Winter-Spring Update (2024)

For the past few years I've written quarterly updates (from "season to season"). I started out writing monthly updates in 2019 and then "two monthly" (two months at a time) ones in 2020, but found that quarterly was better for me. So I'm continuing that in 2024. :)

You can see my autumn-winter 2023 update here if you like: https://livingseasonal.blogspot.com/2024/01/christmas-funfetti-sheet-cake-autumn.html

 

I didn't do much in January apart from my usual park walks and going to Happy Café (Action for Happiness meetups). 

In early February I celebrated Imbolg. You can read about my celebrations here: https://livingseasonal.blogspot.com/2024/02/imbolg-2024.html 

And at the beginning of March it was my birthday. It was actually my 40th which felt a bit strange! I didn't do anything particularly special, just celebrated at home. I'd planned to go out for a meal but haven't got round to that yet, due to various circumstances. 

Also in March, I met up with my belly dance friends at a pub. We don't have classes anymore and it had been ages since I'd seen them, so that was nice. 

Then towards the end of the month it was Oestara/Ostara aka the Spring Equinox You can read my post about it here: https://livingseasonal.blogspot.com/2024/03/oestara-2024.html

 

Easter was early this year at the end of March (Easter Sunday was the 31st). I baked a Tres Leches cake this time , as a change from the frosted white chocolate Easter cake I've made most often in the past few years. I last made a tres leches cake 9 years ago (for Easter 2015)! You can see a post about it here: https://livingseasonal.blogspot.com/2015/04/easter-cake.html

I didn't take a picture this time but it looked pretty much the same, except I put Cadbury Mini Eggs on top (which I had planed to last time). The sponge didn't cook that well in some places which was a bit disappointing. But otherwise it was ok. I think next year I'll probably go back to the white chocolate cake, lol.

I also had a meal at home (chicken) and got a couple of chocolate eggs! 

Here are a couple of pics that I took at the park:

Buckingham Park, Shoreham- Jan.

 

 

 

 

 

Daffodils by the park- Feb.

I also did some baking during winter. I made a Coca-Cola chocolate cake again in January. It's one of my favourite cakes and I make it about once a year. It went wrong again the first time (like last year when I had a problem with the oven), so I baked it again! It was fine the second time, lol. 

As for drinks, I'm still making my own hot chocolate at the moment. I got a chocolate Frosty from Wendy's and tried a drink from Popeyes when I was in Brighton for Happy Cafe (the first time I'd been to Popeyes). And I also went to Starbucks.

The weather has been varied. As I mentioned in my autumn-winter update, we had snow at the beginning of the year. It's not that common too get snow in Sussex, so it made a change, lol. Other parts of the UK had more lately but we didn't, just a lot of rain! The weather warmed up a bit, which I wrote about in my Easing into Spring post last month. It's been feeling a bit colder again lately. It's around 12C (52F) during the day and 5C (41F) at night, which is about average for April, I think. 

I find that this time of year can drag a bit for me because it's spring and getting lighter but still quite cold. It does take me a while to feel "settled" into the year, as I've previously mentioned. 

So that's it for the first update of 2024! :) I struggled a bit around the beginning of the year, with anxiety and health anxiety in particular. Also just been feeling down at times.  The first quarter of last year wasn't very good in general though and I do feel that this one was a bit better. Hope everyone's year has been going well so far. :)

It's Beltane next week (30th April/1st May). While I'm not writing in-depth posts about celebrating the sabbats anymore (since I felt I'd already covered them a lot), I've occasionally had a small section, sharing a few links in my seasonal updates. I thought about including one at the end of this post but I think I might just do a separate post next week, sharing some salad recipes for Beltane. :)

Read: Be the Love by Sarah Prout (I've read this before and got it as a Christmas present), John Eyre by Mimi Matthews (birthday present).

Special mention: Evergreen by Lydia Millen. I got this book for my birthday. It's all about seasonal living (like the theme of this blog) and looking to nature for inspiration. The book is divided into sections for each season- Mid-winter (January, February), Spring (March, April, May), Summer (June, July, August), Autumn (September, October, November) and Winter (December). So it's 5 "seasons" in this case because winter has its own section at the end of the book.

Whenever you start reading, you can work your way through the year. I got the book at the beginning of March, so I read the mid-winter chapter and then started the spring one. I recommend Evergreen if you're into seasonal living and/or nature, or just want to improve your life by looking at things in a new way. You can follow Lydia at her website (she also has a YouTube channel which you can find linked on the site): https://lydiaelisemillen.com

Saw: Barbie. 

Links I found useful during winter and spring:

Post from Diana of The Chic Life about how you have the power to change your life: https://thechiclife.com/2023/12/you-have-the-power-to-change-your-life.html

There's some inspiring videos on Reinventing Poppy's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@reinventingpoppy