Monday ramblings...

Happy Monday to you all, not sure what happened yesterday, I was here all day but it slipped my mind to update the blog! Doh! Guess I was still recovering from my late night on friday at the tower bank arms...
Seems to be lots of action on the farming front today, lots of tractors and trailers passing the shop ...
A customer has brought me in a lovely recipe for spicing up these winter nights.... it is for
Mango Salsa
1 Mango (peeled and sliced)
2 slices of Red Onion
1 Fresh red Chilli (seeded and finely chopped)
2tbsps of lime juice
1 tsp sugar and salt

Combine all the ingredients and allow to stand for several hours before using... great with warm duck breast or with grilled prawns or scallops, it sounds delicious, I love mango chutney so this will make a nice change!

Tonight is mothers class at Brathwaite Hall, think tonights session is about embellishing textile pieces...
The bonus Ball is a rollover again! Thats three weeks now! Someone is in for a nice suprise if their number comes up this saturday...
Thats about all for now...better get offline and order some stock :-)

Saturday...

Good afternoon from Far Sawrey.......busy morning here, had to pop to the cash and carry in Barrow this morning, was a bit of a mad dash as it closes at lunch time, anyway I made it and am now back with a car full to unload...
Last nights event at the Tower bank Arms was EXCELLENT, I took some friends from Ambleside with me, we did not win the Dominoes despite one of my friends getting into the semi finals, darts was still going on when I left at 11pm...The dominoes final was two local women and the woman next door to the shop was the winner!...
It was really really nice to meet up with customers in a social setting...I did really well in the raffle, I won a truck load of seasoned logs to be delivered by Terry Dobson and I also won a big bucket of popcorn! Only thing missing is Mr Right to share it with, when I announced that in the pub the men dived for cover! ;-)
Benny has had a nice walk around the village with a customer this morning which put a smile on his face....
Braithwaite hall has a big group of people staying there for the weekend which is good for trade...
Nothing else to report at the moment....Have a great day... :-)

Royal friday

Good rainy afternoon from far Sawrey...the heavens have just opened as I begin typing, its just gone really dark despite it only being 2pm!

Its Westmoreland Gazette day today and we sell lots of them on a friday....Another popular seller today is sweet potatoes, they look odd but taste delicious!

There has been much talk of the new blog/web site that Prince Charles has set up this week, I have just taken a look at it, its interesting to read his speeches in full, especially the ones about rural communities, something he is a great supporter of, anyway i will post a link to his site for you to judge for yourself if you haven't already http://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/

Tonight is darts and dominoes at the tower bank arms aiming to raise money for the tarn hill trust, I have never thrown a dart in my life, but will pop along and give it a go as its for charity. The mobile mechanic has just been and done the work on my car to prepare it for its MOT, he is extremely handy as he comes here and does the work whilst I am at work....

Had an email from the girl who lived in the village for the summer and grew the giant marrow...she is safely back home in germany and is undertaking a course in leisure and tourism with the hope of becoming a tour guide, it was really nice to hear from her

Mother has set me up making fabric christmas reeths for her rug making classes, so I better get back to it....Keep Dry its wet out there! :0)

Chilly up here!

Good Afternoon from Far Sawrey..it is a chilly day up here today. Apologies for my blog absence, not sure quite where the week has gone to! Yesterday was half day closing and I ventured off to the hairdressers. My hair has grown really long since we have been here in Sawrey, it must be the air! Anyway I had lots of layers put into my hair and it feels much lighter and better……it has also gone very very curly……or as the hairdresser said it looks very “boho chic” Hmmmmmmmmm anyway…..

Logs are the biggest seller of the week, they are flying out of the shop, the weather has really turned cold here this week….The soup mountain I described the other week is merely a pile here in the shop today….soup is selling well with the weather

Today is Esthwaite Link day and its great reading the magazine and seeing what is going on in the villages surrounding Sawrey……..There are lots of dates for the diary including “Christmas carol” singing in Hawkshead. Hawkshead is such a beautiful village and no doubt it will sound great also on Wednesday 13th of December… Song sheets are provided and it begins at the school at 6pm

A customer from the village had a nasty fall in the woods whilst out walking this week, She disclocated her arm and broke her elbow…OUCH… Sending her GET WELL WISHES….Pleased to report that the First Responder from the village was called and duly arrived to administer First Aid whilst awaiting the Ambulance. First Responders are crucial to villages like Sawrey…

