That’s what I did for the new book of Faith Martin, Murder never misses. And I am so glad I did since this book became one of my favorites!

What’s the book about
This is the fourteenth book in a crime mystery series written by Faith Martin, featuring the super cool female detective Hillary Greene, taking place in Oxfordshire.

What’s so cool about this detective? First off she’s not a young woman looking to go up the ladder of police ranks and risk everything for a promotion. She’s a fifty year old former DI that’s been around the block a few times. That in itself is a very novel feature for me, since most of the books I’ve read on this genre involve young detectives and usually male ones.

She was forced to early retirement (I don’t know why yet, I am going to be reading the whole series pretty soon though) but she has found a way to come back to the Thames Valley Police Headquarters as a civilian to help the Crime Review Team with the cold cases.

She’s brilliant and shows it even more now after being attacked by her stalker and coming back to work with three cold cases that may or may not be related to the same stalker.

She’s also involved with her younger boss and lives on a boat house. I am not sure it can get any cooler than that!

What I think of the book
If it wasn’t evident on the above paragraph, I have a slight girl-crush on Hillary. I love the fact that even though I haven’t read the previous book in the series, I was able to come together with a picture of Hillary since Faith’s writing – although subtle in the way she’s not overanalyzing every emotion – leaves no question on her character.

I was able to picture her life as a former DI / middle aged woman who has to came to terms with being attacked, being back to work under different circumstances, trying to solve a cold case and to prevent a new one.

This was a nicely paced book and if I had more time I would probably have read it in one sitting, meaning I would have pulled an all nighter. But since I am sleep deprived as it is with Natalia and her waking up to breastfeed all night, I didn’t finish it for a few days. I loved the twist of the story but I can’t tell you more without spoiling it for you.

Another thing I liked has to do with the English slang or expressions if you will. I am used to reading American English and this was a chance of pace for me. I really enjoyed it and the fact that I made some of the characters sound like an English lord was reading the book to me. Yes, yes I am weird, I know.

This book hooked me so bad to the amazing character of Hillary that I have already started reading the first book of the series. I guess now you know what I will be reading during my summer vacation!

Please note this is a revised edition of a book first published as “walk a narrow mile”. 

Author’s bio
Faith Martin has been writing for over 25 years, in four genres and under four different pen names. She was born in Oxford and sets most of her crime novels within sight of the city of dreaming spires. A real nature lover and afficionado of the countryside, descriptions of wildlife and native flora often find their way into her manuscripts. Right now, JOFFE BOOKS are re-issuing the DI Hillary Greene novels in new updated editions! The first 13 books in the series are available now.

Her romance novels, written under the name of Maxine Barry, are now available from Corazon Books. IMPOSTERS In PARADISE, and HEART OF FIRE are both out, and others will very quickly become available in the future.
Her first foray into writing 'spooky' crime, (and written under the pen name of Jessie Daniels) comes out in November 2017. THE LAVENDER LADY CASEFILE is published by Robert Hale, an imprint of Crowood Press.
As Joyce Cato, she writes more classically-inspired 'proper' whodunits. So, if you like an amateur sleuth, plenty of clues and red herrings, plus a baffling murder mystery to solve, these are the books for you.


What are you going to be reading this summer? Any good mysteries you’ve read lately? 

Lots of love

The other though I decided to do a twist on my morning ritual. So I made some almond milk (store bought is cool too, just make sure it’s carrageenan-free), my Indingo Herbs matcha tea, some organic unsweetened cacao and my trusted blender and made a choco-matcha-latte!

Because, really, not all matcha drinks have to be green, right?

Mine had a velvet chocolate color that made me think of drinking liquid chocolate!

You will need:
200ml of almond milk
1 frozen banana
1 full tsp of organic matcha tea
1 full tsp of organic unsweetened cocoa
½ tsp of honey

Put the almond milk and banana in the blender and blend until smooth. Add the matcha tea, the cocoa and the honey and blend for a couple of minutes. 

Serve in a tall glass filled with ice. 

Enjoy your choco-matcha-latte, guilt free since it’s only around 200kcal per serving. The boost you’ll get from the matcha tea and the cocoa will last you the whole day! And talk about that early morning brain fix from the cocoa and the honey! I promise you, this will be your go to drink when you need to wake up fast! 

