Unbought Delicacies: Enchant your heart..................

Sunday, 6 November 2011

Enchant your heart..................

I don't buy a lot of new things, but sometimes I just *have* to have something! I stand there and try and think will I get home and regret not buying it - for it's never still there when you go back for it, is it? We were at the wonderful Sherborne Castle Gardens garden centre on Friday (I'd been there the day before with my firend Jill, raiding the 50p herb plants reductions), where they have the most glorious, spectacular Christmas display you can imagine. I can't begin to describe it, try and get there if you possibly can. It's won many awards over the years, and deservedly so.
Just found this, take a look to get the flavour of the occasion, from 2008 - have to say this year's display though is the best so far in all the years I've been going...........
http://www.thegardeneronline.co.uk/christmas-video.asp

There is a good selection of nostalgic gifts this year, and this is what I just couldn't resist:

I 've changed a lot over the last two or three years; I've gone through my practical and 'must be useful' phase; I'm lucky now to have amassed a wonderful store of good quality equipment and belongings that will last me forever, and I've come back round to the pretty, beautiful and just plain lovely, often pink too, I never used to be a pink person, but pink is the colour now :)

To quote the wonderful and inspiring William Morris:

''Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful''

I would add 'or enchants your heart' to that..............................................

2 comments:

The Webbers living a life at the beach said...: Sometimes a little of what you fancy does ya good! Personally I'd fancy a LOT of Daniel Craig but he went and got himself married! :D; 6 November 2011 at 22:01
Jacqui said...: We all need a wee treat now and again. I love the address book, i used to spend all my pocket money on ladybird books - and most of my school projects were shamelessly lifted word for word from the relevant book. xx; 6 November 2011 at 22:11

I have found such joy

I have found such joy in simple things;
A plain, clean room, a nut-brown loaf of bread,
A cup of milk, a kettle as it sings,
The shelter of a roof above my head,
And in a leaf-laced square along the floor,
Where yellow sunlight glimmers through the door.
I have found such joy in things that fill
My quiet days: a curtain's blowing grace,
A potted plant upon my window sill,
A rose, fresh-cut and placed within a vase;
A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair,
And books I long have loved beside me there.
Oh, I have found such joys I wish I might
Tell every woman who goes seeking far
For some elusive, feverish delight,
That very close to home the great joys are:
The elemental things- old as the race,
Yet never, through the ages, commonplace.

~ Grace Noll Crowell

Ideas for handmade gifts

Small knitteds - gloves, scarves, hot water bottle covers, hats, tea cosies, phone covers, little toys,,cushion covers, bags. Some of these can be felted/fulled for extra interest.
Edibles - chutneys and jams, pickles, nice teas in a vintage/retro tin, sweeties, toffees, mustard, home made wine and liqueurs, home dried fruits, ketchups.
For the home - trimmed tea towels, handknitted dishcloths, quilted wallhangings, small samplers, restored picture frames, pot pourri, lavender bags, covered coathangers, little scented bags for hanging on handles, framed photos of family,etc you've taken yourself, pincushion,needle book, scissor keeper, book of promises (eg babysitting, 1 hour's housework, the ironing, etc)
Bathtime - homemade soap, bath oils, bath salts, knitted washcloths, herbal bags for the bath, hand sewn toilet bags, trimmed hand towels, homemade lotions and potions packed in pretty jars and bottles.
For the garden - home saved seed in handmade decorated packets; homemade handcream, exfoliating soap, wheat bag for those digger's aches and pains!

Handmade books, personalised printed notepaper and envelopes.
Hamper of bits and bobs from the above lists, packed in a pretty lined basket.

I'll add some more as and when I think of them; These can be used all year round and easily tailored to the recipient - everyone loves a homemade gift. :)

Inspiring thoughts.............

I saw a man, an old Cilician, who occupied an acre or two of land that no one wanted.
A patch not worth the ploughing, unrewarding for flocks, unfit for vineyards;
he, however, by planting here and there among the scrub cabbages or white lilies and verbena and flimsy poppies, fancied himself a king in wealth, and coming home late in the evening, loaded his board with unbought delicacies.
Virgil

I had no theories to prove. I merely wanted to try living by my own hands, independently as far as possible from a system of division of labour in which the participant loses most of the pleasure of making and growing things for himself. I wanted to bring in my own fuel and smell its sweet smell as it burned in the hearth I had made. I wanted to grow my own food, or forage after it. In short I wanted to do as much as I could for myself, because I had already realised from partial experience the inexpressible joy of doing so.

Harlan Hubbard, Shantyboat: A River Way of Life

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Sunday, 6 November 2011

Enchant your heart..................

2 comments: