A perfect summer’s day

Hey! I’m back from my week in Greece, more on that later in another post. It was so nice to land on Sunday afternoon and be met by warm sunny weather, rather than the usual shock to the system when you’ve been in warmer climes. Even better was having an extra day off in the form of Bank Holiday Monday to soften the blow of being home, and yesterday was gorgeously warm and sunny in Birmingham. Yesterday was everything that every weekend was supposed to be in summertime, but has mainly failed miserably due to our rubbish British weather.

I had a lazy start to the day, a leisurely walk to the shops for breakfast supplies, and ate a sausage and mushroom sandwich. Then I pottered around in my garden, trimming bushes and hedges, pruning my overgrown climbing roses, watering all my plants that were thirsty after a week with no love or rain, and repotting rose bushes and french lavender to give them more space to grow.

It’s been so long since I’ve been able to spend any length of time out there because of the rain and general non-summeriness. I’ve probably not had a proper potter since the beginning of July. I was in my element; it’s exactly how I hoped to be spending my summer days. In truth I’d written off any chance of it happening as summer draws to a close (boooooo) but it was great to have a last hurrah.

Sunglasses in the garden

I’ve loved populating my green space with pretty stuff. These ornamental ladders came via a well timed trip to HomeSense, after I’d spotted similar on Pinterest.

Ornamental ladders

I’ve stacked them with pretty lanterns and solar lights from Poundland; they have such lovely garden bits and pieces.

Garden ornaments

These lightbulb shape multi-coloured solar lights were last year’s Poundland, from the Charlie Dimmock garden range (there’s also a blue and yellow one hidden from view)

Solar lightbulbs

These are my favourite garden ornaments though; Easter Island head planters from B&Q with blue grass “hair”. We call them Bert and Ernie (Bert is on the left with the emo sweepy hair and Ernie has the big forehead!)


In the evening we ate Chinese takeaway in the last of the sun and then watched the last two episodes of Game of Thrones season 7, catching up on the one we missed last week while we were away, and yesterday’s season finale. No spoilers, but I was slightly disappointed; previous seasons have led to big expectations!

How was your bank holiday?

Thanks, as always, for reading! x

Moseley Folk Festival

Once again this weekend our beloved village was home to a 3 day festival; bringing bands, bars and brightness to the park.

You may recall I blogged about the previous one – Jazz, Funk and Soul, back in July.

This time it was the turn of the Folk Festival which, over the years, has become less about just folk. Gaz Coombes of SuperGrass played and Sunday night was headlined by The Monkees!

I honestly can’t comment on the music, as it was just a backdrop to a wonderful couple of days in magical surroundings. We were blessed with gorgeous weather on Sunday and it totally made it; chilling out on picnic blankets with friends drinking lots of pink wine and soaking up the late summer sun.

Here it is in pictures – we didn’t head down until early evening on Saturday.

 

Moseley Folk Festival 2

Moseley folk festival bar

Beer barrels

Festival merch

Remember I said on my Hat-urday post that I barely wear my 70s floppy hat? I put that right!

70s floppy hat

Lots of face painting and people looking pretty (I did ask these people if I could share their photographs!)

Face painting menu

Face painted Dad and Daughter

Face painted man

Sunday was nice enough for me to bust out another hat I haven’t worn yet – the straw cowboy one.

Straw cowboy hat selfie

The entrance to the park is so green and secluded; you’d never know it was just off the main road.

Entrace to Moseley Park

Entry to Moseley Park

I drank a lot of wine.

Rose wine

Accosted a Morris Dancer for photographs (and swapped hats with him!)

Morris dancer 2

Morris dancer

Morris dancer and me

Had to have a little lie down on the blanket (I blame the wine)

Mirror shades selfie

Look at the weather – just gorgeous!

Moseley Park trees

Got my face painted.

Me facepaint

What a fabulous time we had!

Moseley Folk Festival

September Sadness

Try as I might, I can’t but help let my mood be affected by the time of year. And even though it’s just another date in the calendar, I always find myself feeling pretty sad at the beginning of September. It signals the beginning of the end of summer, darker mornings and nights, cooler weather, leaves falling off the trees, summer flowers dying, and the onset of winter.

September

I’m such a summer person. I’m truly at my best in summer. I love being outdoors, not wearing a coat, wearing sandals, days out.

I’ve seen a few blog posts over the past few days with people getting excited about the fact it’s September, because it means autumn and a change of season and Halloween and Christmas. Don’t get me wrong, I do like Halloween and Christmas. I think it’s just the transitional period when summer is on it’s way out and you’re still craving warm days and outdoor nights. I just can’t get excited about descending into coldness and darkness.