Some notes:

• Not all matcha teas are created equal. The one I used from Indigo Herbs is of the highest ceremonial grade which means that the Camelia sinensis plant was grown under a shaded reed cover before it was picked and stone ground into powder. Thus the taste is fuller and the antioxidants are intact! It’s high in Vitamins A, C, K, B2 and B6, iron and magnesium too. 
• If you don’t eat anything other organic, please consider drinking organic tea. When it’s not organically grown, the hot water you pour over your tea leafs extracts all the pesticides present in them into your tea infusion. So basically you drink pesticides with a taste of tea! 
• You can leave the honey out altogether or substitute with a plant based sweetener if you are vegan. 

Apart from the liquid sustenance I need something to nibble on though, especially in the evenings where my energy levels sour to the ground after running around with Natalia all day.

During wintertime I like to make my power bites but for summer I needed something raw. We love dates as a natural sweetener and I have been enjoying the benefits of pumpkin seeds too with my yogurt. After some experimenting I came up with this recipe which I feel very strongly will be what will save me from eating store bought chocolates again!

This sugar free, vegan and raw choco bites taste exactly like bounty bars only better! 

You'll need (makes 20 balls):

12 dates pitted

60g almonds

3 tbsp Indigo Herbs organic virgin Coconut oil

3 tbsp of pumpkin seeds

2 tbsp of unsweetened organic shredded coconut

2 tbsp of unsweetened organic cocoa

Cut the dates into quarters and place them in the food processor. Add the almonds, the pumpkin seeds and the coconut oil and blend until you get a paste. Add the cocoa and the shredded coconut and combine.

You will have a somewhat oily paste. With your hands turn it into small balls and roll them on some shredded coconut to decorate.

Place them in the fridge for a couple of hours to set.

Enjoy them! They are also guild free at around 70 kcal each ball, especially if you think that 30g of  dark chocolate is 164kcal!


You will need to exercise some moderation though cause these babies can go down really easy!!! What I like most about them is that they are super healthy, super tastefull and super fast to make!

Some notes:

• Again I urge you to choose organic materials for these bites, they make all the difference! 
• You can substitute the pumpkin seeds with sunflower seeds or use half of each.
• Since I am making my own almond milk, I was left with some almond paste and tried to make these with that paste. Although they didn't taste much different, I should have dried the paste first because it didn't mix well with the oil. But I am pretty sure if you put the paste in the oven for some minutes to take the excess water out, they would work fine!

You can try out the Organic Matcha Tea and the Organic Virgin Coconut Oil from Indigo Herbs, for yourselves! Enter the giveaway below for a chance to win them!
The giveaway is open to all Europe countries and it will run until the 7th of August. The winner will be contacted via email so please use an account you see often.
Best of luck!


Do you like matcha tea? Have you ever tried it with cocoa?

Lots of love

Hello dalrings!

I need to come out and say it: I love eBooks! Literally I adore them! Exactly as much as I adore paper books! Yes, you’ve read that right! I love eBooks just as much as I like regular printed books! 

1. They are books, dah!

It’s common sense really! An eBook, meaning an electronic book is in fact a book! It has pages, it has text, it has heroes and heroines, it has a cover page and a last page. You can loose yourself in an eBook just as well as you can in a regular book. The story in an eBook is not different from the story of the same book in printed form. Shocking I now! 

2. They are cheap(er) 

Usually eBooks are cheaper than the printed book due to lack of printing and material costs. If you read one book per year that will not save you much I know. But if you read 10 books a month, the difference in cost is one to consider. 

Best part? There are A LOT of totally FREE eBooks out there. Granted that’s sometimes a marketing strategy to get you hooked up on a series and make you buy the next book but a) who cares bring me free books and shut up and b) there are also whole series of free books! 

Also there are many great bargains and sales that come as low as $0.99 for a book! 

3. I can take them with me everywhere 

I only need my smart phone and some battery time to read anywhere and everywhere! You can download Amazon Kindle for free and read on your phone without an e-reader or a tablet. There are many apps out there that work great! My favorites apart from Kindle are the Cool reader and the PocketBook Reader which supports Adobe DRM. 

If you use your phone all day like most of us do, you can have a book with you at all times. If you worry about the radiation, take a page of my book (pun intended) and turn your phone to flight mode. 

Hello darlings!

I have always loved nature and apart from the forests and the mountains I had a natural curiosity for geology. No wonder I got married to a geologist! We've traveled a lot and never miss a chance to visit caves, lakes and gorges! I love to listen to him explain all about the formations and forces and any geology trivia comes out of his mouth! 

We haven't been away for some time due to the logistics involved with bringing a two year old into a cave but I wanted to lay the path for our next trips. So I called on my travel blogger friends to share their trips and write a post about the Geological wonders of Europe.

Enjoy!

