The morning routine!
Everybody has one. Some people's morning routines are definitely more hectic than others. For example if you have a child...or several children. I do not have a child...or children so I consider myself lucky at the moment to have quite a chilled out morning routine.
I don't know why, but I really enjoy reading about other peoples' morning routines. I think it's probably because I'm really nosey. I also really love seeing pictures of the inside of other peoples' homes. Anybody else like that?
Anyway...here's a minute by minute account of what generally happens in the morning in this little stone cottage in Northumberland.


06:30 - The alarm goes off and Rick gets up. He slowly pulls his clothes on and wonders about the bedroom trying to wake up, while I watch him from the folds of the duvet, still snuggly. He then goes down stairs and wakes Bosun up to take him out for his morning walk. I'm joking. Bosun's already awake (because he's heard Rick walking about upstairs) and is bouncing up and down ready for Rick to walk down the stairs. I then listen to *bang* *thump* "owww! calm down for gods sake!" for a few minutes, and then the back door opens and closes and I have another half an hour in bed. That's probably the most relaxing half an hour of the entire day. I love it.

07:00 - I spring cheerily from between the sheets and embrace the day. Ahem. There is no reluctant dragging involved. I open the curtains to flood the bedroom with light...and open the window if it's a nice day. I really love the house to smell of fresh air if possible so I like to leave a window open for a few hours. I then head to the bathroom and this is where it really gets exciting.

07:10 - I wash my face with Simple Kind To Skin Refreshing Facial Wash Gel 150 ml in the bath. I used to use the sink, but I found that it really wasn't practical. Leaning over the bath leaves so much more elbow room for scrubbing, splashing and drying. Seriously, try it. I then moisturise using Simple Kind To Skin Hydrating Light Moisturiser . I am a big fan of moisturiser and get through a lot of it. In fact I'd say it is one of my most important cosmetic products. Being outside on a day to day basis means that my face gets an absolute hammering from the elements.

07:20 - I spend a really long time deliberating exactly what I should wear. I am a young, strong, independent woman and I want my style to reflect that while still saying that I like to look feminine if I want to. Pah! I jest. I mainly want to wear something that's not going to get snagged on barbed wire if I have to jump out the way of a herd of stampeding cattle. My go- to outfit is jeans, a check shirt and a gilet (see here). I have a lot of gilets...I'll show you my gilet collection some time.

07:30 - I leap into action and go down stairs to begin the day in earnest. I begin by emptying the dish-washer. I believe in having a clean slate to begin the day and if the dishwasher is already empty, then I can shove things in throughout the day. If there's laundry to do then I'll put on a load of laundry. It will be now, while the boys are out of the house that I'll do some of the day's chores. I sweep the kitchen floor (we gather a lot of dog hair!) and hoover the lounge if need-be.

07:45 - 08:00 - Rick and the little cherub will be home by now. It's usually me that feeds Bosun his breakfast at this point. He is fed raw (see here) so will get a range of different things such as minced chicken, lamb, venison, oily fish, beef and many other bits and pieces. I sometimes give him a raw egg with his food and sometimes some veggies like carrots or peas. It's all very good for him and his breakfast often looks more appetising than mine.

08:00 - I make my self a cup of tea (I have a mild tea addiction) and have breakfast. Sometimes I'll have granola and yogurt. Sometimes I'll have some avocado on toast. Sometimes I'll have a cinnamon bagel. Maybe I'll have bovril on crumpets. So many possibilities. I'll sit and watch the BBC breakfast news while I eat my breakfast. Sometimes I shout with outrage at some of the stories. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I laugh. I always get angry at how much football monopolises the news. I definitely think rugby should get more television time than it already does. I'm a big rugby fan...but that's a story for another time.

08:30 - I check my blog and respond to new comments, I'll do some social media-ing maybe posting some photos or tweeting some links to some blog posts I like. I spend a lot of time on pinterest because...well it's pinterest. I'll catch up on other blog posts and leave lots of nice friendly comments and basically just relax before my working day commences.

08:50 - I'll hang out the laundry and finish any chores that need doing, load breakfast stuff into the dishwasher, Bosun's food bowl etc. I'll wipe down the kitchen surfaces and the sink etc and that way I know I can nag Rick if he leaves anything out on the surface at lunch time.

