I don’t have a recipe for y’all today, I have a wonderful recipe to share with you on Friday though so I hope you can forgive me for the lack of one today!
This year I am spending Christmas over in the US, I do this every other year – to spend the holidays with my best friend, Leah, and my second family. It sucks being away from my mum over Christmas, but that’s the problem with the two most important people to you living 4000 miles apart, you’re always going to be away from one of them! Alternating each year is the best way I can do it. Leah normally lives in the city (Atlanta) but recently she moved back in with her mum to save for a house. So we’re up here in the ‘burbs and as much as I love the city, it’s just beautiful up here. She has a beautiful house surrounded by woods and other beautiful houses, so I thought I’d share some photos with y’all because it really is just lovely
Let’s start with the outside shall we
The front of the house is gorgeous even in the winter when all the plants are sleeping. But to show you how lovely it looks when everything is green, here’s a photo from earlier in the year
Photo by the home owner herself!
The back of the house is perhaps even more beautiful
I don’t know if you can get any more festive than an outdoor fireplace draped with Christmas garlands!
There used to be a lot more woods out back than there is today, but it still looks and feels pretty secluded, like there isn’t another house for miles.
A photo of one of the Japanese Maples out the back, taken by by the home owner herself earlier this year (just fyi, I am currently sitting writing this post on the other side of those windows!)
Now for the inside, it’s a beautiful house to begin with but it’s even nicer when decorated for Christmas!
The Christmas tree this year is flocked, so you can always tell when the cats have been playing in it because they’re wandering around covered in fake snow!
Our stockings are all ready for Santa! (I don’t have a steady handy, so apologies for the shaky photos in the low light!
And now for my favourite part of the house, the kitchen (naturally)
I love baking in here, as you can imagine! I mean double wall ovens is basically any bakers dream!
I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s just gorgeous up here. And the company is even better, so of course I love being up here. It does get a bit scary when Leah and her mum are at work and I’m here alone.
Well, not completely alone! I have these cuties keeping me company
This is Benny aka Benson Hedges (named after a song, not the cigarettes!), he’s mine and Leah’s kitty (we went to the pound on our 1 year frienderversary and got him). He’s made entirely of fluff, get’s easily lost in the house and only likes to be loved on at 5am
This is Albie aka Albus Maxwell, he’s Leah’s kitty. He is the absolutely sweetest ball of mush ever, which is a good thing because he’s also the baddest kitty ever! You can’t leave anything breakable laying around because he will just walk up to it and swipe it off and break it! Just for funsies. He is also has an obsession with eating plastic
This is Archie aka Sterling Malory Archer (if you know what that’s from, you have great taste in TV), he’s Leah’s mum’s cat and he has the sweetest little face ever! Leah saw him one day in Petsmart and convinced her mum to go and adopt him
And the dogs! Toby and Laney, they’re Shetland Sheep Dogs. They are cuties but they also live up to their breed, if they’re outside and you drive away from or to the house they’ll chase the car and bite at the tyres in an attempt to herd you! They’re very festive at the moment, as you can see
And they’re not alive (I hope, that would be a creepy horror story), but this house is also full of roosters
It’s an Italian thing, I think
So, these are my surroundings for the month. It’s pretty inspiring to be honest. I’m not planning on doing much baking while I’m out here (I’m treating it like a vacation for my body) but I did bake some Christmas spiced cookies this week and taking photos of them outside up here was just amazing, here’s a sneak peek for you (which you will have already seen if you follow me on Instagram), recipe coming soon!
Thanks so much for reading despite the lack of recipe, I hope you enjoyed it!
If you did like this post, come follow me on Instagram as I’ll be posting much more of what I’m doing while I’m up here (I’m heading over to Alabama this weekend for Leah’s brother’s college graduation)
And if you want my future actual recipe posts to come straight to your inbox (trust me, you don’t want to miss Friday’s festive recipe, I’m very excited about it) enter your email into the subscription box on my side bar 🙂
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Have a great week 🙂
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Tea Time, Inspire Me Wednesday, Create It Thursday, Pure Blog Love, Fiesta Friday, Scraptastic Saturdays, Sweet and Savoury Sundays, Inspiration Monday, Motivation Monday, Frugal Crafty Home, Hit Me With Your Best Shot
What a beautiful house and grounds and kitties and decorations. How nice that you are able to come to the US every other year. I agree a double wall oven is my dream, Happy Holidays, the cookies look delicious.
It’s definitely nice to be able to split the holidays like that 🙂
Thank you Suzanne 🙂
Thanks for showing us around! I loved looking around! I enjoyed the cats and dogs the most (or did I enjoy the cookies the most?) Hmmm. I’ll have to return Friday!
Both, always both!
Thanks for stopping by 😀
What a beautiful place to spend the holidays. Thanks for giving a tour and an introduction to the household pets.
Thanks for stopping by Hilda 🙂
Oh wow this place looks simply stunning it really does look magical I am in love with the fireplace outside and the amount of effort put in to decorating is fab. All of us the tea party would like tea here please and I can’t wait to see the recipe for those fabulous cookies. Thank you for joining Tuesday tea time mucky appreciated xxx
It really is a lovely place, thanks for stopping by Justine and inviting me along to the tea time 🙂
ps will follow you on the various social media, already did instagram 🙂 x
Me encanta la casa y la chimenea del jardÃn parece estupenda para el verano, y en invierno con los adornos de Navidad queda fantástica.
Espero que tenga traductor para podernos comunicar.
Saludos y felicidades.
Oh Michelle! This house is amazing!!! Love all the decorations they have! I can imagine how hard can be far from your mum, especially for Christmas, but you’re lucky having a friend like Leah!
Thank you, you’re right I am very lucky!
What a beautiful home, inside and out. The outdoor fireplace is really neat – any cooking done in it? Thanks for sharing your plans for Christmas with all of the party goers at Angie’s FF #46 🙂
I don’t think the outdoor fireplace has been lit for a while, but would be perfect for s’mores don’t you think!
Thanks for stopping by Judi and for hosting! Have a great weekend x
How extraordinary ! You are so lucky to be able to celebrate the holidays in such a lovely place!
I am definitely very lucky, perhaps not as lucky as the two who get to live here all year round!
Thanks for stopping by Julianna 🙂
What a stunning home to share for the holidays. The outdoor fireplace is a really stunner!
Thank you for sharing and linking up to Scraptastic Saturdays. This post has been shared via Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. Have a wonderful week.