Samaria Gorge, Crete, Greece
by yours truly

There are numerous geological wonders in Greece. Me and Nick have set out to visit them all in our life times! If you ask me about the one I love most the answer is simple: Samaria Gorge in Crete, my home island. It's one of the most remarkable trekking paths (actually part of the famous E4 European path) and it's a journey in itself.
I've been there numerous times with different people but the one I went with Nick was the most interesting one (and not because of the way he made fun of me). He talked for hours since the path is very long (like 16kms long) and we had all the time in the world, about all the geological phenomena that took place during the eons in order for the gorge to form.

I've learned all about the fact that it was once a flat place or a basin that was forced upwards from the moving plates of Africa. A fault was created and the water was allowed to run through it opening up the gorge with the passing of time. All along the upward forces kept moving the gorge's walls higher and higher to form the gorge that's there today.
Enjoy it with a reusable bottle of water you can fill from numerous stops down your way and a good pair of trekking shoes, like the ones I am wearing in this photo where I pretend to be one of the local goats.

By Caroline from packthesuitcases

Fjords are the absolute must-see spectacles in Norway - and for good reason. They're not only interesting geological phenomena, they're also stunningly beautiful. 

The fjords may look like calm lakes, but they're actually saltwater arms of the sea. They were shaped from glaciation below sea level and carved their way through the land over millions of years, their paths reaching and winding inland. The depth of the water in the fjords means that you can get very close to the side of their towering cliffs - so close that you can even stand on the deck of a boat and fill a glass from the waterfalls! The depth also allows large ships to pass through, so tourists can experience the fjords' beauty right up close.

The Norwegian fjords have quite a mild climate and are usually ice-free. You can even spot seals and porpoises living and playing in some areas. 

When you're sailing through a fjord, you will see some incredibly dramatic and memorable landscapes. The stillness of the water is only broken by the waterfalls pouring down from lush green forests above. Picturesque villages line the way, full of pretty Scandinavian houses and old working farms that would use the fjords to transport their produce. 

Located in the middle of the Atlantic, the chain of Portuguese islands known as the Azores is full of compelling geologic features. The islands themselves are volcanic and are home to a number of active and extinct volcanoes, including one whose crater now holds a famed twin lake. But perhaps one of the most interesting features of the islands is found at Furnas, the name of a village, a lake, and a hot spring. All throughout the village, steam pours up from the earth and fills the air with a distinct sulfuric smell.

You can access the Jurassic Coast trails from Exmouth, Sidmouth, Lyme Regis and Weymouth on the southwestern peninsula in England. It’s easy enough to base yourself in a town and do sections of the trail as a day hike, or you an contract with a luggage portage service and through hike the whole coastline. 

Hello darlings!

If you’ve read the second part of my post about 5 more steps to a safe and natural baby environment you might remember I promised you a crochet pattern for the teether I made for Natalia. 

Well the pattern is here at last and I can’t wait for you to make it and let me know what you think.


My wish is that it will help your baby with teething pain which is no joke at all! Natalia can not sleep when she is teething (and guess who else doesn’t sleep along with her?) and these teethers really helped her, at least during the day. (During the night I found that the amber necklace from Baltic Amber really does work.) 

The pattern can be found below on our last issue of our Crafting and Cooking C2 magazine which you can read below.

The summer issue of our magazine is filled with summer breeze and cool creations for you to replicate. You can make jewelry for the beach, boats decorations for your house and cook healthy and delicious meals. 

Find out how to make your own home spa and relax and how to embellish your old flip flops to something cute and new! 

As for my pattern, it’s really easy to do. There is a trick that saved me a lot of heartache because I didn’t want to use any stuffing for this teether. It’s not the same as my amigurumi monsters. Natalia was free to chew on the monsters too, but it was not the same as this teether that was made specifically for her to chew on. 

I’ve had some parents ask me about the possibility of the kid ending up eating a small amount of fibers from the yarn. I didn’t think of it as a problem. The first reason was because I chose a yarn with an eco-text certification. That really put my mind to ease.

And secondly I prefer that to the possibility of her ingesting small amounts of silicone or any other type of plastic. But that’s up to you as a parent. You should always do your research and not take my word for it! 

Anyway, I am signing off for now, hope you will enjoy our new issue and get creative this summer!

Hello darlings!

My history with birthday cakes and following recipes from the internet is well known for those of you who’ve been reading this little blog for some time. How can you forget the four lessons learned from baking cakes? I know I haven’t!

So imagine having to bake a birthday cake that’s also sugar free, almost unprocessed and with organic ingredients. Do you feel sorry for me yet?