Christmas Countdown Continues

Our countdown to Christmas continues… We ended up not going to Salisbury Cathedral for the carol service this year. We had planned on going, but in the past few days we have been having plumbing problems and we were waiting around for the plumber to let us know when he was coming. It was kind of up in the air. Also, Brit Boy was finishing up his studying, and that was most important for him to finish, so it was a nice weekend around home.

Our shower has been working and then not working. We get scalded one moment and then we freeze the next and it is just all messed up. Sometimes it decides to be merely a trickle, so it's time they finally authorized a repair. We have had a leak also. It’s been really fun ;-) Thankfully the plumber is going to pay us a visit today. Woo Hoo!!!!! That’s our Christmas present for sure :-)

Since we couldn’t venture too far away, we ended up just chilling out around home. Periodically, Brit Boy took breaks from his studying and we watched Christmas movies or watched music videos on television while we danced around. We enjoyed those study breaks! We love to do our freestyle dancing and then we dance together all elegant…it’s funny. Then I do my Beyonce dance :-)

Later in the afternoon on Monday, Brit Boy finished his final paper and turned it in. And as a bonus, we got our call from the plumber soon after so the day turned out good in the end. We were free to head out. We went into town to pick up some ingredients for my baking and for our Christmas Eve nibbles. We fully expected the crowd that met us, but it was wild in there!!!! :-) We bought my baking ingredients, and some cheese and dips and veggies for our Christmas Eve hanging out. Then I saw them and I was in love ……







These cute little journals/notebooks are my new favorite thing. Usually I always take a detour to the stationery aisles wherever I am. I love pens and journals and notebooks…gotta do the writing thing :-) But I haven’t hit pay dirt like this in a long time. These lovely little books are made of recycled materials, so that’s very good. I just love that the outside and inside are very organic-looking with a bit of flower power on the outside :-) The lady at the checkout was oohing and ahhing over them too, so I wasn’t alone in my love. The best part is that they were on sale. I got two of these mid-size books for £1.75!!!! So a deal on top of everything . Yay!!!! Okay, enough of this notebook swooning! :)

When we got home, I figured that I should go ahead and do the baking so I wouldn’t be rushed. But mostly though, we were just greedy and ready to eat. LOL. I decided to bake us a batch of red velvet cupcakes like I did back in the spring, but with these I sprinkled them a bit to add a festive flair.





We stuffed our faces with a couple after they cooled off and I iced them :-) And then today, we have had one…they seem to get better, like most things after they get a chance to sit. So we are happy people right now with cake in the house :-)

Oh, an update on our shower problems. The plumbers arrived as I was writing this. They just left and they said that we need a new shower. They patched up the leak, so that’s good. I guess that after Christmas when they get the order in, we will get fixed up. So it’s very dodgy showers for a bit longer :-) It's all good though. No sense in sweating it. Hopefully Santa will bring us a new shower for after Christmas.

Anyway, we plan to enjoy a quiet Christmas Eve tomorrow with a few drinks, some finger foods, and cake…what could be better! :-) Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

London and Cupcakes

My sinusitis or whatever it was, has nearly calmed down all the way. I had a bit of a sore throat also and that made me feel awful for those couple of days, but now I am doing much better. So I wanted to get back here and get caught up on what is going on. Here is my mini rewind back to Saturday.

Well on Saturday, I went to see Karen and Ta again, to have my acupuncture. It went fine. Then Sunday, Brit Boy and I just hung out around home and enjoyed the nice weather. The weather had been spring-like at that point for a few days, although today it is kind of windy and there has been some rain. The temperature also cooled off too, so I have been putting on my cardigan and taking it off because I can’t decide if I am warm or cold. (smile) Back to Sunday though, I spoke on the phone with my niece who lives in California. She was doing great and we had a good talk about all things retro. (smile) She is only about nine years younger than me. She says that my pop culture tastes from back in the day gave her lots of good memories since she followed some of what I followed. We discussed the upcoming return of New Kids on the Block and a lot of other musical acts from back in the day. It was a wide-ranging discussion and we talked about current artists. This conversation was peppered with me singing lyrics from everyone at random. It was hilarious. It was kinda cool that she said that she enjoyed following some of my tastes from back then and that she has good memories because of that. Awww. (smile) That was good to hear. It was a good talk, filled with good nostalgia.

