tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-77676770793190003422024-03-19T06:37:31.474+00:00 MilkmoonCiara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.comBlogger679125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-33398463714067069222017-05-12T09:42:00.000+01:002017-05-12T09:42:53.056+01:00<div style="text-align: center;">
Just popping in to say hello, and to let you know I can now be found </div>
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(hopefully fairly regularly!) over in my new blog house</div>
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Hope to see some of you there sometime!</div>
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Love Ciara x</div>
Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-7334596941812123612014-01-19T21:54:00.000+00:002017-05-10T17:27:24.016+01:00In The Midst Of The Grey Season, A Quiet Goodbye.There is a slow sinking that happens when the year turns new, isn't there?<br />
The soft, muted landing after the bright sparkle and lustre of the festive season, the aftermath of the whirlwind of gatherings which we found ourselves at finds us in a tangle on the sofa, amidst groans of don't-want-to's and do-I-have-to's and general resistance to the routine of everyday that must be seen to now, whether we want to or not.<br />
Personally, apart from very little get up and go, I don't mind this time of year. I find it a time of reflection and expectation, equally looking back, and forward, at the same time. A time when getting out and walking seems to be a good way of allowing thoughts and ideas to simmer and process and bloom into something with potential, but also a time when that sofa and fire are just far too comfortable, and the days too short, to inspire anything other than hanging out together and staying warm.<br />
So, a time of opposites, but all very quiet and slow and not at all taxing.<br />
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This morning the house smells of cinnamon buns. There is frost on the grass, a slick of ice on the car windows, and as I sit in the warmth, looking out at the pink sky above Bray Head, I find myself coming back once more to that timely idea of resolutions for the new year, of what intentions I would like to set for the coming year, and something that has been floating around and coming in to land every so often, for over a year now, has finally come home to roost.<br />
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I have decided to take a (permanent) hiatus here.<br />
After six years blogging in this place I call Milkmoon, things in my life have changed so much that I am finding it increasingly difficult to make things fit in here, and to find the means and inspiration to. I have tried to force Milkmoon to evolve with these changes, but the result has left me more and more dissatisfied and uninspired, and now, nine months after leaving the house where this all began, I realise once more, that it is the<i> idea</i> of change that is more scary than the change itself, and it's time to let this go.<br />
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I love blogging, and I am not giving it up, but I am letting go of Milkmoon, and I do hope some of you loyal, lovely people who visit here, find something of interest in my new project(s?) when it is up and running properly.<br />
I have met some extraordinarily wonderful, inspiring people through Milkmoon, people who I am honoured to call friends now, and I do hope we stay in touch.<br />
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I may pop in here occasionally. I may even open up again, and dust things off, some day in the future. Who knows. But for now, much like leaving our little cottage, I am shutting up shop, leaving behind the ghosts of my small children as they were when this all began, for they too are growing and changing, and to me, more than anything else, the Milkmoon years were all about our life as a family with young children, in our little house by the sea, and one of the things I have found difficult to adjust to, is not really having small children to photograph any more! I got such pleasure out of this, of being around little ones, being inspired by their innocence and the view of the world from their perspective, and a part of me misses it very much. I am in love with seeing what wondrous people they are growing into, loving how this is influencing my interests in other directions, yes, even loving the challenges it brings! At the same time, now that they are older, other parts of my life are being given a chance to develop, and it's very exciting, but feels wrong to introduce it here in this golden, storybook place of magic, of small children and the waving grass, of being Mama and nothing else. That is something I want to preserve here, and so, a new place for new beginnings feels right to me.<br />
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I will call in and update with a link to the new place as soon as possible, though I am not sure when that will be. There are a number of different paths opening up right now and I'm not sure where they will lead.<br />
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So thank you all, for sharing these years with me, I hope we meet again.<br />
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Lots of love from the Garden of Ireland,<br />
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Ciara xxx<br />
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Update : You can find me over<a href="http://stitcheryandmending.blogspot.ie/"> here.</a><br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com21tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-55199110196774823382013-12-30T19:27:00.002+00:002013-12-30T19:43:10.788+00:00Breathing Space.So we have slipped past the longest night,<br />
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the storms that blew for days have abated, and we find ourselves out tramping the sodden mulchy pathways that criss cross the significant hills of our days. We have gathered together our families, eaten our fill, making merry til the long dark hours are forgotten, pushed aside by the rush of words we swap and share and weave together, for there are months of catching up to be done with those dear to us.</div>
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And here we find ourselves again, in the quiet time between the years, the lying low, the resting, mustering ourselves for the New Year to come. </div>
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I find myself reflecting on this past, most eventful year, and looking forward down the path ahead to the exciting one to come. </div>
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For the second year in a row I find myself standing looking into a great big Unknown - and last year did not disappoint. We didn't even know where we would be living by Christmas, this time last year, and now we are here we are amazed, for it is as though we have always been here. </div>
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<span style="color: #45818e; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>This year I was ~ packing up ~ losing India ~ leaving the marsh ~ moving house ~ attending weddings ~ in Cork ~ at Inis Beg Estate ~ meeting friends ~ in Sligo ~ discovering Bray ~ climbing that hill ~ flying to Virginia ~ delving into caves ~ flying home~ swimming in the sea : Sandycove, White Rock, Killiney, Bray, Greystones, Kilcoole, Silver Strand, Magheramore, Morriscastle Strand, Clogga Bay, Baginbun, Carnivan, Coral Beach Carraroe, Mullaghmore, Bundoran, ~ at Lough Key Forest Park ~ doing yoga ~ starting work ~ seeing our co-op shoot towards the sky ~ organising pop-ups ~ taking photos ~ making drawings ~ stitching ~ walking ~ cycling ~ reading ~ feeling very grateful and heart-full and excited about the coming year. </i></span></div>
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I want to say thank you, to all you folks who have stuck by Milkmoon, despite this most sparse years of all. There is still more to be told here, and I am not done yet. So here's to 2014, and all that it brings.</div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>So, Happy New Year to you all,</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>may 2014 bring you Enough.</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>Sending love to you wherever in the world you may be.</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>~Ciara~</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b><i>xx</i></b></span></div>
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Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-89538045410201006482013-12-03T08:13:00.000+00:002018-02-18T20:57:17.687+00:00What I've Been Up To Lately.Sometimes Life amazes me.<br />
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Picks me up by my tail and whirls me around a bit, then deposits me somewhere unexpected and never-seen-before, and so, a bit ruffled, and maybe even somewhat bedraggled, I pick myself up and dust myself off, check for injuries, and then Proceed With Caution. It doesn't happen very often in life that there is a significant change, I mean, a really, really big one. Usually it's the slow meander along the winding little pathways, with occasional wanderings off into dead ends and loop-the-loops which bring you right back to where you started. And there are lovely woodlands along the way, with leafy green and yellow light dancing up there above you, and sometimes there are banks of the sweetest flowers nodding their heads in the balmy breeze, and sometimes there are puddles of muddy water you have to wade through in your favourite shoes, or stones that trip you up or find their way into your shoe and hurt your feet. But sometimes it turns out that the little beaten track you are on suddenly opens up into Wonder, a great grassy plain with a smooth road and the sea sparkling in the distance, and suddenly everything feels Right, and Good, and you find yourself skipping along, kicking up your heels and skirts, and warmth blooms in your heart.<br />
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Sometimes Life amazes me.</div>
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And I find myself doing something I could never have dreamt of, only a few months ago. And the phrase, In My Element, suddenly has <i>meaning.</i> </div>
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A few months before we moved to this town we began meeting weekly with a bunch of rather splendid folks who had a rather splendid idea about what this town needs, and so, we have spent almost a year now, talking talking talking about just what that might be, and slowly something began to take shape, and then it began to grow, and to our collective amazement we are now in the midst of Something Splendid that is now fluttering out there, above our heads, stretching it's gossamer wings and testing the air. </div>
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We have no idea where it will take us, or what it will bring, but it is exciting and inspiring, and speaking in a voice that, it turns out, many people can, and want to, hear.</div>
