Seeing The Christmas Lights 2023

I haven't really been posting much on my blog this year, due to focusing on my job and sorting out my mental health. However, if there's one thing I would never forget to post about, it's my experience seeing the London Christmas lights each year.

I uploaded this year's blog post a bit later than I usually do. Usually, I tend to upload it before Christmas Eve, but due to having so many things to sort out beforehand, such as getting cards and gifts for relatives and sorting out visits to relatives, I had to upload it after Christmas Day instead. Fortunately, I have managed to upload it on New Year's Eve, which I myself feel is a decent time to put it up on.

This year's trip took place on the 14th December - I can tell because the TV special Dynamo is Dead was airing that night and the train stations were showing adverts featuring a timer for how many hours were left before he was buried alive. When I first entered London, it was at five hours left. Those I will not show any photos of, as they didn't relate with the Christmas lights at all, and besides, why would I take photos of them anyway?

Random anecdotes aside, the first Christmassy place we passed was the Ritz hotel. They always have the nice Christmas wreaths hanging down with the baubles on.

Along the way, we got to see this display on Bond Street, which has been there before but always looks magnificent.

Along with these decorations on Burlington Arcade.

Fortnum & Mason's had their elaborate window displays as always. For starters, they showed the year on the side of their building as usual.

As for what was inside the windows on the bottom floor, they really won me over.

They even featured a miniature version of their shop in the shop windows.

The church had their Christmas tree up again, so of course I had to take a photo of it.

As usual, we stopped in Waterstone's to have our afternoon festive feast. I had my hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows as usual, but this time the treats we had were a cinnamon bun and a toffee apple blondie. They were absolutely delicious and I wish that the toffee apple blondie was offered throughout the whole year rather than only Christmas due to how much I loved it.

Once we'd finished our food and drinks, we looked round the bookshop to have a look at the books and decorations. These are some of my favourite decorations.

After our time in Waterstone's, we headed on down Piccadilly Street and then Regent Street, which have the same angel decorations as usual. Here's a photo of the Regent Street one.

There were some really good shop window displays as well. This one was for Barbour, who did the Paddington-themed one last year, only this time it was themed on Shaun the Sheep. Notice the sheep-themed pun they used in the window based on their name.

And here's another one for another shop featuring a gingerbread man, who somewhat reminds me of the one from Shrek.

On the way to Carnaby Street, we went through the Soho area, meaning that we got to see the Christmas lights designed by children again. I always love seeing these, and I love the fact that my own hometown does the same thing as well so I can see them anytime I like. Here's one featuring a snowman.

Carnaby Street's theme this year was space. This one was absolutely gorgeous, as Carnaby Street displays usually are. Here are some highlights.

And here's Saturn, arguably the centrepiece of the display.

Conduit Street still had its holly decorations from last year. We didn't end up going down that street, but I was able to get a photo of them.

On the same street I was waiting on while taking a picture of the Conduit Street lights was this decoration here, which I assume was part of Regent Street.

Oxford Street had the same star decorations from last year. These looked particularly pretty when against the black night sky.

We managed to pass by John Lewis on Oxford Street, at which point we realised that the front of it was decorated with the singing venus fly trap Snappy from their 2023 Christmas advert.

I get a little bit cynical about British Christmas adverts these days, as they tend to essentially be short films with nothing to do with what the company is actually selling except for their name popping up at the end, but it was such a lovely surprise to see that. We also saw the advert being played in the shop windows and I am not afraid to say that my heart melted when I watched it. Definitely check it out while you can. As a bonus, here's a model of Snappy in one of the shop windows.

Just for fun, I'm going to upload a picture I took later in the month of another model of Snappy that was at Kew Gardens as part of their own Christmas lights trail.

One of the last window displays we saw was the one for Selfridge's. I missed the display last year due to a lack of time, but I did hear that it wasn't up to their usual standards. This one however was amazing and easily one of their best displays of all time. It was themed on a show being put on by different representatives of Christmas. Here are some of the stars who performed in the windows, with the curtains opening and closing on certain occasions.

Culminating in Santa waving to the audience next to one of the fanciest cars you could possibly imagine.

On the side of Selfridge's (I don't remember if this was a smaller display they had or part of another shop) were these vintage-style cutout displays, which really made you feel like you were looking back on a Georgian, Victorian or Edwardian Christmas with a magical touch to it.

