February Things

Lately I feel tired so much of the time. I sleep for eight hours a night, but struggle to get out of bed in the morning. I have dark circles under my eyes and yawn all day long. I can only really put it down to Winter. January and February, I am coming to realise, are my dormant months, for sleeping and resting, well, as much as modern life allows, which is not much. I am doing all the right things, taking regular exercise, eating well. I possibly eat too much cake and drink too much caffeine but I think, overall, my diet is pretty balanced. I think it's just what winter does to me, and it really feels like winter here at the moment. We've had snow flurries all weekend and, while none of it has settled, it's finger-achingly cold out there. A reminder that although the days are steadily lengthening and bulbs starting to poke their shoots up through the earth, spring is a while off yet. 

But I don't really mind the cold, I actually quite like it when the seasons behave like they should, and there are lots of things making me happy at the moment.

:: Spring flowers. Bunches of white tulips, fistfuls of £1 daffodils, pots of tete-a-tetes, I love them all. Instant cheer on the greyest day and one of my favourite things about late winter.

:: Time to bake. The week before last, Bella had a couple of days off school when she was unwell. My mum looked after her the first day but couldn't on the second so I took the day off work. (My boss, such a lovely person, said "don't worry, we'll be fine, go and be a mum.") It was like being a stay at home mum again, pottering around clock watching till 3.15pm, getting on with jobs. I cleaned the kitchen from top to bottom, caught up with the washing and ironing mountain and then baked lemon nutmeg madeleines from the excellent book Scandilicious Baking. Madeleines are a bit of a faff, what with having to chill the batter first, then cook them in batches in my madeleine tin, but so worth the effort. Little clouds of warm, lemony deliciousness, they were. Just the kind of baking I love to do but rarely have time to indulge in.

:: Surprise post. Almost nothing is more delightful than receiving an unexpected parcel or card through the letterbox. My dearest friend Abigail, on reading my post last week about cookery books, sent me this as a little treat. (The card will make sense to Game of Thrones fans.)

:: Molly. Not, ahem, the perfect dog, but goodness we do love her an awful lot. She makes me - well, all of us - very happy.

Bella is her favourite person. As soon as Molly hears sounds of movement upstairs in the morning, she comes upstairs and sits on Bella's bed until it's time to go down for breakfast. Angus suspects that Molly prefers Bella and is quite disgruntled, but we all lie and so no, don't be daft, she loves us all the same.

:: A little trip to IKEA with my mum. When we lived in Leeds we'd visit IKEA regularly as it was only fifteen minutes away. Now it's the best part of an hour to battle through traffic to visit the Southampton branch, so I go rarely. The trouble with that is that I get quite excited when I do go. For example, here, this is what happens when I only need wine glasses.

:: A new food magazine to browse. 

Recently, the gorgeous Winchester-based shop The Hambledon asked if I'd like to try one the magazines they are stocking as part of their newsstand promotion. I was kindly sent (more happy post!) a copy of Lunch Lady, an Australian food quarterly. It's more of a book than a magazine, solidly bound, beautifully produced and with virtually no adverts. Being Australian, it's the summer edition I received, so I am not in a rush to make any homemade ice lollies, but there are some tasty looking weekday pasta recipes that I'd like to try, plus a great feature on no-bake cake bars.

My only gripe with Lunch Lady - larger and clearer type please! I'd love to read your delicious recipes without squinting. Perhaps I am getting old.

Last of all, can I tell you about a brilliant new website called Agnes. My blogging friend Sam at A Coastal Plot has, with her friend Charlotte Ford, been working away on this for months, and it's finally up and running. It is the most wonderful thing, a website aimed at helping girls find their way through their teenage years. Practical and useful, but fun and inspiring too, Sam and Charlotte have created something really special and, in my opinion, necessary. Please do click on the link above and have a look.