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We are part of a growing community co-operative that is still finding that voice, but that is strong and clear and determined. We started out as a wholefood buying club, and then we put on an event, a vegetarian feast with music and dancing and singing, and we started to tell people about what we were doing, and all around us these little lights began to go on, in people's eyes and hearts, as they listened to what we were saying, and they began to add their voices too, and now we find ourselves here, with a gathering crowd of good intentioned, hopeful folks who know that this is the way forward. Sharing our resources, our skills, our experience, sharing those tender seedling ideas that we carry around in our hearts, sometimes for years, not knowing what to do to help it grow, because some things need more than one person to develop and grow into that wondrous something that has untold potential. But then, when we gather together, and begin to talk, magic happens, things do begin to <i>grow,</i> and faster than you could have imagined. And we all realise that it <i>is </i>possible to do things differently than we are told. It is possible to do business another way, that things don't always have to involve money, or multinational companies, or foreign businesses, that we have everything we need right here on our doorstep. We have <i>the community </i>we need, right here in our town. And you know what? So do you!<br />
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The most exciting thing we have discovered is that as soon as you begin to speak, to ask for what you need, you find it's right there, down the street from you, in your community, and it has been all along. There is a network of amazing people all around you who want the same things for themselves and their families that you do, and all you need is a place to come together to <i>talk</i>. A Common Ground to talk about the common ground you share, the back to basics, <i>real</i>, stuff, like how to feed your family, how to provide a real and rich experience for your children of what the world really is, and how people really do want to help one another, because it benefits us all, in the end. And in doing so, we discover how to pare away the unnecessary, stifling, consumer mentality we are all infected with, and to get real again, connect with people in a heartfelt way that brings untold riches of the kind we haven't felt since childhood. </div>
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Last Saturday evening we hosted another event, this time a pop-up restaurant, a seated, four course, vegetarian meal for 30 folks, in a studio in what was once a factory that made the rather famous Beverley Bags in the 50's and 60's, and I found myself In My Element. Seeing all these people, many of them strangers to one another, gathered together and talking talking talking, connecting, sharing food and drink and laughter, stories and ideas and intentions, well, I thought my heart would burst with happiness.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNd9URcxOedJ50c_Qm8ROnJDLUKzYyAAgMHlFJGXf3lJrkFYL8XFlaWG7AURJzSep6C82CtwOlaV6OCd3ax3Qs4PYy5AIptgVVDKaulrq5bX0SKBoHSU3LUxD2JEUIsYm5hlzaF5b897g/s1600/commonground3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNd9URcxOedJ50c_Qm8ROnJDLUKzYyAAgMHlFJGXf3lJrkFYL8XFlaWG7AURJzSep6C82CtwOlaV6OCd3ax3Qs4PYy5AIptgVVDKaulrq5bX0SKBoHSU3LUxD2JEUIsYm5hlzaF5b897g/s640/commonground3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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It's all true, you know, what we know in our hearts; that we all want the same thing in the end. A safe place, with love and support, a community that lifts us all up, collectively nurturing and sustaining us, and that carries us forward into a hopeful future where we are doing things the way <i>we</i> want to.</div>
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Together.</div>
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–*–</div>
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<i>Local friends, and anyone interested, you can find us,</i></div>
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<i><a href="https://www.facebook.com/commongroundbray">Common Ground, Bray, on Facebook, here. </a></i></div>
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And online on <a href="http://commongroundbray.com/">our website here.</a> </div>
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Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-46843015709895840672013-10-27T14:34:00.000+00:002013-11-23T14:54:26.260+00:00Blackberry And Apple Crumble, Oh My! from Milkmoon Kitchen.Six months ago we moved house. We left behind a little cottage that sat in a field by the sea, with a marshland spread out behind us, and a clear view to the mountains. A country setting, by all accounts. Our exciting, and thoroughly successful, I might add, move to a town setting, meant, I assumed, that we had left the country behind. But every day I have been reminded by the tenacity of Mother Nature. There simply is no getting away from it, is there? Thankfully!<br />
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We were very particular about where we ended up, in particular about staying by the sea, and with some compromise on other things, we now find ourselves surrounded by a neighbourhood of old gardens, dating from a time when people grew their food, and being self-sustaining was just the norm, (and not that long ago, either!)<br />
In the summer it was flowers that did it. A walk around town was a joy from start to finish, a perfumed soliloquy on the glory of the pure, and yes tenacious, smorgasbord we have right here, beneath our feet, spilling over the walls as we pass, nodding to us, brushing our shoulder, whispering in our ears and causing us to forget what we were just saying or thinking, gently persuading us to pause and inspect, or smell, ooh and ahh, and oh, what a pleasure it all was!<br />
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And now autumn has arrived, and oh my, it's as though Mother Nature saved the best for last, and has just opened yet another cupboard, beckoning to us in our breathless wonder as we inhale the perfume that is now made into something else, a deep earthy something, born of pollen and spores and the abundance of flora that came together over the summer months, collided in the air, entangled with one another in the tango of love, danced the summer dance before drifting down to settle into the undisturbed sleep of winterness. A potent concoction of humus and decay that reassures the soul.<br />
It's my favourite time of year.<br />
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And so, over the last month, a walk around the neighbourhood has been a delight of another, abundant kind. Everywhere you go there is fruit hanging over the walls, apples, pears, and the occasional plum tree. And the <i>blackberries! </i>They are my favourite, just pushing and poking their way through every crack and crevice, through every hedgerow, and the lovely thing is, for all the gorgeousness and pride of these local gardens, there's very few that don't have brambles somewhere amidst the bushes, and there they are allowed to be, undisturbed.<br />
We even have a beautiful big, old walnut tree around the corner, out on the roadside, and not so long ago, before I realised what it was, there was fruit for the taking.<br />
Next year.<br />
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So, yes, there is an inordinate amount of pleasure to be had in abundance from an unexpected source. And this apple crumble has been our go to dish when visiting friends, or having people over. The crumble is particularly yummy. It is gluten, sugar and dairy free, of course, though I guarantee just as palatable to omnivores of all persuasions.<br />
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<u>Ingredients:</u><br />
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8 eating apples, (or 4 each pears and apples), peeled, cored and quartered,<br />
120ml honey or maple syrup,<br />
60g dried fruit, I used a mix of golden sultanas, cherries, and berries, <i>or </i>a handful of fresh blackberries,<br />
170g fine oatflakes,<br />
30g mixed toasted seeds and nuts,<br />
2tbls unrefined sunflower oil, (I think I'll try coconut oil next time!)<br />
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<u>Oven: </u> Gas 5, 190C, 375F<br />
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<u>Method:</u><br />
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As we are using eating apples, due to the fact there is no refined sugar used in this recipe, there is no need to stew the apples first.<br />
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1) Roughly chop the apples and lay them out in an ovenproof dish.<br />
2) Drizzle with about 30g of the honey/maple syrup.<br />
3) Sprinkle with the dried fruit.<br />
4) In a bowl, mix the oatflakes, nuts and seeds.<br />
5) Add the oil and the rest of the honey/maple syrup, and mix until all the flakes are coated in the oil.<br />
6) Sprinkle over the fruit.<br />
7) Bake in a pre-heated oven for about 45 minutes, or until the topping is golden, and the fruit mixture is bubbling.<br />
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If you can manage to not eat every morsel of this when it comes out of the oven, it tastes even better the next morning, as a delicious, nutritious breakfast.<br />
Enjoy it with yogurt of your choice; dairy, soya or my latest obsession, coconut!<br />
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<i>Footnote: The other morning I looked out my bedroom window, down at the dozens of shiny red apples that bobbed against the grey sky, and wondered for the millionth time about how on earth we were going to reach them. The lower branches have been picked clean, but all the rest were far beyond our reach. Later in the day, as I sat in work, putting finishing touches to this post, I got a phone call from our eldest lad saying he was just home, and was I aware the apple tree was lying across the garden? The lovely old thing, our collective favourite thing about the whole package that is this house, top heavy with it's bumper crop, added to which was the weight of days of rain, simply keeled over. Just like that. We are all very sad.</i><br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-57657886344822664482013-10-27T12:04:00.001+00:002013-11-23T14:54:38.371+00:00Where I Likely Am In My Head, When You Are Talking To Me...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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~*~</div>
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Blog post and recipe for my gluten free, sugar free, vegan, </div>
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apple and blackberry crumble, over on 'the other' blog:</div>
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<a href="http://milkmoonkitchen.blogspot.ie/2013/10/apple-and-blackberry-crumble-oh-my.html">Milkmoon Kitchen.</a></div>
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Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-75554630308204170472013-09-18T14:38:00.000+01:002013-11-23T14:54:47.912+00:00Autumn Spiced Apple Cake from Milkmoon Kitchen.Many years ago, one blustery, wet autumn day much like today, I found myself surrounded by bags of apples from friends gardens, which, naturally, led to a hankering for apple cake. I was disappointed to discover I had no eggs, and really did not feel like getting in my car, (I think there may have been pyjamas involved), and for the first time I considered how reliant I was on eggs for baking. After rummaging through my various cookery books, I eventually stumbled upon a recipe that did not need any eggs, that was filled with stewed apple, spices, and lots of raisins and sultanas. It was in one of those anonymous baking books you pick up in the supermarket for a few quid, that turns out to be brilliant, and one that is reached for again and again over the years.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After the storm ~ blue skies.</td></tr>
