a dress so flowery

'Miss Marriot tying up the clematis and wearing a dress so flowery that many foiled bees buzzed angrily round her for a moment before going on to the less deceiving columbines.' Mollie Panter-Downes It's the real thing this time in Good evening, Mrs Craven

dress

I doubt I'll be wearing a dress like this.

long mornings

'June came in with fields of white clover, and Catherine spent long mornings in the open, reading to Audrey whilst Adam slept and the sunny countryside slept too, mile after undistinguished mile, all about them. Swifts swung overhead, blue church spires pricked the distance, the scent of clover was solid on the windless air.' Elizabeth Cambridge Hostages to Fortune

reading

In the blissful ignorance before TT is born I like to imagine sitting under our apple tree reading whilst TT sleeps or plays. If I manage it once with our current weather then I shall be content.

The Month of May

May started with glorious blue skies, blossom appearing on the apple tree in our garden, green shoots appearing everywhere, wearing shoes without socks.
Painted toe nails - one of the advantages of being 30+ weeks pregnant is that I have to have a pedicure, there is no way I can reach my toes to paint them!
A delightful christening of godchild number six and catching up with dear friends.
Mother and Pops coming up for the day. First time cooking summer food, pottering in the garden together and enjoying the sunshine.
My last week at work before maternity leave - all happening at just the right time. The final day, cards from different classes and being sung to by the different classes in my team. Receiving some lovely gifts, including a nappy cake and then to Canary Wharf for pizza. Home very tired.
Off to Twin and the Blessings for a lovely day. A BBQ in the garden and practising putting on a baby sling with a doll.
Cooking Warmth the meal I cooked on the weekend we became engaged as a celebration for first day of maternity leave.
Mother and Pops coming up for what should have been a day of gardening, but the persistent rain meant we sorted out the linen for TT.
Meeting up with a dear friend for lunch at Peter Jones and then on to try to get ahead by buying cards and gifts for all the summer birthdays.
Days having a gentle rhythm of reading, eating, napping, preparing for TT, pottering in the garden, doing small jobs.
A very belated birthday pamper day with Twin and Mother at Eastwell Manor. So lovely to have a facial, laze in the rest room, float in the deserted pool, have a foot massage, chat and catch up.
Off into town for friend's birthday meal at Bambou. I was determined to stay for supper and not just the drinks part. This will probably be the last time we go out on a Saturday night together with no babysitter.
Meeting up with new NCT friends for lunch at The Station, then after a brief afternoon nap out to Dalys Wine Bar to catch up with old friends.
A very wet day in Sloane Square, hoping to enjoy looking at Chelsea in Bloom shop windows, instead hiding in Patisserie Valerie with a dear friend and then hopping to The Saatchi Gallery and stumbling across Festival des Metiers a Hermes exhibition.
A final pre baby hair cut and lunch with Mama and Papa Warmth.
Good friends for a takeaway curry - we've finally found a good local takeaway Indian.
Pops' 70th birthday celebrations. Nieces, nephews, great nieces and nephews, aunts and immediate family. Thirty in all and the sun shone so magnificently that we spent the whole day outside, suntan lotions necessary.
A lovely Bank Holiday Monday - eating supper outside. Then the next day it rained and rained...
Quickly, or as quickly as I move at the moment, popping to Lambs Conduit Street to Persephone to buy Twin's birthday gift and then deciding I did have time to pop in Ben Penreath, even though I was then late meeting up with dear old colleagues at our favourite restaurant The National Portrait Gallery Restaurant. Lovely to see the views of London in daylight.

Finally finished Restoration by Rose Tremain - quite unlike her other books I've read.  It was a long slow slog. Speeded through Cocktails under the tree of forgetfulness by Alexandra Fuller and The Rain before it Falls by Jonathon Coe. Baked this lemon drizzle cake for NCT ladies day, Hummingbird's Peanut butter and chocolate biscuits. A Ricotta and Lemon Cake, to use up left over ricotta, for Twin and Blessings.

