and pieces, now that would come pretty close to being a darned fine gift

Or, a completed piece of fabulous artwork in the style which I really admire at the moment, like this wonderful piece by Wil from the jawdroppingly gorgeous blog Vintage Wil
That would come pretty close to being a top notch gift.

But, the bestest and most perfect gift from my darling husband to me is

TIME!!!

Yep, time is the most precious and most perfect gift he gives me, and not just on Valentine's Day. All those precious hours when he accompanies me to boot fairs, vide greniers, French charity shops, when he would really rather be doing just about anything else. Time first thing in the morning when he takes the dogs out for a walk and lets me sleep on. Time when he makes me so many cups of tea. All the time he doesn't mind me spending doing my own stuff, messing around with new hobbies, hours on the computer, crocheting, cuddling doggies, rather than doing what any normal housewife would do, like cleaning, errmmm. For me, there is no more perfect present than the time he gives me. Soppy, or what, lol? So, on Sunday morning, we will stroll arm in arm through a couple of boot fairs, and he will carry whatever I find ( most likely just books for reading, nothing exciting ), and then he'll take me home and make me a lovely cup of tea. Bliss. And cook Sunday dinner. Bless.
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Flower Power

This is my third post for the 14 Days of Love Valentine's party. As I mentioned yesterday, I missed the 1st week, but I am thoroughly enjoying myself posting for this second week.

Today's theme is Flower Power, and one of the suggestions for a post were flower arrangements. Well, I don't host formal dinner parties anymore, and therefore haven't done a formal flower arrangements for the dinner table in years. I occasionally buy a bunch of flowers, but they are usually just fairly carelessly arranged in a vase.

But, I do love wildflowers and bunches of them in informal containers. So I thought I post some photos of little wildflower arrangements from last autumn in France.

This little window is at the front of the house, next to the entrance door.

A tiny bunch of wildflowers picked from the bottom field is displayed in a little amber glass milk jug with teeny flowers edged into the glass

I like changing the little display regularly, here I had picked daisies from the lane and one rose from the garden. I only have three (struggling ) rose bushes there, so I tend to leave the roses alone. I also added a couple of other flowers from a little bunch I had bought at the market.

I always have a bunch of wildflowers on the table in the garden. It usually starts like this - I have a womble down the lanes with the doggies and pick a basketful -

and then sit down at the table with a smile on my face and a cup of tea next to me, and arrange them

I have a sweet little jug indoors which I often use to fill with flowers, again, mostly wildflowers from the lanes and our fields

And of course we have to have some flowers on the kitchen window sill as well -

And just because I love the colour so much, here is a photo of one of the little roses in our garden, well, its more of a field than a garden, lol -

Tomorrow's subject is going to be The Perfect Gift. Ooooooooh, can I get my list out? My long list? Only one gift? Perhaps ONE basket with a few gifts? Hmm, this will require careful thinking in case DH is going to have a look at the blog.

xx

Now what have I done, lol

A really lovely lady called Liz ( what else, tehehehe, such a good name ) talked me into joining this rather fun Valentine's party, 14 Days of Love. I missed the first week, but just made it in time for the start of the second week. You can read all about it here. Today's topic is Sweets for the Sweet, all about luscious sweet recipes for your favourite cakes, biscuits, beverages, sweets, whatever. SO NOT FAIR! I have been craving cake all day long, lol! Just have a look at the luscious yummy recipes that the various people have posted, it'll get you drooling, definitely.

Now, I got a bit of a problem here. My alltime favourite dessert is trifle. My DH's whisky trifle. I love it above all other desserts. And I get somewhat possessive about it, nobody is allowed seconds, because I need leftover trifle for the next day. Have to have another trifle fix then. I would love to show you a lovingly prepared trifle, but I don't have any photos, I am sorry. So there is not much point in sharing the recipe with you either. Bummer. Maybe I can talk him into making a trifle tomorrow and I'll take pics then and add them to this post.

Then I thought I would share the recipes and photos of a few other favourite desserts from a couple of our cookery books. And remembered that since I changed computers a couple of weeks ago to one with Vista, my Canon scanner won't work anymore ( oh, and Canon don't do new drivers for mine, grrrr ). So, no pictures of Jamie Oliver's Sheila's pudding either, sigh.

But, despair not, I have a recipe to share with you, my friend JJ is helping me out. She makes the most fabulous muffins, which just melt in the mouth, and are incredibly morish. And best of all, they are full of healthy stuff.

