Vesna Armstrong Photography

"Peace on earth will come to stay, when we live Christmas every day." ~ Helen Steiner Rice ~

  "May the longest night and the shortest day Bring rest to your mind and soul, I pray. May you find guidance and may you find peace, As the cycle of light will slowly increase. Embrace the magic that the darkness bears, Breath deep in the chill and shift in the air. May you always be blessed with the light from within, And may well-being be yours as the new cycle begins."

  Happiness is living near a park where there are miraculously beautiful winter mornings.  Thursday, 16 Dec Friday 17th Dec 

  Since, sadly, there is no Christmas market this year in Leeds, the town I live in, I was very pleased to learn there is one taking place in York, one of my favourite cities and most certainly one of the most beautiful towns in the UK and beyond. I hadn't been there for quite a while and was very excited to walk around the town's old, historic and charming streets festooned with Christmas lights and decorations. There is a lot of Christmas related events happening there at the moment, too, and the city very much exudes the magic of the season.   

   Autumn colours this month have been stunning in my local park, and I have enjoyed immensely my morning walks with the doggie. Here are my favourite captures of what is the best and now the last of this year's autumn.

  Last weekend I stayed in my beloved Haworth, for what could be the last time till spring. Yes, I will be going back soon, of course, but probably just for a day visit until days get longer again. Apart from a couple of brief sunny spells it was a very wet weekend, which prevented me from venturing out on the moors, but I still had a good and relaxing time staying in the village.  It was a Halloween weekend. I personally don't care much about Halloween; what interests me a lot more is Samhain, a pagan Earth festival that usually starts on the 31st October. Samhain marks the end of harvest season and the beginning of winter according to the Celtic calendar. For me winter does start in November when all the autumn colours slowly disappear, the trees become bare, the nights are drawing in, and there is that wintry chill in the air.  This short video is about the change in seasons - the transition from autumn to winter.     

Oakwell Hall is one of the nearest Brontë related places to my home. It is also one of my favourite ones due to the fact there is so much to enjoy around it; the fascinating historic manor house, beautiful gardens and over a 100 acres of country park, all coupled with the fact that Charlotte Brontë also enjoyed this place in her life time.  Oakwell Hall was built in the 16th century by the Batt family, and today it is a living museum featuring a home as it was to the Batt family at the end of the 17th century. In the 19th century the Hall used to be a boarding school for girls run by various families. Charlotte Brontë, the celebrated Victorian novelist, knew one of the Cockill girls who lived at the Hall from 1830 - 1865 and whose mother ran it as a girls' boarding school. Charlotte's best friend Ellen Nussey lived in the same village, Birstall, and it is believed that the two friends visited the Hall together in 1830s.  Charlotte was so inspired by Oakwell Hall that she featu...