It's been a long time since I last posted on JAA.
Continue reading
Tag Archives: Christmas
It’s Been A While …
Filed under Musings
Christmas Eve
So another year has spun around and it’s Christmas time again. This morning I headed into the city centre. Traffic was light so I was all parked up just before eight o’clock and I started the day ensconced in a cosy café (Hatch & Sons), breakfasting on a scrumptious date scone and coffee.
Filed under Celebrations, Musings
Christimas. Carnations. Prejudice
I am not sure of the genesis of my somewhat irrational dislike of carnations but I am reasonably certain that my carnation prejudice couldn’t be innate. The best I could come up with was that at some impressionable age I had read one of those lists which decree what’s cool and what’s not and that the list had declared flower-wise that carnations were totally infra dig. Or maybe I just didn’t like the look of them. Of course the fact that the ubiquitous carnation is a staple in deli-counter and garage bunches of flowers has probably not helped their case. So, for me, a perfectly lovely bunch of flowers which had one or two carnations woven through became a thing of non-beauty once I spotted said carnations.
Filed under Musings
Christmas Shopping in Greystones
Flowers by Lynda
It’s the week before Christmas and all through the land stressed out shoppers are scurrying around. At Christmas time there is little or no escape on high streets or other shopping areas from the madding crowds. It’s just the lucky few insanely organized folk who sorted all things to do with Christmas weeks ago who can now sit happily at home. Freighted as the festive season is with lorry loads of expectations those of us who have left things to the last-minute have no choice but to join frenzied fray. However one way to escape the worst of the madcap cacophonous crowds is to shop out-of-town.
Filed under Ireland, Shops/Shopping
♥ Favourite Days
My favourite days of the year are the ones that immediately follow Christmas. There is no contest, no other day or days (for me) in the annual calendar holds or hold the same allure as the 26th and the 27th December. They are days for rest and relaxation. They are days when behaviour, that at other times of the year might appear lazy, such as taking cups of coffee or tea back to bed and spending an hour or so there poring over a magazine seems almost de rigueur. They are days when culinary treats, such as a large slice of Christmas cake heated in the oven and served with a giant dollop of cream, which might mark one as an eccentric eater outside the festive season seem perfectly normal edible fare. In short they are blissful, restful, and battery-recharging type days.
Filed under Musings
♥ Baking: Last Minute Christmas Cake
As an expression, it’s never too late to bake a Christmas cake, may not be in the same league as one of my favourite quotes ‘It’s never too late to be who you might have been’ (George Eliot). This recipe is from a Delia Smith Christmas Cookery book; she calls it last-minute Christmas mincemeat cake. It seems to prove the point that as in life so too in Christmas baking it’s never too late. Once cooked it can be iced in the traditional way, topped with a glazed nut topping, or simply left as is.
♥ This Week
This week the countdown to Christmas continues and we are now just two weeks away from the day itself. The weather in these parts has been a degree or two chillier than before. But thankfully here has been almost daily winter sun although as time marches on relentlessly towards the shortest day of the year it has only shone for a few short hours before descending beneath yonder hills.
Filed under Musings
Just Add Attitude 