Mulled Wine - One For The Ma's & Pa's

“Love like rain, can nourish from above, drenching couples with a soaking joy. But sometimes under the angry heat of life, love dries on the surface and must nourish from below, tending to its roots keeping itself alive.” 
- Paulo Coelho

Rain falls outside our kitchen window. Soft music plays in the background and I get lost in the lyrics. I can hear giggles and conversations in the next room, my two loves enjoying an afternoon inside. As I cut lemons and grind the peel I remember a time when there were just two in our small home, it feels like so many moons ago.

Our life has been enriched by Audrey in only the way a child can, there is more laughter and adventure, there is chaos and madness and there is love like no other. We enjoy our time as a family and cherish the days we spend as three but there must be time for our relationship to blossom and grow, just as our frog does. We have been trying to find small moments of bliss in the everyday (a post that will be up later in the week) and making time to talk and encourage one another. Life can sometimes take it out of you, especially with a small child and help so far from home, it becomes easy to forget to nourish the relationship that started it all. Last night Luke and I put Audrey to bed early, we sat on the lounge with our mulled wine and cheese platter and we talked. Nothing special was said and yet every word was special because it was said with love and laughter...

Mulled Wine:
80g ground raw sugar
250g water
20g freshly squeezed lemon juice (and I added some rind)
2 cinnamon quills
10 cloves
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1 bottle red wine (no need to spend any more then $10)

- Place sugar, water, lemon juice and rind, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg and heat for 5 minutes.
- Add wine and cook for 7 minutes.
- Serve hot!

* Variation: for spicy mulled wine add 1/4 tsp chilli powder in step one.