09:00 - I will then go and brush my teeth and brush my hair. My hair brushing is a bit of an ordeal...it has a mind of it's own. It's rather long and thick and unruly and un tamable and terrifying and sort of full of the snakes of Medusa. I'll try and beat it into submission into a pony tail...but sometimes if I don't win then I just have to shove it into a generic bun, mess, lump.

09:15 - I don my warden's camo baseball cap, pull on my muck boots, put some snacks and a bottle of water in my rucksack and head off into the park for a day of checking on the cattle, taking care of the park and escorting visitors safely into the park and ensuring they don't get gored...as far as is possible.

I hope you nosey people enjoyed reading about my morning routine. I would love to read about some of your routines! Write a blog post and leave a link in the comments section.
I'm off to drink another cup of tea now.
byeeeeee














This post contains affiliate links. All opinions are my own.

It was my birthday a few weeks ago (yes I am a taurus, shocking) and I was EXTREMELY lucky and fortunate and happy and grateful to receive from my lovely fiancee, something I have wanted for years...The Musto Buckden Boot.

The reason I have never bought these beautiful works of art for myself is that they have always been a teensy bit out of my price range. Rick, however, being the wonderfully resourceful man that he is managed to find them at a sale price at The Sportsman Gun centre and bought them for me as a birthday surprise. Aren't I a lucky girl?

These boots are really durable and will last a life time if treated properly. They are very stylish and you wouldn't look out of place wearing them to the pub for a nice, hot lunch after a jaunt in the country.

We went out for a walk yesterday afternoon with Bosun to test out the new boots. I haven't worn them up to now because I've been waiting for the leather boot treatment to arrive that I'd ordered. I thought that if I'm going to have such nice boots, I'd better treat them properly!




The Musto Buckden Boot is not completely water proof which I'm fine with. It's designed to keep your feet dry when walking through long wet grass and in the rain...so don't go wading through streams in them. If I want to go rock pooling, I have my Muck boots for that!

I really love how grippy and rugged the soles are! I feel like I could tackle any kind of terrain in these boots. They are so comfortable and are lined with Goretex, making them extra warm.

 I learned from this walk and trying to choose some nice pictures to post of my new boots, that my hair is out of control. A lot of the pictures, Rick was there shouting at me to get my hair out the way. Charming,


I will admit The Buckden Boots have a serious case of new boot stiffness, but I have read that with a lot of wearing in, they become soft and supple. So...I will just have to wear them as often as I can! No problem!




On a side note, did you catch my May Scavenger Hunt that I posted last week? I would also just like to post a few links to some of the other bloggers that got involved because there were some fantastic photos from these ladies.

• Granny Smith's Quilting
• In My Playroom
• Winters End Ramblings
• Sustainable Mum

Hey gang!
It's Sunday, the weekend is almost over (boo!), but never fear. I have rounded up some of the cutest animal-themed cupcake recipes out there to cheer you up. Trust me, once you have a look at these, you will completely forget it's Monday tomorrow.

(FYI I do know it's bank-holiday, but the wild-cattle don't believe in such things. The cattle keep me in line!)

I've been on a bit of a baking themed mission this weekend, which is why I thought of doing this cupcake round up. You may have come across my banana bread recipe from yesterday? I am carrying on the theme...

• These are cupcakes that very cleverly use mini marsh-mallows to make sheep! Such a creative idea from Wine and Glue.
• With this recipe from Hobbycraft, you use many cupcakes to form a giraffe. Pretty genius if you ask me.
• These owl cupcakes though! Such a fun thing to make with your children!
• These absolutely cracked me up. They're supposed to be bunny-bums, as if they were disappearing down a rabbit hole!
• Piggy cupcakes! Rick's Auntie is obsessed with piggies so these would be fantastic to make for her.
• I really love the look of these polar bear cupcakes, however it is an american site, and I'm not really sure where we'd get donut holes from here...or what white spice drops are.
• From the same site as the polar bears (the lady is talented!) comes this cool turtle cupcake. Love it!

Happy Saturday Folks!

Today when I got up I noticed that the bananas we'd bought last week with good intentions were looking a little past their best. So let's be honest, there's only one thing for it. Banana bread! Actually if I'm being REALLY honest they were probably past their best around Wednesday. I have always found, however that squishy bananas make the best Banana bread.

