Hi everyone, and happy Easter weekend. For all the new people this week, hello, I’m Catherine and thank you so very much for joining me on this journey. As you can see from this ‘mum on the floor chatting’ photo, I don’t do a whole lot with our Easter celebrations and decorations at home…but I’m spending my time talking with my kids, we saw some favourite friends and had a beach walk yesterday, and today I’m baking cinnamon buns.

I hope you’re doing okay wherever you are.

Do you feel like you need a break, a real break? I do. This weekend I promised myself two things:

1. Laugh and talk as much as possible.

2. Keep my thoughts and conversation about the future (not the past).

So here’s what I’m up to this weekend. And you’ve been warned: I am a baker, so my relaxation always includes a little cinnamon and a hot oven:

• I made the best Rosemary, Lemon, Greek Yogurt cake in the world to take to our friends’ home yesterday and the recipe is here. Don’t you love the edible gold leaf and flowers on top?

• Today, no hot-cross buns for me. I’m making cinnamon rolls. This time I’m trying the recipe from The Food Nanny. Linking it for you in case you want to join me!

• We’ll go for a long walk with Holly, the best little shih tzu on the planet, and then another long walk together. We’ll enjoy coffee and cinnamon rolls, and some chocolate.

• I just finished reading Jessie Burton’s The Miniaturist and now I’m starting on Sue Monk Kidd’s The Book of Longings. I love reading and feel rich when I’m surrounded by a stack of good books. Do you?

Lockdown craziness is still happening in too many parts of the world, and I’m sorry. In Australia, we call ourselves ‘the lucky country’ and I’m so thankful for the government’s quick measures that stopped the spread of Covid.

If you’re at home this weekend and looking for a little cheer, I hope these simple things I love will help you find it. Bake a little, read a little, walk if you can. Gently move your thoughts and conversation into your future and not the past. Together, with time, we’ll all get through this and we’ll be flying around the world to visit the people and places we love once again.

Happy Easter, and I’m thinking of you!

Love Catherine x

PS.

• Cake pictures…and that beautiful edible flower topping. My friend Claire bought it for me on holidays in Byron Bay. You can get it here online in Australia and for everyone overseas, there’s something similar here.

• Another one of the Gold & Flower sprinkle bottle…hope you can find it. So pretty and you use so very little! Thanks again to beautiful Claire for gifting it to me.