Yorkshire Pudding Day for Sunday Favourites wth Chari.

On Sunday Great Britons everywhere will, hopefully, be celebrating Yorkshire Pudding Day.

Fotosearch image

To show my support for this wonderfully iconic British dish, I'm sharing a post from last year which was originally one of my Alphabe-Thursday contributions, and joining Chari for Sunday Favourites @ Happy To Design.

I should imagine that not many of my US followers know too much about the Wars of the Roses?
No, not the movie with Danny DeVito, Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner!

The Wars of the Roses were a series of civil wars fought in medieval England from 1455 to 1487 between the House of Lancaster and the House of York.

The name Wars of the Roses is based on the badges used by the two sides, the red rose for the Lancastrians and the white rose for the Yorkists. Major causes of the conflict include: 1) both houses were direct descendents of king Edward III; 2) the ruling Lancastrian king, Henry VI, surrounded himself with unpopular nobles; 3) the civil unrest of much of the population; 4) the availability of many powerful lords with their own private armies; and 5) the untimely episodes of mental illness by king Henry VI.Source:http://www.warsoftheroses.com/
The end result of the Wars of the Roses was that Henry Earl of Richmond killed Richard
Of Gloucester at the Battle of Bosworth, became Henry VII and went on to found the Tudor Dynasty.
Now, (or nethin as we say in Lancashire) that was a few hundred years ago and I have to say that there is still some slight rivalry between the two counties.



However, on our recent trip back to the UK we stayed in a great little gastro pub with rooms, the New Inn, in the village of Marsden situated in the West Riding of Yorkshire, just a few miles outside of Saddleworth, where my family now reside.
It was lovely.

In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Marsden like this:
MARSDEN, a village and a township-chapelry in Almondbury and Huddersfield parishes, W. R. Yorkshire. The village stands on the river Colne, adjacent to the Manchester and Huddersfield canal and to the Manchester and Leeds railway, under the backbone of England, 4¾ miles E of the boundary with Lancashire, and 7¼ SW by S of Hnddersfield; is a large place; and has a station on the railway, a post office under Huddersfield, and fairs on 25 April, 10 July, and 25 Sept.
Source: A Vision Of Britain Through Time.


Although I am a born and bred Lassie from Lancashire, (that is not me in the vt! I just wanted you to hear the tune) I have to admit that there are some things that the folks over in Yorkshire have done well, and one of them is to produce Yorkshire Tea!
If you like your tea strong, this is the one for you.
Check out this fabulous website to find out all about it.

Another very special foodstuff to come out of Yorkshire and one that I think everyone knows about, is Yorkshire pudding and if I say so myself the ones that I make are Historic!
In a good way!
Helping to make Yorkshire puddings, a traditional part of the family Great British Sunday Roast when I was growing up, was a treat for a young girl and over the intervening years I have tried and tested many different recipes.
However, I always come back to Delia's classic Yorkshire pudding recipe, (well, we do share the same family name: Smith).

I'm also joining in with The Tablescapers Seasonal Sundays this week,
click here to see who else is participating.

January sunrise in Normandy.

Last Monday morning, as I was preparing to link my mosaic to Mary's blog the little red house, I happened to look up and notice a beautiful light coming through the French doors that lead to the front garden.
Whilst I had been travelling through blogland the sun had been making her entrance, and she was coming up in a blaze of glory.
I quickly grabbed my Nikon camera and headed outdoors to capture the moment.

January sunrise in Normandy

Thanks to The Tablescaper for Seasonal Sunday

and also

Mary for Mosaic Monday.

Click on the links above, or on the sidebar buttons, to participate in these weekly events.



A Pause in Advent, Week 2.

