Monday 6th April 2015

No Easter message this year. Except to say that this Easter has been more Easter-like than usual with the right weather and flowers. I dusted and vac-ed the Gay Mother’s public rooms after Church and laid lunch in the dining room with some silver and primroses. Of course, there’s no Aunt Smidge, so we Easter alone. We fought it with flowers, heirlooms and the Gay Mother decided upon a Claudia Roden recipe where you insert herbs under the skin of the lamb’s leg. Not as easy as it sounds. Lovage, majarom, thyme and rosemary. The Gay Mother had them all in her garden. Just imagine – at 91 completely re-thinking the Easter lamb!  It was a great success. Challenging but great. Then we rested, then we gardened until 8pm. The Gay Mother was dead against ‘Poldark’ but I insisted and she was less against by the end. Lovely views of Cornwall and a bit of a story was the verdict. She’d ordered smoked trout to be sent by post from that place in Kent – Whitstable,that’s it! – to have with ‘Poldark’.

Today I’ve finally made my Easter cake although no crystalised violets to be had – ‘But they’re an Easter Essential,’ I shrieked in the aisles. Then Aunt Lavinia and Cousin Lavinia said, ‘Why not use real violets?’ Miracle. So I will. An Easter cake, by the way, is a Vic Sponge with orange juice inserted into the mixture and orange icing (therefore primose yellow for Easter) decorated with crystalised violets. Not a Bake-off winner, but a classic.