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Category Archives: Postaday2013

Xylophone, Brass Owl and Shop Window

1 This video was sent my way this morning and my daughter now tells me that it is an advert. I hadn’t realised and anyway, it is rather lovely so here is the link to a delightful video of a kind of xylophone in the forest.

2 We love our brass owl trivet, especially when he’s all freshly polished as he is today.

Brass owl trivet

3 The shop windows in our town are full of decorations made by local school children and they are looking very beautiful. This one is by pupils of Redruth School (which was once Tolgus School and where my lovely Dad used to be the Headteacher many years ago!)

Optician’s window display for Christmas

5 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on December 3, 2013 in Beauty, music, photography, Postaday2013

Tags: Christmas decorations, polished brass, Redruth School, Tolgus School

Satisfaction, Box and Concert

02 Dec

1 The decorating is almost finished! We just have to put the paintings back and all will soon be well. That’s a job well done!

2 Today, I polished up my box where I keep special things like first haircuts. wedding and birth announcements and noticed again the bee with the flowers. This box was given to me when I was about 11 years old; my Mum bought it at an auction in Truro. Another time, I will show you some of my treasures.

Beautiful painted box

3 Our choir, The Inglehearts, sang with the children from the village school in whose hall we practise each week. It was so lovely to sing with the little ones from 4 – 10 years old who did beautifully in their Christmas Concert. I learned a delightful action song about penguins which I will do with our Grandchildren when they are with us at Christmas.

11 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on December 2, 2013 in Beauty, music, photography, Postaday2013, singing

Tags: Christmas concert, memorablia, The Ingleheart Singers

Cactus, Poem of the Day and 3 Daft Monkeys

01 Dec

1 This beautiful Christmas cactus was a present several years ago from our eldest daughter and this year it is flowering rather early.

Christmas Cactus

2 I love this poem, “Lines for Winter” by Mark Strand. It is today’s poem in Poem for the Day Two, a favourite volume.

Lines for Winter

Tell yourself
as it gets cold and gray falls from the air
that you will go on
walking, hearing
the same tune no matter where
you find yourself—
inside the dome of dark
or under the cracking white
of the moon’s gaze in a valley of snow.
Tonight as it gets cold
tell yourself
what you know which is nothing
but the tune your bones play
as you keep going. And you will be able
for once to lie down under the small fire
of winter stars.
And if it happens that you cannot
go on or turn back
and you find yourself
where you will be at the end,
tell yourself
in that final flowing of cold through your limbs
that you love what you are.

Mark Strand

3 A friend who was with us last night took some amazing photos of the wonderful Three Daft Monkeys launch party. I have his permission to show you the following photos and I also offer you a link to the whole set on his Facebook page.

3 Daft Monkeys Photo taken by David Wheeler

Such fun! Photo taken by David Wheeler

Athene Photo taken by David Wheeler

Tim and 12 string guitar Photo taken by David Wheeler

Athene and her violin Photo taken by David Wheeler

4 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on December 1, 2013 in Beauty, flowers, gigs, music, photography, poetry, Postaday2013

Tags: "Lines for Winter" by Mark Strand, 3 Daft Monkeys, Christmas Cactus, David Wheeler, Of Stones and Bones

November 30th – A Non-Stop Day

01 Dec

We were home too late last night to post this so here is a photo gallery of our day starting with a walk in the afternoon on the cliffs at Chapelporth with our eldest daughter who has been with us for a lovely few days, moving on to The Redruth Christmas Parade where my choir was singing Christmas carols for the families waiting to see Father Christmas and on to dinner with friends prior to dancing the night away to the music of The Three Daft Monkeys at their album, Of Stones and Bones, launch party. I left out the morning getting on with the decorating! A beautiful day from start to finish! Click on any photo for detail and the caption.

The waves crashing against the cliffs at Chapelporth on Cornwall’s North coast

Wheal Coates on the cliffs

The start of the Christmas Parade

Waving at Father Christmas

The excitement of children

All the local schools take part

Two of the Daft Monkeys; they and their audience are constantly on the move – hence the blurriness!

And baby came too for the finale

2 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on December 1, 2013 in Beauty, Chapel Porth, community, Cornwall, festival, photography, Postaday2013, sculpture, Sea

Tags: Christmas Parade, Of Stones and Bones, Three Daft Monkeys

Weekly Photo Challenge: Let There Be Light!

30 Nov

The Portland Lighthouse

Lighthouse on Cape Cod

Listen here for my choir singing, ‘Lower Lights” a beautiful song about the importance of the lights around the coasts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TW9-EQDQX5g

NaBloPoMo

5 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on November 30, 2013 in America, books, music, photography, Postaday2013, singing, travel

Tags: NaBloPoMo, Portland Light House, Portland Lighthouse, Weekly Photo Challenge: Let There Be Light!

