Thursday 17 August 2017

My favourite things . . .

 

These are a few of my favourite things, maybe some of them are yours too! 


I love LOVE Tacos, especially these Spicy Potato Tacos that I made a while back. They're delicious.  What I don't like is the fact that Photo Bucket is holding all my photos hostage.  I am so miffed with them.  In order for my pictures to show on my blog I will have to pay £39 a month.  That's almost as much as we pay for car insurance.  Oh, I can download them onto my computer from Photobucket and then upload them back into the individual posts from there  . . .  but can you imagine how much time that is going to take me?  I have been food blogging daily (pretty much) for about 9 years, and it is only in about the last year and a half that I have been uploading my photos directly onto the blog, mostly because Photobucket was being a big pain and I couldn't access it half the time.  Obviously they were getting ready for this big freeze.  If you think I sound annoyed, then you are right.  I am ANNOYED! No warning whatsoever.  Just slammed the door.  Shame on Photobucket. As it is I pay £8.99 a month to store my photos there.  Go ahead, take a look at the link up there and you will see what people are seeing when they click on my blog posts from the past.  Colour me annoyed.


I adore Holly hocks.  I think they are beautiful and the most cottagy of cottage flowers.  When I lived in Suffield, Alberta, our house had a whole wall of hollyhocks on one side of it and the back of the house was loaded with peonies, which is another flower I love.  I don't have either of those here.  I wish I did.  We did buy a beautiful hollyhock one year and planted it, but it never came back.  No, not ever.  Sigh  . . . 

  

I love colour.  I am so glad I live in a world where there are colours, some we don't even have names for.  Colours are beautiful and you cannot describe them.  How do you explain to a blind man what red is or purple, blue, green, etc.  You can describe how they make you feel, but you cannot describe what they look like, nor is it anything they can "see" by touch . . . 


I love door knockers.  I especially love unsual ones like this one.  I have always loved door knockers.  We have one on our front door, but it is just a simple plain ordinary one, but then again, this isn't the type of house that something like this would suit. 


Glass door knobs.  I quite simply adore them.  I think they are so charming and beautiful. If I owned my own house I would have glass door knobs.  The Manor had glass door knobs, even the laundry room had a glass door knob . . . 

  

Pink Depression Glass.  It is so beautiful.   I love it.   I will never have any of it, and that's okay.  I can just enjoy it from afar. 


Drinking glasses with flowers painted on them.  These are Greengate.  I think they are just beautiful.  My mom has drinking glasses with deers on them, and some with aces/spaces/etc. They are all glasses she collected through the years from buying mustard or peanut butter.  I wish companies still did that . . . the only glass jars I collect now are Bon Maman.  I know I am not alone in that.


Salt and pepper shakers.  I love them.  I was collecting them, but I have started to get rid of my collection.  I have so little storage space and when I die where will they go . . .  I have no way of getting the things I have to the ones I love.  I will have to start mailing stuff to them now, while I am still alive.  On another note however, someone has made cute mini Bon Maman jars into salt and pepper shakers. I so want to do that and I have the jars.  Watch this space.

 
 Cream Teas  . . . with mugs of steaming tea (herbal for me) and fruit scones, with plenty of clotted cream and strawberry preserves.  Nothing could be finer  . . . 


Mmmm . . .  clotted cream, with that layer of buttery crust on top and that thick rich cream beneath.  It is impossible to replicate, no matter how hard people try.  You can get something similar . . .  but it is just not the same.  There is nothing like real, true, clotted cream from Devon and Cornwall . . . 

  

Its a bit sappy, but I just love Road to Avonlea.  It is just a sweet sweet show.  The costumes, the sets, the characters.  So much to love  . . . 

 

Susan Branch.  She has been bringing joy into my life since the early 1980's.   Her art, her books, her products, her blog, her Willard newsletters.  Everything.  She speaks to my heart, always.  Its like she knows all my loves and puts them into words/images/etc. Huge, huge fan.   She is a kindred spirit.


HRH Queen Elizabeth.  Long been a fan and a royalist.  I know lots of people don't have time for the Royal family, but I am not one of those.  I love and respect them.  I think they work really, really hard, and their lives are like fish bowls with everyone watching everything they do, ready to jump on every little thing.  I would not want to have to live like that.  I think the Queen is one very classy lady.  She has never had a hint of scandal attached to her.  I think she has been a very good Queen and has set a wonderful Royal example to us all.  The Royal family and the history of Royalty brings oodles of dosh into the UK every year in Tourism revenue.  Lets face it, people don't come here for the weather, cos the weather here is unreliable at best!  Buckingham palace, Kensington Palace, the Mall, Horseguards Parade, Changing of the Guard, The Tower of London, London Bridge, etc.  That's what people come to see, more than anything else.  The history of this country is amazing and it is just a beautiful country, probably more than anything else, because of the rain.  It makes us very lush and green.


Scented Candles and yes, Yankee Candles are my favourite ones.  I especially love anything spicy . . .  anything that smells like I have just been baking  . . . it smells like home sweet home to me. The Apple Crumble one is particularly nice.


Notebooks and journals.  I have always loved them.  I loved my new scribblers when I went to school and I loved filling them.  I still do. I need to correlate mine.  They are filled with all sorts.  Church conference notes, spiritual thoughts, poetry, quotes, etc.  There is nothing that pleases me more than a fresh notebook, unless it is a new pen.  I love those too.

And those are my favourite things for this week!

A thought to carry with you . . . 

.° * 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ •
•。★★ 。* 。
° 。 ° ˛˚˛ * _Π_____*。*˚
˚ ˛ •˛•˚ */______/~\。˚ ˚ ˛
˚ ˛ •˛• ˚ | 田田 |門 ★

 *.˛.° Be glad of life because 
it gives you the chance to work,
and to love, and to play, 
and to look up at the stars.
~Henry Van Dyke   •。★★ 。* 。



 In The English Kitchen today  . . .  Creamy Garlic Sauced Chicken.

