What I've Loved This Week....

...is nostalgia. For me, blogging has been a very off and on business, and this certainly isn't the first blog I've written. If you're interested, and you've got a little bit of spare time, then do please go off and have a look at my previous ones - you can find me having a tantrum here, and having it all here (but please remember to come back!)

I often think I was born in the wrong time - in my heart, I know I was meant to be waltzing with a dashing young man who's arrived at the ballroom in a carriage and Jane Austen's chosen me as her main study. Or I'm a lovelorn governess with a crush on her boss. Or Anna Karenina. Take your pick really. It often means though I don't necessarily always grasp the current culture, I'm constantly astounded by fashion, culture and hairstyles, and I'd still quite like to wear a gypsy top. Do you remember them? It's a bit of a sign of age that one.

When I first started blogging, there were only a few blogs I knew about, and there certainly wasn't any sort of network of the same size as British Mummy Bloggers. Well , there might have been, but if they existed I didn't know about them and I probably wouldn't have been accepted as a member. Wife in the North had got her book deal, and some of my Open University buddies blogged if they were doing a Creative Writing course, other than that you just sort of waited for people to find you, and you found them by looking at comments on other people's blogs. And I look back on those days quite fondly, I wasn't aware of it being such a big deal as it is nowadays, and probably we danced in cornfields and the sun always shone as well. And in this spirit of looking back:-

this week I've loved shabby. I came across this gorgeous shop while I was in York, and they do a lovely mail order service. How could you not love this gorgeous santa envelope? Or this beautiful lamp? Or these pretty jugs? Frankly I could buy up half their supply, if only I had the money. (And no, this isn't a sponsored post, they haven't offered me any incentives, I just happen to love the shop.

This week I've loved blogs. One of the first blogs I read in great big huge chunks, and still read now is Big Blue Barn West. Aims has had an incredibly difficult life, she has tales to make you laugh and cry, and she's one of the bravest women I'll ever have the pleasure to read. She's also a very talented crafter and although she doesn't blog as regularly as she used to, she's still a writer who will draw you in to her world. In a bid to look to the new as well, I've discovered a gorgeous new blog called Karen and Nigella. She has the most mouthwatering photographs of food, and she's working her way through Nigella's cookbook. I shall personally be hoping to follow her on the journey, literally if necessary, just to get my hands on some of that food.

So that's me done. What have you loved this week?

Edited to add it's no use at all me telling you I used to write other blogs and then not giving you the linky loo la's so you can have a look at them. I can only apologise and blame someone who isn't me, defeinitely not, no sirree bob.