Results matching “Christmas”

Due to the popularity of Peggy Porschen's pink Belgravia cafe on Elizabeth Street, a second branch was opened in mid-March on King's Road in Chelsea. The new branch offers a little more seating and the usual selection of cakes, cupcakes, biscuits, and hot drinks all with seasonal themes. The pink cafe on the corner of King's Road is decorated for Easter with a giant Easter wreath, decorated with flowers and eggs, birds, and rabbits.

Peggy Porschen opened its branch on Elizabeth Street in 2010, though the owner has been working on designing cakes since 2003. Their beautifully-designed cakes and pastries has been a firm favourite of celebrities, royalty, and visitors who flock to the pretty cafe to take photographs to upload onto social media.

I last visited Peggy Porschen near Christmas (read about that here: A Christmas Visit to Peggy Porschen Bakery), so it was nice to see what was on offer for Easter and spring in their brand new cafe. I opted for the hot chocolate, which arrived with a bunny design, and a pot of Earl Grey tea.

I also had one of the bunny cupcakes, and they also have a design with a tulip or carrot for Easter.

The bunny cupcake is strawberry, rhubarb, and custard flavour. This tasted good with the Earl Grey tea. Overall, I was actually very impressed with this choice of cake as it had a good flavour without being too sweet, and it was also light and not too filling. If you're in this area of London, you need to check it out. It should hopefully not be as busy as their flagship Belgravia cafe; I went at lunch time during the week and got a seat straight away, and it was not too busy. If you do want to check it out, go to 219 King's Road in Chelsea, London SW3 5EJ. 

Last April, King's Cross train station introduced new artwork in the main terrace and directly underneath its impressive roof; the artwork was created by British artist Tracey Emin. The new neon sign artwork acts as a focal point along with the clock and the statue (seen from the entrace to the terrace) "The Meeting Place" by Paul Day. "The Meeting Place" depicts a couple embracing, a common sight at a train station. Emin's work is along the same theme and sends a message between London and Europe. 

Tracey Emin was inspired by friends and family greeting each other at the train station, which sees trains depart and arrive London to Europe. The neon sign is created using her handwriting and is 20 meters long. Earlier this year and at the end of last year, we saw Emin experiment with neon artwork. It featured in her Christmas tree at Connaught Hotel (Tracey Emin Designs The Connaught Christmas Tree (Mayfair, London)) and also in a piece that she showed for London Lumiere 2018.

This new artwork fits in well with the rest of the station. Have you seen it yet?

Somerset House is currently hosting an exhibition on the popular comic strip "The Peanuts", famous for its Charlie Brown, Snoopy the dog, and Woodstock the bird characters. Developed by Charles Schultz, this comic has been running in one form or another for nearly eighty years. A special exhibition featuring the strip at Somerset House in London is currently taking place until March 3.

"Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown" and "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" are two of the seasonal cartoons that I would watch every Christmas and Halloween; there were also a Valentine's Day and an Easter one and a series of cartoons. Now, I personally never understood why it was as popular as it was (and I am sure that I was not the target audience), but my father is a huge fan of the strip and has collected the merchandise. He was born on the same day the strip was created/first published. After my visit to the exhibition last month, I now have a better understanding of the comic strip, and as for its appeal, the characters and catch phrases are so well-known that it actually does deserve its place.

I think that although it started its life as a comic strip, it is now being marketed more to children to survive and carry its legacy. A new film was released a couple of years ago, and this was very much a children's film. But, even though it is a children's film, it kept the formulas used in the comic strip to appeal to an older audience. I believe that the addition of Snoopy and Woodstock makes it more accessible to children, and this marketing to children certainly started by the time I was a child and watched the cartoons. (I also had one of the Snoopy Snow-Cone machines that I got for Christmas when I was very young, which really just allows you to hand-crush ice into a cup!)

