Birthday Blog

Yesterday my blog turned 1 and it almost passed me by. I have big plans for this blog for the coming year. I have been lagging lately in the creative/crafty department so that is something that I will be working on a lot more. I also have some photo projects that I want to develop and of course crochet crochet crochet!







I have had so much fun posting posting photos and writing throughout the last 12 months and I have made a lot of lovely blog pals all around the world. Thanks so much for coming to visit my little blog over the past year, I am genuinely touched by all of your lovely comments and so love reading your blogs too -

- Lots of Love, Speak Soon x

old photographs

Spring cleaning always seems to lead to the re-discovery of family treasures. Old photographs allow me to travel through time and peek inside the lives of relatives from distant times and places.

So many photos; weddings, family outings, portraits sent to loved ones, all emblazoned with notes of explanation on the back, 1937, 1921 and even earlier. 

I love seeing photos of my Grandma taken when she was young; I think she was just beautiful. My mum transcribed some of her diary memoirs, detailing her early childhood in Canada and on moving to England. This extract on her life during WWII made me smile no end

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"I enrolled in the category of Dispatch Rider, volunteering for the WRENS. I soon discovered this category was closed for it was decided the motor bikes were too big for girls. I ended up in the category of Officers Cook.

After promotion to Petty Officer I was sent to Skegness on the Mall of Kintyre, an all WREN establishment close to where the Fleet Air Army practiced dropping parashoots. When off duty we would try to retrieve parashoots that had dropped and use them to make our underclothes."

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I love the idea of my Grandma as a frustrated motorcyclist, chasing parachutes through the 1940s Lincolnshire countryside to make her underclothes. And after all, it's surely a crime to waste good silk!

Day Tripper

Yesterday I went on a day trip to Paris with my beau. Just typing that makes me feel like a very lucky duck that such a wonderful city is a viable daytrip destination, a place that is so far away for some that to visit once in a lifetime would be a dream fulfilled.





It rained, Lord did it rain. I wish I could say that the day was made all the more charming because of it but that wouldn’t have been entirely truthful. Paris is stunning in the rain; the city fades away in the misty distance, everything that isn’t grey appears to pop with colour and there is a certain type of magic suspended in the air that I am sure would make millions if bottled, but soggy feet, soaked skirt hems and cold noses are things that can’t be ignored for too long.





We took a break from the downpour to eat Marie Antoinette-esque rose cream filled pastries, drink sweet scented tea and dry our soggy soles and souls at Ladurée Bonaparte. When we left the rain had stopped, we took a long walk around St. Germain, over the Pont des Arts, and to the metro back to Gare du Nord.





When I got home I was the kind of exhausted that prevents you from moving, speaking or even thinking. I flopped into bed with glazed eyes, tired but happy, and had macarons for breakfast the next day.

A Flower Wedding

It was Graham’s birthday on Monday; he turned 25 which seems like a very good age to be. While shopping for his present I couldn’t help coming away with a little gift for myself also.

Sometimes the lure of a pretty book is too much for a girl to take and I was like a great big moth to a flame at the sight of this one with its fabric cover, gilt gold lettering and white satin ribbon page-marker.



A Flower Wedding was originally published in 1905 and is filled with darling illustrations and sweet verses like “Yes, flower bells rang right merry that day, When there was a marriage of flowers they say”.



The book depicts the marriage of two flowers, Lads Love and Miss Meadow Sweet, and their floral wedding guests. I was instantly reminded of Cicely Mary Barker’s Flower Fairies which I used to paw through when I was younger.



The illustrations are so delicate and are drawn with such love and care.



I love reproduction books; yes they are not the real thing but reading this book made me feel inspired by the romance and feeling of the Edwardian era and I went to sleep dreaming of lawn dresses and rambling roses in country gardens.

Breakfast at V&A

The V&A is my favourite museum in London, but more than that, the V&A is my Tiffanies - nothing very bad could ever happen to you there. I have blogged about the place many times before but only because it is so darn amazing, especially as they put on exhibitions like this and this.

Whenever I feel the slightest bit blue (or even a touch of the mean reds) I know I can always take myself off there and wile the day away looking at all the beautiful artefacts and imagining the people who might of made or used them.












My favourite thing spotted on my latest visit was that cape made entirely of silk extracted from 1.2million Madagascar Golden Orb spiders. It was the most heart-stoppingly spectacular article of clothing I have seen in my life, the stuff of myth and legend. It’s not hard to imagine a cape like this being offered as an incredibly extravagant gift for some past monarch or another; rumour has it that Queen Victoria once received a pair of spider silk bloomers from Madagascar and that Louis XIV wore a spider silk suit.

The cape has little embroidered spiders on it popping out strands of silken thread, nice! I decided then and there that if I ever won the lottery (and it would have to be a big win) I would commission a spider silk Kimono, I think that would be lovely.

Lavender

Lavender is one of those delightfully old fashioned scents that I like to imagine held in ornate crystal bottles sitting atop the dressers of proper ladies amidst a sea of lace doilies and pearls.

I love its fussy, almost stuffy image. Although something that grows up on the rolling fields of Provence can never truly be stuffy can it?

We have had a large bag of dried Lavender sitting around the house for a while, some of it has already been portioned out in little fabric bags with pretty ribbons, or sprinkled into especially decadent baths, but I only recently thought of cooking with it. I am a big fan of aromatic flavours (shout out to Earl Grey tea) but as lavender is so pungent I played it safe with some shortbread biscuits.





These are made up just like regular shortbread but the sugar used had been sitting in a jar with a handful of lavender for a week. In my impatience I decided to abandon all efforts to make these look pretty with cookie cutters but if you have more self control they would look cute in little shapes. Although you can eat lavender flowers, and the recipe called for them to be left in, I would leave them out if I were making them again. They do look very lovely but the taste overpowers the scrummy buttery shortbread.

These little biscuits are best enjoyed wearing lace gloves while watching any film starring Maggie Smith and Judi Dench.

Zx

oh so quiet

You may have noticed that things have been a little quiet around here as of late. A series of life events culminating in the spectacular demise of my laptop has meant that blogging has been difficult. I promise to put this to right and start posting enthusiastically again.

On Friday Graham and I walked down to Richmond park to go picnicking and deer spotting. We took provisions of bread, salami and goats cheese and found a spot under a small copse of trees to have lunch with some little green parakeets for company (escapees of a pet shop maybe?).

The day was made even more magical by the closest deer encounter I have ever had in my life.







The deer in Richmond park are used to having people around them although they are still very much wild. Get too close to the herd and you will get several stern looks from the males of the group, especially when there are fawns around.

I noticed after I took this one how much it looks like some double headed super deer:



I have always been too chicken to get up close but Graham turned into some sort of deer whisperer and managed to get right up to the pack without arousing suspicion. I followed, camera in hand and took a few snaps their afternoon graze. I didn't dare pet them though, wild things are meant to be wild.

First swans, now deer, I promise not to turn into a nature blogger.

Until soon, Zx