The last day in May Twin and the blessings up and this also means the last month without a bundle of baby in our lives...

breathing scents of roses

I've been having such an enjoyable potter in the garden last week and over the weekend. The roses aren't out yet but the buds are there and on Sunday the sky was glorious. I'm excited for the summer ahead.

'The garden was peaceful, breathing scents of roses and stocks. The sky was glorious as if a flight of angels had just passed over, sweeping wings of gold from end to end.' Dorothy Whipple Someone at a distance

rose

How is your garden?

Food was wonderful

One of the many rituals that distinguish the weekend, or holiday, to Monday to Friday is breakfast. Eating toast to be precise, in the week it's cereal.

'Audrey went on eating bread and butter and marmalade. It was exciting to eat. It had three tastes. The bitter jelly taste with the candied peel in it, the smooth taste of the butter, and the woolly taste of the bread. Food was wonderful.' Elizabeth Cambridge Hostages to Fortune

breakfast in bed

Yes, food is wonderful. If you're not working tomorrow what are you looking forward to?

Cold puffs of wind

'On a table in the bay window was a glass vase with a bunch of long-stalked narcissi in it. The flower-heads on their thin, giant stalks were no bigger than sixpenny pieces, and each had a frilly orange centre. One or two red dwarf tulips were stuck among the narcissi.
Cold puffs of wind from the partly opened window fidgeted all the flower-heads about...what must have been delicious to them was the fresh, sweet, springlike scent of the narcissi which went wafting round on the air upon each new puff of breeze from the windows.' Julia Strachey Cheerful weather for the wedding

window

What I love about this quote, and what makes it so British is the cold puffs of wind, wanting the windows open and the flowers. Reading about the flowers one would think of warm weather, oh but how we can be fooled when we open the door and realise yes we do still need to wear our coats.

a massed mountain of hyacinths

Cheerful Weather for a Wedding all takes place on 5th March so it seems appropriate to quote from it today.

'Mrs. Thatcham always kept a great number of potted flowers growing in this room, daffodils, fushias, hydrangeas, cyclamen. To-day, besides these, a massed mountain of hyacinths, pink, red and washed-out mauves of all sorts, stood on a table close by the fire, the steely-blue spring light from the window glittering upon each of the narrow waxen petals.' Julia Strachey Cheerful weather for the wedding

flowers

Not sure this is quite Mrs Thatcham's style, but I like it, maybe a few more vases like these dotted around the room.

In Greenery Street

This isn't going to become a pregnancy/baby blog, however there are a few pregnancy quotes that I've collected and as this is in many ways an indirect document of my life occasionally they'll be posted.

'In Greenery Street, you see, we approach this matter of parenthood with a kind of fascinated reluctance. In a way the idea certainly attracts us, and though we resent its being put in that way, we have every intention of ultimately doing our duty by the State. But not just yet, if you see what we mean. For after something like quarter of a century when we have incessantly wanted it to be next week, we have suddenly reached a stage where all this impatience has left us. We want Time to stand still now; we have found what we have been looking for, and intuition tells us to avoid any experiment which will so inevitably start him off again. We have an impression, too, that everyone is watching us; that they are expecting us to have a baby, and that they won't leave us alone until we do. This puts our backs up. What  has it got to do, we ask, with anyone except ourselves? We know perfectly well what we're up to, and we're not going to be hustled by any amount of hints or questions.' Denis Mackail Greenery Street

love

sprigs of winter jasmine

I think our days have been a little more than 'fine cold' but a post to help us look to spring never goes amiss.

'It was the middle of January now, a fine cold Wednesday morning. Ellen, who had half an hour off before serving lunch, came out of the porch in her old coat, the belt hanging, to cut sprigs of winter jasmine for the tables. Jasmine was all there was at present; soon there would be winter aconites and snowdrops, floods of gold and white under the trees; then daffodils, then primroses and violets...' Dorothy Whipple Someone at a distance

white

How is your garden? I miss pottering in it, but look forward to spring and the new life, but bought the first bunch of daffodils at the weekend.