Have a wonderful Thursday.  Don't forget during the fabric of your day  . . . 

═══════════ ღೋƸ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒღೋ ═══════════ ⊰✿░G░O░D⊰✿⊰L░O░V░E░S⊰✿⊰░Y░O░U░⊰✿
═══════════ ღೋƸ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒღೋ ═══════════

and I do too!

 

8 comments:

  1. Yum Marie. The chicken looks wonderful. I love that you have people who inspire you. It is something that makes life so special.

    When we were kids we would visit my great aunt often. It was about a five hour drive in all. She had 2 glasses she kept for my brother and I to use. We used to be almost frothing in anticipation because we both liked the Gepeto one. As for this household I am always throwing glasses away.

    Like you I enjoy the old stories. I lived in a dream world as often as I could.

    I didn't have a cream tea in England. We often have tea here. I have bought some Cornish clotted cream and didn't think it was worth the expense. High tea, low tea, whatever my family likes tea.

    I am not feeling well today. Somehow I seem to have upset my IBS and feel I may need to go back to the elimination diet and start again. ON top of that our winter day hit 32. I went out to open the doors a short while ago and I could feel the heat radiating out of the concrete

    I hope your eye is feeling so much better. Love and God bless.

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  2. So many good things in your post today. I do love tacos and will check out the recipe. I love candles too and burn them often. My grandmother collected salt and pepper shakers and had a huge collection. I often wonder what ever happened to them. She had a large family and everyone gave her one or two sets and they came from all around the world.

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  3. Yikes! I used to save my photos to Picasa etc..so many storage options..but then I just uploaded directly to my computer..do you not find it easy doing that?
    I thn add to my posts..shameful they can't let your old photos be shown..

    that's a lot of $$..
    :(

    Have you gone to Pinterest? Are your boards still how you had them?
    Mine were alphabetically placed..painstaking placed a few yrs ago..now they are all jumbled and no qick fix..it was a Pinterest glitch:(
    Oy.


    Love SB.. an aura about her..so nice!!!So talented..our own Beatrix Potter♥
    Not a creamy girl..here..

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  4. Ohh, what a wonderful memory from your visits to your Auntie Suzan. I know when mom let us use her "special" drinking glasses we felt really special too! Sorry you are not feeling well. (((((hugs)))))My eye is the same, but it is not worse and that is what matters most. I will gradually get used to it. Next time you come to the UK, we will go for a Cream Tea! xoxo

    I bet that collection of your Nan's was fabulous Pam! Oh how wonderful it must have been. Someone must have gotten them, or they might have gone to charity when she was gone. Sad to think of that. xoxo

    I have started (about a year or so ago) to upload my photos directly onto the blog, so thankfully they are alright Monique, its the personal photos I am worried about. My daughter's wedding. Our trips to canada, my sons graduation, our holidays etc. I am terrified I will lose them forever now. As it stands I can go and look at them on Photobucket, but no third party linking, so I can't post them anywhere else. I know they are going to go under with this bad idea of theirs. People are just going to abandon them in droves and then we will all lose everything. Just when things start going good eh? Oh well, that's what makes life so exciting! My boards on Pinterest are a real jumble also. I almost feel like starting from scratch on there. Susan is a kindred spirit, like you say, our very own BP! xoxo

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  5. If you truly love pink depression glass, you may want to check into pricing some. I love depression glass, green being my favorite, followed up by pink. Depression glass is, you'll forgive me, "depressed" right now and prices can be pretty low. I have about 5 pieces of pink glass.

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  6. I'm furious that your almost about to loose your photos..how dare they do something like that, it really is beyond me.....if you could pay the money they are wanting could you then grab all your photos back and perhaps save them on an external disc. The people who know are always telling us to make back ups..Mary did buy me an external disc for Christmas a few years ago and I did download all my photos on to it from my laptop which is good I suppose but it's a bit like keeping photo albums ...how often do we actually look at them,.....I don't think I ever have looked since I did the download. If I was sensible....which I ain't ! I would do another download again mostly photos ...but sensible and I are rarely companions LOL.... I've now discovered another thing that you and I can disagree on. I'm afraid I don't like wraps and certainly not anything spicey...but I do love the same candles in fact a shop in Chippenham has had them on sale for a while now and Mary bless her has been buying me quite a few which I am keeping for during winter also been handy to give as a surprise present to Lyn...
    Well bed calls....night night. God bless. Xxx

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  7. Oh Marie, I am having the very same struggle with Photobucket. I think it is outrageous what they are doing. They have two of those ad things right on my page. I downloaded all my photos on my computer. I'm not sure got them all. I then discontiued them; but these ads things are still on my site. There is no way I would pay so much money to them.
    I enjoyed going through your favorite things. I think the doorknobs are so unique. I don't see them much here. I have some painted Christmas glasses that I love. I haven't watch Road to Avalon but it looks like such a good one. I do love the Queen and I am facinated with Royalty and especially love English History. I do love scented candles. I love notebooks too. I keep a journal but take notes in notebooks. The only thing is I can't imagine I will ever read my notes again. I like to take htem anyway.
    Blessings for you dear friend and I hope you can solve the photobucket problem. Sending big hugs your way~

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  8. Ahh, LeAnn, I am so sorry you are having the same problem. It is really wrong of them. For some reason my photos have magically re-appeared, but I wonder for how long . . . dare we hope? You would love Road to Avonlea. It is quaint and really lovely. I take notes anyways, and then when I go back over them, can't remember what I was thinking at the time I took them, LOL. I know what am I like! Love and hugs, xoxo

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