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MARY ANN MOSS

a brand new postcard from the brand new year!

that’s a 1971 photo of  ma & pa moss and i.  none of us remember who the other kid is.  i wonder what became of that giant punchbowl.

happy new year dear people who swing by here regularly in your great orbits around the vast interwebs!  i am right here where you left me unpeeling the very first layer of the very first day of the shiny new year.

yesterday i was tromping around my favorite garden taking in the quiet glory of the aloe blossoms.  oh they are splendid!

i finished 2 fantastic books recently that were my best reads of 2017.

unputdownable.  if you can even say that about an audio book.  i can.

now i’m deep into the english countryside of the shell seekers.  because sometimes i find myself craving a book where people live in thatched cottages and visit cornwall and have giant oil paintings hung on their walls and visit spanish islands and sit by fires on rainy days and take in orphans and knit sweaters and make bubbling pots of stew.  things like that.  one simply cannot spend all of their time reading listening to great literature.

the new year is spooled out in front of me.  before i book passage on the orient express or hop a cargo ship for the south seas i shall sit here in moss cottage and do nothing.  because doing nothing, and a lot of it, is one of my most cherished pastimes.

hope you’re tucked in somewhere cozy doing something GOOD.  xo

p.s.  here’s a video i found from 2004 featuring mama moss…

mom’s holy water 8:2004

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Comments

  1. Fingers have thawed a bit, dear Mary Ann, so I can finally type Happy New Year greetings for you and your family.
    Peace, Laughter and Inspiration all year through.

    ~sassa

  2. I have another book suggestion: “Shake Down the Stars” by Frances Donnelly. Have read this one several times! There’s a sequel but I don’t think it’s nearly as good.

  3. Thank you for all the beautiful warm weather pictures. We are in the middle of a blizzard here in New York and tomorrow’s high is supposed to be ZERO degrees. I am half done with The History of Love and I am loving it. I also really enjoyed The Nightingale. I love the photo of you and your parents. I have a punch bowl just like the one in the photo; it was handed down from my mother-in-law and we use it every Christmas Eve. Happy New Year!

  4. thank you so much for those flowers bursting with sunshine….its *&^% freezing here on the east coast. and those brave souls along the NE coastline are going to have a whopper of a cyclone of snow/sleet/ice. I LOVED all the books by R. Pilcher. I do think her son wrote a book, or perhaps finished one of hers. Naturally some are better than others, but all are special. Anthony Doerr’s book was a must read for us since we visited NORMANDY for a week April, 2017. The other will be placed on reserve at our public library. I loved the above comment about Spain in winter…I bet it is a great escape, especially the SW portion of the country. Happy New Year and enjoy the remaining holiday vacation days.

    • hi holly,

      i’m sure sorry about that dreadful arctic blast that’s freezing your tuckus! it must be good reading weather though, right? as long as you don’t have to drive. oy! happy new year to you too!

      • many thanks MaryAnn, oh, we are hunkered down with many library books….some for our June travels….some for fun fiction and embroidery! and sewing quilt blocks on the trusty Bernina which survives in the cold very happily

        new to me mystery series: the Bruno series by Martin Walker in the Dordogne region of France

  5. Love, love, loved your posts about Montecito. I am in the same boat – searching the globe for a retirement place so I am using you and your travels for my own research as well! I love your criteria list – I need to make one for myself. Currently I am yearning to get out of sweaty Florida and settle in the mountains of Western North Carolina, but perhaps I should take a good hard look at the West Coast, thanks to all your amazing intel! I got so tickled over your mom’s holy water video – I am also a product of being “sprinkled” at every occasion. My late husband had bottles of holy water from all over the world that I often use to remind me that I am blessed! Thanks as always for your beautiful blog – it is the highlight of my morning coffee time!

    • lorraine i just saw something on the news about people’s swimming pools freezing down in florida. brrrr..
      aww those bottles of holy water..how dear. mama moss would have approved very highly in that endeavor!

  6. Mary Ann! My great-grandmother, “Mama Curtie” as she was affectionately known, had that exact same punch bowl and tray–ancient pressed glass. I’ve petitioned my mother and grandmother to see if they can remember any details on where it was purchased. My mother still has the original tray–sadly Curtie’s original bowl was broken by an amateur hostess and a rogue ice-ring. What memories. 🙂

      • I actually am missing the whole polar vortex thing–in LA working for a few days. I hope things are thawed out by the time I get back!!

  7. MaryAnn, If you liked those two you will also love The Chilbury Women’s Choir by Jennifer Ryan and The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan.

  8. Happy New Year to you Ms. Moss. I delight in your blog. Thanks for sharing your reading material. I have a stack to read, always, by the side of my bed. Just finishing “The Blue Zones Project,” which details several areas around the world where a high percentage of people, both men and women live to be over 100. Non-fiction.

  9. Sweet Mama! And All the Light We Cannot See—holy moses. That was unputdownable. Gosh so good. GOOD!

  10. RP is my favorite author ~ Almost as good as “Shell Seekers” is her “Coming Home”!! Someone above described her books as “comfort food” ~ AMEN to that!

    Enjoy ~

      • She’s my favorite too but I recommend you read “September” first before “Coming Home”, which was her last book. Both of those are set in Scotland. Rosamunde also has about 12 more books but you’ll need to actually read those because they are shorter you can’t get them unabridged in audiobooks. Enjoy!!!!

  11. Love the pic of your Mom and Dad in the kitchen Your Dad is holding salt & pepper in the Tupperware containers. Your Mom and holy water – my Mom had her holy water is a spritzer. Easier to bless us even thou we were sometimes running out the door. Spray would always reach us…

  12. The Shell Seekers is one of my all-time favorite, comfort books! Please let us know how you liked it.
    Happy New Year!

  13. Ma Moss is a keeper! Loved the video. Shell Seekers is such a wonderful book…enjoy!

  14. I used to love The Shell Seekers! For all the same reasons. Could use a dose of that kind of nostalgia myself right now.

    Are you a podcast listener? Would love to know your top recommendations if so.

    Happy New Year!

    • faith dahling, i don’t listen to podcasts, but i am addicted to watching people who live in vans and rvs on youtube. a habit i can’t recommend. ahem.

  17. A very happy new year to you from the Artic, oh no, forgot I live in Ct. where it dropped to zero last night.

    Anyway, thank you for the beautiful photos and your adventurous sense of fun

  19. Thank god you don’t always read great literature – I can more easily relate now. Whew! Today is my last day in Barcelona and my first look at the Sagrada Familia in person! I’m excited and sad all at the same time. Whew again. That is all – carry on!

      • No pix posting as yet – too tired to figure stuff out when I finally collapse! Spain IS fabulous in Winter. So far – like the Costa del Sol (Nerja) the best – then Granada – then today the Sagrada Familia – breathtaking, moving, inspiring and the art oh the art!

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