A full pantry

...or being prepared.



We are a family of 6, a big family for european standards - and what to say for this corner of Europe standards! We need to be prepared and have a full pantry.
Well, looking to several blog's well stocked cupboards, I reminded some pictures I took of mine some time ago. (So, maybe some of you have seen them already).



I must say, also, that my cupboards are in a urgent need of tidying up so they can be prepared to welcome the lot of things we need to buy before Christmas.



I'm always so much afraid of needing something in the days before the big event that I always buy a lot. I don't mind if, in the end I don't need as much because it stays for the days after.

For instance. It's a tradition, here, to have several fried wonderful things for Christmas Day and Eve so, I can't buy only two bottles of sunflower oil, I feel I must buy four, the same with flour, sugar and so on. It's quite ok because the result is I wouldn't need many things in January and the feeling of buying a lot makes me feel more in the season, a bit like the ants, storing things for Winter.



Well, time for homemaking now. I'll let you know about the progress in the tidying up.
The buying will begin is some weeks.



For Blissfully Domestic.

Guy Fawkes

Fawkes's father was either a notary or proctor of the ecclesiastical courts and later an advocate of the consistory court of the Archbishop of York. Edward's wife, Edith Blake, was descended from prominent merchants and aldermen of the city. Edward Fawkes died in 1579, and his widow remarried in 1582, to a Catholic, Denis Bainbridge of Scotton. The family were known to be recusants, resisters of the authority of the Church of England, and it is probable that his stepfather's influence contributed to Guy's affiliation to Catholicism; Fawkes finally converted to Catholicism around the age of 16. In the same year that Fawkes converted to Catholicism (1586), he would be made brutally aware of the repression the English Parliament enacted on local Catholics. Margaret Clitherow, later known as the "Pearl of York", was executed in her hometown that year by being crushed to death. She had originally been arrested for harbouring Catholic priests in her home.

If you want to know more you may go to Wikipedia, which has a lot of references and bibliography about it.

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This is just an homage to all the Catholics persecuted and killed in England before and after Guy Fawkes, for centuries.

Outdoor Wednesday

Who said we hardly have Autumn? It was hard to come but it's here. The air is nicer and the leaves are turning their colours.

These beauties live in the garden of Monserrate, a very pretty garden we have here.

Look at that. Looks like it came of a movie.

For Outdoor Wednesday at A Southern Daydreamer.

The pleasure of homemaking

This last week I was not very productive. Homemaking is a thing I like so much but, for some reason, I coulfn't do much work.

I didn't beat myself just because of that. I decided that it happened because it was my birthday week ( it was on 24 Oct. ) so I had the right to have festivities and be easy on me foe a whole week.

Now a new week begins and I must go back to normal days.



Because yesterday it rained a lot, I thought that today I coukdn't take care of the laundry. You know, in a sunny country like this one, we prefer to dry it outside and only use the dryer when it is really needed.

So, off the computer now and it's tidy up time followed for some sessions of laundrytime. Then 15 minutes in everyroom and so on.

It's a wonderful day waiting for me.

Crumble time

It's foggy here. Cozy time. Good for baking. Maybe some apple crumble.
This picture shows an apple pie my husband made some weeks ago. It was very good but, for me, nothing is better than crumble.
So, crumble it is.

My birthday - part II

Here it is the cake.

I found a way of downloading those pictures I took with my new camera.

My husband made me a dinner, very good, that had leek soup, a kind of beef welington ( with pork) with mashed potatoes and vegetables and ice cream for dessert.

And in the end we still had my cake: a kind of pudding my mother knows I die for.

It was such a good night. The problem with all that so good food was, in the end I was so full.

Never mind, it's everyday that we have our birthday!

My birthday

On the 22 October it was one of my girl's birthday, as I posted before, and on the 24 was mine.

I wanted to post here a picture of the cake and all but I couldn't find a way of transfering the pictues to my computer because I have a new camera!

Yes, my husband gave me as one of the presents. The other one is perfectly good but he wanted to give me one more advanced. The problem is I was so used to the other one that now I don't know, yet, to do some things as putting all the photos in the computer.

Never mind. I will show you the ones taken with the old one.

That's hubby's hand here.

I don't dare to show my face. When I see me in the mirror, I don't dislike it and accept very well the signs of the time but when somebody takes a picture of me it's so depressing. I was looking at some my husband took and I couldn't stop thinking to myself: who is this old woman? And I felt a bit sorry for my husband who married a pretty girl and now have this fat and old thing.

Well, I must say to myself that the image in the mirror is the true one, not the ones in the pictures.

Don't think now that I have a low self estime. I quite like me , with all my good and bed things - in my own opinion, more good than bed. It's just I have a very bad relationship with the camera when it comes to my face. I think I'm never well enough.

Sorry about this, I just needed to talk. Maybe someone who reads my blog can feel the same and understand.

Now, here they are some presents I had, given by my mother: a rose plant, a nightie ( it's so pretty, isn't it?)

a big birthay cake, my favorite, here still inside the box, and a Christmas towel.

My mother knows how I'm crazy for Christmas.

15 !

In my house ther is always someone's birthday.
Now it was the time of girl nº 2. She is 15 years old.

Slow Autumn

Here, in this corner of the world, the Autumn is coming slowly. We have flowers everywhere

as it was spring or summer

but we can see the fallen leaves everywhere.

The temperature has been quite high. Now is going a bit better and pleasent.
We were dreaming with the rain and it came.

Now, in this moment, we are having strong clouds and a bit of sun. Yesterday it rained so much that today we are waiting for more.
Most people dont'l like the rain but I like it so much.
So, I'm happy in this departement.

For Outdoor Wednesday at A Southern Daydreamer.

21 years

Today is our aniversary.
Thanks be to God.