Life With A Happy Dog - The Best Kind of Life in the World - A Spring List

Life With a Happy Dog, the Best Kind of Life in the World

A Spring List

Perhaps it’s the way the light has changed.  No longer the thin grey light of winter, it bursts pink and gold through the windows these mornings like laughter in church - startling, unexpected, and hard to resist.   I would think it only another of my eccentricities to be so affected by this brand-new season if it weren’t for the bubbling happiness of Edward - the spring in his step so pronounced these days, he practically bounces round the garden.  I laugh at the way his ears bob up and down as I try to keep up with him on our afternoon walks; his unabashed grins make me respond in kind.  We spend these breezy days between the just-departed cold and the soon-to-be swelter reacquainting ourselves with the infinite magic of Spring.  The sound of a fat robin, splashing about in the birdbath reaches us from an open window, we breathe in the fragrance of newly mown grass.  Like life itself, Spring days are short, and we know it. 

The evident joys of being a big, furry white dog are delicious reminders to me:  

It is Spring.

There is Beauty.

Life is Sweet.

Here’s a list of good things for Springtime.

Enjoy!

1.  The Best Spring Shirt

Linen is my go to fabric for both Spring and Summer.  

Yes, it wrinkles.

Beautifully.

I couldn’t resist this shirt, in pink.

Find it HERE.

2.  The Best Little Broom

The lure of Spring Cleaning is no mystery to me.  It follows the throwing open of windows and doors - suddenly we want to shake off the dust of the season of hibernation, delightful though it may be, and clean and polish till everything is as fresh and new.  After all, isn’t that what Mother Nature is busy doing just outside our door?  With our new stone courtyard, I find myself sweeping a bit more than usual.  

And isn’t this broom the most wonderful thing ever?

Straight out of Oz.

Find it HERE.

3.  The Best Brand New Antique Pillows

I cannot seem to keep these glorious pillows in my shop.  As soon as they appear, they disappear.  I can easily see why.  They add a bit of beauty and mystery to every room they adorn.  Some have been a wrench to part with, but I have many throughout my home.  I don’t find them that often, and I only choose the ones most special.

There are a few new large ones in the shop now.

Find them HERE.

4. The Best New Take on Toile

There are few fabrics as charming as toile.  I love a completely toile covered bedroom, for instance- beds, curtains, walls, ceiling.  Punctuated by wooden moldings and beams, that sort of room can be enchanting, particularly looking out on a bucolic view.  This new toile from Timorous Beasties takes that old pattern and turns it on its head a bit.  But I love it.

Gone are the milkmaids and sheep.  New, all scenes of London. 

Also designs for Glasgow and New York. 

Contemporary toile.

Marvelous.

Find it HERE.

5.  The Best Spring Bracelet

Rows of hydrangeas line our front garden.  They march down the drive and stand protectively, shoulder to shoulder, along the street.  They are just waking up from their winter’s nap and will soon explode into cotton-candy blues.

  I’ll soon cut masses of them for the house.  

Naturally, I am in love with this Hydrangea Petals bracelet.

Find it HERE.

6.  The Best Fairy House

In the garden.

Beside the pink foxglove, halfway hidden by a chartreuse Hosta.

Magic.

Find it HERE.

7.  The Best Costumes, Ever!

I know from the letters I’m getting,  a lot of us are watching Outlander.Originally enticed by the oh, so, accurate scenes of Scotland, I am now thoroughly besotted with it all. And not least for the amazingly beautiful costumes. (I’ve already knitted one of Claire’s fetching cowls, though mine was done in the color of the sea instead of the earth like hers.) 

 The costume designer for Outlander is Terry Dresbach and all her costumes for this show are intricate, authentic and jaw-dropping.  I thought you all might enjoy reading how these gorgeous outfits are created.

I loved this.

(And I want that Gathering dress, above,  for myself!)

Find all about it, HERE.

8.  The Best Video Ever

I’m not strictly a vegetarian, 

and I often feel guilty about it.

This video doesn’t help me feel a bit better.

You?