Our final stop was Waterloo station. This year, the tree was themed on the Kate Spade brand and shaped like green boxes stacked on top of one another. But what really won me over were the little toy trains whizzing round the tracks around it, which you can just see in this photo if you look closely enough (the close-up shots I took came out blurry due to the movement).

Overall, a really wonderful Christmas experience. And I wasn't even that bothered by the trains running late home that night due to how much I enjoyed seeing the lights.

I hope everyone has had a happy Christmas and enjoys the new year, whatever it offers us. As for myself, the new year starts with celebrating my dad's birthday followed by making the most of the Christmas season until the 6th January. Either way, see you all next year and hopefully I'm able to upload some more blog posts in the process! :D

Suburban Spring Photos

Usually, May Day is something associated with the countryside. You tend to think of country fairs complete with maypole dancing, Morris dancing and the May Queen pageant. You rarely think about spring in the city or town suburbs, mainly because the first thing that comes to mind are the tall concrete buildings.

I'm lucky to live in the suburbs. It's always nice to look round the back roads and see the trees and flowers that are there. It also means that I live between the city and the countryside, so it's essentially the best of both worlds.

To celebrate May Day, here are some photos I took during the spring in the suburbs where I live. I am a massive photo nut - ever since I managed to get a phone with a camera on it, I have never stopped using it. I especially wanted to capture what springtime is like in my area with the flowers and other plants.

I'm using the close-up photos from my phone here. Not only is this so I don't give away the locations for the sake of privacy, but also to highlight the beauty of nature. However, I will leave little aspects of the urban area in some of the photos if I feel it lends a good contrast to the natural aesthetic of the plants.

  

It's only fitting that crocuses, a flower very often associated with spring, should be the first flowers to appear in my photos here. These were found near benches in one of my local parks, which happens to be next to a bypass. I left part of one of the benches nearby in the last photo. There were some cigarettes nearby unfortunately, but I made sure not to include them.

 

 

Daffodils are another major spring flower, and these ones were planted in circles around tree poles in the park. They're right next to a play park area, and you can see the fence in the last photo.

I also took a picture of some magnolia flowers in the same park. Some of the flowers have already opened up while the others are still closed.

 

There was a day I went out and for some reason a lot of worms were on the ground. I took a few close-ups of them - these are just a few of the photos and I like the different lengths and widths they have. I've always been a big fan of mini-beasts and worms are just some of my favourites - they have a pretty cool appearance and they're good for helping out the environment, especially when it comes to the soil.

There is a local National Trust place I often go to on Sundays, which happens to be in a town area with a train station nearby. There are plenty of birds there, including this heron that I took a photo of. I had to crop some of the photo, but I kept part of the car park in because I felt it showed a nice contrast between the natural world and the urban world.

On Easter Sunday, I went for a walk round the back roads and took some photos of the flowers. Cherry blossoms are always a favourite of mine - I love the pink and white colours they come in, but also the symbolism associated with them.

Magnolias have a similar vibe to cherry blossoms. These ones were going over but they still had the bright pink hues.

This was a flower in a box next to a car park near a high street, done as part of a wild flower project. I don't know if the flower was going over or not, but I loved the wispy edges on the petals.

I think this flower from the same box was a tulip that had split open. I still think flowers look good when they go over - it's interesting to compare what they look like normally and what they look like in this state.

In another one of the boxes was this daffodil. This was one of the few daffodil close-ups I was able to get that didn't involve the flower going over.

 

And of course I had to take these photos of more cherry blossom trees up close. This time, I really made sure to take close-ups of the flowers themselves.

Bluebells are one of my favourite flowers to see in the springtime and this is a small patch of them in the wooded part of one of the local parks. I'm not sure what type they are - I think they're English, but they could also be a hybrid between English and Spanish.

This is a picture of King Alfred's Cake, a fungus that grows on trees. These fungi were in our local park and though fungi aren't normally associated with spring, they look pretty cool.

This is a picture of a daisy that I took on the 28th April. It seems basic and simple, but I do like how it stands out against the green grass and how it looks up close.

Ultimately, what I find interesting about spring time in the urban areas is that it is still possible to signs of nature in them. Besides the National Trust property and the local parks, there are the trees on the roads and the flower boxes in the more city-like areas. It's quite likely why spring is my favourite season of all time. :)