Wonderful weekends!

Before you read this post I have to advise you that these are the highlights of the last couple of weekends, I've left out the arguments, the perpetual ironing pile, the broken glass, the overtiredness, the loooong car journey, the whining, the unfinished jobs etc... because I figured no-one wants to read about them! But be assured they did happen, we're quite normal! But as they say - here are our best bits!

We decided to embrace Autumn this weekend and make something different to our usual preserves and chutneys. We have a garden full of fruit trees,unfortunately we missed most of the damsons and plums while we were on holiday but still have loads of apples! One of our varieties, is very good for juice so we dusted down the old juicer and bunged them through - great fun for the smallest Whitething! It tastes really rather good and what's even better is that it requires no chopping or peeling! We've put some bottles aside in the garage to maybe turn into cider - need to find out how to do this though! Unsurprisingly, this was not my idea!

We made some elderflower cordial earlier in the year and had left some flowers to turn into berries. Then we found this recipe in countryfile magazine for elderberry cordial and after reading about it's amazing health benefits (extra Vitamin C, antiviral properties) we decided to give it a go, here's what it said.

200g black elderberries
400g sugar
12 cloves
2.5cm sliced fresh ginger

Strip the elderberries from their stems using fork or fingers!
Put them in a pan, add a cup of water, bring to the boil and simmer for about half an hour.
Mash the berries to release the last of the juice then strain the contents of the pan through a sieve.
Add the sugar, cloves and ginger to the strained juice.
Return the pan to the heat and stir until the sugar dissolves.
Bring to the boil for a further 5 mins and then strain and pour into a bottle.
Seal and store in the fridge. Drink diluted, hot or cold.

Almost makes me want to catch a cold to see if it works! Anyway, it tastes rather lovely regardless.

My husband and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary (belatedly) with a weekend away in Devon in our original honeymoon cottage. It's a converted barn with a galley bedroom, in a little hamlet, a real rural retreat!

 We had a lovely time not doing very much, enjoying the tranquil setting and going at our own pace for a change. It was lovely to go back in time and remember what it was like before the Whitethings came along! And huge thanks to my parents for having them, it's the longest we've both left them. Our middle Whitething did wake us up on our return, claiming she'd forgotten what we looked like! Bless!

So, there you go, a lovely couple of weekends, great marriage and family time and space and time to reflect. I am very grateful and I have been thinking of these verses a lot recently, they're great to take on board!

"Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, 
for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." 

Lamentations 3 v22-23