9. The Best New English Mystery

If, like me, you were utterly charmed by Granchester, the latest cozy mystery to cross the pond and land on our televisions as a delightful series this past winter, then you might be surprised to know that the books from which this production is taken are current ones, with a new book being published every May, according to the author’s website.  Perfect for those Spring evenings on the screened porch with only the wind chimes and hoot owls for a soundtrack.

Find the Books, HERE.

and, if you missed the recent BBC production, 

you must see it.

Find it HERE.

10.  The Best Colouring Book

Yes, Colouring Book

 A colouring book for adults.

 I know, I thought I misheard when I was informed about this, too. 

But no, it’s real, and it sounds like so much fun to me. 

One could, I suppose, say it fosters creativity, that it teaches a person about colour and form.  But who are we kidding?

It’s fun.

It’s just fun.

Find it HERE.

11.  Whiskeyknitters
Throughout time, knitting has been a congenial group activity.  Women, and occasionally men, have gathered together to knit and talk, to share and, well… occasionally, to drink whisky.  My knitting group is such a clan.  We meet once a month, though our schedule is loose, in an atmospheric pub.  We knit, we laugh, we talk about wildly divergent topics, and some of us drink whisky.  I myself rarely indulge - I have the longest drive and am loathe to drop stitches, something that I’ve noticed tends to happen when one imbibes that particular elixir.  
A few weeks ago, some members of the Whiskeyknitters took a field trip to my side of the city where there just happens to be the world’s most tempting yarn shop.  We shopped, had lunch, and then everyone came to The House of Edward for a visit.
Now the founding members of Whiskeyknitters have started a blog. 
They are fun, witty women.   It was bound to happen.
  I thought you might enjoy their account of our visit. 
Fun was had by all.
Read all about it HERE.

Hope you all are enjoying a Happy Spring.
Just like Edward!
Just like me.
xoxo,
p

Two Ramblers on a Spring Afternoon

“Without habit, the beauty of the world would overwhelm us. We’d pass out every time we saw— actually saw— a flower. Imagine if we only got to see a cumulonimbus cloud or Cassiopeia or a snowfall once a century: there’d be pandemonium in the streets. People would lie by the thousands in the fields on their backs.” 

Anthony Doerr

*Congratulations to Mr. Doerr being awarded the Pulitizer Prize this week

 for his wonderful novel, All The Light We Cannot See.

A Secret Garden, and A Few of the Books That Inspired It

A Secret Garden

and a Few of the Books That Inspired It

When the Songwriter and I became engaged to be married, the minister we chose to formalize the process requested we meet with him to answer a few questions and receive a few learned words of advice, something we were more than happy to do.  There were far too many stars in my eyes for me to have been expected to retain all he told us, but one nugget of wisdom took root and has flourished over the years, bearing fruit in all sorts of far flung areas.  To avoid the pitfall of financial disagreements, we were told, always consider any grand purchase to be “exchanging one form of wealth for another”. 

 The Songwriter remains wryly amused that this is all I can recall from that momentous meeting, but throughout our life together I have found it a useful bit of wisdom.   It has encouraged us to take leaps that have resulted in irreplaceable memories and has, on numerous occasions, made our lives better.  It also enabled me to back away from the trendy, thus saving my feet from the mile-high, toe-pinching Sex and the City shoes of the nineties and the humiliating peplum skirt phase of the eighties.

We employed this much relied upon wisdom once again last fall when we decided to add our birdhouse screened porch onto our bedroom.  One enters this porch via a very special door in our window seat and follows a screened breezeway down the side of the cottage to the round, pointed-roof porch.  Here no one can find me, here it’s all birdsong and wind chimes, here Edward and Apple curl up in their matching tartan beds and doze as I write, and knit, and read, and dream.   And here, I am surrounded by our back garden, a garden that, sadly, was utterly ruined during the building of this lovely screened hideaway.  

So, throughout the Christmas holidays, all during those long, cold days of January and February and the unreliable warmth of March, I planned.  With a stack of favorite gardening books at the ready, I made notes and grew pictures, went spelunking deep into Pinterest boards and wandered nursery aisles.  I’m happy to say, all this paid off wonderfully and our new garden is now a reality.    