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These days I find myself with my own (rather large, and very old) apple tree, and an increasing interest in baking without eggs. The other day, with my dearest sister and her family home from Mexico for a family wedding, I found myself with an excuse to do some baking, (does one <i>actually</i> need an excuse to bake?) and this was the first recipe that came to mind. This is a cake that really only ever gets made this time of year, (I do have a thing for seasonal food), and the last few autumns I have been making it for the family, unable to eat it myself, but this year I was inspired to experiment and see if I could tweak the recipe so I could. Obviously it had to be edible for everyone else, though it's rare they ever turn their nose up at anything sweet I make. Dessert is dessert, after all!<br />
So, here it is, reinvented so that it is both gluten and sugar free, and vegan friendly. And I can tell you it has lost nothing on flavour and deliciousness, and the bonus is that the house smells divine as it bakes, a yummy, spicy wafting that draws people into the kitchen looking to see what's cooking. It's dense and moist, with the nuts adding just the right amount of bite to it.<br />
You'll notice I use eating apples. As there is no sugar in this recipe, using eating apples means it's sweet enough without it. I served it with a choice of Alpro vanilla custard, or natural yogurt, for those who preferred. And if you can manage to save some, it is even nicer the following day.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After the storm.</td></tr>
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<u>Recipe:</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
675g eating apples, peeled, cored and quartered<br />
150ml agave syrup<br />
15ml/1tbsp water<br />
350g flour, I use Doves Farm Gluten Free<br />
1 and a quarter tsp bicarb of soda<br />
1tsp ground cloves<br />
1 tsp ground cinnamon<br />
1tsp ground ginger<br />
175g raisins, or half and half raisins and golden sultanas, as I did<br />
150g chopped walnuts, or mixed nuts<br />
225g dairy free 'butter'<br />
1tsp vanilla essence<br />
<br />
Oven: Gas 3, 160C, 325F<br />
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<u>Method:</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
1. Put the apples and the water in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Simmer for about 20 minutes, or until soft, stirring occasionally. Eating apples might take less time than cooking ones. I also found my ones didn't break down into pulp, the way cookers do, though that just might be our variety. Leave to cool.<br />
At this stage you may want to thoroughly butter and line your tin. I used a 9in round tin this time, though a similar sized tube tin works really well too.<br />
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2. Sift the flour, bicarb of soda, and the spices into a bowl, making sure to toss in whatever is left in the sieve if using a more 'wholegrain' flour. Remove about 2tbs of this mixture and, in another bowl, toss it with the raisins, sultanas and nuts.<br />
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3. Cream the 'butter' and the agave syrup well together. Fold in the apple mixture. Then fold the flour mixture into this. Stir in the vanilla, and then add the fruit and nuts mixture. Pour into your tin, and bake until a skewer comes out clean, although this is tricky to tell as there is so much yummy apple in there.<br />
Roughly about an hour and a half, though it's a fairly low oven so it might take longer or shorter, depending on your oven.<br />
When it's done, cool it completely in the tin before turning it out.<br />
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The original recipe, for those who can, just use whatever flour, plain or wholewheat, you usually use, and dairy butter.<br />
For those who can eat sugar, you can replace the agave syrup with about 400g sugar, though a good bit less if still using eating apples. If using cookers, add a tbsp of the sugar to them when stewing them. The original recipe also had a lovely icing on it, that I have yet to figure out how to replace. Visually it misses it, but taste wise, it does just lovely without it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgupuFP8F9jJyQxPCSEJ5PvAE5MpPKeLIUoo_BNZXIsobKuLzr_m_dd7wWrAz8sedRc89OJ4Z6COI70dgSKpK1OelfTCJLO7TCKqt0DNjXFOBS4hYVy6-Azw1RZC-VMG3byXlsj9OfbmEY/s1600/photo+4-1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="462" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgupuFP8F9jJyQxPCSEJ5PvAE5MpPKeLIUoo_BNZXIsobKuLzr_m_dd7wWrAz8sedRc89OJ4Z6COI70dgSKpK1OelfTCJLO7TCKqt0DNjXFOBS4hYVy6-Azw1RZC-VMG3byXlsj9OfbmEY/s640/photo+4-1.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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For the icing, for those who like:<br />
<br />
115g icing sugar<br />
Quarter tsp vanilla ess.<br />
30-45ml milk of your choice<br />
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4. Put the sugar in a bowl, add the vanilla, then slowly add the milk, mixing it in thoroughly, until it is smooth and has a thick, pouring consistency. Transfer the cake to a serving plate, and drizzle the icing on top. If you like, you can sprinkle it with some chopped nuts. Allow the icing to set before serving.<br />
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Enjoy!<br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-58562623312511759562013-09-18T13:33:00.000+01:002013-09-18T13:34:22.784+01:00In The Midst Of Autumn, Suddenly. What is it about this time of year?<br />
When the green has grown tired, and the wind is taking it's toll<br />
leaves blown about the garden<br />
sheets snapping on the line<br />
and in the morning there are apples on the ground<br />
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<br />
Between deepest blue skies and grey stormy tussles<br />
the quivering green and the brightest berry reds arrest my eye<br />
pause me in my movement through the day<br />
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<br />
I am lured by the sea, still,<br />
though not so eager to go in<br />
drawn instead to it's hunger<br />
a deepening boom that resounds from it's depths<br />
it's summer humour gone now<br />
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<br />
And I will wait<br />
for the darkening days to draw in<br />
to wrap themselves around us<br />
pulling into the dark days and nights<br />
when we move indoors<br />
when time becomes our own again<br />
the wild outside to be first considered carefully<br />
the carefree, go-in-what-you-have-on-you days put to bed for another year<br />
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<br />
I will watch the green withdraw<br />
sink back into the restful earth<br />
into the silence<br />
into the long wait for spring<br />
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<br />
In the quiet we will embrace the calm<br />
while outside winter heaves itself about <br />
breathlessly trying to catch itself<br />
and my pen will scratch, my needle stitch<br />
my eyes always on the sky and the sea<br />
waiting.<br />
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~*~</div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://milkmoonkitchen.blogspot.ie/2013/09/autumn-spiced-apple-cake.html">Recipe for Autumn Spiced Apple Cake over in my kitchen, here. </a></div>
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-71711205232254390162013-08-28T07:52:00.000+01:002013-08-28T07:53:35.838+01:00Just Before You Go, Summer.....Well, these last few mornings there is a definite autumny shiver in the early air, the top of Bray Head has a wooly cap of damp clouds just sitting on it, and the milky sunlight filters through the apple boughs that are literally bowing under their swag. School is looming, literally imminently, and we are getting ready to embrace our first autumn in a house with heating in it! Suddenly, my love for this season has grown tenfold.<br />
Fittingly, a whole new chapter is beginning for me, in so many ways I couldn't list them here, their microscopicness adding up to a Significantness that thrills me and excites me and has me revving to go.<br />
<br />
But first, as a Last Blast before that school business is upon us, and to celebrate the return of my man, we took ourselves off on a little adventure, back across this island of ours again, this time out into the west of Ireland. Poor Jay missed all our traipsing and trekking, all our adventuring on beaches and down boreens, and all the fine, unexpected weather we had, so we just had to squeeze something in. And if this mild weather continues into the autumn, we will just do the same, we will take it and run with it for as long as we can.<br />
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We rolled along the winding roads, under those white skies that shower occasional fine rain, that sit high and hard above us, not gloomy, but with a bright glare that turns the landscape into a glowing, magical vista. Everything about it so familiar to myself and Jay, though it's been two decades since we were here, and I found my heart filled with fondness, with tender memories of those young things we were when last we walked the streets of Galway city. Oh how we have changed!<br />
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And of course, there had to be a beach, and an extra special one this time, a glowing wonder of a coral beach, the likes of which I'd never seen. The water appeared tropical in it's hues, set as it is against the glow of the coral sand, but I can vouch that it is by no means tropical! It was <i>cold!</i> But in we got, regardless, and it was delicious.<br />
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We took a winding road back, the scenic route, stopping whenever we fancied. Meandering, I think is the word, and I savoured the pleasure of unhurried meandering, for I know it is coming to an end now, for another year.<br />
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But in the midst of my lament for the end of summer, I admit, I have never felt so ready to get back into the swing and routine of school, of all that autumn brings.<br />
In spite of missing Jay, or perhaps because of it, along with the good weather, we have had The Best Summer Ever. We had to, or it would have been unbearably lonely without him. I have never been more grateful for the brilliant timing of a Random Act of Nature, for this out of the blue amazing summer we had, for it allowed us an excuse to make the most of it, and get out there and enjoy it.<br />
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And so, back home now, it's the first day of school, for some, and as I sit with my steaming cup, looking out my window at the slightly worn and fading green that looks partied out and hung over, the early morning sun is now creeping over the top of the headland, and I hear the first stirrings upstairs, the creak of floorboards above my head, the murmur of sleepy voices. </div>
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And so it begins.</div>
