Have I ever told you that I am one eighth Welsh? My maternal great-grandmother was Welsh, from near Buckley or Hawarden. Her name was Gertrude Thomas, and she seems to have been a bit of a dour woman, from my Mum’s accounts. I can’t exactly blame her: her husband was injured in World War I, her son was killed in World War II and by … Continue reading In Wales, it’s Eight Different Weathers in a Day: Part One
I don’t know how time works: I just know that some weeks the time is everlasting and sometimes it flies. We’ve been watching The Lazarus Project on Sky recently, and the idea that there’s a reset point (on July 1st every year) that only some people remember if the machine resets is intriguing. Messing with time is dangerous, especially when we try to fit too … Continue reading Book Friday: The Green Sketching Handbook by Dr Ali Foxon
Change your space, transform your life. I like bold assertions and claims by books. This Book Will Change Your Life Forever has a nice ring about it… and then you read it, and realise that possibly it could… if you had the money to do everything it’s telling you to, or an army of servants to take over mundane tasks or even just space and … Continue reading Book Friday: Happy Starts at Home by Rebecca West.
When the sun shines, the thermometer rises and the weather has you gasping for breath, it can be hard to appreciate how good summertime is for hygge. It’s too easy to have hygge down as a cold weather thing when, at its heart, hygge is probably just as enjoyable during summer if you think of it as finding a cosy, welcoming place, spending time with … Continue reading Summer Hygge: 10 Ways to Really Appreciate Life When It’s Summer
What a strange few weeks it has been! I’m finally getting past my crazy cough that stopped me from fully participating in my Canterbury holiday. It’s not until now, when my energy is making a full return, that I realise how tired I really was, and how much I *may* have let slip by because of it. And now we’re in the last week of … Continue reading Creating Sanctuary: Summer Rescue Remedies
I’ve been away for nearly a week, plonked very usefully over a weekend so it didn’t take too much time away from work. It’s funny the lengths, as a self-employed firm, that you go to to maximise holiday time. We always used to go away over August Bank Holiday, so that a 5 day break from the office was really only 4 days holiday used … Continue reading Book Friday: Bella Grace Issue 32
I reallly do appreciate how sometimes a load of different interests or philosophies of a person can intersect to create something wholly personal, intensely suited to them. A neat-freak, tech-obsessed minimalist, for example, whose dream home is a white box flat in a neat, square glass-coated tower block will have a clear, clean, virtual-living focused home, while a gardener in love with organic, natural living … Continue reading Book Friday: The New Mindful Home (and how to make it yours) by Joanna Thornhill
A few weeks ago, I signed up for an art class that a friend had advertised… she was running it on a Tuesday night in a local gallery/social hub, Smithdown Social Arts Hub. It’s a short course, involving using inks, pastels, pens, paint, it was free to attend…. and it intrigued me. I draw and I have painted for fun, but I’ve never been brave … Continue reading Creating Flow… finding craft hygge in a circle.
How to Hygge the British Way 