Wagga Wagga to Worcestershire & back again
I had the privlege of attending my first English wedding at the weekend. Adam’s mum got remarried and it so lovely to be a part of the celebrations.
Whenever I think about an English wedding, it’s always Four Weddings and Funeral that comes to mind. Historic stone churches, top hats and tails and a young Hugh Grant. This wedding was a little different. There was no church, no men in fancy hats (but there were a few ladies in fabulous fascinators!) and no Hugh. It was refreshingly real.
It’s been grey and drizzly over the last few weeks but on Saturday the sun finally came out and stuck around all day! It was the perfect way to start a long weekend. Adam and I are currently in Gibraltar (more on that later this week!), but is there anything better than a bright, cool winter’s day? The clouds, haze and woodsmoke from cosy fireplaces gets swept away to reveal a landscape in muted but rich colour.
I nervously watched the weather forecast all last week. Snow had been predicted across a large part of England and on Thursday afternoon it started to fall.
I was incredibly excited, as it was first snow I’ve seen in England. There’s just something about those flakes of ice that puts a smile on my face. I didn’t see snow until I was 21, working and living as a television reporter in south-west New South Wales. While driving with a cameraman to our shoot location for the day, I mistook hail netting on apple orchards for the real stuff!
I’ve visited the Australian High Country dozens of time over the last decade to both ski and play in the snow, but seeing it fall naturally on the place where I’m living is something I’ll never forget. It didn’t settle in Malvern itself on Thursday afternoon, but standing in our front yard watching the snow gracefully descend to the ground, was enough to keep me happy.
You can imagine my smile then, when the next morning Adam and I woke up to everything covered in white! It was only an icing sugar dusting – nowhere near enough for a snowman, but enough to fully cover the ground, roads and roofs of all the houses nearby.
Adam had an early start at work, so I took advantage of being awake at the crack of dawn to rug up and head out for a wander around. There was a brief, but beautifully colourful sunrise that I was lucky enough to see before the clouds rolled on in again.
My morning walk was just wonderful – there was the scent of wood fuelled fires in the air and I passed ruddy cheeked children on their way to school with big grins on their face (much like me!) taking in the snowy scene.
The snow was all melted by the weekend and there’s no more forecast in the next week or so, but fingers crossed we see another flurry or two before the winter’s out!
Have you heard of hygge? It’s a Danish concept that’s focused on the home. It doesn’t have a direct English translation, but it’s essentially about making your house a cosy, comfortable place in the colder weather, where you can focus on the small things in life that make you feel happy and fulfilled. Think a delicious hot chocolate in a big mug, swathes of blankets, dim lights and a good book. Hygge (hew [like threw]-guh) has been huge in Britain over the last few months. There were dozens of books on the subject released over Autumn and they flooded bookstores in the lead-up to Christmas.
I’d never heard of hygge until I started flipping through one of the aforementioned books while browsing a store in December. As an Australian experiencing her first northern hemisphere winter, it was a concept I was immediately drawn to. For me it hasn’t really been the cold that’s bothered me, rather it’s the short days I’ve noticed the most. It’s dark a lot and I can understand why people develop Seasonal Affective Disorder now. Hygee it’s all about encouraging you and your family’s wellbeing during the long cold winter months. Denmark has topped the United Nations World Happiness Report twice (it’s been a top five country in the five years the report’s been compiled), so they’re obviously onto something.
Since I discovered hygge, I’ve been trying to introduce it into my day-to-day living. Instead of getting disheartened at the current 4:18pm sunset (with a 8:15am sunrise!), I’ve turned drawing the curtains of an afternoon into a ritual. I switch on lamps and fairylights (which we’ve reappropriated now Christmas is over) around the house, which add a lovely glow and make myself a cup of tea, while trying to knock over a few pages in whatever book I’m reading.
Adam’s 2017 hobby (read obsession!) is baking bread. Often he’ll make tomorrow’s loaf before we cook dinner, so our afternoon cuppa is increasingly being accompanied by a slice of fresh, warm bread spread with butter, honey and dusted with salt flakes. It’s a nice way to wind down after the day and an opportunity to sit quietly for a few minutes and chat about our days.