Battle of Flowers

After the dark days earlier in the week some flowers.

'All autumn Mrs. Parmenter had run out between the showers and picked the asters, saying brightly that an old woman must be allowed to do something around the house. Opposition would hardly have been hysterical if she had offered to make the beds, but her tastes appeared to be floral. Now it was January and the snowdrops, and before you knew where you were, Mrs. Ramsay thought morbidly, it would be May and the tulips. Somehow she had never expected to spend the war having a Battle of Flowers with Mrs. Parmenter.' Mollie Panter-Downes Mrs Ramsay's War in Good Evening, Mrs Craven

tulips

Not quite sure what a Battle of Flowers would look like but in some ways I like the sound of it. Which flower would win?

a delightful little Tudor gem

'It was before lunch on a dark January day in the Ramsays' country cottage in Sussex. Just how dark January could be, Mrs Ramsay reflected gloomily, no one would ever know who had not spent it in a delightful little Tudor gem with a wealth of of old oak and several interesting features (such as the beam on which you knocked your head outside the bathroom).' Mollie Panter-Downes Mrs Ramsay's War in Good evening, Mrs. Craven: The Wartime stories of Mollie Panter-Downes

home

Hoping you have moments of light this January day.

feast days

Today with #shareadvent it's Gratitude. This post makes me grateful for a festivity to break up the dark winter months. An excuse to see family, celebrate, reflect and be joyful.

'How wise and right feast days were, and how cleverly Christmas broke up the winter ... just when the weight of the cold and darkness were beginning to make themselves felt.' Elizabeth Cambridge Hostages to Fortune

light

hot and shimmering with candles

The prompt for #shareadvent today is. 'Light a candle. Remember. Give Thanks.'

'Audrey stood and looked at the Christmas tree. She had had a good tea, though not as good as she would have liked, or could have managed. Now there was this new and shining thing. The little spindling thuya which she had seen, dusty and lonely, in its pot, stood translated. Its spiky boughs stood out stiffly. bright with red, yellow and pink butterflies, hot and shimmering with candles. 
The point of the flames strained upwards, there was a smell of warm wax. she was too happy to shout or sing. She was so happy that she had a hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach. It hurt, yet she wished that this minute could go on forever. The wonderful tree was true.' Elizabeth Cambridge Hostages to fortune.

candle

#shareadvent

two boxes of fancy notepaper

We started some of our Christmas shopping this weekend and had our traditional Christmas shopping lunch of a Pret turkey sandwich.

'Either side of the crowded dirty street the lights were coming out in the shop windows. Snow fingered their faces like cold feathers. They went gay. They bought red, green, yellow, and solferino candles in a box for a shilling at an ironmongers, they bought red and gold cake frill for sixpence at a cash drug stores, and two boxes of fancy notepaper and two pairs of gloves at a drapers. They bought oranges, and chocolate mice, and soap babies, and penny whistles for the stockings...' Elizabeth Cambridge Hostages to Fortune

gifts

Are you an organised buy gifts in advance person or do you like to save it for nearer the time?

Goodbye, my love

We all travelled home on Sunday for a farewell lunch for Pops. Tomorrow he leaves for three months volunteering in Palestine with EAPPI. 

'Language was inadequate, after all. One used the same words for a parting which might be for years... as one did for an overnight business trip. She put her arms tightly around him and said, 'Goodbye, my love.' Mollie Panter-Downes Goodbye, my love in Good Evening, Mrs Craven: The wartime stories of Mollie Panter-Downes

au revoir

He's only going for three months the words the same as usual when we say goodbye after a family weekend but the tears and the longer, tighter hug spoke of a different au revoir.

Someone at a distance

Whilst reading Someone at a distance I thought what a wonderful television, BBC I feel, adaptation it would make. If they hurried I'm sure it could be ready for next Christmas. There would have to be a caveat of no changing the story line as a film company did with Miss Pettigrew lives for a day.  My mind started wandering who would I cast?

