Dip Your Sponge in Christmas!

It's Christmas Eve and all the shopping is done but there is still a pile of presents to wrap.  Earlier presents were wrapped in a rush and sometimes seemed like just one more job to do so for today's wrapping I decided to get in the mood and make it the festive task it should be.  Here are my instructions.

First lay out all you need:-

Gather presents to be wrapped in a pile.
Wrapping paper, scissors, Sellotape.
Tags, ribbons and bows.

Then light a Christmas candle (I love the Jo Malone one), pour a glass of Baileys (essential), put on some Christmas music (carols are good) and begin.  

Happy Wrapping!

Sometimes it's all about the journey!

Most of our travel is about getting to the place, preferably as fast and cheaply as possible.  To this end we put up with budget airlines, ridiculous queues, grabbed snacks or junk food instead of proper meals and often lots of stress. So it was wonderful to go on a trip that was all about the journey for a change and travelling in an old-style luxury train with interesting people at the weekend was just that.

The train with it's fabulously old refurbished Pullman carriages was comfort itself.  The chairs moved forwards and backwards like car seats and were clean, comfortable and well-cushioned. There was thick wooden panelling and fringed brass lampshades.  The route was picturesque most of the way - from Scarborough to Oxford - and took hours and hours.  During that time we wandered up and down the carriages, met old acquaintances and new friends and ate and drank lots.  The food was superb and I was amazed that they managed to produce dishes that could grace any high-end restaurant table from such a small galley.  We started with a Full English at breakfast and moved on to sandwiches and scones with jam and cream before searching out the bar car, a quaint Art Deco carriage with armchairs and coffee tables and plush red carpet.

By the time we reached Oxford we were full and lazy and it was raining again. We only had a couple of hours anyway (I told you this was about the journey) so we decided to head for one of our favourite galleries at the Ashmolean Museum and after a browse decamp to their friendly rooftop restaurant but only for a cup of tea because we were still full from all the morning's food.

Back on the train we began the slow rail home.  This was the best bit as the sun was, if not quite over the yardarm then at least well into the afternoon position.  No sooner had we settled back into our seats with our good friends Sue and Harry then our dinner arrived - Beef Wellington for me - and a bottle of spicy red Shiraz to wash it down.  The courses kept arriving and the bottle-levels kept descending before coffee came to save us and a walk down to the bar carriage for a digestive nightcap (it was dark by now) finished us off before our train delivered us into the late night station and a taxi home.

It was a day off the roundabout that seems to spin faster this time of year and my friend Sue summed it up nicely, "It's just so good to sit, relax and chat about anything and everything.  Life gets too hectic sometimes and this is a great release in beautiful surroundings with oh so lovely food.  Just what we all need I think."  

The Dining Carriage

Dave, Dianne Sue and Harry

The Bar Carriage

Holing up in a remote country cottage

These are the ingredients I need for a week of peace and recharging:  

A remote cottage in peaceful countryside

Some lovely country walks from my doorstep

A log fire to come back to and a husband to stoke it for me 

A country pub that does good hearty lunches

A box of books I've been meaning to read for ages

Films to watch cuddled up to at night

A large comfy sofa with blankets to snuggle in

A crate of red wine

Candlelight, preferably deliciously scented

Last week in Devon I had all that and more (a fabulous bakery, a waterfall to admire on my walk, bowls of pasta, fresh soups, local cheeses and a special homemade onion bread, a big deep bath and huge soft bed). 

In 1855 George Sand said  "The important thing is not to travel, but rather to depart; who among us does not have some pain they wish to escape from, or some bondage they wish to break out of?"  Her words are just as true today and we all need to get away from the carnival from time to time.  It works too because when you know you can't do anything about all those things that are worrying you, since you're not at home to deal with them anyway, your mind relaxes and so it's not just your body that gets a rest, fresh air and exercise of a more gentle variety.  By the time you get back home everything seems more manageable and less critical, after all its waited a week already!    

So don't dismiss Britain as a place for a winter break, because not only are the cottages cheaper but the places are quieter, and if the weather is bad it gives you a great excuse just to stay by the fire.