Of an evening Adam and I will listen to music and read (occasionally while enjoying a glass of Australian shiraz!) It creates this wonderfully relaxed atmosphere and you go to bed with a clear mind.
Hygge is something I’d like to keep up even when the weather warms. I’m imagining fresh flowers, open windows, elderflower spritzers and bowls of jewel-like berries. It’s also increased my desire for a Scandinavian holiday over the next 12 months tenfold!
What I really like about hygge though, is that it’s something you can create in your own home too with either little or no expense. It’s not about having designer throw blankets, or fancy scented candles, it’s more about creating that feeling of loveliness by changing your mindset. You can use what you’ve got around you to do that. Try it, you might be pleasantly surprised :). Happy hygee-ing! x
One of my favourite things about living in England is the houses. Every village, town and city has its centuries of history preserved in the homes its residents live in. While Australia has a small amount of architectural history, it pales in comparison to places like the U.K.
I’m pretty sure I’ve pointed out a home I’ve liked to Adam almost ever day since our arrival. Being a sucker for a good story, I get so much delight out of thinking about all the people who’ve lived in these buildings over the years. What were their names, what did they do, what food did they cook and what flowers did they plant in the garden?
Can’t you just imagine sitting in a slightly worn, super squishy armchair with a good book, roaring fire and mug of tea in front of some of those front windows?! #bliss
Sometimes the unplanned, imperfect pictures are the best ones. It can be so easy to share images of perfectly stylised celebrations, but for me that’s not what Christmas is all about. It’s about the sitting room floor getting covered in torn wrapping paper, the dog bringing in a half chewed stick and gnawing it on the rug, spilling gravy on the table cloth and sneaky afternoon naps while wearing a paper crown.
So this is what my first English Christmas looked like: Sunny and mild (gasp!), with clumsily held video calls to Australia involving dorky family traditions, gifts to help me adapt to the English way of life, way too much food and magical lights in all the right places.
It was perfect. Who needs a Christmas Day that looks like it should be on the pages of a magazine, when you can have your nearest and dearest nearby laughing, eating and simply being them?!
I trust you all had a lovely Christmas Day and are now in the post December 25th haze, taking it easy… or finding a bargain at the Boxing Day sales!
PS – The Christmas elves came and overhauled the blog over the weekend. Hope you like the changes!
I find there are two sorts of people in life – those who love wrapping presents and those who’ll happily pawn the task off to others. I’m in the first camp. As a child growing up my mum was always pretty particular about the styling of her Christmas tree. Gifts had to coordinate with the tree and a general colour scheme was adopted every year. I have fond memories of the two of us sitting on the floor in the family lounge room surrounded by rolls of paper and boxes of ribbons and bows, televised Christmas carol special on in background, wrapping presents in the days leading up to December the 25th.
It’s a tradition I continue to keep and over the last few weeks I’ve seen countless images on Instagram and Pinterest of fresh foliage adorning beautifully boxed presents. As it’s so warm in Australia around Christmas, adding a sprig of spruce as part of the wrapping process never really crossed my mind. This year however, I decided to use harness that inspiration and try it myself!
I raided the garden at the front of Adam and my apartment finding holly leaves and a large shrub with red berries, which I believe is cotoneaster horizontalis (budding gardeners, is that right?!) and got busy!
Is it just me, or do special occasions often make you think about life? The past, the present and what’s happening right now. Today is my birthday, the first I’ve celebrated abroad (!), and this week I’ve been spending a lot of time just thinking about how much has changed since December last year.
Twelve months ago I was getting ready to host my family for Christmas in Wagga Wagga. This year I’ll be with Adam’s family in England. It still seems slightly surreal that I’m here, in the UK… and not on holiday! I’m still pinching myself, realising this is now my every day.
One of the first purchases Adam and I wanted to make when we moved into our new home was a Christmas tree. When Adam was growing up he fondly remembers going to the Leigh Sinton Christmas tree farm, just north of Malvern – the trees are so well regarded they’ve even been used outside of the British Prime Minister’s house at 10 Downing Street!
I’ve only ever had a ‘real life’ Christmas tree once before at my brother’s house in Canberra. Growing up in tropical Queensland, humid summers and fir trees just don’t mix, so we always had a fake tree.
I was amazed at the huge variety of trees available…
Wattle and Ash 