52 Weeks of Happy...43/52

The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything.

It's been a busy week. It's been a tiring week too, but mainly it's been very happy. My sister Anna and her two girls came to stay and it's been such a treat having so much time together to chat and catch up, and to have some precious time with my nieces who I see only two or three times a year. So, joining in with my friend Jen at little birdie, here are a few of our happies from the last seven days:

1. Three beds all in a row. My nieces, Jennifer and Eleanor, shared Bella's bedroom this week. There was much whispering and giggling long after they should've been asleep.

2. Bella's passion for all things royal continues - she drew this picture of a palace guard last weekend. She started it over about three times before deciding this one was suitable. Great concentration was needed and my job was to pass her the felt pens. We are going to post it to Buckingham Palace. Wouldn't it be wonderful if she got a reply?

3. Fun on our local city farm. The birds and animals are quite tame and roam about among the children. Although to be honest the main attraction for me was the indoor play barn where my sister and I let the kids loose on the toys and sat down chatting with cups of tea for a couple of hours. 

4. Gladioli, £2, looking pretty on the mantle piece. 

I wish you all a fun weekend. It's cool and cloudy here and we are very much hoping it doesn't rain as John has just painted the front door. We've got friends coming over later with their kids to stay the night so I need to tidy up and get the hoover out. I am starting to feel like a small hotel, one which doesn't charge but where the proprietor drinks slightly too much wine and makes the guests sleep on sofa beds among the toys.

Pavlova

I am reminding myself that it is still summer.

Last night, just before bed, I went outside to put away the toys left in the garden and lock up the garage. It was a clear, starry night and there was a faintly woody smell and quite a distinct nip in the air and I thought, hmm, autumn is coming. Not now, not tomorrow, but it's on it's way. The garden is starting to take on a slightly faded, frazzled look as though colour is beginning to fade from the leaves and it all looks less lush than it did a month ago.

Now, I love autumn, I really do, it's by far and away my favourite season. But summer (which, this year, has been pretty fantastic) is not over yet and so let's talk about pavlova. 

I do think of pavlova as a summery desert (although there is no reason why it should be) mainly because it's a wonderful way to show of fresh soft fruits and just let them shine in all their seasonal glory, rather than cooking them or mixing them with other things. It is perfect in it's simplicity; meringue, cream, fruit. Nothing else is needed, except maybe a spoon. It's also a handy recipe for when you're cooking for people as the meringue can be made up to one day in advance then you just need to whip the cream and assemble it when you're ready to serve.

My meringue recipe was copied out and given to me by my mum when I left home and I still have that same, splattered piece of paper tucked into my recipes folder. It's a keeper. It makes the most perfect meringue as the centre remains soft and marshmallowy, not dry and crispy like shop-bought meringue. I like my meringues soft and chewy, almost gooey, inside.

You will need:

4 egg whites. 

8 oz or 225 grams sugar. (I use white sugar - golden or unrefined sugar will give you a darker, creamier coloured meringue and a toffee flavour.)

2 tsps cornflour.

1 tsp vinegar.

1 tsp vanilla extract.

½ pint or 300 ml whipping or double cream.

Lots of fresh fruit. I used around 14 oz/ 400 grams of strawberries, hulled and halved here but use whatever is in season or to hand. Strawberries, raspberries and blueberries will look and taste glorious together. 

To make:

Preheat your oven to 120°C (100°C fan) or 250°F.

Separate your eggs taking care that not even the tiniest bit of yolk gets into your whites. (A very good tip my mum wrote down is to separate each egg into a cup or small bowl first then transfer to the big mixing bowl, to prevent that little bit of yolk writing off the whole recipe and causing you to start again.)

Whisk your egg whites until stiff - either in a mixer or with a hand-held electric whisk. This should take around 1 minute.

Add the sugar very gradually, a tablesoon at a time, whisking steadily throughout. If you add all the sugar at once it will knock all that precious air out of the egg whites.

Beat again for another couple of minute until it looks glossy and shiny. Turn the mixer down and, while beating slowly, add the cornflour, vinegar and vanilla. Beat again thoroughly. 

