For Winter 2017, we've redesigned our boxes to include rich red edging and sprigs of holly...making both the Large Candle and the Extra Large 3 Wick Candle the perfect gift for a loved one.
With notes of cinnamon, clove and orange, this really is Christmas in a candle. But unlike other seasonal candles, Field Day Winter fragrance is not cloying in any way. Customers have told us that they can't bear other Christmas candles after burning ours - that our candle is so beautifully natural and a pure pleasure to burn. What wonderful feedback to get!Our winter Christmas candle will only be available for a limited time online on this link and via our stockists nationwide. Contact us to find our where your nearest stockist is.

Ax

Cushions

Velvet is huge this AW17 in interiors and on the catwalk, so adding some velvet cushions to your sofas, chairs and beds will add a rich warmth to your room. This cushion is from Marks & Spencer and comes in a range of colours.


Throws
For this time of year, it has to be faux fur and this gorgeous throw from Next comes in two colours. How inviting to have this thrown on your sofa? It's just asking to be snuggled up to while watching a movie.


Lighting:
This autumn/winter, it's all about coloured, textured glass and marble effect so this light fitting from Matalan ticks all the boxes at a budget:

Candles:
Of course, nothing adds a bit of winter to  your home than a candle and our favourites this time of year include our Woodland Candle, remininscent of the moss covered forest floor, with notes of Fig, Greens Leaves & