ONCE UPON A DREAM; Cosy Winter Reading Days

Today is a dull grey day and the sun is hiding away behind a thick duvet of cloud as the rain falls in drizzles.   Yesterday I put up my Christmas tree and decorated my house for the festive season so while it's dull outside, indoors is all aglow with fairy-lights gleaming and sparkling in every room.  It looks so pretty!  I've spritzed Festive Spice room spray from M&S all around the house and I have the matching oil simmering in the oil burners, so my home smells as festive and Christmassy as it looks.  I had all their Christmas fragrances delivered last month in sprays, oils and tealights and while I enjoy the Winter's Eve and Frankincense & Myrrh scents, their Festive Spice one is my favourite.  I use it every year.

One of the things I most enjoy about the dark season is that it gives permission for slow living and cosy days.  At this time of the year it is perfectly acceptable not to stir from your living room, unless it's to put the kettle on.  It's acceptable to enjoy being at home as much as possible, to draw the curtains and close out the night, light candles at noon and have the fairy-lights on all day.  This year especially we have an additional excuse for all this cosiness because we are all under restrictions due to the Covid virus pandemic.  Now we are forced to keep winter as it should be kept - by being as warm and toasty as can be and staying in with a  nice film or a great book.

Universities always factor 'reading days' into their courses.  This is time when students can catch up on any reading they might have missed, or do their extended reading around a particular topic.  It's good to get into the practice of setting aside a specific day for your reading.  It's isn't about being lazy, but it's essential to increase your knowledge and to give your brain fuel to burn.  A reading day is also an enjoyable form of self care, but many people think that they are too busy to spend a day reading books.  I would say that they are too busy not to! 

I have a few reading days on my university timetable coming up next month and I am looking forward to them.  In addition I have a pile of new books that I need to read and review for my blog, so that is what I plan to get to started on today.  The books I've complied are all snowy, wintry books that evoke the spirit of winter, so look out for Book Nooks on them coming over the next two or three months.  At this time of year, when the Christmas lights are twinkling and the fire is aglow, there is nothing better than curling up under a faux fur throw with a hot chocolate and reading a book of festive cheer, whether that's an old childhood favourite such as The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, a classic fairytale like The Snow Queen or a new festive romance you picked up at the supermarket.

Books are a part of everyday life, but never more so than in the winter months, when the imagination naturally leans towards tales of myth and magic and romance.  I like to make my reading days as atmospheric as possible, playing an ambient DVD and a CD softly in the background at the same time.  Today I have The Sleigh Ride on the TV, which is a long journey through the snows of Norway on a reindeer pulled sleigh and I'm playing The Box of Delights soundtrack.  The two together, along with all the Christmas lights, make up an enchanting festive reading grotto.  

I do encourage you to make time for your own reading days, because if you don't plan them and schedule them in you might not find the time.  It's a lovely way to spend a day, during a time when we can't actually go anywhere anyway, and if you create a pretty festive atmosphere you'll enjoy it even more.  So I'm off to get started on this pile of wintry novels I want to review for my blog and I'll be spending the next week or so curled up by the Christmas tree and lost in a book. 

Enjoy your cosy reading days because this is what keeping winter is all about.  

BB Marie x

ONCE UPON A DREAM; Lock-down Birthday

 Do you believe in magic?

So what does a birthday in lock-down look like?  Well, it's been very nice so far, despite all the things I had planned for today (and December) already being cancelled due to the pandemic - it's been rather lovely actually.   It began with a festive shopping trip - because there's not really anything else we're allowed to do.  The Christmas Markets have been cancelled, but some shops are open, including The Range, who have ingeniously shoved half a dozen chest freezers into a corner of the shop to sell food so that they can legitimately stay open!  I love that sense of adaptation and survival - what a genius idea!  Of course, the shop was busy, with queues waiting to go in - and no-one was actually buying the food from the freezers, everyone was heading straights for the 'non-essentials' - but they are managing to stay in business and maintain jobs which is the main thing.

I had my very first Starbucks Eggnog Latte and it was delicious; sweet and creamy, with a hint of festive spice.  Then we went to buy new trimmings for our Christmas trees.  I picked up a pretty mouse-queen ballerina, a sparkly ice skate, unicorns and an ice-skating squirrel.  I'm looking forward to putting the tree up soon.