Your meringe mixture should be quite firm now, so that you could form peaks in it. If you were to hold the bowl over your head, none would fall from the bowl. I did actually make John take a photo of me doing just this for illustrative purposes but thankfully sanity (and vanity - hello bingo wings!) prevailed and I deleted it.

Line a baking sheet with greaseproof/baking paper. A little meringue mixture in each corner will help the paper stay in place. Dollop the mixture onto the paper and form into a rough circle. I like to mound mine up around the edge and create a well in the centre for the cream, others like theirs to be perfectly smooth and straight - it's up to you.

Bake for two hours. When the oven timer beeps, turn off the oven and, ideally, leave the meringue inside until the oven is cold - this will help it cool slowly and prevent cracks.

When it's cool, peel of the paper and slide it onto a plate. Whip up your cream and pile it into the centre of the meringue.

Pile up your fruit on top of the cream.

This photo is not great but it does show off the soft and gooey centre of the meringue. It's not an easy desert to slice and present elegantly, but it makes up for this in flavour and texture.

This should feed six or eight and you'll need to eat it fairly quickly, within 24 hours I'd say, or else the combination of soft meringue, cream and fruit will create a soggy mess. 

In the Garden

Oh my goodness, THANK YOU for the brilliant response to my holiday money dilemma. Such wonderful suggestions and tips! I don't quite know where to start but the main thing is I am no longer worried, I am instead very excited, so that is good. I suspect I am doing a fair bit of stress displacement here, ie. worrying like mad about holiday budgets instead of big things like jobs and how far redundancy money will stretch.

We (six children, seven adults) are staying in a self catering villa in a tiny village in rural south-west France. If you imagine a triangle between Cognac, Bordeaux and Angouleme, we will be roughly in the centre of that area. Most of our meals will be eaten at home I should think, so lots of opportunity to save money there. I will make sure I'm super organised and have drinks and snacks at all times for even the hungriest child. And adult. I've had a look further into boring things like mileage, diesel and toll road costs and satisfied myself that budgets will accommodate the smooth, quiet, expensive French motorways. There may even be shopping! There will certainly be wine. I am hugely cheered to learn that wine is cheaper in France than here which is no bad thing at all. 

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So, the garden. I've worked really hard on the garden this spring and summer and feel like I'm starting to get a tentative feel for what works where. I'm also realising what a responsibility it is in that, like a pet, it needs looking after if you go away. Thankfully, there have been lots of rain showers recently so I haven't needed to water anything for a while, but I suspect that gardens can be very tying

The thing I'm most proud of is my tomatoes.

They are still very green, but there are lots of them.

I grew all these from seed. They are lined up in against a west-facing wall where they benefit from lots of sun. Last winter the wall looked like this:

Bleak. The bricks belong to the side wall of my neighbour's garage. Between our garden and the wall was a gap about one foot wide, just big enough to lose all garden toys down and make the area annoyingly useless. Our garden is very small so every corner has to earn it's keep.

My lovely dad lined and filled the gap with gravel and it now holds a row of plant pots with my tomatoes and a few sunflowers too. We washed all the kids' smudged chalk off the wall. The ugly plastic table and chairs went and I found this little wrought iron set in the sale last autumn. It all looks much less bleak. It's almost pretty.

But the thing is, I have a horrible feeling that our tomatoes will be just perfect for picking while we're on holiday. That pains me! I'm not sure what to do about that yet.

We also have a lot of raspberries. Every year they just appear and I do nothing to them. They are starting to spread and poke spiky heads through the lawn so I think that, come autumn, I may have to do something pro-active and unfriendly to them before they colonise the entire garden.

The fig tree is showing fruit for the first time ever and I do hope it ripens. I would love to eat home grown figs. And the flowers that some of you very kindly identified as a type of allium have turned the most beautiful colour.

So, for the first time, I have grown rhubarb (a little), strawberries (a handful each day - enough to put on my muesli each morning for breakfast), raspberries (by accident) and tomatoes but we haven't eaten those yet. And possibly figs. An eclectic mix, but one I've enjoyed very much. 

