Angel Jem's City Cottage

How much of my life do I spend looking ahead? I've worked hard since I was young to not look back and to regret nothing (and guilt, darling; that isn't even in my vocabulary. Je ne regret rien) but I can't stop looking forward. To the weekend, to the summer holidays, to September, to Christmas..... I feel sometimes that I am so not in the moment; that I'm always looking ahead. And sometimes I like looking ahead, but other times I don't. This year September will be fun; a new job, a role that suits my abilities and projects galore to do. 2015 = good. But 2016, well, that's a different kettle of fish. My first little baby will be 18 and ready for university. And I don't know if he'll go far or near. Whether he'll escape to adulthood or stay in his bunk bed for a little longer. And today we joined other bloggers like Winwick Mum and Jo at Through the Keyhole  who have both blogged about Uni spotting. We went to look at a possib...

I had a really busy couple of weeks, including good news about September (I have a new role within my current school... I'll tell you more later!) and some racing around getting things done. I have photos that I want to load up, but the camera is hiding on me so they'll go on later. For now, it's time to just say, I have a few quiet weeks ahead of me at last, so a chance to get the blog clean and tidy, perhaps sort a room in the house out and get my memories down on paper ready to go up. For now, I'll leave you with a cute picture. And a couple of questions; have you ever had one of these and are they difficult to care for?

A book club favourite this year; The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins was our Bookclub read for April, but I'm only just catching up with reviews and things like that now. It's a thriller that starts with Rachel who travels by train every day past the row of houses where she used to live with her ex-husband Tom. She is solitary and sad and makes up a story about a young Golden Couple who live near to her old house. She wants what they have, but like so many people looking in to a relationship from outside she doesn't see the reality behind the smile.  When her fantasy wife disappears and then is found dead, believed murdered, she gets involved, desperate to work out what happened. It's like she stalks the dead woman's life, visiting her therapist, her family and even the husband. Rachel has nothing else to do; she's an alcoholic and needs a purpose, because her job, that she travelled to by train every day, has gone and she is so lacking in self ...

I am inordinately proud of my front door. If you remember, last year I painted it and spruced it up a little, but it was still crowded and cluttered, just because my style is slightly cluttered and crowded. Last week I decided that the summer styling of my door needed something a little more elegant, less in your face. So I cleared the pots away, cleaned the brass and washed the step (still haven't painted the window frames or eaves yet!) and felt rightly pleased with the effect. For about £10 (two cheap marguerites and two pots at £1.25 each) my door has a little more grace and elegance.  And because a little is good and more must be better, some purely gratuitous shots that I fiddled with using my camera.  The Painting effect  Toy Camera 2. My first camera when I was 10 automatically did this. It was a 110 with film on a double ended cassette. Don't tell me, you're too young to remember 110 cameras. At least it wasn't a box brownie!  Cross effect....

On a Wednesday, for once and without a gap in between! What am I reading this week? I am reading something that isn't Poldark!!! I'm reading Hip Tranquil Chick and contemplating taking up Yoga. Slow yoga, cool yoga, sit in a space and stretch greatly yoga. Not Hot Yoga or Bithram Yoga which seems more like keep fit than yoga. I found Kimberly's site, I'm reading her book but I won't be getting hooked on pink any time soon. Fiction-wise  I am going to start this book tonight; The Book of You by Claire Kendal.  A psychological thriller perfect for fans of Gone Girl and Before I go to Sleep . That's what the Amazon page says. Well, since I liked both of those, I'm prepared to give this one a go. I shall share results with you next week! What have I watched this week? Paddington... again! I needed a film that felt like a warm hug, and Paddington it was. I am still lusting after the house.  I never thought my house needed blossoms u...

My spices don't go in my spice cupboard; I've tried all sorts to store and have spices to hand, including keeping them on shelves, in a revolving rack and in the drawer of my butcher's block. But all to no avail. They need to  be at hand, but covered so the sun and heat doesn't affect them. Not in the drawer out of sight so I never think to add spices or herbs to my cooking. I thought I had a solution in the spice rack that I found at Amazon; YouCopia 18-Bottle Original SpiceStack, Silver Spice Organizer/Rack looks really useful, and it would solve my problems spice wise, but I haven't got the spare spondulicks at the moment, so I needed a similar solution for the total cost of nothing. Enter a plastic set of drawers I had used for card and sticker storage in the past. With a little pattern making, alphabetising and an investment in some new spices (ground spices lose their pungency after a while and some of my spices were getting on), my spice drawer...

Ah ha! I got VERY organised and not only is all my planning done for June, but in pdf/png format as well! The M- numbers afterwards are the numbers of the recipes in my ditsy recipe file box. Some of them I need to read, others I know virtually by heart and don't actually look at much beyond a peek when I do my shopping list. And NLFS is Nigella Lawson's Forever Summer. After her appearance on Eurovision I just had to get her book out, and see what recipes I wanted to use.