Dr Janet Gunning

I received a happy bookshop type email this morning to say my copy in the post.

Wassailing to bless orchards, it’s usually in weeks around 12th night.

The front cover of ‘A History of England in 25 Poems’ by Catherine Clarke, with a Christmas tree in the background.

A bit of book treasure under the Christmas tree for me. 📚🎄
#IAmReading
#BookSky

And to all of you 🎄

A tabby cat is peering out from under a pile of Christmas wrapping paper.

Happy Christmas

In my first few weeks of work at my previous employer I…
1) handled a manuscript once handled by Bede
2) found a canon ball in a desk drawer
3) had to call the ‘bat ambulance’ to rescue a downed juvenile bat from the resident protected bat colony.
Soon discovered that was just a normal working week.

Loved the book. And your presentation at the Leaf conference. 😊

Shout out for ‘The Things We Leave Behind’ by @clarefurniss.bsky.social - brilliantly thought provoking and disturbing.

Yes - so many battles. I struggled to finish Anna Karenina - she was just so annoying. It’s funny which books we connect with isn’t it - I’ve tried & failed to read Middlemarch multiple times, and can’t read Dickens, though I’ll happily watch TV adaptations.

I love a long novel - I’ve read War and Peace twice. Favourites of mine are Anthony Trollope’s The Way We Live Now, Gaskell’s North and South, and Thackeray’s Vanity Fair.

Apricot pink rose, with petals beginning to unfurl, seems to glow in the gentle afternoon light. The flower is a cabbage style rose and round like a pompom.

Last roses of the summer in the garden.
🌱

I was given the Reader’s Digest edition of David Attenborough’s ‘Life on Earth’ to accompany the TV series for my birthday when I was about 7. I struggled to read the text, but spent hours & hours looking at that book.

He’s here:
@caenhillcc.bsky.social

App on my phone says Koelreuteria paniculata - Goldenrain tree.

Front cover of Katherine Rundell’s novel Rooftoppers. The illustration shows the roof tops of Paris in grey against a pale yellow sky with two children leaping between the roof tops. Above them a huge flock of pigeons rises into the sky.

I just asked my 21 year old for their favourite childhood comfort read and without hesitation they said Rooftoppers.

Front cover of ‘The Whale Rider’ by Whiti Ihimaera. The illustration shows the back view of a young girl with dark hair and a pink dress standing on a lush green hill looking out over a bay. The colours are muted evening light, the sea a pale lavender, the sky a pale apricot. Filling the sky above her head is the shape of a whale formed from wispy clouds, and decorated with traditional Māori patterns.

One of the great classics of NZ literature - and I think I’m right in saying, it remains the most translated work by any New Zealand writer.

Kevin van Whye ‘Date me Bryson Keller’ and Mason Deaver ‘I wish you all the best’ are both good.
If she enjoys Jane Austen she might enjoy Georgette Heyer? Arabella, The Grand Sophie, Frederica are some of my favourites.

We were there too - wasn’t it wonderful. It’s my husband’s absolute favourite, but I’d never heard the whole symphony before and it was brilliant.
Last night we were at my favourite, Gorecki’s Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, which was so beautiful it made me cry.

Small paper cup containing very dark brown sorbet and creamy white ice cream, with a chocolate star and little spoon stuck in the top.

I was feeling adventurous.

Olive oil ice cream and 80% dark chocolate sorbet.

Delicious.

The Royal Albert Hall all lit up against a dark night sky.

On the left an orchestra are arriving on stage & starting to tune their instruments. On the right a sea of people fill the Royal Albert Hall.

Glorious night out at the Proms to hear one of my most favourite pieces of music - Gorecki’s Symphony of Sorrowful Songs.

Done - hope it helps!
We are a family of dual citizens (my children are entitled to 3 different passports, and my immediate extended family includes 5 nationalities) so I sympathise hugely with your situation.

Yes agree - that lovely frothy whiteness.

Northumberland is gorgeous - beaches, wildlife, hill walks, heritage sites. And very few people.

Those lovely delicate little flowers are definitely not a hawthorn - I think it’s a myrtle.

Yes I think the carving has been identified as 14th century, but it’s possible these might be later additions to an earlier font.

Large stone font, with a wide carved octagonal bowl sitting on a paler stone pedestal. The carvings are worn and battered.

Local tradition says this is the font in which Edward the Confessor was baptised. Top half is medieval, bottom half much later. Now in All Saints Church, Middleton Stoney, it was brought here from the King’s Chapel Islip in the mid-nineteenth century. #medievalsky

Big clumps of vibrant stargazer lilies, each flower has six dark speckled pink petals with white edges. In the background are lemon yellow snapdragons, purple thyme, and ornamental grasses.

These lilies didn’t flower last summer so I thought we’d lost them - but they’re back with all their joyful flamboyance. 🌱
#TinyJoys

Haven’t read it yet - but ‘Vanished: An unnatural history of extinction’ by Sadiah Qureshi looks fascinating.

Little orange ladybird with creamy white spots sitting on the closed green bud of a day lily. The golden yellow heads of day lily flowers in bloom can be seen in the background.

Little orange ladybird (halyzia sedecimguttata)
on the day lilies in the garden. We are surrounded by mature sycamore trees, which apparently these chaps love, but this is first time I’ve spotted an orange ladybird in our garden.
🌱 🐞

In the foreground the tawny orange flowers of a Red Hot Poker plant stand tall like flaming torches against a background of green leaves, and soft blue and pink flowers.

Love the way these kniphofia seem to glow in the evening light. 🌱