Spring is slowly coming back, at last…

We have sunshine again! It’s actually warm enough that I don’t need a thick winter coat today! Joy and blessings be upon your houses as a result!

(I think the sudden influx of Vitamin D may be getting to me. I don’t care. It’s even almost warm!)

This morning I woke up early, since my husband left to go to the airport. (He’s going to the South of France, where it will no doubt be much warmer and sunnier, but I no longer care, because it’s almost acceptable here, for once! And he’s going to have to work, so he won’t see so much of the sunshine anyway…) So, I’ve had breakfast, put the dishwasher on, and been for a walk round the park. I may even be bold and exploratory and go to Tervuren this afternoon, because they have a bigger park. Or I may just sit on the balcony with a book and a coffee and read in the sunshine – today, the world is my oyster.

Here are some park photos, to show the spring is coming. (They are also the product of me learning how to automate the resizing process in photoshop, which makes this whole uploading-pictures-to-blog thing a lot easier to do!)

Is the weather nice where you are? I hope winter’s abandoning you all, too!

Scharnaval 2014 – carnival in Schaerbeek

This weekend, our commune had its annual carnival – a tradition that has apparently been going on since 1903, with short breaks for periods of war. It had floats, dancers, children in costumes, unicorns, waffle-eating and cigarette-smoking bears, and beer. And confetti. And presents for the audience.

It was really rather good.

At Pride parades I’ve been to, the presents for the audience thrown out from floats tend to be condoms. This parade featured sweets and (somewhat more oddly) calenders and diaries. I got a very nice red weekly diary to help me plan my life, and a bunch of sweets; what more could one ask for?

Also slightly odd to foreign me was the amount of people taking part in the parade who were smoking and drinking beer. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a similar event in the UK (I don’t even know if we have similar events in the UK, truth be told), but I feel sure that people co-opted to take part in a parade like this wouldn’t be allowed to smoke and drink during a supposedly children-focused event like this. Symbolised most clearly by a somewhat unhappy looking grown-up bear, holding his little daughter’s hand, smoking his way through the parade stop I was standing at. It was cold and I totally sympathised with the guy! The numerous floats finishing up the parade drinking beer were also a surprise (except for the pub-themed float – also unlikely in the UK – where a man in a dress was repeatedly throwing a giant stuffed dog under the wheels of his float while drinking beer; that seemed almost reasonable, in the circumstances…) but everyone seemed happy and none of the children watching seemed particularly traumatised!

A selection of photos follows…

And a couple of bonus sunset photos, because we had a particularly nice sunset the other day:

Spring has definitely sprung

It got off to a bit of a shaky start, but spring has definitely arrived in Brussels. Flowers are growing bigger and brighter by the day, the sun is shining, and the sky is blue. Brussels looks much nicer in the spring, and people are popping up all over green spaces and parks. (A little bit like worms after rain. But more brightly dressed and less wriggly. Most of the time.)

Today I walked around our local park, and you can see how much more things have grown compared to the last set of photos I took just a couple of weeks ago!

And then we went into town for a quick drink and lunch at Zebra bar, in St Gery.

And walked home, via this spring-filled garden in front of one of Brussels’ many spectacular churches:

I am now being super-domestic and roasting a chicken. A whole chicken, with vegetables and home-made gravy and everything. (Keep your fingers crossed that I don’t accidentally poison us all. Cooking isn’t my best thing – the enthusiasm is there, but actual skill is sort of lacking. Since I don’t let that stop me anywhere else, though, I see no reason not to experiment at home…)

Spring in Brussels!

Over the last couple of weeks, spring has slowly but surely been making its presence felt. (Well, up until this morning, anyway, when it was almost arctic – at least the afternoon improved…) It is glorious, and I am going to love Brussels in the summer time, I can just tell.

Here are some photos from a couple of weeks ago, just as winter was beginning to turn into spring. The flowers are even more alive now, and if the weather holds this weekend, a fresh set of pretty pictures will make its way blogwards!