Mixed bunch

Well this has been a rather strange week - an in-between sort of time when it's not still Christmas and not quite New Year either there has been nothing in the diary and the world is not yet back to normal. Here in the UK storms have led to flooding and loss of electricity along with damaging winds tumbling trees and causing damage to property along with transport chaos.  We personally haven't been affected apart from the Wanderer not being able to get to us for Christmas but my heart goes out to those whose homes are under water and who have not had any electricity for days on end.

One of my resolves for 2014 is to try bottling fruit - no electricity needed to keep fruit this way.  I remember the serried ranks of jewel bright jars in the pantry cupboard of my childhood and want to learn how to do it myself.  How come I never learned whilst my mother was busy doing it I wonder?!

 I also want to get to grips with sourdough baking  You may remember I told you about the starter a bloggy friend gave me here?  Well I did try and after a long time I managed to get the starter to froth as required.

 The bread I eventually produced though was not a success.  I ended up with this rather flat loaf - dough too moist I think - which we did slice and eat toasted but it reminded me of biscotti to look at and although it was edible it certainly wasn't what I had envisaged!  Must try harder.

 The weather has been a mixture of storms and some bright days, frost and mild grey days.  Yesterday the frost didn't melt from the garden all day and it was very cold but today dawned wet and dismal - this was the sky when  went out with the birds' food early this morning (they are enjoying the bird table I am happy to say!)

  Gradually the sky brightened...

... and the grey clouds headed east leaving us with a sunny bright morning.

After lunch I decided a walk to the Post Office through the woods would be good - it was lovely the sky above so blue even though underfoot it was muddy and the ground littered with branches, some across the path.

On my way back I picked this little posy of twigs which were in bud and some hazel catkins - hopeful eh?!

As we have spent such a quiet Christmas just the two of us I have had time to do plenty of reading and had a good selection of library books on hand for the holiday.  This one I can recommend - it turned out to be something quite different to the usual.  It is a story written from the point of view of a 5 year old which is in itself unusual but it works well.  If you want a story which will transport you to the sunny south of France, that contains no love stories or at least not the usual man meets woman sort, but a lovely sad/bittersweet tale of real love, friendship and imagination with a twist in the tail then this is for you!  If you read it let me know what you make of it  For more information see here.

I was going to wish you a "Happy New Year" but then I started to think about what is meant by this wish - happiness is after all ephemeral and I think rather like a butterfly which if you seek it will flit away but if you sit still and quiet might just land upon you only to fly away a few moments later.  So maybe what I wish you is many Santosha moments for nobody can have wall to wall happiness and it might not be a good thing if we could.  So I wish you peace, health and plenty of happy moments in 2014!