Snapshots | The Little Room of Rachell

MAKING great fires in the log burner! Does that count?

COOKING warming veggie curries; pumpkin & chickpea and a peanutty aubergine recipe

BAKING Scottish Shortbread. Delicious!

SIPPING a few hot chocolates lately. Well, it’s cold. 3° yesterday, 2° today. Brrr!

READING Mad Blood Stirring by Simon Mayo (and listening to it on Spotify)

WAITING for snow. First snowfall nearby last night

LOOKING very wrapped up when out. All the woollies. Wearing my rainbow bobble cowl at the mo and wrapping my purple Hitchhiker scarf on top when I go back to the car

LISTENING to The Battersea Poltergeist and Uncanny podcasts by Danny Robins

WISHING Christmas presents magically bought and wrapped themselves

ENJOYING lights and sparkle when out and about

DISLIKING Christmas trees and decs up in early November. Soon it’s going to be Christmas from the day after Halloween…

APPRECIATING any sunny blue days

EATING toasted goats cheese, rocket & red onion chutney toastie in a favourite cafe today

LIKING the mocha that always accompanies it. Strange combo maybe…

LOVING heated car seat and stirring wheel. A car with gizmos

BUYING a Star Bar recently, then dropping the last bit in the gutter

MANAGING to forget about a third of all I need to remember

WATCHING Ant & Dec in Australia. They make me laugh

HOPING for a good December

LISTENING to be audiobook of Mad Blood Stirring by Simon Mayo (on Spotify)

WEARING black jeans, green top

VISITING The V&A: Gabrielle Chanel, Fashion Manifesto

NOTICING how one person with a (very) loud voice can dominate a space. Shoulders went down in the cafe when they left

FOLLOWING …it’s macabre, but so many death announcements today …Shane MacGowan, Alistair Darling, Henry Kissinger and Dean Sullivan (Jimmy Corkhill in Brookside, a particularly English soap opera)

SORTING photos. Where do you store your digital photos? Cloud? Lap top? External hard drive?

GETTING organised with lists, but not much action

COVETING I can’t think of anything. A chateau maybe? A castle?

FEELING relaxed

HEARING a buzz of conversation, South Oxfordshire accents

How are you? What are you up to at the moment? Tell me three things?

Making: Ummm I’m not sure how this happened, one minute it was a ball of Hayfield Spirit and the next it’s half a cowl! Addicted to bobbles still

Cooking: spicy chicken with tomatoes & peppers, lots of mixed spices

Sipping: water, tonic, lemonade, lime & soda (Dry Lent)

Washing on the line, cyclamen in lots of corners of the garden, mid-March

Reading: Landlines by Raynor Winn. Nearly finished. It’s her third walking book and I’ve loved spending time with her and Moth again

Waiting: for my parcel delivery

Spot the daffodil? A bit invisible and crunched up to the others, but the people coming through on the double deckers will be able to see!

Looking: at all the spring flowers in the garden. So many anemones this year and the heathers are really vibrantly pink

Listening: to Conversations from a Long Marriage (BBC Sounds) Hancock (ditto) my latest Radar playlist on Spotify

Wishing: I planted my chilies, peppers and tomato seeds earlier

The leaves have been munched, but the hellebore flowers are looking good. The garden needs a good spring clean and tidy up

Enjoying: sunny blue sky days which seem slightly more frequent. Today’s one of the best in ages

Appreciating: blossom, daffodils and the smell of flowers’ perfume on the breeze

Eating: an epic goats cheese, onion chutney & rocket sourdough toasty in a cafe on Friday. I earned it!

Liking: my bed, I’ve got into the habit of heading up about 9:30pm to have lots of reading time. Then I wake at 1200/0100/0200 (latest so far: 0215) glasses on and Kindle in sleep mode, bruised side of nose from glasses! A huge D’oh!

Loving: watching Lockwood and Co. On Netflix

I took this photo on the 14th, now the pot is absolutely brimful of viola again. Best autumn purchase I’ve ever made! It’s been a really nice sight from the kitchen window over winter

Buying: local free range eggs (as always.) I’m having another phase of fried and scrambled for lunch

Baking: (this morning) mixed seed sourdough, what a great crust! It’s always a much deeper colour and crunchier, from the oils in the seeds probably

Managing: to get out for more walks lately, dodging the rain storms. It’s been really good to get up to the fields again and not have to wade through ankle-deep mud. It’s a bit slip and slide, but so far I haven’t…

Watching: The latest series of: Unforgotten, Vera and planning to start the new David Attenborough soon

Hoping: for peace, easier financial times for all …so much… positives for the environment, the homeless and disenfranchised …the list seems endless at the moment

Watching: films…Everything, Everywhere, All at Once (or as I called it “A lot of Biff Boff”) Billy Elliot (a modern classic, so worth rewatching!) Brian & Charles (well worth renting via Prime, particularly for those who like quirky British films) Empire of Light (Sam Mendes latest. We really, really enjoyed this at the weekend.)

Saturday. It won’t be long before the trees are in leaf again

Wearing: one of my favourite Seasalt tops. It’s green

Noticing: leaf shadows on the curtain

Forsythia just coming out in flower at the beginning of March

Following: an arrow shaped cloud tracking across the blue sky

Sorting: bits for the charity shop

Getting: a list written for the next groceries order, it’s one of those big order weeks. Why do all the tissues etc all run out at once?

Coveting: Spotify premium, mine’s just run-out

Feeling: the need to move again shortly

Hearing: the clock tick, the birds chirp, someone on a call, the fridge click off

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The clocks went forward this weekend, that loss of an hour can be so discombobulating! I woke up Sunday morning, asked what the time was and when I heard 9 o’clock, I nearly fell out of bed! And then of course I realised that really it was eight. Or, so my body still thought. I wish we didn’t have to change the clocks, although I suppose the extra long hours of daylight until October are good. I’d like to have a year where we try not moving them, just to see what it’s like. I was going to ask if anyone remembered before British summertime began. Then googled it, thank goodness, otherwise I would’ve looked a right idiot! It began in 1916.

To save energy and help the war effort, the Summer Time Act 1916 advanced the clocks in the UK for 1 hour from May 21 until October 1 in the same year. Summer time, or DST, proved so popular that it was named British Summer Time (BST) and the seasonal practice kept

From TimeandDate.com this has some good nuggets of information, although I admit ‘Time Zone History of the United Kingdom’ isn’t exactly a catchy title.

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Tell us a few things, what have you been up to during March? What are you making, enjoying eating, reading or watching on TV?