A toast!

Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year and I hope 2011 is as sweet as honey for you all.

It's also macro Friday over at blogging for Bolivia do check other entries out.

Pretending....

Here in England it is foggy, misty, and grey. I decided I needed a bit of warmth and thoughts of sunshine so I recreated a small beach scene on my bed, what do you think?

Back to normal.

Ironing the shirts.

Resolutions?

I always find myself a bit out of sorts at this time of year, after Christmas and before New Year. I feel I should be making endless lists of life changing resolutions, go on a diet because from the weekend onwards every magazine and paper I open will tell me I should, and relieve in minute detail all the trials and tribulations of 2010 in the press.  I hate making resolutions as I feel such a failure when I last just a few days. I mulled all these things in my head this morning on a long walk with the dogs, came to absolutely no conclusions but saw these lovely horses on the way with their heavy winter coats, they were a lovely distraction. Does anyone have any answers? do you feel this way too??

A breath of fresh air.

Today for picture holidays we have to take a picture of one of Mother nature's gifts outside. I am now completely over the snow so found these remaining seed pods on the trees.

Restoring order.

I can't believe Christmas is over so quickly, I say the same thing every year! We had a lovely day yesterday. Today is all about tidying up and putting a bit of order back, I like the feeling of being in control again and find the whole process very calming. Hope you are still having a wonderful lazy time.

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas

I hope you have a wonderful Christmas with lots of love, laughter , good company, and presents!

See you soon
x Justine

Black and white wednesday.

Alice is home from University and I have so missed her, I've missed the little things like watching her put her make up on, albeit at midday when she has just woken up! I am participating in black and white Wednesday on the Long road to China, do check out other entries.

Mince pies and more....

Now we are not going away I seem to be eating mince pies and Christmas chocolate all the time to compensate! I didn't make these and only bought six of them so hopefully the temptations will be finished soon.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.......

It was a record -12 here at 6am! Today looks truly beautiful as the sun is shining and it is picture postcard stuff but England has come to a standstill and it looks like we won't be going away tomorrow as we are supposed to be flying to Hong Kong from Heathrow. It's not the end of the world as we will still all be together at home but it means I have to rush out and buy all the Christmas presents now as I was going to do that in Hong Kong so I am in a little bit of a panic.....

Mistletoe

I bought some mistletoe today, a fun bit of love for Christmas, now I am going to have the wine to go with it as the songs say.

Christmas pudding

I bought this wonderful Christmas pudding flower arrangement yesterday, it was made of carnations placed in Oasis, I thought it was so pretty, next year I will try and make my own.

Light

The theme for picture the holidays today was warm light. Harry helped me pose today which was very nice of him.

Gold

I love to fill bowls with Christmas tree baubles and put them around the house, I always think they look like bowls of golden fruit. The decorating in nearly done, I will finish it off tomorrow. Have you finished yet?

Giving

The fantastic Mortal Muses are doing a wonderful daily holiday prompt and today it is 'giving'. I love to give hand made presents to friends for Christmas and these hyacinth bulbs I potted up will hopefully fill someone's house with a wonderful perfume in the next few weeks. Do join in and have a look at what everyone else is giving.

Making pancakes

Harry decided to make pancakes this morning, he got cross with me trying to photograph him making them so this was all he would let me take a picture of! I am also linking up to sweet shot Tuesday as I haven't done so for a while.

Cherubs

Today in picture the holidays we had to share the divinity in our life, this little cherub watches over us.

Lazy Sundays

Sundays to me are all about being lazy, getting up late, and reading the paper over coffee and breakfast. Michael patiently let me snap him whilst eating his cheese on toast. Hope you are having a nice lazy Sunday, what are you doing today?

Saturday

The decorations are nearly all done and now I just need to go shopping to buy the presents to put under the tree. Do join in over at a common thread and tell us what your favourite Christmas colour schemes are.

Jingle Bells and Macro Friday.

It's Friday again, two weeks till Christmas! the school holidays started yesterday, I love it when school breaks up, no routine, mess, and more mess. I am so behind in decorating the house, I hope to get a tree up and decorated this weekend and hoping my 17 year old son isn't too old to help! Do check out other entries for macro friday at Blogging from Bolivia.