So I thought I would share my recipe with you. I can't even remember where I got the original recipe from (some old book?) but I've tried and tested many methods over the years, and this is just how my Banana breads turned out after years of tweaking and trying and testing different ingredients, quantities and temperatures.

I use a 5 x 9 inch loaf tin and bear in mind that I do have a very temperamental gas oven. You can see here for tips on cooking with gas ovens! Temperatures may vary slightly if you're using an electric oven.

Ingredients

Method

Do let me know if you make this banana bread using the recipe. I'd love to see it! Tag me on twitter or instagram, or post a link to your blog post here in the comments.

So...I saw this roughly about a month ago and was a teensy weensy bit excited about it and decided I simply HAD to get involved or else I was going to have some serious FOMO. (Fear of Missing Out).

This cute blog called Live Love Craft Me organises a monthly scavenger hunt for bloggers to be involved in whereby a list of words is set for the month, and then at the end of the month you simply post your photos that you have interpreted from those words. I had to get on board!

So here are my photos for the May Scavenger Hunt. Duh duh duh duuuuuuuh!

Path

Hairy

Edible

Small

Poem

Hands

Vintage

Shadows

View from a Window

My Own Choice

Hello everybody! Today we are saying hello to Alice!

So I'm writing and publishing this post today which is Wednesday 25th May 2016. I'm really glad that I decided to take my pictures for this post over the past few days and edit them because the weather has been glorious, but right now it's 8:30 in the morning on Wednesday and the weather outside is despicable! Wind, rain and miserable, ominous clouds. If I had decided to take the pictures for this post today then I would have been severely disappointed, as would you guys...

A lot of the things that I've been noticing are really difficult to take pictures of so I haven't been able to document them properly, for that I sincerely apologise.

The cuckoo has been back in the park now for roughly a month (I stupidly didn't write down the exact date I first heard it). It's endearing sound echoes for miles around, and on a daily basis I get visitors commenting how lovely it is to hear, because they haven't heard one where they live for years. If I'm honest, I hear it every day and it does start to drive one slightly insane. I would really love to get a picture of said cuckoo but I really wouldn't have the first clue where to start looking. Because we're in a valley I genuinely cannot tell which direction the noise is coming from. Also, if I'm really honest, I don't know that I'd immediately recognise a cuckoo.

The swallows are nesting in the Hemmel. They come back to this area every year and they are simply magnificent. They are migratory and travel for absolutely miles every year to South Africa and back. They eat flying insects and you can observe them dipping, diving and swooping to catch these flying insects in their mouth. You can see great flocks of swallows bunched up on fences and phone lines. I love that they are so acrobatic, they can fly through the smallest of spaces with so much skill and make it look so easy. I would love to get a picture of a swallow, but they are simply to quick! I looked like a right plank the other day running around the field with Rick's camera trying to get an action shot of a swallow. It really was a futile effort.



Hares are really common up here in Northumberland. I don't recall actually ever having seen a hare in Dorset. So basically my first time ever seeing a hare was when I moved to Northumberland last year. There are loads of them. They've just about finished boxing now. Watching the boxing displays was fantastic and thrilling, but really difficult to photograph. I think this post is just turning into a "Ellie's really bad at photography" post.



The badgers are creating a new sett in Chillingham. They've been really busy! I've noticed that the soil in this particular area is really sandy so I think that's made for easier digging and quicker progress.


Hawthorn. Horrible to walk through but a gloriously beautiful flower when it arrives. I find it really bizarre that in different parts of Chillingham, the hawthorn is at different stages. As you can see, here it's in it's small, flowery ball stage. In other areas, it's already in full bloom. In another part, it still hasn't finished growing leaves yet. Maybe due to the light available? Or different soil types? I'd be interested to find out.

I hope you're all enjoying your nature-ful adventures. What's going on in your part of the country?

So back in February, I announced some exciting news. I got engaged! My wonderful boyfriend of two years spent a long time planning a treasure hunt around the house and eventually I found my engagement ring in a most unlikely place. I was ridiculously excited. I am so happy to be marrying the man of my dreams. And of course I said yes!

