All Hallows Eve...boo!

 Image from here

 Hallow dear friends!

Halloween is not a huge event in New Zealand

but it is becoming more so every year

as you can see from the advertisement above

from one of our local shopping malls.

Children of all ages (and some adults too)

love dressing up in costumes.

It's

FUN FUN FUN

to dress up and take on another persona

every once in a while!  

I've always bought or made up bags of

spooky treats for the neighborhood

visiting gremlins, witches and ghosts

who knock on our door once it gets dark.

Image and historical information from here

I decided to search Mr Google for a traditional

halloween biscuit and this is what I found

with a song to go with it.

Soul Cakes

if you would like to see the recipe it's here 

SOUL CAKES SONG 

BY STING

A soul cake, a soul cake,
Please, good missus, a soul cake,
An apple, a pear, a plum or a cherry,
Any good thing to make us all merry.

A soul cake, a soul cake,
Please, good missus, a soul cake,
One for Peter, two for Paul,
And three for Him that made us all.

God bless the master of this house
And the mistress also,
And all the little children
That round your table grow,

The cattle in your stable,
The dogs at your front door,
And all that dwell within your gates
We'll wish you ten times more.
A soul cake, a soul cake:

Go down into the cellar
And see what you can find,

If the barrels are not empty
We'll hope that you'll be kind,

We'll hope that you'll be kind
With your apple and your pear,
And we'll come no more a-soulin'
Till Christmas time next year.
A soul cake, a soul cake:

The streets are very dirty,
Me shoes are very thin,
I have a little pocket
To put a penny in,

If you haven't got a penny
A ha'penny will do,

If you haven't got a ha'penny
God bless you.
A soul cake, a soul cake 

 

There are some interesting
decorating ideas out there
(Shhh don't tell anyone... but time has got away with me on Google this morning
flitting from one site to the next!)

Image from here

I love these 'spooky' candle holders 

easy to make and a

great thing to do with your children/grandies!

There are lots of wonderful

FREE

images to download from

Mr Printables

Please check it out!!!!

 Image from here

SO CUTE

This is a Kea - our native parrot.

He is very cheeky and also loves

shiney objects just like magpies!

Best wishes to all of you

my dear friends

for a fun and

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

  Merci à bientôt
take care of one another!

♥ Shane ♥

 

 

 

I must go down to the Sea again.........

Hello dear friends

Summery days are in the air in our part of the world!

We have just had our last long weekend

before Christmas

Labour Day weekend.

We went away on our cousin's boat for the weekend.

The weather looked promising

although it can be fickle in Spring.

When we left the mariner this amazing

super yacht was sitting in mid-stream

of the harbour.

It resembles a stealth destroyer.  

Known only as 'A' it is owned by  a

Russian fertiliser and chemical magnate 

Andrey Melnichenko.

Some fascinating facts I discovered on Google.

"While a frigate can probably outrun 'A'

 – cruising at 50 kph to the superyacht’s 42 kph

 a frigate probably wouldn’t boast a jacuzzi or a swimming pool. 

It’s also an open question which ship has more security systems.

Superyachts.com rates A as the 16th largest superyacht in the world

 – but it is due to slip a couple of places to 18 this year

 thanks to some Middle East billionaires building bigger vessels".

Back to reality!

I took this photo in Islington Bay

Rangitoto Island

where we moored for our first evening.

Rangitoto is an extinct volcano

in Auckland Waitemata harbour

and can be seen from almost anywhere in

Auckland. 

Little boats were out for a sail at the weekend too.
It was exhilirating to be back on the water!

The good news is
we have bought an old classic launch
which "we" are slowly restoring back to
how she was when she was originally built.
It is time consuming meticulous work,
scraping, sanding, painting etc
but I know it will be worth it!!!

The royal "we" means my husband
aka "the yachtie"
does the bulk of the work and I encourage
and help where I can!

Thank you dear friends for popping in
I'm belatedly joining Mary for
Mosaic Monday 

WELCOME
to my new followers - lovely to meet you!


 Merci à bientôt
take care of one another!

♥ Shane ♥

 

 

 

Campagne Grey Deys

Hello dear friends

my daughter recently sent me the

latest issue of my favourite

french Interior Design magazine

CAMPAGNE

DECORATION 

You can imagine how I squeal with delight

when I find one of her parcels in our letterbox!

The best part is

there's always a lovely long

newsy letter inside

which I read over and over again!

 

All of my "greys" this week

come from Issue #83

September/October.

The entrance way

of a

private château in the

Loire valley

dining room

grey vintage candlesticks

I love grey..........................................!

I'm joining Michelle of

Petite Michelle Louise blog for

Grey Deys Thursdey 

please pop over as there are some

great grey posts there this week!

Thank you for visiting

and

WELCOME

to my new followers.

Merci à bientôt
take care of one another!

♥ Shane ♥

 

 

 

 

 

Embroidery Tea....

Hello dear friends!

I've blogged about embroidery days before.
Our small group meets fortnightly
and this time our venue was
Mary's apartment on harbour side.
Some of you might recognise her lovely pink glass teapot
with the Chinese flower tea I posted about here

We each had a different tea cup, saucer and plate.
There is nothing quite like sipping tea
from a fine bone china cup
I'm sure you would agree!

This was my cup
with the most beautifully painted pattern
of a Spring garden.
The flowers are pink and white aubretia, bluebells
and yellow primroses in a rock garden.

I forgot to photograph the maker's stamp underneath
so I can't tell you the name or the company...
I searched Mr Google but didn't find an image
of this particular one -
can someone please tell me what it is?

Today I'm joining these tea parties
Ruth at Tuesday Cuppa Tea 
Terri at Tea Cup Tuesday
Bernideen at Friends Sharing Tea
Sandi at Tea Time Tuesday
Kathy at A Return to Loveliness

If you're into "tea, pretty china and yummy baking"
please click on the links to visit these
these blogs - why not join in
with your post on anything to do with tea!

A very yummy chocolate slice topped with toasted coconut!


Thank you dear friends
for visiting and leaving your sweet comments!

WELCOME
to my new followers - thank you for being here.


Merci à bientôt
take care of one another!
 

♥ Shane ♥

A beautiful village in France

Hello dear friends

we have had two beautifully warm and sunny

Spring days in a row - long may it continue!

It's Monday so I'm joining

Mary for her party

MOSAIC MONDAY 

 I'm taking you back to France

to wander with me through one of

the top most beautiful villages there called

Noyers

(Noyers-sur Serein)

in Burgundy.

It was one of those languid days

we all remember from our childhood....

hot and sunny with bees buzzing about the flowers

collecting  nectar....

the kind of day you wish would never end!

 

This walk was a feast of photo opportunities,

from the beautiful old 14th century buildings

to charming little gardens

and some unexpected touches in between

as  there always are in these villages.

We were escorted for part of our walk

by this friendly little cat

much to the delight of my

granddaughters!

I'm looking everywhere for a basket like this

to hang in my courtyard!

and of course I fell in love with this cute little Renault

and wanted to bring it home with me!

Please pop over to Mary's

she is a very accomplished photographer,

it's her business as well as her hobby.

Thank you for popping in here and leaving 

your sweet comments!

Merci à bientôt!

♥ Shane ♥