Autumn Now

Hello! It's been a while. I hope you are all ok? Here, we've stepped firmly into autumn now and it's heaven. The light has that sharp, golden quality that this time of year brings and I never tire of watching the shadows and shapes it creates around the house. 

We've yet to light the fire, but the heating has been switched on a couple of times and there are blankets on the beds. I packed away all my summer clothes but am not quite ready to shift into tights season (I loathe tights, they are never comfortable) leaving me with two outfits to wear to work on rotation.

I have rediscovered a love of reading this year, no doubt partly to do with joining a book club. We just read Everything I Know About Love and I have to say it wasn't my favourite, but it made for a lively discussion. Other books on my table: The Midnight Library, lent to me by a colleague, looks good and The Little Library Cookbook and the Little Library Year, both by Kate Young and the perfect example of love of literature meeting a love of cooking with the most beautiful food writing and recipes. The Hunting Party is a crime fiction novel passed on to me by my dad who shares my love of a country house style murder mystery.

I started The Hunting Party and am really enjoying it, I always want to read one more chapter. All of the main characters are horrible people but that just seems to make it even more enjoyable.

Despite the madness of the last month, weekend baking still happens, in fact I try to make it a priority. It's good for my mental health. This is the apple cake with honey icing from Anna Jones' first book A Modern Way to Eat. Other bakes have included blondies, flapjacks and bread. We're in lunchbox territory again. My mind is now turning towards autumn bakes; gingerbread, parkin, spiced biscuits, anything with pumpkin in it.

Weekend walks also continue and the local woods are starting to shift from green to brown and orange. It's lovely. My favourite time of year. I love how, in just one or two weeks, the landscape can change so dramatically. And now September is over, we can let Ziggy off the lead at our favourite beach (dogs, understandably, need to be kept on a lead there during the summer) so that opens up the beach to us for weekend walks too. There is almost nothing I love more than a deserted, cold, windy beach....

I'm preparing for a big gardening session this weekend (weather depending) with lots of cutting back and tidying up, but the plants by the front door are still going strong and that pop of pink against the blue door always cheers me.

My teaching course is going well. It's incredibly challenging but I cannot believe how much I have learnt in just a few weeks, and I now have three weeks at University ahead of me before half term which I'm looking forward to. Evenings at home are different. I usually get in around six and at least once a week have something ready to go in the slow cooker for dinner, or if John is off or gets in first he starts dinner. Chores like housework and washing happen around this time, and at the weekends too, and we just about manage to keep everything ticking along without any major dramas., Usually by around 9pm I am safe to collapse on the sofa and try to keep my eyes open for half an hour or so before staggering up to bed. But yes, it's going well.