Of course I am a girl so naturally I've had my dream wedding planned out in my head for years. I began putting these plans together in earnest, doing research. creating pinterest boards and ordering samples of things. I know that a lot of the decorations are going to be home made by myself or one of my willing volunteers (Future mother in law is a whizz with the bunting!). We have planted the flowers that are going to be used, so will be doing all the flower arrangements and bouquets ourselves. (I say we, again it's the FMIL that will be leading the way because she is fantastic).

But now that's come down to actually planning things and booking things and asking for quotes, I had no idea that planning the happiest day of my life was going to be so stressful! Could somebody please have warned me? And do you know what's really annoying? Is that men really don't care about weddings. I sit there on pinterest in the evenings looking through table decorations and rustic looking cakes and show Rick and his response is a standard "yes that's nice". Some more feed back would be helpful dear. But let's be honest here, I will have the final say. And that's his argument. I see his point. He says that he would quite happily go down to the registry office, sign the paper and then have a meal at the pub. The wedding is for the girls. Yep.

We started our wedding fund as soon as we got engaged. We already had a bit saved up in individual saving funds but we decided if we were going to build our lives together, we needed to be more adult and have a joint account to be used for wedding savings in the mean time but for adult things after the wedding. We had quite a bit saved up, I was quite proud of our little fund. This week I have kicked off the plans by starting to book things in earnest. I have booked the catering, the band and the photographer. We have also been to see the reverend who will be marrying us and booked in the ceremony at st Peter's Church in Chillingham.

What is really terrifying is that I have spent most of our fund on deposits! Of course we have almost a year to continue saving and the saving plan that we've put in place in theory should mean that we have more than enough for the size of wedding that we would like. But seriously, weddings are expensive. It's frightening how much money Rick and I will be spending, considering we are going with the most economical options on things. How much do people usually spend on weddings?

Trying to sort out bridesmaid dresses that all my bridesmaids will agree with is also proving a challenge...but I think we've got it sorted out...just about.

To top it all off, the emerald in my engagement ring came loose so at the moment it is off being repaired. Rick was angry to say the least because of the time and effort he put into choosing that ring. After all the money stress, I was thinking "oh gosh, is this an omen? Is the universe trying to tell me that I'm spending too much money?" But I realised quickly that I was being hysterical.

I have downloaded a helpful app onto my phone called Wed Happy which is basically a hand held wedding planner. It's really useful. You can put in your budget and then it keeps track of how much you're spending so that you don't go over that budget. Although I'm fairly sure that we'll be going over budget. Don't tell Rick. The app also sends me little notifications to tell me to do things such as phone back the caterers or post save the date cards etc. Very handy.

Right now I am looking forward to the few days before the wedding where there is nothing else to be planned, everything is as prepared as it can be and I can just relax with my family. I will get my hair and nails done, eat some takeaway and prepare for the chaos and hectic-ness that will be my wedding day.

We have planned some fun things for the day as well which we are both really excited about. I've been to a few really boring weddings in my time where everyone stands around waiting for things to happen, and I didn't want that for my wedding. I can assure you that everybody will be entertained!

So, I will keep persevering and hopefully not lose many of my marbles. Do you have any wedding planning tips? Any ways to keep sane? Anything I should just chuck out? I would love to hear from you.

I am and always have been an avid walker. I grew up in the heart of the Dorset countryside and from an early age was getting up to all kinds of mischief with my sisters and friends on long rambling adventures. Part of those rambles would at some point always lead us through a field of cattle. For us it was just normal. We grew up knowing how to act around cattle and it became second nature.

More and more nowadays we are being faced with article after article describing horrifying incidents where walkers are chased by cattle, sometimes even being hurt by them. I can never recall an incident growing up where I was at all concerned about walking through cattle, I don't remember being chased or intimidated at all. I suppose I was lucky in that it was just part of every day life. I appreciate that a lot of people are not that lucky, but still would like to enjoy the Countryside. I have put together this (what I hope is) helpful guide which will hopefully help you walk with confidence through a field where they may be cattle present.

Only walk on designated rights of way

I'm walking through the countryside and I see a field up ahead of me with cattle in it...

What if they're stood round the gate?

What if they start coming towards me?

But what if they DO start running?

Can I take my dog with me?

When all else fails...