Here goes, a very delicious, healthy, unpretentious everday dollop of yumminess -


Blueberry & Oat muffins Makes 12

105g wholemeal flour

115g plain flour

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

90g rolled oats

1 medium egg

2 medium egg whites

125ml maple syrup (I used honey & it worked fine)

180ml buttermilk (or semi-skimmed milk/soya milk soured with lemon juice)

3 tablespoons rapeseed oil (I used vegetable oil)

2 teaspoons grated orange zest

1 tablespoon orange juice

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

225g fresh blueberries, rinsed & patted dry

1 Preheat oven to 200C/Gas 6. Lightly grease a 12-hole muffin tin or insert paper cups

2 In a large bowl, whisk together the wholemeal flour, plain flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, salt & cinnamon. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the oats and stir the rest into the mixture

3 In a medium bowl, whisk the egg and egg whites with the maple syrup until smooth. Add the buttermilk, oil, orange zest and juice, and vanilla extract. Whisk until blended. Add to the flour mixture and mix with a rubber spatula until the dry ingredients are moistened. Fold in the blueberries. Spoon the mixture into the tray filling the cups almost to the top. Sprinkle the reserved oats on top

4 Bake for 18-22 minutes or until lightly browned and the tops spring back when touched lightly. Transfer to a wire rack to cook slightly before scoffing.

Ta daa, and here they are, courtesy of my friend JJ -

The second recipe I would like to share with you is a very simple but utterly delicious recipe for a drink, chili chocolate cocoa. This is really lovely on a winter evening, my husband and I often have it when we settle down to watch a film. It was given to me by a dear American friend now living in Scotland. I am sure she won't mind if I pass this on to you.

You will need ( for two people )

cocoa powder - 2 heaped soup spoons
butter - good sized knob ( about a heaped tea spoon )
milk - enough for two large mugs, I use the actual mugs to measure out the milk
pinch of salt
brown sugar - to taste, I use 2 teaspoons per large mug
pinch of chili powder - again, to taste, we like it quite spicy

Firstly, gently melt the butter in a milk pan. When the butter is melted, take off the heat, and add the cocoa powder slowly, constantly whisking it into the butter. Add the sugar and the little pinch of salt ( unless you are using salted butter, then you don't need it ), keep whisking. Slowly add the milk, whisking all the time, making sure that you get all the cocoa and butter mix from the bottom. Return to the stove and gently heat whilst stirring. Add chili powder to taste. Thats it, ever so simple, but it tastes so much better than prefab hot chocolate from a packet! If you feel really wicked, add a good glug of cream or top with whipped cream.

Drooling now, lol, will definitely have to make that tonight.

Right, enough of that, I need some kind of sweet fix now, lol. Let's hope I can add the trifle pics tomorrow, toodlepip for now! xxx

Aahh, winter in France

The photos from our week in the cottage in France on the last post showed our hill top all misty and grey, and the world around us gone, lost in the sea of clouds below us.

A couple of days later though, it all changed quite dramatically. The dogs got me up quite early. It was still dark outside, but by the time I had almost woken up, gotten dressed and bundled myself up in winter gear, there was a hint of sunrise showing on the other side of the valley. And the sky was clear above us, hurrah, even though the valley below us was filled with a sea of clouds!


When we stepped out of the house and onto our little lane, I saw that the full moon was still high in the sky and incredibly bright

( not entirely sure how I ended up with a second moon, lol, but it appeals to my sci-fi loving mind )

It was incredibly peaceful and serene and quite magical walking down the lane in this half light, crisp morning. In the next photo, you can just about see our our cottage on the left hand side


Ahhh, the views at this time of the morning, you don't know whether to shout with joy or just admire it all in quiet reverie


It was the start of a beautiful day with bright blue skies, and glittering snow. The next pic is looking from our garden across the dip to one of our neighbours -


The valley below us was remarkably snow free and looked quite green -


This is the view on the other side of the hill


And this little strip of tarmac is the main road going past one end of our lane


We had quite a dramatic sunset that evening, not quite what you would expect, it wasn't all orange and red and purple, it was just black and white, quite strange really


Yep, thats the sun. I got really disorientated for a second when I saw this, I thought, hang on, whats the moon doing there?? Quite a weird moment. It was definitely the sun though, lol.

Next morning, same story, the dogs were raring to go just before sunrise. It was so worth getting up early, I tell ya, look what was happening across the dip, on the little hill next to us -



Was't long before we had beautiful blue skies again, I loved walking in the crisp snow -



Sigh, it was so beautiful, and what did I get today? Here in England? First rain, then sleet, then a few snowflakes, then sleet, then rain again...........

To finish off, just a silly little picture of the cottage roof, but I liked it, the slight, hazy covering of frost, a bit of snow and these rows of icicles -



See you tomorrow! xx