Presided over by a serene stone Humpty Dumpty, it is filled with Mauve Lenten Roses, Pink Astilbe, Chartreuse Hostas, Japanese Forest Grass and and Foxglove.  There is a round flower bed in a circle of  English cottage stone with masses of white verbena spilling over and around, calling forth butterflies of every size and colour, and a flagstone terrace with Mazus Alba flowering between the stones. And best of all, old-fashioned Gardenias by the door and under the old stained glass casement windows.  I sit in my gothic willow chair, listening to the exuberant splash of robins in the birdbath  and the lugubrious hum of fat, lazy bumblebees as they hover around the blooms.  

Truly a fair exchange of one form of wealth to another, wouldn’t you say?

  I have recently returned from a visit to a very special, very happily haunted, garden and will share all with you soon, but till then I thought you might like to take a look at some of the books that inspired the creation of this secret garden of mine.  I found as much inspiration from narrative as from instruction.   Perhaps you will too, I’ve shared an irresistible quote from each, just click on the books to see more.  
If any of you love gardens, and gardening, as much as I do,
 please share your favorite flowers, and gardening books, with me! 

Onward and Upward in the Garden

by Katherine White

“I have read somewhere that no Japanese child will instinctively pick a flower, 

not even a very young child attracted by its bright color, because the sacredness of flowers is so deeply imbued in the culture of Japan that its children understand the blossoms are there to look at, not to pluck.”

The Morville Year

by Katherine Swift

“I love the way wild foxgloves have their bells all on one side,

 as if straining to catch the last notes of some far-off tune…”

In Your Garden

by Vita Sackville-West

“The charm of annuals is their light gaiety, as though they must make the most of their brief lives to be frivolous and pleasure-giving.  They have no time to be austere or glum.  They must always be youthful, because they have no time to grow old.  And so their colours are bright, and their foliage airy, and their only morality is to be as cheerful as possible….”

Merry Hall

by Beverley Nichols

“But whatever else people may see, they cannot help seeing the lilies.  They are all over the house, like groups of dancers, poised and waiting; those that stand near mirrors seem to take on a silver sheen, and those that catch the glow of the candles are lit with gold; in the full light they sparkle like sunlit snow, in the shadows they are luminous…and always, upstairs, downstairs, in every nook and cranny, there is fragrance.”

The Writer in the Garden

edited by Jane Garmey

“That evening, for instance, as the light faded, and the tree branches grew black against the pink sky, I knew it was getting on toward dinnertime, and I felt so peaceful sitting like a child in the warm earth.  It was dark as I strained my eyes, searching out infinitesimal parsley seedlings among the weeds.”

Virginia Woolf’s Garden

by Caroline Zoob

“…a weekend of no talking, sinking at once into deep safe book reading; & then sleep:  clear, transparent, with the may tree like a breaking wave outside & all the garden green tunnels, mounds of green:  & then to wake into the hot still day, & never a person to be seen, never an interruption:  the place to ourselves:  the long hours.”

The Gardens of William Morris

by Jill Duchess of Hamilton, Penny Hart and John Simmons

“The garden, divided by old clipped yew hedges, is quite unaffected and very pleasant, and looks in fact as if it were a part of the house, yet at least the clothes of it:  which I think ought to be the aim of the layer-out of a garden.”

Beatrix Potter At Home in the Lake District

by Susan Denyer

“Beatrix was not preserving a cottage garden; what she was doing was creating a garden  - her own garden - in the cottage style.  It was in this way that she conformed with what was then being written about gardens:  the imagery of gardens, the way spaces within then should be divided up and above all how gardens would be seen as an extension of the building to which they belonged.”

Writing the Garden

A Literary Conversation Between Two Centuries

by Elizabeth Barlow Rogers

"No one gardens alone."

Behold The Face

Behold the face of a fellow who thinks

making up the bed is the most glorious fun.

Love this boy!

What is Luxury?

What is Luxury?