Then on Tuesday, the 13th, I was in a baking mood, so I baked some red velvet cupcakes again. Brit Boy and I love them. They are SO not low-fat, but we eat them in semi-moderation. (wink)(smile) I won’t make anymore for a while though in order to save the specialness of them and to save our waistlines.

I have to backtrack a bit. I wanted to save this bit of news for last. Brit Boy and I are adding another event to our next London adventure. Back on Wednesday, May 7th, we got a chance to buy some tickets to a concert during a presale that we had registered for. We were able to purchase two tickets to the 90th birthday celebration concert for Nelson Mandela that will be held in Hyde Park on June 27th. We are so excited. It is amazing to think that Brit Boy and I will be seeing a truly great person of our times. We are really humbled by this opportunity. To see Nelson Mandela will certainly be a great highpoint in our lives. I will most certainly share this experience here on my blog. The timing of all of this works out great, because this will be the same week that we go to Wimbledon. So I will definitely share some of the experiences of that week here, along with some photos. It will be a fun week and we just can’t wait. So London, here we come again. Oh and this time, those blister-causing boots will be left at home. (laugh)

Red Velvet and Good Fridays

Today is Good Friday and I remember what I was taught in Sunday school when I was a kid, about Good Friday. But whilst I still treat the day with well-placed respect, I just couldn’t help using a play on words here and say that it has indeed been a good Friday.

Me and my hubby have been lounging today for the most part. We did our venturing out into the town centre yesterday, so we stayed in today and listened to the wind whirling things around outside while we watched some movies. I always like days like this. Just me and my hubby sitting around not really “doing” anything, but just loving it.

We watched most things that we both wanted to watch and then this afternoon, my hubby fell asleep on the sofa next to me, so I grasped my chance to watch a nice melodramatic movie. The kind of movie that I would watch when I was a single girl, lying around on a Sunday, deciding to not get dressed, and surrounded by my potato chips and drinks. I love being married, but sometimes I miss being able to just slob out on Sunday and watch tv movies and graze on whatever is handy and not have to think about what I am going to cook for dinner. So I grabbed the remote and switch over just in time to see a good one. It was a romantic type movie starring Lindsay Wagner. I have always liked her since back in the day when she was the Bionic Woman. I was a little kid, but I used to run around outside acting like I was bionic too. I used to make the scraping sound that was the sound effect for the bionics in action when she ran. I was a full on Lindsay Wagner girl. So it got me feeling all nostalgic to see she was in this movie. I watched nearly all of it before my hubby woke up. I guess he was really tired. Anyway, he watched the last bits with me and even waxed nostalgic about our shared memories of those bionic days gone by. So he was cool with watching it. It proved to be a satisfying bit of nostalgia in many ways.

The weather was back and forth all day and couldn’t decide how it wanted to be. It was cloudy and then sunny and then at one point it even sleeted. It was very, very windy all day. Our wheelie bin or trash can, as we would call it back home, was moving back and forth, threatening to topple over. I have a bit to tell about our wheelie bin. Today was the day to have our garbage pickup and they came early today. Well, our neighbor, an older lady, did something great to start our good Friday. She actually brought our wheelie bin back down from the sidewalk for us when she brought hers down. And this was big, because she never speaks to us when we see her. We usually just shrugged our shoulders when she doesn't speak and go on with our lives. So we were truly shocked that she made such a gesture today. I am always a true believer in thanking people who are kind to me and I was truly touched by her out of character gesture. Despite some days that I have, I still believe that generally people are good inside. So I wrote her a note on a card I had and thanked her for her kindness and wished her a Happy Easter. I dropped it through the letter slot in her door. So that was yet another good thing about this good Friday. It really made up for Thursday that was not so great at all.

This evening, me and my hubby had our dinner, or “tea” as they call the meal here. We had a light dinner since we had pigged out on junk earlier in the day. We had a couple of potato skins with cheese, which got a bit extra brown, but they were still edible. And on the side we had a nice green salad. I also felt a creative rush and decided to top the salad with a tomato that I fashioned into a tomato flower of sorts. I will post a picture of it. Then for dessert we had some cupcakes that I made on Wednesday. I made really tasty chocolate cupcakes with chocolate sprinkles and red velvet cupcakes, which are my very favorite ones. Red velvet cakes and cupcakes are made a lot back where I come from, so making them here is my way of keeping a bit of back home alive in my new home here. You will see in one of the pictures that my Brit husband has come over to the red velvet side of things and adores red velvet cake too. He took a big bite out of one before I took the picture. Gotta love boys who like red velvet cakes on a good Friday.