Decorating, Owl Wood-stack and The Snow Dog

27 Nov

1 Decorating is making progress. It will be beautiful in time…….

2 This amazing picture of an immaculate wood-stack in the shape of an owl came my way recently. I can’t imagine actually using any of the wood.

Beautiful owl woodstack

3 I started knitting the Snow Dog months ago but have put off the sewing up, my least favourite part of making anything. Today, in a break from painting the coving, I made a start. It’s hard!

Snow Dog pieces

30 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on November 27, 2013 in Beauty, craft, knitting, Postaday2013

Tags: knitting, NaBloPoMo, Snow Dog, wood pile

Batch Cooking, Viburnum and Restoration

26 Nov

1 Yesterday I cooked up a storm, making the first of the meals for 11 and a 1/2 family people for the holiday season! This was the beautiful Flemish Beef casserole which will be topped with garlic bread. It is now in the freezer in 6 boxes of two servings each and I thank my school friend, Stella, for the recipe. I shall add chestnuts to the final dish to make it even more festive!

Stella’s Flemish Beef

2 The Viburnum is bursting with waxy blossom, such a welcome sight when there’s not much colour in the garden.

Viburnum

3 The people who had this house before us changed some of the beautiful Victorian features and as we decorate, we are restoring those we can. They removed the picture rail and put it lower than it should be. The lovely Mr S has taken it all down, we have filled the holes and re-plastered parts and now the rail is back at the height it should be, restoring the elegant beauty of the room. Now we just have to get it all re-painted before Grand-baby B arrives on Monday as she will need somewhere to crawl about!

The rail in its original position and the patchwork where it was.

The rail in its original position and the patchwork where it used to be.

5 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on November 26, 2013 in Beauty, flowers, Food, nature, photography, Postaday2013

Tags: batch cooking, Flemish Beef, Flemish Beef casserole, NaBloPoMo, restoration, viburnum, Victorian house

The Ballad of Joe Hill, Singing and Limequats

25 Nov

1 I was reminded of these words of Shelley yesterday

“Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory- “

when I heard ‘The Ballad Of Joe Hill’ sung by Paul Robeson, one of my all time favourite voices singing one of my lovely Dad’s favourite songs, and one which we played at Dad’s Humanist funeral. It was chosen by Ed Milliband in Desert Island Discs on Sunday and has been in my head ever since. Some of you will know this – but it doesn’t matter how long ago you ‘lost’ a parent, they never actually leave you and music can suddenly bring them back into the kitchen as clearly as if they were still alive.

3 Singing with The Inglehearts tonight was especially good. There’s something very special about singing in harmony with friends. Here’s a public Thank you to Claire Ingleheart for her work, her friendship and her very special talent which she shares so freely.

3 The Crystallised Limequats look beautiful in their jar.

Crystallised Limequats

18 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on November 25, 2013 in Beauty, Humanist ceremony, music, photography, Postaday2013, quotations, singing

Tags: bereavement, Claire Ingleheart, Desert Island Discs, Ed Milliband, limequats, NaBloPoMo, Paul Robeson, The Ballad of Joe Hill, The Ingleheart Singers

Horse, Sweet Potato Soup and Limequats

24 Nov

1 The horses in the field behind us almost came into the garden today! One was scratching his neck so hard on the fence that we thought it might give way!

Our neighbour in the back field

2 I had some left-over sweet potato from making a Sweet Potato Cake (Don’t ask! It was a disaster! The recipe read well but it was almost tasteless, solid as a brick and fit only for the birds!) While it was in the oven and before I knew how awful it was, I decided to make the rest into soup with carrots and ginger, onions and garlic and vegetable stock and that was fabulous!

Sweet potato, carrot and ginger soup

3 I didn’t know what Limequats were either! I’d eaten Kumquats and these, it seems, are the lime version. I decided to make Crystallised fruits with them so here they are in their sugary bath with cinnamon and vanilla. I love how the little seeds have the green line in them. In case you can’t tell the scale, each Limequat is a bit bigger than a marble but not quite as big as a golf ball.

Inside a Limequat

Toady I’ve posted the recipe for the very delicious Raw Chocolate Brownies should you wish to try them. You can find it on my Recipe page or click here.

NaBloPoMo

8 Comments

Posted by mybeautfulthings on November 24, 2013 in Beauty, Food, nature, photography, Postaday2013

Tags: crystallised fruit, limequats, NaBloPoMo, recipe for raw chocolate brownies, sweet potato soup

Golden Onions, Walk and Raw Chocolate Brownie

23 Nov

1 This morning the low beams of the winter sun caught our homegrown plaited onions and made them even more beautiful.

Golden onions

2 We had a walk around the Great Flat Lode behind our house today. There was a surprising amount of colour – golden gorse, Pink Campions, red berries and lovely green moss with ivy leaves and, on this crisp clear day, a very good blue view of the sea on the North coast of Cornwall.