Some thoughts on holiday budgets and July in Instagram

I've just spent a very pleasant hour sitting at my mother-in-law's table with a cup of tea catching up on some blog reading. At least four of the posts I read today were all about holidays in France and I enjoyed every one of them. We are going to France soon (two weeks today in fact!) and John asked me this morning if I was looking forward to it. I took so long to answer that I kind of answered his question. I have so much to do between now and then, so much to occupy me and think about, that I can't really see beyond that. We get back the Sunday before term starts so I need to feel organised before our holiday begins. 

And I'm worried about money. I've been told by someone who just returned from France that everything was horribly, ludicrously expensive. Whether this is due to the exchange rate or their expectations I don't know. People who've recently been to France - did you find this to be the case? I'm worried that what we've budgeted for spending money wont be nearly enough but I don't want to penny-pinch all through the holiday either. I am used to (and good at) living on a tight budget at home but on holiday I find it depressing. I want to indulge the kids in ice creams and myself in the odd coffee or glass of beer and pizzas for lunch for all of us without worrying about how overpriced things are or how far the euros will stretch. And I love to browse the shops and bring trinkets and bits and bobs home with me - it makes the holiday feeling stretch further. Am I the only person who worries about such things?

So John and I sat down a wrote a list of all the things that needed to be done before we go and did two of them today (new school shoes for the kids and fix the rear brake light on the car). I feel better. And the posts I read today made me remember how I love France and what a beautiful country it is. And two weeks with my parents, sisters, partners, nieces and nephews...that will be heaven.

We'll find a balance. We'll muddle through, we always do.

Anyway, the reason I originally started this post was to make a pretty mosaic of my July photos on Instagram. My Instagram love increases all the time. I like the quick glance back over a month of photos, they way it just gives you a feel for the rhythm of daily life and the seasons, nothing more. Of course you don't need Instagram for this but since my camera is heavy it's nice just to use my phone sometimes when I'm out and about. I'm also loving the social side if it too, that's a lot of fun.

So above, we have a month of unbelievably good weather, hot and sunny just like summer should be. Nearly all those photos were taken outside. There are lots of blue skies, plenty of lush greens and a few pops of berry-fruit red. July was a month of picking flowers, picking fruit, enjoying time at home and away, road trips, days out, enjoying the garden, mainly just enjoying the sunshine and life in general. 

I hope August is as good.

52 Weeks of Happy...42/52

The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything.

It's Friday night. We've just come back from a very nice meal at the local pub with John's lovely parents. We spent our day in the park, in the garden, shopping, eating ice cream. The kids are asleep. The weather is glorious - still! - and I'm deciding which craft project to start next which might be one of my all time favourite things to do. I'm happy. So, joining in with my friend Jen at little birdie, here are this weeks happy things:

1. This little embroidery was an unexpected gift from Abigail. The text is a saying which she uses constantly.* I especially like the way she stitched over her own, unique handwriting rather than fancy script. I will treasure it.

2. Lavender from the lavender farm. I've hung it up to dry out and it smells out of this world. Not everyone likes the smell of lavender. I have to admit I don't much like it's scent when it's been processed into soaps, candles and the like, but just-cut lavender, fresh from the field...lush.

3. I treated myself to a new necklace. Jen at little birdie wrote about Layla Amber's work a while ago and I knew it was only a matter of time before I made a little purchase. I think she epitomises the best of individual, smaller sellers: gorgeous products, well made, fairly priced and beautifully packaged. I do like pretty packaging.

4. The sunflowers I planted in front of the wall by our front door are looking magnificent! They come up to my shoulder now and every day a couple more open up. I can't help smiling as I walk up the front steps towards the door...until I see the peeling paint all around the lock then I think we MUST get that door painted.

Thank you for all your fabulous comments lately...and hello new followers! Thanks again - always - for stopping by and reading. You are all my cup of tea.

