Saturday, March 17, 2012

Not quite Jan Constantine!
The Countdown has begun!

Spring is here. In fact, Spring Break has been and gone, but the light of the summer is on the horizon and with that comes for me a new venture, one that gives me a sense of relief and hope and endless possibility - but one that I am oh so annoyingly not permitted to blog about just yet. I will reveal this great mystery just as soon as I can! You will hear it here first and just be assured that at last it will allow me more time to write.

Traditionally Spring Break seems to make me feel more English. Perhaps this is because the weather seems so much gentler and more akin to what we experience in the U.K. or maybe it is simply that I have more time to do things that interest me and they are often to do with my heritage country.

So, in terms of baking it was a luscious golden fruit cake that filled the house with a rich fruity aroma that had the kids all running to the kitchen to see what they could scrounge. Then there was a very tasty leek and potato soup and a shepherd's pie. I don't really like making shepherd's pie because it never takes me less than an hour to go through all that peeling and chopping, but my middle offspring loves it and I'm too frazzled to make it during the school year.

In terms of reading I was captivated by C.J. Sansom's 'Sovereign', a murder mystery set in Tudor England. I've never really been a big fan of the Tudor period. It's so harsh and dark and I grew up a stone's throw from the Ann of Cleve's House in East Sussex which had a horrible spooky atmosphere that just compounded everything I sensed or knew about that time of history, but Sansom's hero, an unlikely, hunchbacked lawyer was plausible and compelling and I found myself sucked in to the plot. In fact I will go on Amazon after this blog post and try to get a used one cent copy of another of his books!

Another book I picked up at Hobby Lobby was Jan Constantine's 'For the Love of Hand Stitching', a beautiful, slightly (who am I kidding, completely) above my level of ability embroidery and applique book. It has been a lot of fun to resurrect sewing skills learned at my rarified private girls school! My first two offspring were gung-ho about learning this art and creating some of the gorgeous projects in this book. Sadly their enthusiasm lasted as long as it took to make their first mistake and now they are back to their previous passtimes which is how I have the time to blog this post :)
 
I'm looking forward to more adventures as the spring blossoms into a highly anticiipated summer....

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.