For By Invitation Only

“Luxury:   free or habitual indulgence in or enjoyment of comforts and pleasures

 in addition to those necessary for a reasonable standard of well-being”

There is a country house in the Lake District of England, sitting high on a sheep-speckled hill overlooking the still, reflective waters of Lake Windermere.  In the tip-top tower of this house is a room with a window that opens out to welcome in the perfume of late summer roses and freshly mown hay, where the only sounds one hears is the wind swishing through emerald cedars and the tintinnabula of cow bells as their wearers make their way home at vespers.  I have slept in that room, in a bed so high, so deep, that I felt like a princess of Oz….

In the furthermost islands of Scotland, closer in distance to Norway than Britain, there is a yarn shop several streets from the sea where every colour in the palette lines the walls in a rainbow of wool.  The mind simply boggles at the possibilities of pattern and design within these walls.  I have gathered up armload of skeins here in much the same way a child gathers up candy in a candy shop and flown home to await the arrival of my choices … so many skeins they had to be shipped over….  

On a tiny side street in the heart of Chelsea there is a bookshop where the books are piled in stacks of unrelated subject and name, one up next to another as though gathering together for conversation the way strangers sometimes do whilst waiting for something to happen.  In this shop I have occasionally seen one special book, as one always does in bookshops such as this, shining as though singularly lit to catch my attention alone.  And I have stood on a stool and stretched out to retrieve it,  slightly dizzy at the good fortune of my find, and held it close like the treasure it is as I’ve made my way down the stairs to secure my purchase…..

Like Mrs. Dalloway on the morning of her famous party, I have entered dimly lit flower shops to the magical sound of a tinkling bells, waiting for my eyes to adjust in the close, humid air before being knocked off kilter by the unseen hand of beauty as the colours of a thousand flowers coalesced into one glorious tapestry right before my eyes.  I have wandered home in absolute bliss, carrying as many bouquets as I could hold…..

Without doubt, these experiences have represented luxury to me though I can think of no other word quite as subjective as that one.  Luxury.  What is truly luxurious to me might well be considered a trivial squander to you.  For instance, I have ridden in a limousine twice in my life and have felt like a complete, conspicuous nincompoop both times, though I can name people for whom that form of conveyance would seem the height of luxury.  When traveling, I can be, and often am, perfectly content with yogurt, fruit and biscuits for dinner, something that would horrify those gourmands of my acquaintance.  One man’s luxury is so often another’s trifle.

  One’s idea of luxury changes over time as well.  For instance, I am increasingly reluctant to spend my money on expensive frocks but, as illustrated in the paragraphs above, I am most liberal when it comes to books, yarn, flowers and travel.  No doubt I would spend my last dollar on flowers.  

Truth is, to me there is nothing as luxurious as a sparkling clean house, redolent of baking bread and gardenias, where soft music plays and furry dogs nap, where teetering stacks of books and a half-finished cashmere sweater await my attention as I sit at my table planning my next journey to Scotland.   After all, as I explained in my last post, my tastes do run along the same lines as the home-loving characters in Wind in the Willows. 

 I would so love to hear what you consider to be a luxury worthy of indulgence.

An Hermes bag?  Or a new pair of Wellies?

A gourmet kitchen?  Or a summer month in Greece?

Do tell!

Find more posts on this subject HERE.

The Wind Is In The Willows

The Wind Is In The Willows

I have always been amazed at the sagacity of the little animals that forever reside within the pages of The Wind in the Willows.  Ratty, Mole, Otter, Toad.  Perhaps it is merely that I seem to share so  many of their sensibilities - about home, about travel, about friendship and, well, about life in general, but I find them utterly reliable and true.  How often I have sat, wrapped up snugly before the fire on a frosty winter’s night, watching jack-o-lantern orange flames paint wild dancing shadows on the ceiling above me, without one shred of remorse for my appalling lack of industry, when these highly apropos words come wafting through my mind, “No animal, according to the rules of animal-etiquette, is ever expected to do anything strenuous, or heroic, or even moderately active during the off-season of winter”.

Mr. Mole seemed to materialize alongside me the May morning I visited Sissinghurst garden in Kent.  So beautiful it was, I fairly skipped along the water’s edge at the end of the lemon-lime walk, nearly astonished to be present in a place I’d only imagined existed in books, when those old familiar words came back to me, words that described such a similar scene, though one experienced by a fictitious mole… “The Mole was bewitched, entranced, fascinated. By the side of the river he trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spellbound by exciting stories; and when tired at last, he sat on the bank, while the river still chattered on to him, a babbling procession of the best stories in the world, sent from the heart of the earth to be told at last to the insatiable sea.”