I recieved some pretty gifts too, including Kylie's new album Disco, which is great.  Magic is my favourite song so far, and I also like Mary Mary.  I got the limited edition transparent vinyl in an aquamarine colour.  It's lovely and goes nicely with the jade vinyl double album of Kylie's I got last year.  I've been playing Disco this afternoon, as I found places for my new presents.

My Mum also bought me a stunning fountain pen.  The only thing on my list this year was a new fountain pen and she has found the prettiest one I've ever seen.  It's a pastel pink pen with gold nib and pocket clip from Ted Baker.  It's so special and I love it.  Plus she got me a musical carousel ornament, as the carousel is my favourite ride and I haven't been able to go on one at all this year, because of the corona virus.

Of course I got lots of sweets, chocolates, cards, scented candles and bath products to pamper with, plus a baby soft sleep mask to wear in bed.   I'm currently burning Snowflake Cookie, which is my all time favorite festive candle and my house smells amazing.  In addition I got the Too Faced festive Enchanted Wonderland eye palette set.  This is dreamy, with gorgeous woodland animals on the front of each book-style palette, all wearing sparkling crowns and tiaras.  There is a Swan Queen, a Doe Deer and a Raccoon.

I treated myself to a few bits too, namely a pair of beautiful stud earrings from Pandora, fashioned to look like Cinderella's pumpkin coach.  They haven't arrived yet, but they should be here soon.  I might wear them for my next graduation ceremony.  I also bought myself a couple of box-sets - Outlander 5, which has become an annual birthday tradition - and the ITV series Cheat, a work of dark academia/thriller, set in Cambridge University, so I think I'm going to curl up with a slice of my Belgian chocolate birthday cake and watch that this evening.  So all in all, despite the very best efforts of Covid 19 to ruin everything for everyone this year, I have had a very enjoyable birthday and I feel spoilt rotten!  But you're allowed to be spoilt on your birthday 😊

 

BOOK NOOK; The Lost Spells by Robert Macfarlane

 

I adore synchronicity and I always feel like magic is afoot when serendipity turns up in my life.  A few weeks ago, before lock-down, I came across The Lost Spells and after flicking through and reading some of the poetry I knew I had to get it.  It's a beautiful book of nature based poetry and stunning water colour illustrations.  The words have great musicality and the artwork is very dynamic and full of  movement.   It's just the kind of poetry book that has a universal appeal, because its not too heavy and the illustrations add another dimension to the word pictures that the poems create. 

I enjoyed reading the book and loved it's almost pagan elements of connecting with the natural world around us.  My favourite poems are Red Fox who is the main character overall and the book begins and ends with him;  Grey Seal with it's enchanting selkie connotations; and Silver Birch which is wintry and beautiful. I can see why The Lost Spells has been such a hit with teachers, parents and children alike. It is a gentle, fun way to introduce youngsters to the magic of poetry and the vanishing landscapes around us.  This would be a great book to read to young children at bedtime, or when out on a field trip as they learn how to recognize the wildlife they come into contact with.  

I read the book and then put it on the shelf with my poetry collection, and didn't think too much more about it.  So imagine my surprise when one of my tutors told me that the author of The Lost Spells, Robert Macfarlane, was one of our Visiting Professors from Cambridge and that he was giving our next class!   I just love it when that kind of thing happens - the magic in the everyday coincidence - because there are no coincidences really.

That class was held tonight and it was great.  I learnt so much about Macfarlane and his work, not only as a poet, but also as an environmental activist too,  as well as being a Fellow at Cambridge University.  He even played a significant part in saving the trees of Sheffield with his poem Heartwood, which is featured in the book and was written especially for the Sheffield campaign to stop the felling of old, but healthy, trees across the city.   Heartwood gave our trees a much needed, and well respected voice, because when the Fellows from the top Universities in the country speak - people tend to listen.  This I feel, is a remnant of the deference given to the old cultured class, and a natural result of how Fellows have been taught to hold an audience and respectfully command a room.   

His class tonight raised many questions about the legacy we are leaving environmentally and he said that we are unfortunately becoming 'bad ancestors' for future historians, who will uncover our blatant misuse of the landscape in their excavations.  I can image the remnants of plastic that some future Neil Oliver type will be digging up in disgust a few hundred years from now!  It's embarrassing to think about. 

Macfarlane's work gets this message across in a powerful, almost subliminal way, for how can we save that which we cannot name?  His poetry therefore, reaches out to children, teaching them to look around them at the birds and bees, to identify and name them - and so to love them and help save them.  Sadly, it is the younger generations who will be left to right our wrongs in nature.

