Just a few words from the wintry meadows... before i head off for a nice little mid-afternoon nap before another night shift... it's been a week of night shifts - oh, i don't mind, they tend to be quieter than day shifts, but it sure makes for interesting sleeping patterns! A few friends of mine have been taking up the challenge of taking a picture a day for a year - my uncle did that a few years ago and it was really neat to see his images... i will admit to being intrigued by the idea and started off valiantly... for the first day... and haven't been very faithful since then - oh, maybe every two days or so now. I know, it takes dedication and i've got to make sure i've got my camera with me at all times - and my picture-taking eyes open - since it doesn't really matter what the images are of - just my daily life... so i'm going to keep trying and we'll see what comes of it all! That first shot is of my little house in the city - after a windy, snowy, wintry night - kinda cozy to go to bed on a night like that, all snug and warm in bed with the wind howling around the house, seeking to get in but being denied by the walls of the house - i'm thankful for the walls of my house (silly eh, but true!)
This was Saturday morning - i had to take this shot to prove to several people that we were indeed receiving snow - it stopped in the afternoon but was coming down pretty good at the time this was taken - it looked oh so pretty - i don't always like it when i end up with soggy pant legs because of wet car mats and snow piles, but i'll take the good with the bad!
Hmmm... my computer has all of a sudden changed fonts and now has decided to underline everything - not sure what i did there - but sorry, you'll just have to put up with it... this shot is of my neighbour's tree in the backyard - always provides interesting shapes and shadows in contrast with the sky for taking pictures - i just loved the sky... i realize that i might be at risk of taking 365 pictures of skies and trees - hopefully it doesn't turn out that way!
Hmmm... back to normal typing again - must be the ghost living in my keyboard causing havoc and mischief for the poor uneducated computer-illiterate writer. I didn't know if this was cheating to take a picture of a picture - but hey, there are no rules right? This is a shot my sister Lauren took and which hangs proudly on my living room wall - i love the colours and as you can see, it's still decorated for the Christmas season (see the previous blog about tinsel and decorations for further ideas!)
A bird of paradise flower - aren't they amazing - taken in the greenhouses at the RBG - some really neat plants there to be sure!
Ummmm... cookie! I got all "domestic" the other day and rustled up some cookies to take to a church shower - they were pretty yummy - a little crispy since i seem never to be able to take them out on time - i have to remember a few minutes before the buzzer goes off! But they still managed to be tasty! Thanks Rachel, for the recipe.
And my dinner - yep, it was worthy of a picture - looked pretty tasty - and it sure was - warms you up to the core - i love hutspot (stampot wortels as we used to call it). It's such a good winter meal - a good stick to your ribs food! I made enough for a bunch of meals so now i'm set for a few shifts - handy! I thought i'd include a little history of the dish - since i love history - and i was just in Leiden, apparently the home of hutspot in Holland! The article is from wikipedia (fount of all wisdom - haha)According to legend, the recipe came from the cooked bits of potato left behind by hastily departing Spanish soldiers during their Siege of Leiden in 1574 during the Eighty Year's War, when the liberators breached the dikes of the lower lying polders surrounding the city. This flooded all the fields around the city with around a foot of water. As there were few, if any, high points (and September in the Netherlands is not exactly a warm month), the Spanish soldiers camping in the fields were essentially flushed out.
The anniversary of this event, known as Leidens Ontzet, is still celebrated every October 3 in Leiden and by Dutch expatriates the world over. Traditionally, the celebration includes consumption of a lot of "Hutspot met klapstuk/stooflap" (Hotchpotch with chuck roast/beef shoulder chops).
During the Nazi occupation the dish came to represent freedom from oppression since its ingredients could be grown beneath the soil and thus somewhat hidden from sight, and the carrots gave the dish an orange colour, which represents the Dutch Royal Family.
1 comment:
AS delightful as the bird of paradise plant is to look at, I cant say that personally I was too fond of such fauna, as I had one ugly unkept, brown dead flower topped strangle at the front of my house. Inspired by someone who had a few of them, we attacked and chopped and cut back and watered and with gloved hand removed probably about 15 years of eco system in the base of the plant with the end result of beautiful flowers. However they eventually died but it sure was a beauty in that time.
Wonder if there is a moral to such a story ... Im post nights so no moral is coming real fast,
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