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Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-5581841599184818262013-08-22T14:40:00.000+01:002013-11-23T14:55:40.961+00:00Date Oat, And Orange Squares from Milkmoon Kitchen.Sweet things. They are the challenge for me, and while I don't have much of a sweet tooth anymore, I still like to provide treats for Jay and the kids that are healthy, and that I can eat, if I feel like it. I have two children who will devour any treats I make, and two who won't, unless there is chocolate involved. Anything too healthy looking they won't even look at. This here is something I love to make when I do feel like something sweet, and even if the two fussy ones won't eat it, the rest of us do, with gusto.<br />
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This recipe is from one of my favourite books, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Blazing-Salads/133608040018629">Blazing Salads,</a> which is also a vegetarian, wholefood deli at 42 Drury St. Dublin. When we were living in Dublin, they had a restaurant in the Powerscourt Townhouse, and I would go miles out of my way, if I had to, to get some of their pumpkin, sweet potato and almond turnovers, or their brown rice balls with aduki beans. It was our number one place to meet certain friends, people who equally appreciated their, for it's time, groundbreaking cuisine. Gosh, I miss that place.... These days, any time I get into the city they are still on my list of places to visit, any time I can.<br />
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Dates do have a pretty high sugar content, so have a high GI content, but they have so much other good stuff in them like fiber, calcium and potassium, that it makes them a wonderful, occasional treat.<br />
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<br />
<u>Recipe:</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
985g pitted dates<br />
140ml fresh orange juice<br />
240g organic fine oatflakes<br />
120g brown rice flour<br />
90g ground almonds<br />
1 orange<br />
150ml natural sunflower oil<br />
50ml organic apple juice concentrate<br />
<br />
Oven: Gas 5, 190C, 375F<br />
<br />
<u>Method:</u><br />
<u><br /></u>
1. Wash the dates, place in a pot and add water up to level with the top of the dates. Place a lid on top, bring to the boil, lower the heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Stir 40ml of the fresh orange juice and mix until smooth. Set aside.<br />
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2. Oil a 23cm (9in) square baking tin and line the bottom with greaseproof paper. Oil the paper.<br />
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3. In a mixing bowl mix the oatflakes, rice flour, and ground almonds together. Using a zester, remove the rind of the orange and mix with the dry ingredients. Stir in the sunflower oil, apple juice concentrate, orange juice, and the juice from the zested orange into the dry ingredients. Mix well.<br />
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4. With dampened fingers, press two thirds of the mixture firmly into the baking tin. Spread the dates on top. Gently press the remainder of the mixture on top of the dates.<br />
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5. Bake in a preheated oven for 40 minutes, or until golden. Allow to cool and slice into about 12 pieces.<br />
<u><br /></u>
<br />
Even though it has the same mixture on top and on the bottom, baking it makes the top golden and crumbly, while all that orange juice soaking into the bottom makes it deliciously damp and moist.<br />
It keeps for a few days in the fridge, if it lasts that long without being eaten, and is delicious for breakfast the next day, especially with a good dollop of natural yogurt, for those who fancy it.<br />
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Enjoy!<br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-19373566920948442942013-08-18T19:34:00.000+01:002013-08-24T10:55:23.503+01:00Holding Fast.I'm afraid I'd have nothing more to show you here but more beaches, for there have been many more since last I wrote.<br />
There has also been occasional rainy days, though there is a faint whisper of autumn in the morning now, and the apple tree in the garden is laden with red, ripening fruit, and we are beginning to tingle with that sense of urgency now, to cram in as much Summer as we can before the leaves begin to turn.<br />
<a href="http://milk-moon.blogspot.ie/2012/05/where-i-think-you-are-when-you-are-not.html">Yet again</a>, Jay has been away for six weeks now, has missed this marvelous summer we have had, all the way across the other side of the world, in Australia. We have kept ourselves busy, true, but it's not the same without him.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTC0I37MHHUHG1C15fnd14YVW1dPT9I2GAS1LQe46Q2Yu03XDEaqoU8HnN8b79l6xqXuuq1Ye_8otMwgao-0N7DJ5v6Ub-9OTe81EjgmZsi5ygRi7TDNzVv9HiiFpf0H9YBdPs5T1bMXw/s1600/1043961_10151531603106025_1372345980_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTC0I37MHHUHG1C15fnd14YVW1dPT9I2GAS1LQe46Q2Yu03XDEaqoU8HnN8b79l6xqXuuq1Ye_8otMwgao-0N7DJ5v6Ub-9OTe81EjgmZsi5ygRi7TDNzVv9HiiFpf0H9YBdPs5T1bMXw/s640/1043961_10151531603106025_1372345980_n.jpg" width="478" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Portrait Of My Sleeping Husband.<br />(I did this of Jay just before he left)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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We are counting the days until we see him, and then there will be yet more cramming while we ignore the calendar that goes on counting down without us, to the return of School. <i>That </i>we will ignore, yes, until the last possible day, and take ourselves off again, over the mountains to visit some dear friends, and then on until we reach the other side of this island.<br />
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We will not think of that other S word until the bell rings and we really have to.<br />
<br />
In the next day or so, I will have something new to share. And maybe some of those beaches.<br />
<br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-84028722616666801172013-07-19T09:18:00.000+01:002013-07-19T09:19:34.444+01:00Summer - And Nothing More....Oh hello, there you are, or rather, here we are, in the midst of Summer! Do you see that capital S there at the beginning of the word <i>Summer?</i> Well, I have to tell you, this year it has to have a capital S, because that is what we are having, a proper, <i>capital</i>, long-awaited, hot, hot summer. And it just keeps going on and on and on, and we are not complaining, not one bit!<br />
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So, the floors have a permanent dusting of sand, the chores are done to a minimum, for as happens<a href="http://milk-moon.blogspot.ie/2010/09/little-milkmoon-ing-of-another-kind.html"> most other years</a>, no matter what the weather, we have simply dropped everything and just taken ourselves off to one beach or another, and let me tell you there have been quite a few, with more to come.<br />
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Ahh, the joys of living on an island! I estimate we will have been to no fewer than ten different beaches by summer's end, with definite potential for others I haven't accounted for yet. With such a variety of beaches so close to home (and some further afield) it is impossible to not take advantage of it. Some are perfect for swimming, some for body boarding, some for rock pooling, and some for building epic sandcastles!<br />
I am so very grateful to still have children young enough to have an excuse for spending countless hours, days, just Being At The Beach.<br />
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And for the days when other things take us elsewhere, the best part is, we can walk out the door in the evening, before or after dinner, and stroll down to the seafront for a dip, pausing to chat with friends or neighbours we meet along the way, maybe stopping for an icecream, or occasional bag of salty chips, watching the fairground rides against the dimming sky as we wander back up the hill to home.<br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-68980831897602854532013-06-09T13:28:00.000+01:002013-06-09T13:33:25.592+01:00Seventeen Days In Virginia.<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><i> An Appalachian visit to my sister, her daughter, and their red dog.</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Some days we drove,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">my mother and sister and I,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">skirting the Blue Ridges,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">layers of smokey blue that rode away into the horizon like a tide.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Through rolling hills of green that fold back and forth onto themselves</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">as far as my eye could see.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Miles and miles of trees that thronged with birds,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">red birds, blue birds, yellow, brown.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Birds as unfamiliar to me as the very air here.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">And overhead, birds of prey wheel and cry like falling stars from some ancient tale we never knew.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">On the way, we sang songs to our small travelling companion,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">our little stalwart passenger whose bright presence was our totem, our lucky charm.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We delved into caves,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">great endless milky caverns where we stood enthralled</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">listened to the rocks as they sang to us</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">a deep melancholy song,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">a song we could not decipher,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">a story as old as the earth itself.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">And I could not help but dwell in my mind,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">ponder, on what these lands were like</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">when smoke rose in the distance,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">when the earth ran with blood</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">and your sons marched away over the mountains,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">those boys of yours, tenderhearted, naive, awash with bravado and terror.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Marched away and did not come home.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Everything I saw was new, yet so familiar, like a memory, or a deep knowledge I had forgotten, that now stirs with something like hope.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">The unfamiliar birdsong, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">the clamouring, legendary brood II cicadas, heard with disbelief in the place Jefferson heard them, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">fireflies in my bedroom, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">the scent of skunk that greets us on the doorstep in the morning, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">the kindness of strangers,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">but most of all, those mountains.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">I will hold on to those.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">It is morning now, and today I will be returning to my home,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">back to my dearlings and my sea, my heart sore and yearning for them now.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Though how I will say goodbye to my sister, and to this other tiny dearling who has a hold on my heart,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">and to the red dog, I do not know. for they are leaving this place too,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">beginning a new part of their story when they join her husband in Mexico. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">And it's true also, I find myself heartbroken to be leaving these mountains,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">these blue endless, mysterious mountains that are not mine, yet somehow have a hold on me,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">have burrowed under my skin a desire to come back.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #eeeeee; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">And I thought my heart was already full.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span>Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-61211236621647750282013-04-25T10:21:00.000+01:002013-10-13T09:21:50.996+01:00Finding Our Feet.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