The Lost Spells appealed to me because it explores the magic of words. Whether it's a poem or an incantation, they have much in common and all words have power.   I liked the sense of creating magic by speaking the poems aloud - for what is that if not an incantation, a spell?  As I spent over twenty years writing spells poems in one way or another, be it for books, music or magazines, I was drawn to the spell-speaker power of this book and found it to be quite enchanting.   

As you read, you will find the melody in the words, the musicality of the stanzas.  Again, it is a good example of the fine line between poetry, music and lyrics.  But then the author told us tonight that his main inspirations are Beowulf and Gawain and the Green Knight, so it's not surprising his work has a touch of bardic music about it.  

He also gave us several readings of his work, which was very enjoyable and entertaining.  I especially liked his rendition of Jackdaw, in his softly spoken Received Pronunciation.  He has the kind of voice that is perfect for readings and bedtime stories.  Even in normal conversation , he speaks poetically and builds landscapes with his words, comparing a forest of birch trees to a barcode as he was 'driving through grey half-light'.  Just beautiful!

I always enjoy being taught by our Visiting Professors from Oxford and Cambridge as they do bring the magic of those Universities with them and their classes are always full.  This is what people mean when the say that University will open doors for you.  I have met so many people - authors, agents, Fellows and Professors -  that I would never have had the opportunity to meet had I not been a Masters student and it is one of the most valuable things I've experienced so far in over seven years of studying.  When such authors and prestigious Professors and Fellows venture north, they are sprinkling their magic on all of us in class - you just can't get that anywhere else.  I hope Robert Macfarlane comes to teach us again at some point as his class tonight was brilliant.   And if you love magic and poetry and art, then you will love The Lost Spells too.  

Enjoy!

BB Marie x

ONCE UPON A DREAM; A Year Ago Today...

 On this date,  a year ago today - this happened...😃🎓

MUSICAL DOLL; Between Twilight

 Beautiful, enchanting and romantic...

ONCE UPON A DREAM; Lock-down Princess

As the country prepares to go back into lock-down for the month of November,  I have been considering how this half-hearted attempt at stemming the corona virus will impact on my birthday month.  I say half-hearted because the Prime Minister has decreed that people must still go to work and school - so it's no lock-down at all really, as most people mix with far more 'households' through work than they do socially - so it's all a bit of a farce.  Still, it will upset some plans - bonfire night for instance, will effectively be cancelled, as no-one is allowed to hold organised fireworks displays and the fire brigade, understandably, are discouraging private bonfire parties. 

So my birthday later this month is going to be quite different.  Usually I go to see a show or something, but this year the theaters and ballets are closed, as are cinemas.  Last year I went to see the Little Mix concert and a few days later I went to see Last Christmas at the cinema.  This year I did have plans to go and see Ant Middleton's seminar and then for a pre-Christmas festive cream tea on my birthday at a local stately home, but now those plans are scuppered too!  At least our tickets for both events are still valid for when things return to normal.  And as for a spot of festive Christmas shopping while the brass band plays Christmas carols in the local shopping center - that's out the window as well because it's non-essential. And all this after my holiday to Orkney was cancelled in the summer!

What-a-to-do!  Of course I'm grateful for many things this year - we do at least have our government endorsed 'bubbles' to keep us company this time round.  I didn't mind the last lock-down and I was perfectly content with my own company, but my mother did struggle not seeing anyone for several months as she is a very social person.  All I need is a book!  But we just have to make the make the best of things, so we'll probably repeat what we did on Halloween and have a movie night with roasted chestnuts, festive food and drinks.  That was a fun night - we watched The Awakening, which we both enjoyed and my mum had decorated her house with pumpkins, ghost fairy-lights and lots of candles , so it was an enjoyable spooky evening and it made up for us not being able to go to the Halloween events at Sherwood Forest as we'd originally planned.   We'll probably do something similar for my birthday.

Another thing I'm grateful for is my habit of shopping ahead.  All my Christmas shopping is already done and dusted!  I even have all the cards, wrapping paper and gift tags ready in a drawer.  I've got my 2021 calendar - it's Anne Stokes Unicorns - and my mother bought me a pink 2021 diary/planner.  So apart from the food shop - I'm all done. It pays to be organised and to read and respond to a situation before it fully evolves, rather than reacting to it and panic buying after the crisis has hit home.  I do feel sorry for those people with children though, who are now faced with doing their present shopping online, in competition with every other family in lock-down.

