We’re both flumping around today, having decided that we’re too old for all this staying up late and drinking a lot malarkey!

I am very pleased to report that the extemporaneous ‘crème brulee without the crème’ was pronounced a success by Becks, who says it has to be a part of my recipe book, which was one of my projects that I’d planned to do when we got down here and I was working fewer hours!!!

Despite working much longer hours than I had anticipated, I am still getting through things in the ‘grand plan’ albeit much more slowly than I’d have liked. There’s much work going on in the house – I’ve been painting the fireplace today in advance of my beautiful overmantle, bought on ebay at a very good price, arriving – it’s coming on Friday and I want to be in a position to put it up on Saturday. If it’s anything like as lovely as it looks in the pic, it’s going to be one of my ‘treasures’. I have now won two auctions – one with the help of that thing that Ian C (BTW – thanks Ian) doesn’t want me to mention in public and one using nothing but my own skill and cunning!!!

Over Christmas, I have also done a huge ‘push’ on my latest photography project and made significant progress there too. I’m investing a huge amount of time and effort for what I hope will reap reward later but as yet, it’s all untried.

BUT, I realised late last year, that I needed to prioritise – one big project in each ‘box’ of my life and that’s all – and once a ‘project’ has started, I’m not allowing myself to be distracted until it’s finished – DM has come up with a number of other ideas for me but I’ve said ‘yes, but not now’! So, the recipe book is on the back burner for now is why this ramble started.

Today, though, when I asked DM what he wanted to do for the day, he replied in a very dejected manner ‘nothing, I want to sleep and hide away’ so I tried a different tack – ‘what do you fancy for lunch?’ Soup, he replied. He is feeling very sorry for himself and wants comforting things. I know I can supply comfort in abundance so that’s OK, even though I’d much rather he was up and about as bright as a button because he promised me he would fit the chimney and register plate on our new/old woodburner today. This is all that remains of that job before we can light a fire and heat our water. Even though that is definitely his project, it’s still another ‘tick’ in a box, despite it not getting that final tick today.

So, here is a shot of my butternut squash, prepped up and ready to go into the oven to roast before being made into soup. I am also planning to put this into my recipe book when it pops up to top of my list of priorities. Although I like the vibrancy of the colour and the ‘moistness’ of this shot, I know it’s not what I want for the illustration of the recipe for my book – but I now know exactly in my mind what it will look like and how I can do it. So, that’s another ‘tick’ – I’ve worked out that with the still-life stuff, getting a view in your head of what it will look like on a page with text is more than half of the battle!

The comfort food is particularly needed because it’s snow and hail storms here!

PS - Mum - what are you doing up that late? Are you taking a leaf out of our book, in which case, does your head hurt as much as ours do today???

Last year, DM was my pic - and he looked a lot healthier than he does today!!!