This week is another Rollover with the Braithwaite Hall Bonus Ball game…Got to be in it to win it, the prize stands at £50 this week and its all for a good cause

Hot chocolate time for me…….Keep warm and well :o)

sunday ramblings

Good Afternoon a chilly chilly Far Sawrey....I printed off the waether from the lake district weatherline this morning and it said we are in for a stormy afternoon with a wind chill factor of Minus 17 Celsius at 900 feet!!!! Thank goodness we are only a couple of hundred feet above sea level as it is cold enough! The weatherline page is an excellent place to get an acurate weather prediction for the lake district, I have taken to copying it onto a chalk borad for customers to read and plan there day accordingly. Winter fell-top conditions are provided from Helvellyn by the National Park Authority Ranger Service, yes it is someones job to hike up there every day and do weather things! But thank goodness they do as the service and the information they provide is particularly useful if you're going walking or climbing up on the fells where the weather conditions can change rapidly.
http://www.lake-district.gov.uk/weatherline/home/index.php

It has been a suprisingly busy sunday morning considering the time of year, all of the bread and bath buns have been sold. We seem to sell newspapers first thing on a sunday and then nothing until last thing, guess thats with people out walking.

We have a poster in the window for the panto in Hawkshead, this year it is Aladdin. Apparently its a great night out with lots of laughs, it starts on Dec the 5th and the tickets are on sale from hawkshead post office.

We have decided to arrange all of the vegetables in the shop for the winter, the cold and rain really does not agree with them, the shop really is compact now!

Driving through Ambleside early this morning I saw that operation put up the christmas lights was in full swing, lots of men swinging from buildings in order to light up the town, I LOVE the lights in Ambleside at christmas, it really does look traditional...

Keep warm wishes :-)

Taxi !!!!!!

Good Afternoon from a wet and windy far sawrey, its been a suprisingly busy day here today, sold lots and lots of logs! it certainly is a day to light the fire and stay in and keep warm!

As promised a few weeks ago I have been sent pictures of the Moet Taxi from hawkshead, well, I was sent them weeks ago but on a disk, but I am rubbish with anything technical and I could not upload pictures, Anyway if you see them below, the upload from the email has worked!
It got dark soooooooooo early today! Despite the weather pineapples are on offer and look really lush.

Yesterday I decided to have a bit of a sort out and decided to put soups on display as its soup time of year, Hmmmm in the process I managed to drop 12 large bottles of passata all over the floor, all over me and in fact all over the shop, what a mess....it looked like a scene from an abbatoir...Anyway in the sort out process I decided to stack up all of the soup tims we have, customers in today are taking bets as to how long my soup tin mountain display will last! It will be fine! I hope!

As I am typing I can see and hear hail! Wrap up warm blog readers if the weather is like this with you! :0)

Thursday

Good Afternoon....its a rather damp day here in far Sawrey....One way of telling the telling how chilly the temperature is, is by my hair, I washed it this morning and did not dry it, it is still wet some 6 hours later! Hmmmm won't do that again! Brrrrrrr
I have spent the morning putting away the goodies from the cash and carry, the cash and carry had gone christmas crazy! I think here at Sawrey Stores we will be having a very traditional christmas with lots of seasonal fruit and vegetables. According to past owners of the business mushrooms and cream are a top seller at christmas! I will let you know!
Despite it been much quieter at this time of the year it is really nice to talk to customers that bit more as there is no rush, its good to catch up with people
One customer who lives in the village is Alex Brodie, he is a former BBC World Service correspondent, he began producing beers in the late summer of 2002 in his brand new brewery, located in the old dairy at Town End Farm, Hawkshead. He has now expanded and opened a new brewery in Staveley near Kendal. Today he is having a very special opening day and I believe Border News will be filming there, so if you get Border it may be on the news this evening. Here is a link to his site and you can see the new beer hall which looks great! And we wish him well
http://www.hawksheadbrewery.co.uk/?Welcome
There are several japanese tourists outside the shop as I am typing this, they are taking pictures of the shop... I have just been out and shown them the link ot the blog advertised in the window, they all wrote it down! The blog may go Japanese!!!!!! :-)
There are still a few people in the village in the village who remain unwell and I send them all GET WELL SOON WISHES

Good Afternoon

Greetings....its a bit of a blustery day here today... Just a half day for me today, mum did this morning...
I must report that the vegetable site that I found yesterday really did inspire me to do a bit of a delia in the kitchen last night, followed the recipe for roasted butternut squash with a parmasean crust and the sticky parsnips and little onions, both were really really easy and really really tasty! I have just brought the vegetables in for the day and I noticed that there are no butternut squashes left!....
Its been a quiet day here in the shop, but then again it is monday, tonight is mum's rug class at the hall and in Hawkshead there is charity bingo...its all go go!!...