We are settling in.</div>
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Some of us not quite settled yet. A whole new world to get used to.</div>
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Getting to know the light in this new place.</div>
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I love it very much.</div>
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Follow it from room to room.</div>
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Loving the hill behind our house.<br />
Our new playground.<br />
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Loving this new urban life that allows us to not have to give up the sea.<br />
Loving so many friends on our doorstep.<br />
Loving <i>walking </i>everywhere!<br />
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Loving that spring is rushing towards summer.<br />
Happiness runs.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-90290728879924728352013-04-11T10:53:00.000+01:002013-04-11T10:53:44.355+01:00A Brief Sojourn Before Uprooting Ourselves.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Not so long ago, we took the winding road south, down through the belly of this island of ours, through damp, mizzling hills that rolled under us and away to the glowering east. The rain ran down the foggy windows, the grey and the green flew past us in a rush as we sped towards the Atlantic coast on the southern rim of Ireland.<br />
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We spent the weekend with new friends, the warmest, loveliest of people, we took our time, we savoured every minute, we reminded ourselves of how much we love this place, memories returning of distant weekend visits to my sister when she lived here, so many years ago.<br />
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We passed through the wet, through the green, as though flying like ghosts, through virescent memories that clung to our hair, our skin, in the very drops of rain that hung in the air about us.<br />
A heady combination of the newness of friendships lately found, and the deep hum of history stirring under our feet, all bound by the verdant magic of where we found ourselves.<br />
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A briefest of sojourns before we returned home, to the mammoth undertaking of uprooting our little family, of deconstructing all we had spent our parenting years building. Our Home.<br />
An exciting, daunting endeavour, that caught us up in it's momentum and carried us onwards, of which there will be more, anon.<br />
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Returned to this, a most splendid of evenings that held a promise of spring. An evening that gave me perhaps my most favourite image of this view, in all my years photographing it.<br />
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A view that will always be there, behind my eyelids, when I close them against the sun.<br />
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Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-22431093568563329142013-04-10T23:25:00.000+01:002013-04-11T10:26:16.220+01:00Wordless Wednesday.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4r5s0eBOpGrO4OdyZ_Ib-Lms00c3TGHSJC94Zuz-p90zU9LE3AGj3JPmyX-BvDdiam_DwwvIuqFZuFDyyeG08XSRVhkB0znYlFp8-j8vYc3UY25flvQGaa7l6oqpA3AWFxamtsMBF-cA/s1600/photo-2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4r5s0eBOpGrO4OdyZ_Ib-Lms00c3TGHSJC94Zuz-p90zU9LE3AGj3JPmyX-BvDdiam_DwwvIuqFZuFDyyeG08XSRVhkB0znYlFp8-j8vYc3UY25flvQGaa7l6oqpA3AWFxamtsMBF-cA/s640/photo-2.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-37347131177364306222013-03-24T11:47:00.000+00:002014-01-26T13:39:44.726+00:00Sorrow and Joy, And This Business Of Life.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
You know those times when your feet don't touch the ground, when Life is too big and too fast for you to even draw breath, and everything whirls past in a flurry until whatever song it is dancing to finally runs out and you slow down to a gentle sway for a while, and so you can begin to absorb all that has just gone by.</div>
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We have been busy, with Splendid Adventures (which I will post about here soon), and crazy weather, and only a week left before we get the key to our new house, so Chaos Reigns.</div>
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And in the midst of it all, we lost a little friend. Our little furry friend, India, who was born here not even two years ago. </div>
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Little hearts are broken.</div>
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We think it was poison, though we cannot be sure, but an awful end it was. One I am glad the children did not witness, but which I will never forget. </div>
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This image at our bedroom window is a familiar one. I'm sure any pet owners among you know that look: 'Hey, can you let me in....so I can go back out?'<br />
His favourite was to stand on his hind legs and pound the window, at four am, while yowling in a voice that can only be described as akin to Marge Simpson. Honestly, I actually kind of miss that!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPxS4cnT1urSI9SZv4ONgImTirj1W9wQjYQbZ6FoqDUR1TAXPiEhVqFu45MT5PGvHvebkIoT5UJ7gUjZyW8S1RDMB1rm9CgOqV0XbXoE_LsXrlgjsZjkZOeps16kqkmN5TVnZTKXt3ZXg/s1600/photo-3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPxS4cnT1urSI9SZv4ONgImTirj1W9wQjYQbZ6FoqDUR1TAXPiEhVqFu45MT5PGvHvebkIoT5UJ7gUjZyW8S1RDMB1rm9CgOqV0XbXoE_LsXrlgjsZjkZOeps16kqkmN5TVnZTKXt3ZXg/s320/photo-3.JPG" height="320" width="320" /></a></div>
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He was the best cat. Just sweet and cuddly and friendly and chilled out, and so handsome and <i>so fluffy</i> you just couldn't help but love him.<br />
And even though he drove her mad, and she <i>loved </i>when he went off a-wandering and she had us all to herself, his mama, Sparrow, is a little bit lost without him.<br />
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So, we are just coming out of the what if's and maybes phase, of wondering would he still be alive if we had done anything differently. But the truth of it is, sadly, I don't think so.<br />
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But let me finish this post with the Joy part of this title.<br />
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This week, Our Smallest turned <i>six!</i> And although I find myself looking back at pictures like the one below, of my baby, and my heart squeezes painfully with <i>that Loss</i>, I marvel, too, at how this little flower of ours has taken his time to reveal himself to us, and how enthralled I am by it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfYclY9Rjrzp9_LXI0f3bZQlYHYnDX8NWfesNnOrQuDnmfFMwaSPOjep15w5p67VHpcwEi77Tau9RnrloBecZrfmnX40am5okm_j8UuPXcsZcFn20HPJ4AKNE1EZilyjHy8eP9Z1fCpW8/s1600/photo.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfYclY9Rjrzp9_LXI0f3bZQlYHYnDX8NWfesNnOrQuDnmfFMwaSPOjep15w5p67VHpcwEi77Tau9RnrloBecZrfmnX40am5okm_j8UuPXcsZcFn20HPJ4AKNE1EZilyjHy8eP9Z1fCpW8/s640/photo.JPG" height="424" width="640" /></a></div>
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For so very long it seemed as though some part of him stayed, or strayed, in some Other World, some dreamy place that he had come from. A Very New Person. A tender, sweet presence, and one we all cannot help but love, and love to be around. One who cries when trees are felled, and who asks why we are here, and the How of things, and wonders about God and volcanos and love, and dreams of dinosaurs and dragons.<br />
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And now, as the first of his baby teeth have fallen, and his feet are more on the ground than ever, I am savouring what is left to me of these days. Days of magic and wonder and yes, mischief. Days of small boys and the joy they bring. Days that, as I look at our eldest, now a young man of almost seventeen, seem to have a number, and I want to hold onto with all my heart.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqSqjcQAJDuR071OkbwZRYSEJlLijUcJyYMirhHOGe4Utj6KY5f_BXbmEOrx_SeKCswhqeJ1QY8Vz7u15XgyEMcEZvAnPtdkHgRlK_UdNGFWZAIV8t_Wq35Z56_xWl1d2wLPp5tVSReUw/s1600/photo-1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqSqjcQAJDuR071OkbwZRYSEJlLijUcJyYMirhHOGe4Utj6KY5f_BXbmEOrx_SeKCswhqeJ1QY8Vz7u15XgyEMcEZvAnPtdkHgRlK_UdNGFWZAIV8t_Wq35Z56_xWl1d2wLPp5tVSReUw/s640/photo-1.JPG" height="640" width="478" /></a></div>
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<span class="line line-s" id="line_4" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">The only things that you should keep in rows</span></i></span><span class="line line-s" id="line_5" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">Are your perfect teeth and the rest you know</span></i></span><span class="line line-s" id="line_6" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">Its own sweet way will always go</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="color: #134f5c; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
<span class="line line-s" id="line_7" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">Add your footsteps to the wear</span></i></span><span class="line line-s" id="line_8" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">For a tiny dent in every stair</span></i></span><span class="line line-s" id="line_8" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><span style="color: #134f5c;">Will let them know that you've been there</span></i></span><span class="line line-s" id="line_8" style="border: 0px; display: block; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 5px; vertical-align: baseline;"><i><br /></i></span><br />
