The end of April

Some highlights from the last couple of weeks at home:

Walking in the bluebell-filled woods, always a favourite. The shade of blue is more purple when you're in the woods, although is does seem to depend on the camera too. The photo above was taken on my Olympus before the battery died, so the rest were taken on my phone. The shots from my phone do look more purple than blue, but all beautiful.

A day out in the pretty West Sussex town of Petworth, just my friend Abigail and I. It's a good halfway meeting place for us.

 

No husbands and children, so we were free to browse the antiques shops as much as we wanted. I found this beautiful green fish-shaped vase, below, and have since discovered that it is actually a jug. I've heard they can be called "glug-glug", "guggle", "gluggle" and "gurgle" jugs but basically, the water makes a wonderful glugging, bubbling noise as it moves through the hollow arm of the vase, hence the evocative name. I love it and filled it with flowers from the garden.

The weather was dry and sunny all over the Easter holidays, and there were days when it was quite warm, especially when there was little wind.

Some of us read.

Some of us lounged. Ziggy loves it when we are working in the garden. He lies watching us then occasionally comes over, tail wagging, to say hello.

And some of us gardened. 

There was fresh air and vitamin D and lots of walks, long and short. 

I am still working my way through the delicious wild garlic pesto, and tried some in a toasted cheese sandwich. Amazing - the slight oniony tones of the pesto go so well with the cheddar.

As the seasons move slowly onwards, it's always time to review the bedding situation.  The winter duvet has been packed away meaning we need a slightly heavier blanket, and this cotton one is ideal, providing weight but not as much warmth as wool. Luckily I have lots of blankets and throws in various weights so am always happy to have a change, give the bedroom a slightly different look. I am still working on my king size patchwork quilt here and there, along with a pair of crochet socks, but do wonder if it might be time to crochet another blanket. I've always wanted to make a ripple blanket in the softest, most muted colours, with maybe a little black thrown in. 

We did have a little break over the Easter holidays and spent a few nights in London doing all the touristy things and spending lots of time together. The sun shone constantly and we had the best time. Photos will follow just as soon as I have time to organise them.

Wild garlic, crochet scarves and Easter biscuits

The magnolia season is over, brought to a sudden end by sharp frosts and a drop in temperatures. March started mildly, with weather mild enough for t-shirts.

We even got the pizza oven out. 

It was cold when the sun went down, admittedly, but still lovely weather.

But we weren't quite ready to pack away the winter duvet or turn off the heating just yet. But, despite the cold temperatures in March, spring was still happening everywhere. 

My Dad picked me some wild garlic (ramsons) and I had a lot of fun cooking with it. I made pesto following this recipe, although I left out the garlic clove as the wild garlic is garlicky enough.

I ate the pesto with pasta....

....added to scrambed eggs (trust me, pesto in scrambled eggs is amazing)...

....and stirred into soup. This soup was a onion, potato and cavolo nero that needed eating up, and the pesto added a much needed hit of flavour.

The rest of the leaves I have been treating like a fresh herb, adding to cooking like risottos and pasta. 

Other spring highlights: I finished my shawl, this pattern using this yarn. 

Although the pattern is called a shawl, and it is the traditional triangular shape, I wear it with the point at the front and the two longer ends wrapped around, so it is very much a scarf in my eyes. 

The garden has really woken up and changed over the last month. 

The camellia, which used to live in a pot on our balcony, was moved to this new border last summer. I was not expecting any flowers this year but it is looking ok.

Some of the leaves are brown-tinged at the end and the internet tells me that this is because camellias do not appreciate full sun, so its position on the sunny south-west facing balcony for a couple of years may not have helped. But now it's in a partly sunny area of the garden, and with more room to spread its roots, so hopefully it will be happy here. 

It is nice to pick flowers from the garden. I rarely feel as though I have enough blooms to cut any to bring indoors, but the grape hyacinths (muscari) grow like weeds all over our front garden, and I had lots of this pink tulip too. I like how frilly the leaves are. Of course I have lost the label so I have no idea what I have planted or where. 

And now it is almost Easter. We are halfway through our Easter holidays here in Hampshire and I have spent most of the first week pottering around, catching up with myself, my friends, the house, the garden. It's been nice. I haven't really stopped but it's been a nice kind of busy.

It wouldn't be Easter without some kind of baking, and this week Bella and I got out our trusty egg-shaped cutter and spent a very nice afternoon together in the kitchen while Angus was spending some time with my parents. 

Bella doesn't love baking, but she does love icing and decorating. These rainbow marbled creations were hers and she really enjoyed playing with the fondant icing and food colouring The ones above are mine - I enjoyed playing with the sprinkles and watching them stick to the melted apricot jam. We are all enjoying eating them.

Bella has just reminded me that we have not made chocolate Easter nest yet. I have the chocolate, but may need to pop to the shop for cornflakes and mini eggs. The little traditions, they matter, don't they?

Today it is Good Friday and sunny, and the rest of the Easter weekend looks good. The weather is finally warming up and it's a joy to watch the garden wake up a little every day. I have been busy planting for the summer; agapanthus and nerine bulbs, pom-pom dahlia tubers, sweet peas, geraniums, nemesia. The window boxes on the shed have been refreshed and I am slowing digging over and weeding the garden, doing a section each day. I love how I can lose track of time when I'm in the garden. At the moment it's still bare in places, but I am optimistic for a summer full of bees and butterflies.

Wishing you all a happy Easter.