Its difficult to say goodbye to summer, especially when it hasn’t been so good this year.

Even worse, September so far seems to have struck with a vengeance this year – it’s not even a gentle decline into autumn so much as going to bed in August and walking up in November! Rain, clouds, temperature drops. I mean, come on!

On the plus side, I still have lots of nice summery stuff planned before I totally give in to autumn and it’s cold, damp, miserable clutches. Including a local festival this weekend, a long weekend in Cornwall, a road trip to a gig in Leeds, a wedding and a week in Italy.

On the negative side, when all that’s over AND it’s autumn proper I’ll probably be really miserable.

What’s your favourite time of year?

My weekend in pictures

I’ve had a stunning weekend of doing very little. Weekends like that are few and far between – we seem to have so much on this year. We were supposed to be out for a birthday on Saturday night but we were both feeling pretty burnt out from work and family stuff and just life so we made the decision to stay home for some much needed R&R. It was a good decision.

Here’s a pictorial round up!

Baked lamb with potatoes and stilton – I’ll post up a recipe for this, it’s so so good.

Baked lamb with stilton and potatoes

Breakfast on the balcony

Breakfast on the balcony

Enjoying the view

Balcony view

Reading chick lit in the sunshine

Reading on the balcony

Still on the balcony, even in the dark, just add hoodie and burner!

Balcony by night

Popping to the local shops, wearing straw and stripes

Me in straw hat and stripes

Owl spotting – check out the Big Hoot (most of the owls are in the city centre and I haven’t had chance to get there yet but there are the odd few dotted around on the outskirts, these are in Kings Heath).

The Big Hoot Owl and the Pussycat

The Big Hoot Owl of Athena

The Big Hoot owl selfie The Big Hoot Athena owl selfie

Sunday papers (yes I read the tabloids, no I’m not sorry – it’s all about trash and escapism at the weekend!)

Sunday papers

Pruning my bushes (fnar!) – a bit of a tidy up of my balcony pots which I’ve shamefully neglected somewhat this year

Watering can and gardening tools

Pink petunias

Purple balcony flowers

Sunday roast – one of my favourite meals to cook

Sunday roast

Strawberries and cream!

Strawberries and cream

A massive sigh of relief, “I-tal-you”

From what, you might ask?

(or might not!)

Is it relief at having passed my job probation? Relief that the weather forecast in Wales has improved since my last desperate post? Relief that the Foo Fighters have rearranged some dates after cancelling Wembley due to Dave’s broken leg?

Nope. None of those things.

It’s relief that finally, at last, after weeks of deliberation and stress…

…we’ve booked a summer holiday.

I’ve mentioned before that I have a predilection to being dramatic, but in this case rightly so. I truly believe that we have never struggled to agree on a week away as much as this year.

Timing was an issue; we have so much on over the remaining summer months (I know, diddums) that we were struggling on when to go (and no point shoehorning something in for the sake of it). Realistically we don’t have time until mid October, by which point many of the traditional resorts in Europe are too cool temperature wise to guarantee a great holiday (not that it’s all about lying in the sun, but for what we were originally looking at that would probably have been the case).

Expectation was also an issue, because neither of us would commit to what we actually wanted from a holiday – was it just lying around doing nothing at all, or maybe with some sightseeing thrown in, or total sightseeing? We’ve danced around each other nervously, with husband eventually telling me that he would go along with whatever I wanted to do (probably because I was getting this wild woman of Borneo look in my eye and started twitching whenever a week off was mentioned).

Egypt was on the list; Sharm el Sheikh for late season sunshine and a day trip to the Pyramids as we’ve both always wanted to go. But recent horrors in Tunisia made us rethink that plan. Even if we scrapped the pyramid visit and just stayed in the resort, where there’s increased security, Egypt is a bit too close to the conflict for comfort; especially when attacks have happened from the sea. And do I really want to be sunbathing and watching an armed security team from the corner of my eye. Er, no.

Hong Kong was also on the list, but then with even more things popping into our calendar that require time off here and there, we don’t really have enough annual leave to do it justice. And it’s a bloomin’ long flight to only have 5 real usable days once you take travel time into account. Plus it would be full on doing and seeing stuff, which I don’t think is what husband really wants (although he’s too scared to say anything – negative or positive – by now, in case it finally tips me over the edge!!) So that was shelved.