If you've been reading my blog this week you will have some idea of what this second Advent week was like for me.
The heavy snow fall definitely gave me pause for thought as it curtailed many of our daily activities and gave me the gift of time.
Time for a long, really long, I'm talking over an hour long, chat with my sister Rhonda who lives in Australia. Our phone calls are usually much shorter affairs and I so enjoyed being able to sit and talk  without one eye on the clock.
She has had quite a trying year this year with many ups and downs with her health & relationships.
But when we spoke this week she was beginning to come to terms with the end of one set of circumstances and starting to look forward once again.
Living so far away this big sister can but be a shoulder to cry on, to share the tears and then the laughter as she described some new people she had met and how much she was looking forward to collecting her new puppy, Sophie a companion for Roy who is getting on in years, in the New Year.
Being virtually housebound had other advantages too, I had plenty of time to bring the Christmas boxes down from their various hiding places in the attics.
There are many Christmas parties happening in blogland at the moment and I had thought that I would never be ready in time to participate.
I've had two peaceful days to sort through my collections of Christmas ephemera and decide where and how to display it all.
With all of the amazing vignettes and mantles that my fellow bloggers have been sharing in the past few days, I have been inspired to mix things up a little and think outside the box.
More about that soon.
The snow has all but gone, there was a very rapid thaw all day yesterday and the ditches are overflowing, trying to cope with the runoff.
Sadly, we did have one casualty from all that white stuff...........................

our ancient apple tree, which is riddled with Mistletoe, finally gave way beneath the extra weight.
Looking on the bright side ....................
I shan't have to send Mr B up a long ladder to harvest some white berries to decorate the hall chandelier this year.
I'll easily be able to gather arm fulls of Mistletoe sans problem.

Click here for a previous post about Mistletoe and why not join Floss for "Pause in Advent"  and also The Tablescaper for "Seasonal Sundays", two great places where bloggers gather together on Sunday.
bon dimanche à tous.

First Pause in Advent 2010.

As today is the First Sunday in Advent I'd like to share a little of my story with you, and introduce you to a wonderful friend of ours.
In 1984 Mr B's career took us to Bavaria, Germany.
We left all our family and friends behind in the UK to start a new life in a new country. Scary.
We threw ourselves wholeheartedly into our new surroundings, making many German friends in our neighbourhood and amongst his work collegues, but the most important friends we made were our landlords and next door neighbours Herr & Frau Wilde.
Over the years we shared many wonderful times with the Wildes, celebrating not only high days and holidays but also day to day life in Pöcking, a small town on the shores of Starnberger See.
Frau Wilde (never Traudl, never "du") sort of adopted me as the daughter she never had.
She taught me many things, like how to play bridge, she is a fanatical bridge player and to this day, if I ever get the chance to play, I always find myself bidding in German! (Vier pik!)
We spent many an afternoon sitting in her "winter garden" as she helped me improve my embroidery, knitting, and German conversation skills all the time enjoying her "kaffee und kuchen".

From top right: Our house
 a favourite woods where we walked our dogs,
Feldafinger Strasse.

The snow season in Bavaria starts around the beginning of December and during our first winter in Pöcking she taught me how to cross country ski on the local golf course in Feldafing.
Did I mention that the lady was born in 1918?

Frau W & me 1991

Perhaps the one thing that Frau Wilde taught me which touched me the deepest was how to celebrate Christmas the Bavarian way,
Her Weihnachts Plaetzchen (Christmas biscuits) such as Zimtsterne and Springerele were legendary.

And so on this First Sunday in Advent and in honour of a much loved lady, I'd like to invite you to "kaffe und kuchen" my way.

My Adventskranz 2010.

Sadly, fresh evergreen wreaths are not easily found here in rural Normandy and so once again this year, a "faux" wreath decorated with white poinsettia flowers and silver pine cones surrounds four classic white Church candles.

The china service is Rosenthal's "Classic Rose" in white, which with its silvery grey design and gold trim complements the Adventskranz beautifully.
Napkins: Spode Christmas tree. (was sonst?)

For you to enjoy during the Adventszeit old fashioned mincepies (click here for the recipe) and lebkuchen, a very simple iced biscuit, similar to gingerbread.
(Note to Floss: I'm going back to Delia!)

With this post I'm joining

Floss @ Troc, Broc and Recup for First Pause in Advent.

The Tablescaper for Seasonal Sundays.
Marty @ A Stroll Through Life for Tabletop Tuesday.

The Lady Katherine, for the first time, and Teatime Tuesday.

Click on the links above to see who else is joining in this week.