January Nature

I've got a non-yarny post for you lovelies today.

Fridays are my BIG shop day, I usually take my Mother-in-law along as she doesn't drive . One of her favourite subjects is the weather...suppose I talk about it quite a lot too, hopefully not in a boring way ?!

Well, today I made a comment about the days getting longer and she quoted one of her favourite weather sayings... " as the days lenghten the cold strengthens" Have you ever heard this saying ? I must admit I used to think she was just saying it to annoy me ( sorry MIL ).
This year though ,it didn't, and we got to talking about other similar sayings she could remember from her youth. I'm finding it actually quite interesting .

I came home and asked Mr google what he knew, with the idea of printing off something to show my MIL. I found a nice site here.

But better than that, something on another page jogged my memory about this ......

I found this last year, in the very bookshop I mentioned in my last post.
It's the sister book to the more famous " Country diary of an Edwardian lady" I remember when that book was published in the eighties, it became hugely popular. Spawning loads of merchandise . I seem to remember bedding and crockery sporting the beautiful illustrations from the book.
It didn't do much for me at the time.

Now, though ,I love these books. They have stunning paintings of British nature. " Nature Notes " is from 1905.
The lady behind them is Edith Holden, you can read more about her here.
The book is organised into months.This is her January painting ....

I think it's so lovely.Here are some other illustrations from this month....

Birds( gold crested wrens, do we still have those ?),Ivy and my fave ..berries.

In the pages there are also Edith's thoughts on the Nature around her . Not to mention poems and folk-lore sayings like...........

(Remember you click on the image to make it bigger.)

Result :0)
 I'll be taking this to show my MIL tomorrow and I plan to share each month with you lovelies as the year progresses...you're in for a treat.

This afternoon the sun peeped through and I was inspired ,by this book ,to set out to school a bit early and stop to see what January nature I could find. By the time I got to the fields the clouds were blocking out the sun, bother, I thought . But actually the brooding sky was stunning......

The countryside did look pretty bleak , with bare hedges and trees , but beautiful,none the less.........

I managed to find some colour, Ivy , like Edith, and this stunning Lichen...

I'll be back soon with crochet goodness , but I hope you enjoyed this little nature interlude :0)
Have a great weekend .
Jacquie x