Taste some tropical fruit!

Now that Winter is well and truly on the horizon all those lovely fresh fruits of summer are disappearing. Although I usually try and buy fruit that is grown locally, in Winter you sometimes have to cast your net further to much hotter climes like South America and Africa, because even in Spain where the orange and lemon trees are in full fruit, it is too bitter and only suitable for cooking.

I love those boxes of easy peel Satsumas currently in the shops (my daughter used to be able to peel them in her pocket during lessons with one hand) and fresh figs are sometimes available but its a good opportunity to try something a bit different.  Of course some fruits are no longer so exotic.  Mango is one of my favourites but I'm not sure it can be considered unusual these days, the same with Pineapples, Kiwis and probably Pomegrantes.  I remember trying the awful smelling Durian Fruit in Singapore once, it tasted OK but for some reason never took off over here!  A friend gave me some Sharon Fruit the other day, a fruit she used to love to eat growing up in Algeria (top on the photos).  Here we know it as Persimmon too and its easy to cut as it has no hard core.  I thought it tasted a little like a mild pear and it offset the tangy mango quite well on my fruit plate.  I also tried Papaya or Pawpaw (the yellow one in the top photo) which has a lot of black pips to scoop out first (you can eat them but they are quite bitter and peppery).  It is much used in Thai cooking but raw it doesn't smell very appetising close up although the taste is quite mild.  Together they made a delicious healthy finish to a meal, full of antioxidants and vitamins.  My favourite though will always be the mango.

Mind you exotic is a matter of opinion, my father-in-law recalls seeing a banana for the first time as a child after the war and biting into it skin and all which he thought disgusting and wondered why there was such a fuss about them being back in the shops!

Wet Sponge in the Morning

Mornings are often so much of a rush that we go through them on automatic pilot noticing little of the world around us and only using our eyes to register what is happening.  Taking only a few moments to engage our other senses can make a big difference to the beginning of our day.  Here are a few ideas that take no time at all and won't make you late...I promise!

Really notice the taste and smell of your first drink in the morning and savour it as it washes away the thirst of the night.

Use a deliciously scented shower gel and inhale it's fragrance to wake you up.  If you use body lotion and perfume have a good big sniff of that too.

When you leave the house pause for just a few seconds on the doorstep to take a deep breath and just look around and listen.  I know it's a rush...but a couple of seconds won't make a difference!

If you have a commute you hate then you need to find a distraction.  Make sure you have some favourite music to listen to, or even better, an audio book or podcast.  If you are on public transport you could read a book or magazine.  I once read Anna Karenina on my train journeys to work and was so thrilled I'd got through it I moved on to War and Peace.  I didn't have to feel guilty for sitting reading either and delays caused by 'leaves on the line' or whatever were turned into a bonus (although my boss didn't agree on that one!).

The point is to try and make a stressful time more enjoyable, especially early in the morning as it can set the mood for the whole day.

Dip Your Sponge in Autumn!

Autumn is my favourite time of year.  It's strange really because it heralds the arrival of Winter which is my least favourite season - give or take the odd snow day.  I think perhaps it stems back to my childhood - the new term, the handing out of interesting (sometimes anyway) text books, different classes and teachers and best of all brand new exercise books to write in....who doesn't love starting that first fresh blank page?  Then there was playing in the leaves and kicking them all over each other with our new shoes, collecting acorns to see who could get the most or biggest, conker fights in the playground and picking blackberries from the hedgerows to eat on the way home from school. We always seemed to do a lot of walking at that time of year too, mostly in woods to see the beautiful colours of the trees before they shed their leaves and to search for bright, highly poisonous toadstools, which we knew not to touch.

It hasn't lost any of its magic for me and I find that going for a country walk on one of those crisp bright days is a great way to refresh and replenish my sponge whilst also getting my dose of fresh air and exercise.  I still collect conkers and acorns to display on my windowsill (although I don't fight with them anymore...perhaps I should!), and love going blackberry picking.  You can eat as you go, licking sticky purple fingers all you like and then when you get home, if there is any left, you have a healthy, tasty and, best of all free, dessert for after dinner.

