Blowing Away the Cobwebs....

Happy 2020 everyone. I hope your celebrations went well. I had a lovely New Year's Day with my tribe. It was very tiring, shopping for the food, preparing the food, cooking the food, serving the food and clearing up afterwards but altogether highly enjoyable. I made carrot, roasted pepper and roasted sweet potato soup, bought a fabulously huge steak pie at my local farm butchers (a little bit pricier than the supermarket but I know that the ingredients are all top notch and no carbon emissions used in collecting it, within walking distance) and for the veggie in the company, I made roasted sweet potato and red pepper filo pastry parcels. We had roasted baby potatoes, sweet potato mash, brussel sprouts, baby carrots, buttered cabbage and baked beetroot (all veg supplied fresh from the fields by my youngest son).

The dishwasher was already full!

No minimalist photo shoots of pristine kitchens in this house. It is what it is!

At this point, they were all tucking into chocolate profiteroles and ice cream, provided by my eldest boy.
It was a very lovely time, having them all under the same roof at the same time and tomorrow we'll all be together again for the day because my sisters and I have organised a surprise 89th birthday party for my Mother, at her house!

Today, I'm having a bit of a slow day. 😀

 xoxoxo

I made my excuses at work yesterday morning to be able to get away early to pop up to Edinburgh to see my nephew off on the train back to London (actually, that was the secondary reason, the main reason being that I just didn't want to be there but more of that later, let's not start the year off with negativity, there's more than enough of that going around at the moment, I'm sure you'd agree?) and afterwards, in the brilliant winter sunshine, I went for a wander.

 There were an abundance of charity shops in the area where I went a-wandering and I particularly liked this display in one of them, mostly of murder mystery books but I didn't buy any since I have more than enough books to kit out a library, including some library books which are due back next week! Mustn't forget.

I followed the long climb up the Royal Mile (through throngs of Japanese tourists!) and down through The Mound to Princes Street Gardens where the remnants of the Christmas Market were still in place. I didn't manage to get there before Christmas this year. For one thing, it's been too cold and for another, too many people but it does look really pretty at night, when the sky is dark and the lights are very bright and colourful.

These really brave people were circling the blue sky and making a lot of noise while they were at it!

Eventually, the reason for my visit came into sight. My friend, The Artist, was having an exhibition of his latest paintings. Edinburgh captured in her beauty through his canvasses.
I  couldn't afford to buy any, even with the 'pay-as-you-go' scheme that the gallery temptingly dangles in the introduction of their brochure to accompany the exhibition. I did pick up a free postcard though. That'll do for now.

I love the colour in this painting. It reminded me of my niece's hair on Christmas Day. She's an art student! They love colour, those artists.

It was a most enjoyable way to spend an afternoon. I'm working on doing more of it this year, time, money and the needs of other people allowing!

xoxoxo

Hope your weekend is going well. Back to some sense of normality next week now that it's all over for another year. 

I've cleared the decks of the remaining evidence of Christmas and taken a huge box of surplus ornaments and decorations to the charity shop.  

I think 'minimalism' is going to be my word of the year.

What about you?

xoxoxo