The exhibition explores how "The Peanuts" strip became popular and how it dealt with issues such as war, racism, and feminism. In its most popular time, the readers of the comic strip were 355 million, according to a note at the exhibition, and it was syndicated in 2,600 newspapers in 75 countries. Charles  Schulz had created 17,897 strips before he died in 2000, and a lot of the events relate to him. All of the notes in this post relate to what I read at the exhibition.

Charles Schultz was born in St. Paul in 1922 to immigrants; his father was a German barber during the Great Depression, and his mother came from a large Norwegian family that encouraged him to not aspire to success or stand out and to accept his fate in a hard world. Schultz was nicknamed "Sparky" when he was two days old, and this name came from a racehorse in the "Barney Google" comic strip; his father instilled the love of comics into him as they'd read them together. 

When he was 13, the family got a dog that they named Spike. The dog was very intelligent, mischievious, and had a large personality, and it came to become the model in personality and in markings for the fictional Snoopy. The name came about as a tribute to Schultz's mother because she had said that if they ever had another dog, it should be called "Snoopy". Apparently, the dog could understand over 50 human words.

Schulz's first published work was in 1937 for "Ripley's Believe it or Not!", which was an insert and magazine that published hard-to-believe facts. Schultz illustrated and posted facts about Spike the dog.

Sport is what connected Scultz to make friends, and he enjoyed ice skating in winter when his father would put water in their garden to make a home-made ice rink for him and his friends to play hockey on.

Schultz's father paid for him to go to art school, and he was then drafted into the army for a short time. He got his big break with a syndicate from New York who saw his "Li'l Folks" comic strip, which was a strip featuring children, that he had published locally and was trying to get more exposure from. Because that name was already copyrighted by another cartoonist, the syndicate called his work "Peanuts", which he disliked. The "Peanuts" strip was first syndicated in 7 newspapers on October 2, 1950.

One of the subjects that Scultz writes about a lot is love and unrequited love. "The Little Red-Haired Girl" is based on a real person. In this case, the girl was a colleague of Scultz's at Art Instruction School, and he dated her for three years in the 1940s, but she turned down his marriage proposal. A lot of the names of the characters came from friends, such as Linus, Frieda and Schroeder.

"The Peanuts" strip immortialised new phrases and words. "Aaugh!", "Good Grief", "Rats!", and "Blockhead" are a few of the words Scultz created and used daily. He was also the first to treat text denoting sounds in a different mannor, such as "Z" for sleep, "Whap!", and other phrases such as "sigh" placed between asterisks. In addition to that, he helped to create mood by showing atmosphere such as lines for rain, snowflakes, scratchy speech marks for Woodstock the bird, and dust clouds around the character Pig Pen. To add emphasis to character tone of speech, such as shouting, he used different pencil thickness.

I think "The Peanuts" strip had appeal to people who lived through the 1950s because a lot of the strip featured abstract ideas and unseen things, and alienation was a common theme of the 1950s. Schultz was worried that his mother would forget him when they were separated and was worried that he would be abandoned. The Charlie Brown character is meant to be an "everyman" or a "loser" and struggles in life. This is a universal feeling as not everyone can win at everything.

Psychology is also an aspect of the strip, and the strip was placed in the dictionary for the phrase "security blanket" to describe the blanket that Linus carries around with him everywhere.

"The Peanuts" comic strip was the first to have a black character. The boy's name is Franklin, and his father fought alongside soldiers in Vietnam. He lost some readers to introducing this character. Scultz did not seem to know how this would be well-received and did not wish to upset a community that he was not familiar with, which is clear in his letters to a reader who wrote to him and asked for the black character to be included.

The Snoopy character was depicted as walking and acting more human-like in the early 1970s and became a popular character in the strip. Snoopy became an icon in himself. A stuffed toy Snoopy went to space with the crew of Apollo 10.

Schultz also created strong female characters that defied gender norms. Lucy, the outspoken one, helps to ground Charlie Brown and both exist and become better with one another. Peppermint Patty is a tomboyish female who is the best at sports.