Shopping ahead is the opposite of panic buying and it's something I addressed in my psychotherapy column recently.  The housewives of old used to keep a store cupboard, fully stocked with dried foods, canned goods, preserves, pickles, herbs, spices and baking ingredients.  This meant that they always had the means of a meal in the house - no matter what.  It meant that when they went shopping, they would purchase their fresh produce for the week, but everything else would be bought for the store cupboard, buying ahead on those items, so that they never ran out or ran too short.  I expect it was a natural response to years of rationing after the war.  When you have a well stocked store cupboard, there is simply no need to panic buy anything, because you already have everything you need in the cupboard.

We can all learn from this and I'm not just talking about groceries.  The habit of shopping ahead means that my mother and I have both completed all our Christmas shopping by the end of October.  She has even pre-ordered all her Christmas meats from the local butcher, so all she has to do is pick it up on Christmas week.  I'm not keen on meat, but I do like to shop ahead for all those little extras that make day to day life more luxurious.  I keep a 'little luxuries' store cupboard in my bedroom and I like to keep it stocked with skin care products, scented candles, new perfumes and so on.  I call it my beauty cabinet. I also buy stacks of books, films and music, plus I get sent them for review from time to time.  This effectively means that I can 'shop my shelves' and pick out something brand new whenever I want to treat myself.  When I shop for these items, I am generally shopping for my store cupboard, rather than for items I need to use immediately. 

Not only does this mean that the recent lock-down announcement didn't send me into a spiral of panic buying, it also creates a sense of calm, peace and security.  Life can be unpredictable.  The global pandemic has highlighted that jobs and incomes can be lost in an instant.  If you are living hand to mouth when that occurs, you could find yourselves in dire straits within a matter of days.  But if you've created the habit of shopping ahead during the prosperous times, when the lean times hit, you will feel them less keenly.  You will have a cosy nest, well feathered with all the items that make your life as comfortable as possible, as well as a store cupboard full of basics to tide you over for a bit.

I cannot overstate the sense of security this gives you.  I could lose my income tomorrow and still live like a princess.  This is because I know how it feels to struggle, how it feels to have the financial rug pulled out from under your feet, whether by circumstance or sabotage,  and so I've spent the more prosperous days lining my nest with everyday luxury.  It's not about being rich.  It's about being organised and budgeting the money you do have.  It's about the concept of buying pretty, which is something I've explored before here on my blog - why buy something plain, when you can buy something pretty?   Why have chrome desk lamps when you can buy rose gold ones?  Why have ordinary sewing scissors when you can buy an iridescent pair that look like a unicorn or a bird? And never underestimate the power of beautiful music to lift your mood and create a cosy atmosphere.  It's these little details that help to make up a princessy lifestyle. It's these small things that make you smile and realize how fortunate you are to enjoy such a pretty life, especially when the world has gone to pot. 

All it takes is a little organisation and planning.  Decide what makes your life feel luxurious. For me it's books, lovely music, candles, perfumes and pampering products.  If I can shop my own shelves and come back with a brand new book I've never read before, put on a face mask, pick out a scented candle from my stash and play a CD of beautiful music, I feel rich, regardless of how much money is in the bank.  For you, it might be teddy bear bedding and a box of chocolates; for your gran it might be a stash of new yarn and a fresh knitting pattern; for your husband it might a stack of vintage comics.  Whatever says everyday luxury to you, embrace it and stock up on it. Oh and here's one more tip  - if you can, pay ahead on your bills too, as this also creates a sense of security and mental well-being, plus it buys you time if your finances change for the worse.  It goes without saying that you should have some savings as well. And no, your husband's money doesn't count! Every woman should have a personal income and savings of her own. It's 2020 FFS. 

Living through uncertain times can foster anxiety and negativity.  Having your carefully laid plans cancelled or changed at the last minute is frustrating.  Yet there are always things you can do to live like a princess and to weather the storms that life throws at you.  Think ahead, plan ahead but be prepared to adapt, save up, buy pretty and shop ahead as much as you can, creating store cupboards of both basics and little luxuries that will provide comfort through lock-downs, down-turns and disasters, and that will help to cushion any negative blow that might be heading your way, because this is how you can live like a princess everyday, no matter what!

Stay safe in your castle, pretty one, until next time,

BB Marie x