So go on....wait for a sunny day, put on your woolly jumper if you need to, and dip your sponge in Autumn!

You have the freedom to Dip Your Sponge!

I love books and reading....have I mentioned that?  Okay, but some books really make you think hard about the Dip Your Sponge philosophy.  One I've read recently is JoJo Moyes' 'ME BEFORE YOU'.  The basic premise is "What if your life changed drastically in an instant?  Would you be able to adapt and forge a new pathway or would you give up because you missed your old life so much?"  The book, which has a chick-lit cover that doesn't remotely do justice to the serious nature of the content, follows a young man who lives life at such a pace that he's never still - a high-flying career, a daredevil traveller and a lover of adventure sports - maybe he even overdid the Dip Your Sponge bit as he was never still, but that was his personality.  In the first chapter (so I'm not giving anything away) all this is taken away in one horrendous moment.  You come away from the book appreciating everything about your life, even the simple things like getting yourself food when you are hungry and having basic privacy and choice.

Another book that reminded me to Dip My Sponge as often as possible was a book we read with my wonderful online bookclub 'Every Book and Cranny' (http://www.my-bookclub.com/bookclub/every-book-and-cranny/), called 'DELIRIUM' by Lauren Oliver. This described a future United States with closed borders and a dictatorship where love and all it's accompaniments such as poetry and demonstrations of affection are banned, not just between lovers but friends, parents, siblings....anyone.  A cure has been found which involves an operation to remove the emotion centre of the brain.  This is performed at the age of 18. The sorrowful results are that parents no longer even love their children and a manual similar to Mao's Red Book uses classic stories and art and poetry as warning symptoms of the disease.  It is a very real and convincing portrait of an alternative world and the really scary thing is that our current day scientists have actually recently identified the part of the brain that processes emotions so its not such a stretch of the imagination to leap to some dictator having all their subjects robotised.

So let's revel in our freedom and make the most of the fact that we are allowed to celebrate art and literature and to hug and write and sing and dance just as we wish.

Barefoot and Barefaced!

A Turkish gulet cruise looks and sounds luxurious and exotic but the reality and practicalities don't occur to you until you get on board.  Then it becomes a bit like camping.  The main thing is that you need to go with someone you know really well and feel very relaxed with, especially if you are sharing a cabin. Luckily I was with my good friend of over 20 years; Sheila. We went through having babies together then and so there isn't much that has fazed us since.

The cabins, like those on most boats, are tiny and in our case the bathroom door didn't shut properly but we soon learnt to take it in turns to be below deck when feasible and to be as discreet as possible for the rest of the time.

My next issue was with going barefoot.  I've never liked it, and even at home, on a beach or by a pool, I wear flip-flops.  They were banned though on the gulet, along with all shoes, which had to be placed in a chest by the gangplank on embarking.  I presume it was to save the old wooden deck from wear and tear. Yet I was surprised at how quickly I got used to being shoeless and how much stronger my feet became, even in a week.

Then there was make-up.  The cabin was rocking and so dark (these boats are 200 years old remember) that it would have been hit and miss to apply but the fierce Turkish sun would have just melted it down our faces anyway.  So after day one our make-up bags stayed firmly zipped.  We only had tiny mirrors and couldn't see what we really looked like anyway.

At first we ventured on deck shyly in swimming costumes and wraps because we are not the spring chickens we once were, but nobody cared.  All ages from 30 to 80 were relaxing and swimming, sunbathing and walking around the boat in skimpy swimwear and it didn't matter a bit.

It was all incredibly liberating this not bothering what we looked like.  We'd wake up and jump in the warm, salty sea and stay like that all day.  Even at night after a shower there was no hair-dryer or straighteners and insect repellent was our perfume of choice so make-up seemed superfluous.  The freedom from thinking what we looked like was akin to being children again and all we had to do was swim and play and read and sleep....oh and eat the delicious food served up three times a day.  We reconnected not only with our inner-child but our outer one too.

Warning:   Its a good job it was only a week!   When I got back and looked in the mirror I was extremely ravished and spotty looking and I had to set to work pronto with conditioners and creams for immediate repair work.

