Best Ways to Embrace the Cosy Season

The cosy season is upon us, the nights are getting longer, the days are shorter and if you can't spend so much time outdoors, it's the best time to start declaring your love of houseplants.  Houseplants bring the outdoors indoors and earlier in the year while I was planning my urban haven I declared that by the time it got to this winter I would have a house full of plants to try and help me with seasonal affective disorder.

Every year in the last 5 years I've done small things to help with SAD, I've bought a lightbox, I've continually taken a high dose of vitamin D3, I've embraced all things hygge and now, I've got my own indoor garden for the days when I can't embrace the outdoors.  I don't particularly care about the varieties of houseplant, I just buy the ones I like and really, in a lot of ways, houseplants are a gentle way of gardening, you buy the plant, you buy the pot and then you take it home and put it where you want it.  

I do talk to my plants but you'd expect that wouldn't you, you might think I'm slightly eccentric but I'm also pretty sure that there's scientific evidence that if you're nice to your plants then they will grow for you.  I also know that they improve the air quality and they're so much prettier than buying an air purifier.

I've also, for the last few years, worked really hard at making my living room the cosiest place on earth, yes, the walls and the ceiling could do with a paint, it's definitely not Mrs Hinch's house and it's a little rough around the edges but to me it's the perfect nest to live in during the cosy season.  I love twinkly lights, cushions, throws, second-hand furniture, and of course, lots and lots of plants plus candles, wax melts and reed diffusers.  I genuinely love the space that I've curated and whilst I used to dread the knock of the door (I once went for 7 years without letting someone in my house) now I openly embrace friends coming over and once a year, when planning Christmas, I open my house to as many of my close friends as I can squeeze through the door at my annual Christmas party.

I love shopping at Homesense and Ikea as well as charity shops and garden centres, I think if you put all of those stores together and jumble them all up, you come out with my style somewhere in there.  I like colour and patterns and I'm not scared to mix them up, oh and of course, I love, love, love, photos on the wall.

I love dark nights and warm blankets even though I hate the cold dark days of winter which is why I curated my own adult-sized nest, now add in some good friends and a sparkly glass of Champagne and you will find me in Cosy Season heaven.