This week we have been celebrating the Autumn Equinox. I’ve always found autumn to be the most beautiful of all the seasons. The colours are wonderful, and the mornings are crisp. As the nights begin to draw in the promise of Christmas and all its magic fills my thoughts. It is a special time of year. As a child I would love to spend long Sunday afternoons leaf kicking and collecting conkers, coming home to a family meal followed by hot chocolate. I would snuggle under a blanket and drink it slowly, making it last.

I love that we celebrate so much here at Westhill Park, dates that would have previously just passed me by are now special, it’s a great reminder of just how wonderful life is.

Yesterday we saw in the start of autumn with hot chocolate and S’mores. I’m going to come clean; I didn’t know what a S’more was. The team here did give us a brief history. They are very popular in the USA and date back to at least the early 1900s. A S’more, an abbreviation of Some More, started life as a campfire snack comprising of biscuit, marshmallow and chocolate all melted together, what’s not to like about that?

We had a wonderful evening, firstly making the S’mores. We crushed biscuits, we chopped the chocolate and topped with marshmallow, then, not having access to a campfire, we placed them in the oven. While they baked, we swapped stories about our experiences of girl guides and boy scouts, of camping with our families and of bonfire nights and fireworks.

The team brewed up a saucepan of decadent hot chocolate, they topped it with whipped cream and marshmallows, served up the s’mores on pretty tray and we sat in full view of the sky bar window watching the summer sun set for the final time. Pure bliss.