Other themes looked at the Halloween special, religion, fine art, and music. One small area discussed the music of Vince Guaraldi Trio. This band created the music for the "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and is played at Christmas each year.

The exhibition also showcased artwork by artists inspired by the characters and comic.

At the end of the exhibition, visitors could use the artwork light boxes to draw out their own "Peanuts" comic strip. They could also read the comic strip books on display to read, take a photograph with Lucy's stand, and visit the gift shop. If you are a fan of the characters and comic strip, then this is a "must-see" exhibition. It's currently on at Somerset House until March 3 and costs 14.00 for a full-price ticket, open daily.

My friends from the states flew to Manchester in mid-July, and I went to see them for the weekend, and we hung out and went to the Manchester Cat Cafe, shops, and the BBC Media City Tour. Another item on the itinerary that one of them wanted to see was the National Football Museum. I believe this museum replaces an older one that was located on the outskirts of Manchester. This is housed in a new building. I do not follow football myself, so I don't know too much about the game and history to go into too much detail here like I would on other subjects, but if you really enjoy the game, then I recommend this. It has several exhibits with various aspects of the game and participation areas to test various skills that the football players use.

The museum has extras to do, so if you want to get your photograph with the trophies or participate in some of the football-related games to see if you could play the game, then I advise you to buy this before you enter. We got a few to use.

The museum is a historical look at the game of football (or 'soccer' as it's known to people who live in the states). The museum shows several areas related to the game. One section looks at the early beginnings of the game and displays some old balls and fan collectibles. On display is a statue of the Great War truce held on Christmas day when the Germans and English soldiers took time out to play a game. One of two footballs used by men at The Battle of the Somme in July 1916 is also on display here.

Another section covers the radio commentary of football, and another looks at the fans and some of the nation's popular clubs. Related to this are the media and press and how it affects the players and games.

Another section of the museum shows the game of football with its global influences, including the World Cup with a selection of trophies, including the 1966 trophy that England won. Throughout are featured collectibles, ticket stubs, posters, and much more. The graphic design aspect appealed the most to me.

Stadiums are also looked at as well as stadium disasters. One of the turnstiles from the old Wembley Stadium, before it was demolished in the early 2000s is on display here.

A large section was dedicated to toys and games available of that had been available, and this also included arcade machines. These vintage machines are in working order, and visitors can play the games and win prizes. Some of them are very unique. One annoying one was just a little puppet "The Jolly Goalie" that kept laughing, and it laughed for around ten minutes straight.

Another interesting section of the museum was the top floor where there is a photo gallery.

Three years ago, I visited Choccywoccydoodah off Carnaby Street and finally got to try hot chocolate and cake in their chocolate cafe. Of course, I had been to the London shop dozens of times to look in the windows at the chocolate creations on offer, especially during the holidays. They create some stunning chocolate creations, including huge cakes, and actually have their own television programme that started in 2010. Their flagship store is located in Brighton, and it was opened in 1994. I visited it in or around the year 2004 and bought a chocolate-popcorn bar, and I also received some for Christmas. It was a big deal in Brighton, so it was inevitable that it would open a branch in London in 2012. I'm a little late writing this post as I expected to return but have noticed that they recently (as of last summer) closed their shop at Carnaby Street and opened a new one at Seven Dials. The photographs of my visit and experience were located in their previous Carnaby Street location.

With their move, that means I will no doubt be checking them out again, but I really thought that since it is the end of the era, I had better post my photographs. I actually did not realise that they had even moved until I went to check them out whilst looking at the holiday lights and saw that they'd gone. I then had to look them up online to see where they'd moved to.

While on this visit, I had a hot chocolate and a slice of cake.  This came with ice cream with some white chocolate drizzled on top.

Their cafe was created upstairs with the shop downstairs filled with the chocolate creations. Below's photograph showcases their Valentine's Day range as I visited the shop in early January a couple of years ago.