But I still don't like putting my shoes on and I do have a lovely tan.

The beauty of a pot of basil

I think I'm addicted to basil.  I keep this gorgeous smelling herb on my kitchen windowsill and can't resist pulling off a leaf to chew on as I pass.  I throw it in salads as a tasty leaf and in all my stews and pasta dishes and of course you can't eat Mozzarella without it.

Herbs are such an easy way to flavour up your cooking and so easy to keep (trust me, they are the only plants I can keep) and they can be picked up very cheaply from so many places.  My latest addition is mint. After a week of eating Turkish cuisine where it is thrown in with everything, especially vegetables, and goes so well with all the yoghurt and cucumber dressings, it has risen up my list of favourites...I've even made mint tea with a sprig dipped in a cup of boiling water.

My other chosen ones are lemon thyme which smells of hot holidays in the Mediterranean and is fabulous in all my chicken dishes; rosemary which roasts beautifully on vegetables and potatoes and oregano which invokes my local Italian restaurant and so always gets put with pasta, especially bolognaise. Parsley we all know goes with fish but did you know that chewing a head or two gets rid of the smell of garlic on the breath? Talking of garlic, there is a variety you can grow called Society Garlic (Tulbaghia) which has pretty purple flowers and doesn't make your breath smell at all (hence the name). I love Thai food so would like to try and grow kaffir lime leaves next or maybe cardamom as both of these leaves work well in curry.

Herbs even have excellent health benefits.  They work as detoxifyers, stimulants and antiseptics and have been used for weight loss and skin conditions as well as cures for infections and viruses, especially colds.

So grow some herbs...not only will it save some money on all those dusty dried spice jars and give you something pretty and fragrant to scent your home but it will  remind you of summer sunshine on even the rainiest day.    

Dip your sponge in Nostalgia!

I first heard the words 'dip your sponge' thirty years ago when I met my husband Dave.  He can't remember where it came from but 'you've got to dip your sponge' became a regular family saying. Sponge dipping is a rule in our house and at least one day each weekend is devoted to it in some way. Maybe its just a walk or a visit to a bookshop, the cinema or Sunday Lunch at a new pub, but often its a day-trip to an unfamiliar town or county or to an event or festival of some kind.  One of Dave's favourites is a gathering of the old steam trains.  He loves the sight, sound and smell of them and I have to admit there is a romance in travelling in the old-fashioned way - nice and slowly to appreciate the countryside, in comfortable seats with thick oak panelling to run your hands over and imagine all those travellers who made journeys at that same table before you.

Last weekend we visited a quaint village called Grosmont in North Yorkshire. A tiny place dominated by the prettiest station I have ever seen, but with everything you need for a good day out including the sunshine. After I had watched the third steam train pull in and out, I left Dave to it and went for a wander down the narrow street.  I found a crooked-floored bookshop crammed to the rafters with heaps and heaps of second-hand books all costing not much more than a pound.

Books are my oldest passion.  I learnt to read really early and had piles of them by my bed from the age of five.  They are my escape, my teachers, my entertainment, my travel companions and a lot more besides.  A couple of hours later I emerged with an armful and settled in the sun to read them while Dave went to investigate the price of train tickets.  Every now and then a whistle would blow and a cloud of smoke billowed across me as I broke off to tune into the chuff-chuff of a departing train.  All the children waved madly from the windows and the families still on the platform noisily broke out their picnics or headed to the tea-rooms or pub gardens.  It it seemed to me like an advertisement for an idyllic traditional English day...but maybe one from about fifty years ago.  

Welcome To My Blog!

Life should be an adventure.  There is so much world out there - so many things to see, do, taste and enjoy.  Never let an adventure pass you by because it may not come round again.  Think of your life as a sponge and keep dipping it in the rich waters of experience and enjoying its offerings.  I will help you keep your sponge soaked at all times by sparking ideas of places to go and things to see both near and far. Sometimes it's just about small precious moments and sometimes it's about big dramatic sights but you can easily create them every day.  My love of travel, food, literature and art keep me doing that week after week, year after year and I look forward to sharing the fun of my sponge-dipping with you.