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And I am put in mind of the above song by Vashti Bunyan, called 'Lately', a song about this very thing, and it is a comfort to know that most of you reading this have known, or will know, this exact feeling. </div>
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The comfort is, that this Business Of Life is just that, and we are all in it together. </div>
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The sorrow and the joy. The loving and the letting go. </div>
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We can reach out a hand, and it will, at once, find another that understands.</div>
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-51501074367471069972013-03-06T12:01:00.000+00:002013-03-06T12:14:19.787+00:00What's Cooking In The Milkmoon Kitchen.After years of struggling with food intolerances, I finally feel like I have something of a handle on it, albeit no closer to finding a 'solution', if such thing exists. But over the years, my interest in the topic of food, and how it behaves in our bodies, has led me down many a rabbit hole of intrigue on the subject, and I have come across many fascinating people, articles, books, and films, which I immediately want to share with the world. I have <a href="http://milk-moon.blogspot.ie/2012/09/the-new-improved-milkmoon-manifesto-of.html">written here </a>before about the many different hats I wear, and I have struggled to find a way to fit all these together here on Milkmoon, and I must admit, it's just not working for me. Milkmoon is more about photographs, musings, stitchery, and all those little things that take place in the regular workings of my life, and I've come to realise that the food element is just too big to incorporate into it. It would change Milkmoon too much, and I don't want that to happen, and so I haven't been blogging about it here, as I had intended. I like this dreamy place as it is, and once I get onto the topic of food, a whole devil of reality rears it's head, and sometimes it's not that pretty! But mostly, it's delicious and inspiring and wholesome, but in a very different realm to this.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEWRAqf5q1DVC-W_xeeOnrWT75PbmN5BHBnbMHrINEX5oo0-IOrKsUhTdw-xEcbxjA0BYl8LWOjuGcDvA_6KMiLJaewhnPZBFUUJlJ1FqsI50bFcq0cKALgxMKNRx92F9AJb8sRVbE2FU/s1600/photo+1.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEWRAqf5q1DVC-W_xeeOnrWT75PbmN5BHBnbMHrINEX5oo0-IOrKsUhTdw-xEcbxjA0BYl8LWOjuGcDvA_6KMiLJaewhnPZBFUUJlJ1FqsI50bFcq0cKALgxMKNRx92F9AJb8sRVbE2FU/s640/photo+1.jpeg" width="478" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our week in pictures.<br />
In between this....</td></tr>
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So what to do?<br />
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I have gone from being a prolific blogger, with four or five blogs on the go at once, to struggling to keep one afloat, let lone two, and so, even though I have a burning desire to share all that I have found, I am now wary of undertaking another blog. So I have decided to try another tactic; a Facebook Page, which I reckon will tie in with the usual Facebooking that goes on, on a daily basis.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygu0h6rdIXtNVVKncY0tbv7Iz1TsHZBzLPwVLon57kSNgNx7oA6ttSlC_mCtyBo8F9l4ieMy8lB9VuVwVWpa_xQl7MErd0MksBHlB2HEW81zQWjBis_qWukKbjZi931XNuF80n4vd0qg/s1600/photo+4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygu0h6rdIXtNVVKncY0tbv7Iz1TsHZBzLPwVLon57kSNgNx7oA6ttSlC_mCtyBo8F9l4ieMy8lB9VuVwVWpa_xQl7MErd0MksBHlB2HEW81zQWjBis_qWukKbjZi931XNuF80n4vd0qg/s400/photo+4.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">....and this,</td></tr>
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For the first time in what seems like a lifetime, after almost seventeen years of coasting happily along through Mother-land, in this magic place that we were so blessed to find ourselves land in as new parents, my life is now veering off into a vast, unknown territory, and <i>boy am I ready for it!</i><br />
By this time next year, I doubt I will recognise my life. So many things are falling ever so neatly into lines of such Serendipitous-ness, that I can barely catch my breath.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-UMj09TcrOma_ym4oNHZMQVCiMmBDljMeBrqo2oXoX7NEGyZPxlUast7THBJAZpznP3inuobqxPqrieoln513MSeCZlqKNHCsJ93DpgIPKsaLx2i9Xxxs1tfD6ziOsE5PhPafGelRKbU/s1600/photo+2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-UMj09TcrOma_ym4oNHZMQVCiMmBDljMeBrqo2oXoX7NEGyZPxlUast7THBJAZpznP3inuobqxPqrieoln513MSeCZlqKNHCsJ93DpgIPKsaLx2i9Xxxs1tfD6ziOsE5PhPafGelRKbU/s640/photo+2.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">we had this!<br />
Bizarre weather, altogether.</td></tr>
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For one, we have found a house. A Stepping Stone House, if you get my meaning, and as this is what happened the last time we moved house, it seems this is how we do things here. It ticks a lot of boxes, and it doesn't ticks some others, but the ones it does ticks are wonderful and exciting, and we <i>just won't know ourselves! </i>And so we will make the most of it, and when the time is right The Place We Are Seeking will present itself. I promise to have photos just as soon as we actually move.<br />
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My mantra of the season has been:<br />
<i><span style="color: purple; font-size: large;">I Am Open To The Abundance of the Universe.</span></i><br />
And once again it has provided.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhExQ2IMb5IuJejqBlneCfAOrl4YSsMJRhAER52A951S1xjkiX-8j8PGhesjZ5Sn2cy0-6h4bK1x8o8ABsRTao6M5eQtkGkYdKx8xIbYouCWMrWzk3DIubwiuf7G6Qkegy_VogN8BEQCUY/s1600/photo+5.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="432" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhExQ2IMb5IuJejqBlneCfAOrl4YSsMJRhAER52A951S1xjkiX-8j8PGhesjZ5Sn2cy0-6h4bK1x8o8ABsRTao6M5eQtkGkYdKx8xIbYouCWMrWzk3DIubwiuf7G6Qkegy_VogN8BEQCUY/s640/photo+5.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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So if Facebook is your thing, and you feel so inclined, do please come and peep in the door of the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Milkmoon-Kitchen/164674187017270?skip_nax_wizard=true">Milkmoon Kitchen</a>, and stay for a chat. There will be recipes, and I have great hopes for threads of conversation that inspire and inform and bring together our wealth of experience and knowledge on the subject of health and vittles and sustenance.<br />
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And together we will change the world, one meal at a time.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-33006905223869244172013-02-19T11:20:00.000+00:002013-10-13T09:26:13.651+01:00Learning From The Trees.<br />
We had a lovely week off school, and even though for a lot of it the clouds sat low over the mountains, a mizzling rain pressing up against the windows, keeping us mostly indoors, we really didn't mind at all. We had lots of pyjama days, with plenty of baking and cooking going on, and just as cabin fever began to set in, the days began with blue skies and there was that little whisper of spring in the air.<br />
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There, in the stretch of light in the morning sky, or stirred into the tenacious sting of the winter wind, a hint of warmth that was not there before, just a momentary tenderness against our skin, and all of a sudden there is a new softness, a slackening off, in the physical tension of winter, and our bodies somehow fathom, in some deep place, that instinct of the trees to begin to let go of that green they have held onto during the dark months, to allow it to begin to unfurl.<br />
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Our hunt for a new home continues apace.<br />
We have all been dreaming strange, house-related dreams. Uncomfortable, insecure kind of dreams that leave us unsettled. We have never undertaken anything like this before, as a family, and while it really is unsettling, I think it may be no bad thing. Sometimes we need to shake things up, to force ourselves out of our comfort zone, in order to unfurl and reach for the sky and warm air, in order to <i>grow</i>.<br />
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And so, we wait patiently for Something Wonderful to come our way, and I am grateful for the time of year, for that sense of the rising sap, and I know that, like the trees, if we trust our instincts, we will know just what to do when the time comes.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-54606299780565575762013-02-09T12:03:00.002+00:002013-02-09T12:08:38.792+00:00These Friends Of Mine.Well, this week has seen us struck down with an 'aul dose' as we say, four of us are at various stages of a stinker of a cold, and my ears pricked this morning as The Smallest headed out to school with a suspicious sniffling. It seems he will be the next to fall.<br />
But next week is mid-term, thankfully, so I anticipate lots of lazy pyjama days, slow breakfasts, and maybe a walk or two, once we are all well. Though there has been a flurry of snow, and more to come, they say, so we shall see.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMi-gntj5YTUxccjLPW9x-JtYjwLFF77TO87NR2KrP-GVuzzCXnOhQhppeclitj_zG8Ruqkj5A9VRp3o63ys5uGxKPA-8cllrT550uF0SupWsJDhUAWzCmW2a9kr3ualVIJRMgO0TaSGM/s1600/398443_460620043982872_631492157_n.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMi-gntj5YTUxccjLPW9x-JtYjwLFF77TO87NR2KrP-GVuzzCXnOhQhppeclitj_zG8Ruqkj5A9VRp3o63ys5uGxKPA-8cllrT550uF0SupWsJDhUAWzCmW2a9kr3ualVIJRMgO0TaSGM/s640/398443_460620043982872_631492157_n.jpeg" width="440" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://shop.babaa.es/product/jumper-no-7">babaá - no.7 - Flame</a></td></tr>
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Regular readers here know I love the seasons, I love weather of all kinds, and although, unusually for me, I am finding this winter particularly long, let me just ignore that and talk about something I love about winter, which is Winter Woolies! One of my great loves in life; all things knitted. It's the first thing I look for when browsing in shops.<br />
With four children, we have gone through a lot of clothes, throughout their growing years especially, and I have found that it is often the hand knitted goodness that I fold away affectionately, into the box of Keepsakes, like tender memories I am afraid will disappear. And there they wait for the next child who will wear it, who will add their memories to it, as though knitted into the very fabric of it.<br />
How many of you are lucky enough to have had items from your childhood to put on your own children, when the time came?<br />
I love this weave of threads through our lives, the continuity, if we allow it.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://shop.babaa.es/">babaá - shop</a></td></tr>
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And so, this brings me to Something Lovely. Something <i>new</i> and lovely, and I hope, regular, here on Milkmoon. As I said in my last post, I am bringing back an old Milkmoon model of regular, themed posts, that somehow fell by the wayside over the last couple of years, but with a new spin on it.<br />
To start, I have a lot of very talented family members, and friends, and I just can't help myself, I want to share their goodness and creativity with you. So, introducing a new tag, to sit side by side with my Something Lovely tag: These Friends Of Mine.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://shop.babaa.es/">babaá - shop</a></td></tr>