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*It's an old nautical saying; the "cut of the jib" - jib being a type of sail  - would determine the way a ship would sail. It's one of those expressions you use when you know you like someone but can't always say exactly why. It means something like "I like your style". I would say "He/she is exactly my cup of tea". 

Sunshine, Soldiers and Big Ben

As you'll know we spent a week or so staying with my friend Abigail who lives in South London. Inconvenient for friendship, but very convenient for a day trip into the city. I asked Bella and Angus what they most wanted to do in London. Bella said, without a moment's hesitation, go to Buckingham Palace. Angus wanted to go on an underground train. That was it, nothing else. Because there were adults coming too we booked tickets for the London Eye - we didn't just want to ride public transport all day. 

We went to the palace first when little legs had the most energy for walking around. You know you're getting near royalty because everything gets very gold and shiny.

The weather all day was bright and blustery with clouds scudding overhead. The light was constantly changing. 

So many tourists. Do you ever look at all those strangers in your holiday photos and wonder who they are and where they travelled from? I do. It fascinates me. All those random people captured on camera, and how many stranger's photos do I accidentally feature in around the world? I hope I remembered to suck in my tummy.

The changing of the guard was approaching and so we found a good spot along the side of a road. Bella and Angus were expectant, to put it mildly.

We weren't disappointed. A band came marching past full of pomp and ceremony and very colourful and noisy too.

Angus has talked of nothing but the soldiers ever since.

We were too far from the palace to see the actual changing of the guard, so we walked up the Mall, past St James's Park and the very tempting looking deckchairs...

...to Trafalgar Square. The kids trailed their fingers in the fountain and we hung around and took lots of touristy photos.

I have to admit that when someone said "Look at that big blue cock!" my first thought was not a bird, and I was slightly disappointed to discover that it is indeed just a very big blue cockerel. 

Lunch next, then a short bus journey to the London Eye. The last time I went there was in 2006 when I was pregnant with Bella. We went about 5pm and the sun was setting over the city. It was incredibly beautiful. Today, we had an alarming big black cloud hovering ominously above us.

It did look quite threatening when we were high up in our little pod.

Then the rain came. It was wonderful to watch it move over London towards us.

And it arrived...

...then just as quickly moved away and brightened up. All in the space of thirty minutes.

I love this shot of the pod above us.

And my boys looking out of the window. Angus needs a haircut.

We felt quite smug about timing our trip just to avoid the rain - especially since I'd recklessly decided that morning that there was absolutely NO need to take any raincoats with us. Last of all was a short tube journey, mainly to satisfy Angus and you never saw anyone ride escalators or sit on a train with such an expression of complete joy and wonder on their face. He just grinned and pointed at things the whole time. Brilliant, all of it.

Lavender Fields

We spent Saturday morning at a very beautiful lavender farm not far from Abigail's house, where we are currently staying.

It was a hot, sultry morning - in fact, we had thunder storms that afternoon and evening - and the scent of the flowers was heady and intense.

It's a very photogenic place. 

It's not large, you couldn't really spend more than a couple of hours there but it's time enough to wander up and down the fields and take lots of photos then retreat to the shady cafe and shop area.

They sell freshly cut lavender by the bunch (as well as every type of lavender-related gift you could imagine) and I bought one to dry out when I get back to Leeds. There is also a menu of lavender flavoured drinks, bread, shortbread and tea among other things. The ice cream is exceptional. Just lavender-y enough.

I became obsessed with trying to photograph a butterfly.

Difficult. They move to fast for me! These shots were the best I could manage.

After we'd sampled the wares and made the children pose for about one hundred photos (trying to get a baby, a three year old, a four year old and a six year old to all smile and look at the camera at the same time is a challenge) we went home. 

Lovely place, lovely people.

We go back to Leeds tomorrow. It's been a such good week here with our friends; slow and relaxing with lots of time to do nothing much but chat and play with the babies, and we managed to squeeze in a day trip to London too. Then it's back to emails, washing, errands, appointments and a big blog reading catch up.

And if all that purple was a bit much, here's some colour from our week.