Oh, the times when, thinking myself clever, I’ve done something rash and have figuratively turned up in an ungraceful pile on the side of the road, so like Mr. Toad in my foolishness and and folly, and heard, faintly, like the whisper of pages turning, the pitiful “Poop-Poop” of that dear, infuriating amphibian. 

Or, how grateful I’ve been on countless occasions to have The Songwriter in my life, someone who has always promised, just as the stalwart friend, Mr. Otter, “It'll be all right, my fine fellow”…… "I'm coming along with you, and I know every path blindfold; and if there's a head that needs to be punched, you can confidently rely upon me to punch it.”

And then, whenever contemplating a far-flung journey or mysterious path, there comes the voice I’ve often heard, just as Ratty himself once heard before me,… “Take the Adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes!’ ‘Tis but a banging of the door behind you, a blithesome step forward, and you are out of the old life and into the new! Then some day, some day long hence, jog home here if you will, when the cup has been drained and the play has been played, and sit down by your quiet river with a store of goodly memories for company.” 

So it was inevitable, of course.  If one is foolish enough to listen to Alan Bennett read The Wind in the Willows whilst one is attempting a bout of strenuous spring cleaning, one will naturally begin to strongly identify with Mr. Mole.  Please don’t misunderstand me, I’m one of those odd ones who actually enjoys spring cleaning.  The throwing open of windows, the polishing-shaking-gleaming-shining - the filling of vases with yellow flowers, the gathering up of pink china on which to place cakes with white icing and strawberries dusted with snowfalls of sugar….  it all makes me very happy.  But a few days ago, just as I was kneading a batch of Chocolate Babka for Easter and contemplating an appallingly high stack of linen shirts to be ironed, I heard , “The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home.  First with brooms, then with dusters; then on ladders and steps and chairs, with a brush and a pail of whitewash; till he had dust in his throat and eyes, and splashes of whitewash all over his black fur, and an aching back and weary arms.  Spring was moving in the air above and the earth below and around him, penetrating even his dark and lowly little house with its spirit of divine discontent and longing.  It was small wonder, then, that he suddenly flung down his brush on the floor and said, ‘Bother’ and ‘Oh, blow!’ and also ‘Hang spring-cleaning’ and bolted out of the house without even bothering to put on his coat.”  

And I simply could not resist doing precisely the same thing.

Particularly as it's my birthday tomorrow and no one should spring-clean on their birthday.

I will relate my adventure next week.  

Till then, listen to this wise, utterly delightful, story for yourself.  

There is simply no telling what you’ll get up to this week.

Easter Light

Easter Light

There are those who still wait on the hillsides, 

their weary eyes fixed on the far eastern sky. 

 They stand with their hopes linked to all of mankind as they watch for signs of the dawn, each of them longing to see, once again, the promise, the holy confirmation, as the darkness disappears in the presence of the light.   Slowly, the aurora emerges along the horizon like the casual opening of a seraphic eye, casting prismatic rays out over the landscape, painting a languishing world with the colours of joy. 

Mingling mystery with memory, the light travels through gardens graced with cherry trees weeping in candescent blooms of pink.  It blazes through cathedral windows, their picturesque puzzle pieces trembling with the resounding hosannas of song.   It illuminates the stage sets of my memory with ephemeral beams that shine down on my father as he once again places an Easter gardenia into the palm of my hand. It warms with a radiance that remembers the best of our future whilst turning to ashes the worst of our past. 

 Be they twisted and coiled as the back of a serpent,

 or a continuous ribbon of white flowers and moss,

 this beacon still shines upon all of our pathways  -  no stone can eclipse this light.  

And we may follow it, singing, up over the hillsides, 

on up through the clouds, 

all the long, long way back,

 into Canaan.

*** 

For Easter, a reprint of a previous essay, 

found on page 45 in From The House of Edward, here.
Edward and I wish you a most happy holiday.
xo