in the bleak midwinter

brrrr!

Oh my goodness it is COLD! Cold but beautiful.  As we type, the low afternoon sun is burnishing the thatch of the cottage opposite with a warm copper glow and the distant granite tors of Dartmoor are tipped with winter fire.  There are even rumours of snow (which for those of us without direct responsibility for livestock is almost as exciting as Christmas). 

Suddenly it feels properly wintry and the temptation for one last bracing dip in the sea has vanished in a puff of visible warm breath.

The Rona II in Bermuda

Back in the workshop Hilary and Rosamund are busy making bespoke Christmas orders and bags of all shapes and sizes are tumbling onto the wrapping table from the sewing machines ready for the precarious Crackerjack!-style dash to the post office down the road.  There's even a bit of tuneful Christmas humming going on in between catching up on news (Rosamund's been sailing across the world in the Tall Ships' Race since we last saw her and has tales aplenty of seafaring derring-do). 

Tomorrow the studio will be busy again as we invite Chulmleigh folk in for our annual Christmas decoration workshop: the window is filled with fairy lights, the fridge stocked with bubbles and Mr Bublé is poised to get us in the festive mood as we cut, glue and sew our way through herds of reindeer and a sky full of stars.  Magical!