Greece was a real contender, as it’s still warm into October and they really need tourist investment right now. But we’ve been to Greece for the past two years and weren’t sure if we were just considering it because we didn’t know where else to go.

And then I came across an amazing deal in Italy. Flying into Naples, staying just outside Sorrento in a cliff side hotel. Free minibus to Sorrento multiple times each day. Excursions to Vesuvius and Pompeii. A boat trip to Capri. A drive along the Amalfi coast. All options that are open to us, if we want them. OK, it’s not going to be scorchio in October. But it will, at worst, be t-shirt and shorts weather in the day, perfectly nice for sitting outside overlooking the sea and reading a book. Ideal temperature for sightseeing. And should the worst happen, and it rains, we’re staying at a fabulous all inclusive hotel so we can sit inside and eat and drink all day long.

I’m thrilled. Beyond thrilled, actually. I’ve been wanting to visit the Neopolitan Riviera and always just assumed we’d do a city break. This way we get the best of both worlds – relaxing AND sightseeing, It’s a really economical way to do it as well, which is always good (OK, that’s all relative, but cheaper than a city break and a separate chilling holiday, and also great value due to being all inclusive, as food and drink in Italy is expensive). We’ll probably eat out a couple of times, and obviously spend money on some excursions. Pompeii!! I come over all Frankie Howerd (oo-er) just thinking about it!

(and now my poor attempt at humour in the title of this post makes sense as well, no?)

Meanwhile, to get me even more excitable, here are some pics. Just wow!

Sorrento Sorrento 2

Pompeii

Vesuvius

Green Grotto of Capri Amalfi Coast

The summer tag

I saw this on haysparkle’s blog via Twitter. I’m a definite summer person and because no-one is likely to tag me (violins, please!!) I thought I’d nominate myself!

1. What’s your favourite thing about summer?
The weather. No doubt. Going bare legged, not needing a coat, sitting in the garden until late at night. Love it.

2. Do you have a favourite summer drink?
It has to be chilled white wine – sometimes as a spritzer with lemonade. Slurp.

White wine in summer

3. Is there a special place you like to visit each summer?
When the better weather comes we tend to do a pilgrimage to Weston Super Mare as it’s the closest beach resort to Birmingham. It’s become something of a habit. We were there in May this year, but it was so windy we couldn’t really spend any time outside!

4.What’s your favourite make up look for summer?
My absolute favourite is when I’m abroad and my freckles come out and I tend to just go for a pale eyeshadow, smudgy eyeliner and mascara, maybe with a touch of lipgloss or balm. It’s the epitome of laid back summer wear.

5. Dresses or skirts?
Dresses all the way – they’re easy to wear, don’t require any matching and keep you cool; no bunching up round the middle or sweaty waistbands! I’m currently waiting delivery on this pretty floral number.

Peacocks floral dress

6. Festivals or vacations?
Always vacations. I love love LOVE getting away from it all and seeing something new or experiencing different cultures. Plus if you go abroad you’re pretty much guaranteed good weather, whereas UK summer festivals are hit and miss (this year’s rainy Download Festival being a case in point).

7. What’s your signature summer hairstyle?
I don’t really have one, although I do go for a messy bun quite often, especially at home, when it’s very hot. I’m trying to experiment with plaits but my hair’s slightly too short since I cut it off last year.

8. What’s your signature summer scent?
I tend to wear the same fragrances year round; I’ve always got about 5 different ones on the go. My current favourite is D&G L’Imperatrice which has citrusy notes and is very summery.

D&G L'Imperatice

9. Favourite music for summer?
I have very eclectic music tastes whatever the time of year and can find enjoyment in many different things. But of course Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince is a summer favourite (because it’s the best summer song EVER – remind yourself by waitching the video, if you don’t believe me!); Don Henley Boys of Summer and happy bouncy music that makes you smile.

10. Pool or beach?
I love to be by the beach to see the sea, but for sunbathing I’m more of a pool girl. At the beach you just get sand EVERYWHERE, and it usually burns your feet as you run from your sunbed to the sea for a dip, and I hate the feeling of sand on wet feet. HATE it. Our pool in Greece last year was lovely, but then the beach – with it’s sparkling crystal sea and mountain backdrop – was amazing too. So I’ll take both please.

Stoupa beach Manis Rose pool Stoupa

11. BBQ or seafood?
Probably BBQ because of the whole atmosphere and experience; al fresco, the smell of the coals, avoiding the burnt sausage. There’s nothing that says summer dining more than a BBQ.

I tag anyone who would like to get involved…while summer is still here!