Happy Monday from Sawrey :-)

Fab Link

Just surfing the net, decided not to read the papers cover to cover today...stumbled on what I think looks like a great site for mouth-watering vegetable recipes....think I am favouring the
Roasted Butternut Squash with a Parmesan crust for dinner later....yum yum...we have some butternut squash in stock if you fancy it too!! :-)

http://thinkvegetables.co.uk/recipe_search_results.html

Rememberence Sunday

Good Morning from far sawrey......its Rememberence Sunday today, there was a service earlier this morning at the church in the village, I think there was a large congregation, well there were lots of cars leaving the church afterwards...including the vicar who I imagine was in a hurry to get to his other 4 sevices! Amazing!
I went out for dinner last night and was late home so I have not fully come too yet...
The Times newspaper magazines did not arrive yesterday, which upset the times readers, I phoned up the newspaper distribution people and reminded them that we have lots of loyal times readers in the village and this keeps happening and its just not good enough...today they have sent me more saturday times magazines than I could ever wish for and guess what, not enough sunday times magazines!!!! DOH!!! So if you have a sunday paper with a saturday magazine in it, its ok you not going mad, it is sunday, I am getting confused just writing it all down :-)
This weeks bonus ball competition was a rollover and has been won by the woman who lives over the road from the shop, she put it in the name of her grand-daughter who is staying for the weekend, I bet she is in for a treat or two!
Reports from the domino night on friday night at Braithwaite Hall are that it was a success and everyone had a great night and that the food was really good...I hope the committe raised lots of money, I will try and find out how much...
Yesterday was such a windy day up here, however today things are much calmer today and the newspapers are remaining in the stand, mother reported yesterday that they were blowing all over the place...
A friend has sent me another link that I thought I would paste onto the blog for your amusement
http://joe-ks.com/archives_may2005/Elastic_Baby.htm
The sunday paper headlines range from stories on Brittany Spears divorce to Gordon Browns plans for the labour leadership...Hmmmm my headline is Rememberence Sunday and here is a poem I think appropriate..

In Flanders Fields
In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.
John McCrae (1872 - 1918)

Love from Far Sawrey

Bath Bun Day

Good Morning from Far Sawrey....I was a couple of minutes late opening up this morning due the bath buns still been in the oven when I arrived at the bakery en route to the shop....They are well worth the wait though! They smell as good as they look....
Today is the first wednesday that the shop will close at 1.30pm...it will feel strange locking up at lunch time, but its only until the new year...
Mother is at Hawkshead school today meeting with the headmistress to talk about doing a textile project with the school children...
A friend has send me another funny link today...its really good so I have posted a link to it below...
http://www.eyegas.com/xmas05/
I had some roasted beetroot from the shop for the 1st time last night, it was lush, roasted it with some sweet potatoes, it made a real change!
Hope you all have a nice day, think I will use the time off to catch up on domestic goddess chores :-)

rain rain GO AWAY

Good Morning from Far Sawrey....its raining.....its pouring! However despite the rain I have seen at least a dozen walkers heading up onto claife heights! Thought I would take a pitcure of veg display of the day, had some celeriac, raw beetroot, sweet potatoes, savoy cabbages amd broccolli delivered today, very autumny!
Its nice to see a gang of people who all come and stay at the Sawrey Hotel at the same time as each other, they were up here in April and have all returned for another break..
Mother reports that the Rug class was a great success last night.....14 ladies from the village attended and feedback form some of them this morning is that they havd a good time..
The new vicar for the parish has just popped into the shop, he really is nice and easy to talk to, he does well to stop and talk! I believe he has several parishes to look after, Sawrey, hawkshead, Wray, Satterthwaite and Rusland! thats what being a rural vicar entails hey!
Jill Aldersley, a local artist has dropped off some more xmas cards this morning, she paints some really great cards of the local area, this years new editions include one of the langdale scenery with a mountain rescue hellicopter dropping off santa and also one of santa sitting on top of the little bridge house in Ambleside. The one of Santa feeding his flock in Near Sawrey is still my favourite tho...
Hope you all keep warm and dry today :-)