Their chocolate is quite nice, but be warned that it is very sweet. I could not eat all of my cake because it was just too sweet, especially paired with the hot chocolate, so part of it went home with me. I am looking forward to checking out their new Seven Dials branch in London. Seven Dials is a favourite area of mine, so I am looking forward to visiting.

Those who love chocolate will need to know a wonderful little gem that I discovered in Brighton. While I am not a huge chocolate consumer, I am picky about my chocolate and enjoy good chocolate every now and again but I won't touch bad chocolate (or chocolate I just dislike). I was pleasantly surprised to discover a chocolate gem selling bespoke chocolates (all made in store) and hot chocolate. The name of the little chocolate shop is "Be Chocolat" by Michel Clement. Michel Clement is a world-leading chocolatier, and his first chocolate shops were in Barcelona and Bali before opening the branch in Brighton.

The chocolate is all made in store, and the byproducts are all ethical without the use of palm oil. The dark chocolate is also vegan, and the chocolate is gluten free. I treated myself to a small box with a selection of the different chocolates that were available in-store. Christmas chocolates were on sale as well as chocolate slabs, and I had a creamy and delicious hot chocolate to take away. 

Be Chocolat by Michel Clement is located on Duke Street in Brighton, near the historical shopping district "The Lanes". It's located not far from the main shopping mall "Churchill Square" in Brighton, so it is the perfect place to visit after having a walk around the shops or visiting "The Lanes".

This is one of the best hot chocolates that I have had, and the chocolate really is a great quality, so I recommend a visit if you find yourself in Brighton. 

Yesterday was January 6, and that day (also known as Ephiphany) marks the official end of the Christmas season and the day where all Christmas decorations should be taken down or left up all year to prevent bad omens. I celebrated the end to the season by going to Bankside to watch "the Lions part" perform their 25th traditional Twelfth Night traditional events and celebrations (I've previously been to their Apple Day at Borough Market 'October Plenty'). These traditions included the Green Man (Holly Man) arriving across the river Thames, Wassailing through Bankside, a Mummer's Play, traditional dancing, and the crowning of the King Bean and Queen Pea. I will explain more in detail about these different traditions below. (Last year, I celebrated Twelfth Night at the Geffrye Museum, but the museum is currently closed for a couple of years due to renovations.)

'Ephiphany' comes from a Greek word that means "manifestation", and in Christain religion, this was written as the day when the wise men arrived to see the baby Jesus and presented him with gifts. Further back in time, this time of the year was celebrated as the Winter Solstice when the days start to get lighter earlier again. The Romans called it "Saturnalia", and they spent the time feasting, exchanging gifts, playing games, and swapping social status. They also decorated the buildings with greenery to welcome the promise of spring and warmer months. The bonfire was important to keep a Yule log alight through the dark winter months. A "Lord of Misrule" was appointed on Twelfth Night to conduct the merry-making. These traditions continued throughout the past years with some evolving into indoor Christmas trees, pine branches, and mistletoe and chocolate Yule logs.

The Twelfth Night was the final day of celebrations before people had to return to work in medieval England. What happened on the night was the "topsy turvy" gender and social status reversals, which was one of the traditions carried over from the Roman Saturnalia. Master and slave would have had rules reversed, but in medieval England, the person who found a pea or a bean would be queen or king for the day. The Twelfth Night also meant playing games, drinking, and feasting. 

The celebrations of Twelfth Night started on Bankside about ten minutes prior to the main event with entertainers dressed as drinking pirates firing up the crowd.

When the time came, part of the group paraded through the street of Bankside to arrive at the crowd. These included the bell-ringers and a symbol of the apple tree. They announced the arrival of the Green Man, known as the Holly Man in winter form. The Green Man is meant to arrive by boat on the Thames, but they have not been permitted to arrive by the river for health and safety reasons for the past couple of years.

The Green Man conducted the Wassails. The first one was for the boat, and the second wassail was for the symbolic apple tree present and being carried.