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Given the wintery weather we are having, I would like to begin with someone who, while is not officially my sister, is like a sister to me, whom I first met when she was the same age my daughter is now. She was 14, and I was 22, and unusually, in spite of the age difference, we became instant friends. And have remained so to this day.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYBJdnOwukcq8S93I9i2OPDElTwZK4DeoMqtB-yO_Q0opSlghH6Sj9Jrmho_ylVPYDPPTABR8bWqs3g61eiZ2zkdkz5lPnt5aTS4pEbceEp2pbyDVQQQhUKuqyDQLcTZ7iJzUdK9o100Y/s1600/C&M.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYBJdnOwukcq8S93I9i2OPDElTwZK4DeoMqtB-yO_Q0opSlghH6Sj9Jrmho_ylVPYDPPTABR8bWqs3g61eiZ2zkdkz5lPnt5aTS4pEbceEp2pbyDVQQQhUKuqyDQLcTZ7iJzUdK9o100Y/s640/C&M.jpg" width="436" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ciara and Marta<br />
Dublin - 1993</td></tr>
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Marta is now living back in her native Madrid, and has recently launched her children's knitwear label; <a href="http://www.babaa.es/"><span style="font-size: large;">babaá</span>,</a> and yes, you can immediately see one reason why we get on so well! These are definitely Keepsakes. Timeless, but quirky, with just the perfect balance of functionality. (Is there anything more wonderful than someone you love creating something, and it turns out that you genuinely <i>love </i>it?) You can read here what <span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.babaa.es/about.html">babaá </a></span>is all about, and you will see exactly why this gorgeous knitwear is destined to become family heirlooms. And while you are there, take a peek<a href="http://shop.babaa.es/"> in her shop,</a> (there is a sale on) especially if you have any small people in your life who are growing up before your eyes, and you long to hold onto a little longer, and items like these are perfect memory making additions to your Keepsake Box.<br />
And all these <span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.babaa.es/">babaá</a></span> photographs are by the exceptionally talented Clíona O'Flaherty, my lovely sister-in-law, who will also be featured here over the next while.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">babaá - jumper no.4 - Coral</td></tr>
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I am making my order for one for my Smallest, as we speak, because almost all his keepsakes already have a history to them, and I want to have one that begins with him.<br />
<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-55240266414481855612013-01-24T11:06:00.000+00:002013-10-13T09:35:09.249+01:00In Which The Milkmooners Go On An Adventure.Has it really been more than two months since I peeked in here? Well, it's not like life has been uneventful, probably too eventful really, and therefore, where do I start? I won't recap, as it would not do justice to all the wonderful things that have been and gone, but instead I will just have to see which ones emerge over the next few posts here, as I<i> </i>actually have a number of marvelous things to share with you, in the style of The Early Days of Milkmoon, because that is where I have woken up on this side of the New Year, in a place of Blogging Rediscovery, which is quite exciting for me.<br />
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So, with photos from my archives (as I am still without a camera), of corners of our home, I will start with what is most currant for us here in the Milkmoon household: you may recall <i><a href="http://milk-moon.blogspot.ie/2012/07/leave-taking.html">this post </a></i>about our looming Leave-Taking.<br />
But I have questions. For example, how does one begin to pack up a house? Accumulated belongings of more than sixteen years, times six people.... Let's just say I am somewhat overwhelmed by it.<br />
Where does one start? Is there a system to it? We've never had to do it before. The last time we moved, we had a two roomed apartment, no furniture, and just ourselves and a four month old baby to pack up. It all fit into the back of a car.<br />
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We have become extremely adept at finding excuses to not do it. It's not that we don't want to move, although there is a reluctance to leave this beautiful place, of course, but it's more just the sheer enormity of this mountain we have to climb to get ourselves to the other side of it.<br />
We are hoarders, of sorts, the waste-not-want-not kind of hoarders, the rainy-day kind, and while Jay would deny he is one in any way, I admit I am the worst of them. For example, what constitutes my 'studio' is a haphazard mountain of shoe-boxes, jars, bags, curvers, baskets, all stuffed with bits of fabric, ribbons, buttons, threads, haberdashery of all kinds, as well as postcards, photos, magazine cuttings, letters, and teetering piles of books... you get the picture. And four children means an accumulation of toys, partly because I have a penchant for antique/old-school toys, which are impossible to get rid of, right?<br />
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And books, oh my, the books. One of the things I valued most, growing up, was my Dad's extensive library, which I truly discovered in my late teens, early twenties, when I read as many classics as were there, poetry, plays, biographies, you name it. It truly was a significant part of my education, one which had a bigger impact on the adult I was to become than any other singular element. And so, without being conscious of it, I have since spent my adult years building a Library Of Significance for my own children. Add to that the fact that when we moved into this house the bookshelves were already full, <i>full </i>I tell you, of someone else's, very long, life's collection! I cannot begin to estimate just how many books we have, but I can say it runs to the thousands, with bags and bags of them stuffed into cupboards too. So you can imagine, can't you, the task in that department alone. Clearly I can't bring them all, so there will have to be a culling, won't there, something I am dreading.<br />
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I also love teacups, and saucers, and teapots, and jugs, and I adore antique furniture, the bigger the better, I hold on to clothes that one lad grows out of, so the next lad can wear them, even though there is three - five years age difference between them, baskets and cupboards full of every kind of art and craft materials for the children, oh I could go on...the list is random and endless.<br />
Now don't get me wrong, I am actually <i>really </i>looking forward to a new, simplified, pared (a bit, anyway) back, beginning in our new house, which no, we have not found yet, but are now wholeheartedly looking for.<br />
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However, first we have to get through the dismantling, sorting, packing, moving, bit. And that's after making a decision on whether or not to go after a house that ticks some very important boxes, but does not tick other very important ones. Is it possible to get everything you want when house hunting? We did last time. Literally. To such fine detail it would give you goosebumps and instant Faith In The Universe. And I want with all my heart to believe we can do it again, because to us our home is not just bricks and mortar, it is a beloved part of the family, and therefore must be something we can love. Oh! the responsibility! the expectations! the enormity! of it all. Plus the fact that there are now <i>six </i>of us, all with different needs and desires and hopes.<br />
It's a very fine juggling act we are now involved in, and I hope we get it right.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-12365636114288689662012-11-14T12:03:00.000+00:002012-11-14T12:21:18.755+00:00What Happens When You Forget To Breathe.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTPyoPVIdU8bABbvn725h97M-K124ZFesPMD2U6hH-S2LkqDIRUIztLTB_Mp3In7sJUtNYIGRsp5sfZmVijcNZdOP9T5SA8DwfODYFELFFTxObmROUdfjUn1y1IXXVM5tKd037wmxTQpE/s1600/photo-2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="472" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTPyoPVIdU8bABbvn725h97M-K124ZFesPMD2U6hH-S2LkqDIRUIztLTB_Mp3In7sJUtNYIGRsp5sfZmVijcNZdOP9T5SA8DwfODYFELFFTxObmROUdfjUn1y1IXXVM5tKd037wmxTQpE/s640/photo-2.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div>
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You know sometimes how magic happens right there where you are? When the world takes you gently by the chin and tilts your head at just the right moment, and you find yourself suspended in something of such heart-stopping beauty that you are transported somewhere else, for just those few seconds.<br />
And always just when you need it.<br />
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There we were, on our daily commute through this most beautiful valley, that has held on to autumn for weeks now, the colours singing from the trees, 'the rainbow trees' as The Smallest calls them. The morning had been a bit fraught already, with just too many things to fit in, and tempers frayed from early on, and the sense of <i>rushing </i>just permeating everything. This part of our journey always provides a little bit of solace in our daily run anyway, but this time there was something else.<br />
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Inexplicably, at this point on the road, for two minutes, the traffic all but stopped, slowed to a crawl, and out of nowhere suddenly the air was filled with golden leaves that danced over the cars, that stayed in the air, dancing like snowflakes as the sun hit the mountain, and we stared in awe, our hearts filled, overflowing.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/QJKC5hk4aKs" width="560"></iframe>Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-22197501975717748442012-10-30T19:40:00.000+00:002012-10-30T19:46:40.712+00:00The Wildness of Things.<i><br /></i>
I began this post a week or so back, a post about the arrival of autumn, of the sudden profusion of posts online about leaves and rain and weather of all sorts, of lighting fires and digging out ones winter woolies, and the <i>pleasure </i>of it all. But now, in the midst of Sandy, that part of what I wanted to say all seems so irrelevant. Of course we have not been affected by it here, but I am put in mind of the times we do experience the Wildness of Things, and how it shakes us to our bones, reduces us to the tiny things we are in the grander scale of bigger things, and just how vulnerable we truly are when nature rages and heaves itself up out of its bed, and towers over us so <i>terrifyingly</i>.<br />
Here in this little temperate island of ours, storms on the scale of what the US is experiencing right now are extremely rare, but living practically on the beach, and with our house at sea level, it is something I think about on a regular basis during winter months, when we lie awake in bed, our little house rocked by howling winds as the sea booms and thunders outside the windows.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXbcDuzY108FrxiCZ6q27Qsn-pvnN_nQQBErRd1Nx7ooI4v72LF7NhX5lKFa3S6tOmFezJzW_AdfXAlQ-02SQwH8fLg8ICc1T_8t4Ve6DVHerYLARo7IU0PwCqxSFv3tcM7YHYvfxmf4E/s1600/photo-2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="478" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXbcDuzY108FrxiCZ6q27Qsn-pvnN_nQQBErRd1Nx7ooI4v72LF7NhX5lKFa3S6tOmFezJzW_AdfXAlQ-02SQwH8fLg8ICc1T_8t4Ve6DVHerYLARo7IU0PwCqxSFv3tcM7YHYvfxmf4E/s640/photo-2.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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As I sat up stitching, into the small hours last night, I was thinking about my sister in Virginia, and all those people out there who are being affected by the storm.<br />
