Snowed in

We're ending the weekend in the wrong house.  We should be with my family in Oxford, but the snow has kept us in East London, and here we are staying.  We hope to be able to try again next week, after Christmas, but we are all bitterly disappointed.  C's eyes welled up when he heard that my mother had been baking mince pies especially for him, and O is desperately sad to be missing her cousin's 7th birthday party.

But these things happen.  We are all safe and warm and there is an undeniable romance to being snow-bound.  Particularly in London where snow is more usually grey and slushy than thick, white and crunchy.

We have been consoling ourselves in some very good ways.

• We made a batch of snow toffee.  O remembered it from reading Little House in the Big Woods, and I remembered that Jane Brocket wrote more detailed instructions in Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer.  It was a roaring success, and we learnt that enamel pie tins were the best dishes to make it in, and that it works really well with golden syrup, as well as with maple syrup.

• I soothed myself by cooking - banana bread, a roast chicken, cheese scones, two loaves of bread, and a very large pan of minestrone soup.
• I am not a fan of the Christmas tree.  The principal benefit as far as I can see, is to make the house seem gloriously spacious and airy once it is taken down and packed away (of course I have a fake one - the only thing worse than a Christmas tree cluttering up the house for days on end, is one that I have to hoover up after as well).  But we put it up on Saturday, and I just could not remain unmoved when the children unwrapped the decorations with such excitement and cries of "oh, I love this one!" and "this is the one Granny knit for us!".  I concede it does look rather pretty now it is up.

• In between episodes of cooking, I've curled up on the sofa, under my quilt, with a good book and a cup of tea.  I am working my way through the Barbara Vine novels, and loving every minute of them.  I have a couple of Penelope Lively books lined up next, which are also good for gobbling up greedily over a summer or winter holiday when there is idling to be done.
• Inspired by Calvin and Hobbes, the children built a murdered snowman and his killer - a long and fearsome snow crocodile - in the garden.  The chickens are peering at it rather warily from their run.