The tradition of wassailing is a rural one. Wassail is a drink of mulled apple cider or ale, and on the Twelfth Night, a group of people would gather together. They would be led by the king and queen of the wassailing party and sing and put drink amongst the apple trees to promote good health and to keep away the evil spirits. If successful, this would produce good harvests. The wassailing can also be done in the town from house-to-house where people would sing and drink the mulled drink. Today, the tradition of caroling replaces wassailing.

The Green Man drank the drink from a wooden bowl, as per tradition, during the Wassail.

The Green Man is a symbol that pre-dates Christianity and has been adopted by Christianity possibly in earlier days to promote pagan conversions to Christainity. He is almost always depicted as male and can be found in cathedrals. He is depicted with vines and branches making up his head or coming from his head. "The Green Man" is also a popular name for English pubs. He has become a motif, and his symbol essentially means "rebirth". 

After the Green Man performed the boat and apple tree wassails, the event continued to the front of the Globe theatre.

We met the mayor of Southwark, who attended the special Twelfth Night event.

The Globe Wassail was then recited.

After this wassail, the event continued with the Mummer's Play. What is a Mummer's Play? A Mummer's Play is a traditional play, and it essentially involves two characters who participate in a sword dance and sword combat; the loser of this combat is then revived by a doctor character. These plays are usually held on special days, such as Halloween, Bonfire Night, Shrove Tuesday, and Twelfth Night.

The primary characters are King George and the main opponent (sometimes called the Turkish Knight as a country of conflict to the nation), a doctor, Father Christmas, and Beelzebub (devil). The mummers would paint their faces and wear their coats inside out, adorning it with colourful rags. 

Mumming was the most popular in the late 19th and early 20th century. It slowed down after the Great War. There are slight variations of the story based on the time of the year.

The Mummer's Play started off with singing and dancing. I was lucky to have a space in the front to watch considering that each aspect of the event required moving and walking around to a different area on Bankside, so it did not matter how early you visited but you needed to be in the right place at the right time.

After the doctor brought King George back to life, the singing and dancing continued, and Twelfth Night cakes were handed out. Traditionally, these are fruit cakes, but the cakes passed out were modern day sponge cakes. A pea or bean could be found in any of the cakes, and this would make the finder the Queen or King of the day.

A little girl found the pea, and she became the queen and had a straw crown and had to also carry a parsnip. An older man found the bean and was crowned, and he had to carry a cabbage and sprouts.

This was then the beginning of the group wassail through the streets from The Globe theatre, through Borough Market, and to the George Inn pub.

The George Inn is a listed building owned by the National Trust and dates from the medieval ages. This is the only surviving galleried coaching innm and it was frequented by Charles Dickens. This part of London had many inns, and one of those was the Tabard, where Chaucer started to write "The Canterbury Tales"; it was demolished in the late 1800s. The George was rebuilt after a fire in Southwark in 1677. These types of inns with galleries were used for Elizabethan theatre productions, called inn-yard theatre. So, this was a perfect place for the continuation of the Twelfth Night celebrations.

The events continued with the "George Inn Wassail" to celebrate the old building, its patrons and drinking. And several people started to drink and enjoy the festivities.

The George Inn also had a wishing tree. A wishing tree is a tree that has spiritual value, and people place offerings on the tree in the hope that the wish is granted. One type of wishing tree is a tree trunk that has coins hammered into it. Some timbers in pubs have a beam for coins to be hammered into them as offerings too. In addition to hammering coins in, pieces of cloth can also be tied to trees as offerings. This tree had ribbons tied to it.

Morris dancers also started to dance at one end of the inn's yard, and the other end of the yard also had traditional dancing, though I am not sure if it was Morris dancing or not.

And, this concludes with the Twelfth Night celebrations. I did not stay at the George Inn for too long because I had had a long day and I went to the celebrations by myself so wasn't really in the mood for hanging around by myself. I did not event attempt to get a drink as I thought that the pub would be busy. However, I enjoyed this event and learning about the traditional aspects of Twelfth Night and celebrating the day or understanding how to celebrate the day as it had been celebrated in the past. I think that it would be very nice if we continued to celebrate this day as in a lot of places, the event and festivities end after Christmas Day. Imagine if we had a few more days to have parties. Spreading it out may make it less stressful.