Winter

Another one of the pictures I took yesterday in the little bit of sunshine we had.

Catkins or lamb's ears

These catkins or lamb's ears always remind me of Christmas time. It is absolutely freezing here but the sun was out this afternoon and they looked so beautiful silhouetted against the sky.

Clementines or satsumas.

At this time of year the shops are full to the brim with wonderful clementines and satsumas. My mother always used to put one at the bottom of our stockings on Christmas Day. The smell of the peeled fruit always reminds me of Christmas.

Sunday

Firstly, the great news is that Maegan is back so please pop over to the fabulous Madeline Bea for The Sunday Creative, I have so enjoyed hosting it for the last few weeks.

Secondly I am participating in Scavenger hunt Sunday, I love this challenge and haven't done it for a while. Do pop over to see what others have found and see Ashley at Ramblings and photos, she has such a great blog.

1. In my home

I bought this pussy willow yesterday for the house, it looks like little cotton wool buds.

2. It's beginning to look a lot like....

I bought my first new Christmas ornament this week, it now hangs in the kitchen.

3. Sweet treat

I am trying to be so good before Christmas so there is nothing sweet in the house at all, I searched high and low and all I could find was this ceramic chocolate eclair! 

4. Time

I love this antique desk clock, it hasn't worked for years but I still love seeing it stuck at six o'clock.

5. Everyday

Everyday I turn on my Kitchen lights.

slowing down.

I am participating in picture holidays and the theme today is what holds the key and slows you down, looking through recipe books and planning always helps me. What slows you down in this busy time?

Macro Friday

It's macro Friday again at Blogging from Bolivia. It is still snowing here, I spent about five minutes outside as it was so cold, saw this leaf was clinging on to the fence this morning. Are any of you photographing in the snow finding your exposure is way off? I was reading an article yesterday saying how almost always your exposure will be off due to the metering system in your camera that is set to callibrate an average scene and snow is not average so most of the time your shot will come out underexposed and the snow will be grey. If you are using aperture priority you can use exposure compensation or if not, just give it a few tweaks in the computer.

Soup for a cold day

Well I am completely and utterly snowed in today, we live at the bottom of a hill and no one is going anywhere. Everything looks absolutely beautiful and it is so quiet. I thought now would be a good time to make a big bowl of soup and luckily I have a full larder as I went shopping before the snow. I am using a recipe from Nigel Slater's kitchen diaries - this is a wonderful book based on the dates and months of the year and by rights this soup should be cooked on January 13th he says!

The one thing he always says to do is keep those parmesan rinds, the nasty ones that have been sitting in the fridge for weeks, they are full of flavour and make this leek and potato soup even more delicious. You will also need -
3 good sized leeks
40g butter
3 medium potatoes
a couple of large hunks of parmesan rind
1.5 litres of light stock or water
a handful of parsley
6 tablespoons of grated parmesan

Trim the leeks, slice them into thick rings, then wash thoroughly. Melt the butter in a heavy based pan and then tip in the washed leeks and let them soften slowly, covered with a lid, over a low to moderate heat. After about twenty minutes and with some occasional stirring, they should be silkily tender.

While they are softening, peel the potatoes and cut them into chunks. Add them to the leeks when they are soft and let them cook for five minutes before dropping in the cheese rinds and pouring in the stock or water. Season with salt and pepper and then partially cover and leave to simmer for forty minutes.

Remove and discard the undissolved cheese rinds, scraping back into the soup any cheesy goo from them as you go. Add the leaves of the parsley and blitz the soup in a blender. Check the seasoning - it does need a surprisingly generous amount of salt and pepper - bring briefly to the boil and serve piping hot with the grated parmesan. This will feed 6.

Colour!!

 It has been a real learning curve taking only black and white photographs in November, it has really made me think about what works etc. I have been so looking forward to getting back to colour today and will stick to colour for the rest of the month as there are so many wonderful things to photograph as we countdown to Christmas. I have changed the flickr group to 'Decorations for December' so if anyone wants to join in and post whenever you feel like it, here is the link.
I found some lovely holly berries this morning for my splash of colour.