Times like this, things have a way of slipping neatly into perspective, don't they?<br />
At the moment Jay is away again, this time he is down under in Sydney, and as per usual there has been the usual litany of minor 'disasters'.<br />
Car trouble, check, internet gone, check, people sick, check, cold snap and no fuel brought in, check.<br />
But as I said, everything is in perspective, and my inner Pollyanna is well and healthy.<br />
And so, in the midst of all this stress and mayhem I sit and stitch, and count my blessings as I do, forever grateful for this moderate, nonextreme country I have found myself in.<br />
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And here is what I have been working on while Holding The Fort (I do like that expression!)<br />
Inspired by the looming winter months filled with nights I have just described, this little piece has, as usual, taken forever to finish.<br />
I have this notion that if I ever actually take to making things on my machine then I'll get loads done, but that is not likely to happen any time soon, and anyway, is likely to be a complete fallacy. I hand make my small things because usually, my studio is my car, or my kitchen table, in between a myriad of other appointments and tasks throughout my day. They are made, literally a stitch at a time, and at times it feels like a meditation, at others like a muse, with ideas flowing through my head as I work, stories unfolding in a dreamlike manner, hints and voices and realisations, all tumble together into a tangled weave of something with potential.<br />
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So I stitch and sew in the dark hours, and I send heartfelt thoughts and wishes to all and any of you who have been affected by the weather these last few days.<br />
May whatever help you need come your way on swiftly wings, and with it the return of things to As They Should Be.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-80682050894372577012012-10-26T23:31:00.000+01:002012-10-26T23:31:22.519+01:00This Moment.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;"><em>{this moment}</em></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;"> - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;">If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;">Inspired by <a href="http://Soulemama./">Soulemama.</a> </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span>Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7767677079319000342.post-20085333459890427692012-10-11T00:12:00.001+01:002012-10-13T07:07:15.261+01:00Of Snow And Ice And The Frozen Lands.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I love when something drifts into your ether, and for some reason, on this particular occasion, buries itself deep inside you, and takes hold of your Interest with tenacious hands, and soon you begin to notice all kinds of Things of Interest relating to it positively popping up in front of you.<br />
For months now I have been filling my head and heart with all things of the far, distant North, and farthest South too. Increasingly, as the weeks go by, I have been dwelling, in my mind, in places of ice and water, reading of explorers of a frozen world few of us have seen, watching <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0272839/">this drama</a> about Ernest Shackleton, trying unsuccessfully, to see <a href="http://www.shackletonexhibition.com/">this exhibition</a> about his journey, (although it will be on for two years, so I'm not worried about missing it!), being unexpectedly inspired by a talk I attended by a wonderful geologist-turned-textile-artist called <a href="http://www.annfleeton.com/index.html">Ann Fleeton</a>, at this months Irish Guild of Embroiderers meeting, gathering books and images and inspiration.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFYWSKa7-bDADOpvTFzZQMhZpOMvCn8Prt4L6ZgKpTuj8DTJ-dIeFzHJlfsj39jQHsKjlrS47_upnnrOnzip2xdd4nA0dspilWM1xY5Gl1e6bMrQhRFhWMf9Rocb02nAXXIvz9HsMXeDg/s1600/_01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="284" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFYWSKa7-bDADOpvTFzZQMhZpOMvCn8Prt4L6ZgKpTuj8DTJ-dIeFzHJlfsj39jQHsKjlrS47_upnnrOnzip2xdd4nA0dspilWM1xY5Gl1e6bMrQhRFhWMf9Rocb02nAXXIvz9HsMXeDg/s640/_01.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dark Ice by Camille Seaman.</i></td></tr>
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But it all started with the happy coincidence of two things coming my way within days of each other, which settled onto the already lingering taste of two books I had read in the last year. The first book was <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Still-Point-Amy-Sackville/dp/1846272300/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1349908151&sr=1-1">The Stillpoint, by Amy Sackville</a>, which I have to say is one of the finest written books I have read in many a year. It contains one of the most heartbreakingly romantic love stories, as well as descriptive writing that will make you swoon, and read and reread countless paragraphs again and again.<br />
The other book is less to do with snow and ice, and more to do with the kind of desolate places that some of the characters of The Stillpoint find themselves. The book is by Judith Schalansky, and is called<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Atlas-Remote-Islands-Fifty-Visited/dp/1846143489/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1349909707&sr=1-2"> 'Atlas of Remote Islands, Fifty Islands I have not visited and never will.'</a> Incredibly beautiful and thought-provoking, and in fact, winner of the German Arts Foundation prize for The Most Beautiful Book of the Year. It is a book I keep by my bedside and dip into continuously.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicLMam4xgd-t41auggX4w1vD1tGjrwD7qIvKDYKezL1oNuww-2c3RNO40y52SFQwtRtSPMbuMUD0yv6D0DtKFUPfoKZHyuOA-meuo1XxbL95g7x1WzUd9SwST3pZtnKOZ98s9z_f29MS4/s1600/Camille-photography3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicLMam4xgd-t41auggX4w1vD1tGjrwD7qIvKDYKezL1oNuww-2c3RNO40y52SFQwtRtSPMbuMUD0yv6D0DtKFUPfoKZHyuOA-meuo1XxbL95g7x1WzUd9SwST3pZtnKOZ98s9z_f29MS4/s640/Camille-photography3.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Last Iceberg Series by Camille Seaman.</i></td></tr>
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So, the two things. First, these incredible photographs by <a href="http://www.camilleseaman.com/Artist.asp?ArtistID=3258&Akey=WX679BJN">Camille Seaman</a>, which are just majestic and beautiful and completely enthralling to me. (She also photographs clouds like no one I have seen before.)<br />
And then <a href="http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/artists-in-the-arctic/">this most wondrous thing</a> that I found via the lovely <a href="http://thebinsubtle.blogspot.ie/">Nancy, of The b In Subtle,</a> which I now have my heart set on and <i>will go on some day! </i>A ship, The Noorderlicht, a century-old Dutch schooner, which carries a boatload of artists and scientists into waters around Norway's archipelago, who's mission is 'to seek out and foster areas of collaboration to engage in the central issues of our time'. In other words, to 'discuss' global warming and related issues, and to make art about it. The project is called <a href="http://www.thearcticcircle.org/">The Arctic Circle </a>, and well worth checking out. As I write this, Irish artist <a href="http://wonderscape.tumblr.com/">Ruth Le Gear </a> is there now, collecting arctic water in tiny bottles.<br />
I am...jealous.<br />
I have not stopped thinking about it since first coming across it.<br />
I would give anything to be there right now, in this magical place who's time is limited, and who's face is changing by the year. To record something of it in my own small way.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinN0DolhbhPpiRL88eDvA2TirVQE3zRuY7-Pv66V5LCWoYMJWZaC8kNRPwEmu_ryFT1kttZsXP4QKlyDaJPfiLnyoQmCjp_lBFOP4PFwK9yfeo_NZs-D24aZh0Lld-NABapCEqlG1GKrw/s1600/Camille-Seaman-icebergs10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinN0DolhbhPpiRL88eDvA2TirVQE3zRuY7-Pv66V5LCWoYMJWZaC8kNRPwEmu_ryFT1kttZsXP4QKlyDaJPfiLnyoQmCjp_lBFOP4PFwK9yfeo_NZs-D24aZh0Lld-NABapCEqlG1GKrw/s640/Camille-Seaman-icebergs10.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Last Iceberg Series by Camille Seaman.</i></td></tr>
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In all of this, my light relief has been rereading Philip Pullman's Northern Lights. So today, when I saw it, I could not help but purchase, and immediately immerse myself in, a very beautiful, small book by him called<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Once-Upon-Time-North-Materials/dp/0385614322/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1349882527&sr=8-1"> Once Upon Time In The North</a>, a sort of precursor to Northern Lights. It was the small size of it, and the cover, that did it, a cloth-bound thing of beauty that had on it an engraving by John Lawrence. Indeed it is filled with such engravings, beautifully rendered, on almost every page.<br />
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So I sat in the hairdressers for a little over an hour, while the best kind of misty, autumnal rain quietly closed in around this seaside town of ours, a haze of silver and grey outside the window, and lost myself in a grim, desolate icebound island, where sour, suspicious people live alongside <i>panserborne, </i>or polar bears, a once proud, great culture, and now seen as nothing but drunkards, vagrants, who skulk the bleak streets of the dismal town.<br />
When my time was up, I put away my book, and took a winding road up into the rain clouds, between two mountains, surprised at the lack of icebergs in the grey sea below, through the silent silver haze, listening, as I do most days, to music from the north lands, this time <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_TZdqc5EpE">Sigur Rós</a>, (Iceland is about as far north as my music taste goes, for I am well and truly stuck there, without hope, or desire, to be unstuck!), my head filled with snow and ice and frozen lands.<br />
When I arrived at school, it was too wet to stand around chatting, so as I waited in my car I opened facebook on my phone, and the first thing I saw was a post from <a href="http://charlieandcaroline-pedlars.blogspot.ie/">Charlie and Caroline Gladstone</a>, a video called A Homeless Polar Bear in London. I had to take a look.<br />
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As I said, I love how these things all just come together like a beautiful dance that is perfectly choreographed, and suddenly your day just seems like a story, or a dream, with all things dovetailing beautifully.<br />
This time a dream of expansive snowy landscapes, vast tundras of ice, blue icebergs and polar bears, and crowds of white sea birds relentlessly thronging the bitter air.<br />
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<br />Ciara Brehonyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10583812950426579762noreply@blogger.com11