Its Monday

Good Afternoon from Far sawrey...its a chilly day up here today! Today I am selling lots of Milk and Broccolli!!!! It reminds me of dinner last night, I had some cauliflower cheese with broccolli covered in in toasted almonds as they do on an advert on the tv, it was lush! If you get the urge we sell flaked almonds here in the shop :-)
The leaves have really turned golden this week and everywhere you look there are picture postcard views...
Radio reception is poor for some reason up here today. Tonight mum is starting her 6 week course at Braithwaite Hall in the village teaching rug techniques for people who want to do some funky things with textiles...
Some japanese students have just been in the shop, they have walked up the hill from the lake and are en route to Hill Top to Beatrix Potters house, I broke the news to them that it is closed until next April, they looked soooooooo sad, guess you would be if you have travelled all of the way from japan and the place you want to see is closed, I think the gardens may be open to the public tho anyway they have carried on walking..
A friend sent me a link to a web page that made me laugh so much I nearly fell off my seat...it took a while to load, but then again we do not have broadband here, if you have a look at it make sure you turn on the music link and then press the buttons on the left hand side, hope you find it as funny as I did...The laughter it generated is keeping me warm on this chilly chilly day.
http://dancingbush.com/

Happy Monday to you all :-)

email

I have had several requests for my email address from blog readers so they can write to the blog, I am not sure how to make it so blog readers can directly email the blog page so here is my email address for those of you who want to drop me a line here at the shop
anniecarlislemor@aol.com

Bonfire Night

Sunday Morning Greetings from Far Sawrey....I am pleased to report that I feel much better today....Well bonfire night certainly got off to a bang here in the village this morning....The local builder who is working on a house next to the shop decided to have a fire this morning.... And doing his bit for global warming he managed to blow up an aerosol cannister that was hidden the bonfire.....OOOOOOOOOPPPPZZZZZZZZZZ...As you can imagine it made quite a bang and as for the smoke!!! All good fun, I am pleased to report there are no injuries other that the builders blood pressure that I imagine is through the roof!

The village has remained quite busy this week, the hotels and self catering cottages all report good trade and the shop is ticking along nicely...

News to report from Braithwaite Hall is that there is a Domino evening next friday the 10th of Nov starting at 7pm, for the bargain price of £3 you can have an evening in good company playing domino's combined with a homemade supper and a glass of wine or juice, finished off with a raffle...

One customer has just been in, I said...hello I have not seen you for a couple of days...sadly his brother died last week, and in the space of 72hours he has flown to Ottowa in Canada, attended the funeral and is now back for Sunday Morning in Sawrey! AMAZING!

Last night was the Bonfire and Fireworks in Hawkshead, what a spectacular evening it was, its a real cosy kind of bonfire in the heart of the lake district with a great fireworks display that equalled some much larger gatherings that I have been to in my time...whoever made the hungarian vegetable soup deserves a medal it was DELICIOUS!

Well I better get back to wading through the sunday papers, I start with the tabloids and work my way around to the broadsheets...Hope you all have a safe and fun bonfire night :-)

flu flu flu

Good afternoon from Far Sawrey...Its been a while since I updated the blog, I have had gastric flu, horrible horrible gastric flu...I thought I had had flu before but I now realise I have not, this was the real deal and boy did it sweep me off my feet! I even lost my appetite for several days and that really is not me...I am pleased to report however that I am getting better by the day... I am house/dog sitting at a lush house in the village and have not been able to enjoy the experience until today....
Its a real blue sky day here in Sawrey, its bitterly cold but very clear and crispy...Despite the bitter chill in the air I have sold 2 fresh coconuts this morning!
The giant marrow has been opened up in my absence and I have been reliabley informed that they have been dried and put away somewhere safe until its time to plant them out next year...
Many customers have told me how they are looking forward to the giant bonfire in Hawkshead on saturday night, I am looking forward to seeing the fireworks display, health permitting!

Listening to Radio 2 as I type and the lunchtime debate is about CCTV and how technology keeps its eye on us, I was laughing to myself thinking how big brother is not watching us up here in sawrey and then I remembered, there is a web cam at ferry house down the hill! So I guess even here in the chocolate box that is sawrey we have not escaped technological advances! Its not all bad though, its nice to be able to log on and see if the ferry is working for people who need it for work as its a rather long drive round, below is a link to the web cam...
http://www.fba.org.uk/webcam.html

Thats all for now...I hope the flu has avioded you :-)