It's already January, and I bought several Lush bath bombs and soaps to use up before Christmas, but I found that the time went super-quick and I did not get time for relaxing in the bath during the season. I visited a Lush shop at the end of September. I enjoy visiting the shop to see which products they have brought back for a new year and to check out their new products. Golden Wonder, pear soap, butterbear, snow fairy, and Luxury Christmas pud were a few of the past products that came back this year.

From top left: Cheery Christmas bath bomb; Golden Pear soap; butterbear bath bomb; Luxury Lush Pud bath bomb; Strawberry Santa bath bar; Iceshoggles soap; Naughty Elf bubble bar

I loved the festive Candy Cane Bubble Bar pictured above.

Puddy Holly Bubbleroon is the above product, and I love how festive this one looks. It's a soft butter-bubblebar with a thin layer of ultra-soft body butter in the middle.

The new collection above consisted of the Princess Bath Bomb, Snowman Bath Bomb, and Santa Bath bomb (pictured in both photographs above).

The World's Smallest Disco bath bomb is dark grey with bright pops of colour and one that I was instantly attracted to purchase.

Holey Night Bath Bomb is pictured above.

Ghost in the Dark Soap was one of the Halloween products that I thought was really cute. Lush are certainly getting bigger on Halloween now, especially since they have now expanded into America where Halloween is a big deal. A few years ago, there was only one or two offerings for Halloween, such as the pumpkin soap or 'cinders' bath bomb, which is more of a Bonfire Night treat.

Eyeball Bath Bomb was another one of the Halloween products at Lush for last Halloween.

Located between Kensignton and Notting Hill is a very festive pub called "The Churchill Arms". It is completely covered in Christmas trees and Christmas lights/decorations. It really is a sight to see! Last month, I had a drink here before completing my day out in London. Inside and outside, the pub is festive. They also decorate the pub for spring and summer, so I hope to return.

The pub got its name because it was frequented by Churchill's grandparents. To honour the past prime minister, Churchill-related items are located inside the pub.

Have you ever been to The Churchill Arms?

Before the holidays, I visited Toby Carvery to have their Fesitve Menu. I also had the Toby Carvery Festive Menu a couple of years ago and never posted about it, and I accidentally deleted one of my photographs of my soup starter from this year. Oops. It was a simple mistake as I'd ran out of space on my mobile phone and was clearing out some old photographs and accidentally deleted it before I could stop myself. For those who are not aware, Toby Carvery is a chain of restaurants that offer traditional British roast meals. It is also a stop on some tour groups. On one visit, a bus load of Chinese tourists came in to the restaurant to sample the British traditional food.

The Toby Carvery Festive Menu comes with a meal of two or three courses (a starter and main or main and dessert) and a Christmas cracker with a paper hat, joke, and small plastic 'toy'. 

I had the soup to start both times, and the first time, the bloke had pate.

The main course was a visit to the buffet where visitors can choose the meats that they wish to have from a small selection. The selection alters somewhat but typically includes turkey, roast beef, gammon, and it can also include pork. This is served with a Yorkshire pudding. Vegetables are also seasonal but can include peas, carrots, leeks, sprouts, mashed potato, roast potato, parsnip, cabbage, broccoli, and califlower. Pork crackling, stuffing, and gravy are also available. There are also vegetarian options.

The dessert options on the Festive Menu are limited, but they can include a sundae or a warm dessert. The first time, I had the ice cream.

The second time, I tried the brownie, which was really tasty. This included a dollop of cream and strawberries. 

Overall, I enjoy visiting Toby Carvery for a traditional British roast meal without having to cook several different items and then clean up. The food is always consistent. I think that the Festive Menu is a good touch as well.