I think Kiera Knightly fresh from her Anna Karenina role would play Louise, Audrey Tatou though beautiful is too lovely for the part. Louise also reminded me of maybe modern day WAG and how we think characters only out for glamour and money are a modern occurrence. Louise shows that they have always, and will always exist.

'The light from the lamp shone downwards on her smooth dark head. Her arms were bare and slender on the desk, her dress, her favourite magenta red, fitted closely over waist and bosom and spread into wide skirts as she sat. ...there was no one to look at her. But it really didn't matter, because she looked at herself from time to time in the mirror on the wall. She always gave as much pleasure to her own eyes as to others. More, in fact, because she alone knew what perfect finish she had achieved.'

Kiera

I fear that Colin Firth is perhaps too old to play Avery,
'Nevertheless, at forty-three, he was beginning to put on weight. So far it only added to his good looks. He was tall and it suited him to be slightly heavy in build.'

I'm still undecided on Ellen, Hugh and Anne. Though in my mind Anne would be dressed in Orla Kiely clothes, with blonde hair and a fringe.
'She was such a persuasive teasing sort of child. Very lovable.' 

Orla Kiely

I'm pondering Dames Maggie Smith and Judi Dench as a wonderful double act of Miss Beasley and Mrs Pretty the cleaners (would make a change for Maggie Smith from being The Dowager), or would one of them be better as Old Mrs North and the other as Mrs Brockington?

There will then be a raft of wonderful small parts for all our great character actors and actresses. John Bennett, Miss Beldon the head teacher, stroppy Mrs Beard at Somerton, Miss Daley, Papa and Mama, Paul Devoisy.

Who would you cast in your adaptation of Someone at a distance?

unseen, but certain

The final quote that I really liked, that in its way concludes the book.

'She had learnt to wait for the changes and the help that life brings. Life is like the sea, sometimes you are in the trough of the wave, sometimes on the crest, and always, trough or crest a mysterious tide bears you forward to an unseen, but certain shore.' Dorothy Whipple

sea

love and courage

Rachel mentioned that she'd be hosting a read along of Someone at a Distance in the second week of November and lo and behold I just happened to be reading that novel. Rachel will I'm sure write the most wonderful and thought provoking posts. So I shall mainly focus on favourite passages. There were two that really spoke to me, passages that stick with you and one hopes to remember and return to when needed.

'You must go on with love and courage... and trust to God to carry you forward through your life.'
.... 'I think the way to grow in faith is to behave as if all God's promises are true, and miraculously, you find that they are.' Dorothy Whipple Someone at a Distance

faith

dusty stars of sunlight

Autumn makes me, as perhaps you, want to go to the woods and scuff the gorgeous leaves with my feet.

'It was better there, the woods were unchanged and dim, and still seemed to wrap one in an underwater atmosphere of green warmth, scattered with dusty stars of sunlight that had eaten through the thick delicately patterned ceiling. Deep in the woods there was a clearing, where the sky was a piece of bright colour, like a silken tent stretched across the gap in the trees.' Jocelyn Playfair A house in the country

wood

full of light and silver

Are you enjoying the new series of Downton Abbey? Sunday evenings once more have a rhythm to them.

'I must agree with you when you speak of beautiful furniture. Who does not enjoy food upon shining tables with glass full of light and silver - Ah! ....'the sensation of the fingers of a well-polished silver-spoon!'
...
'But,' he said dramatically, 'what shall happen when the tables no longer shine, when those who clean them are taken from you and there is no time to sit and polish spoons?'... 
'Then how terrible to see the table dull, to see, perhaps scratches, to know you cannot preserve the beauty you enjoy, because there is no time in the day for so much. No, no,' he went on, 'that shall not happen, that must not. Silver and shining mahogany and bright glass must remain in memory beautiful, and not be seen in actuality smeared and unkept. I like better to have this table' - he smote the deal with vigour - 'which is so clean, and to see my good friend en casserole, rather than to have it made lordly and perhaps cold in a silver dish not well cleaned!' Jocelyn Playfair A house in the country

kitchen

I think this story line might be one hear more of this season.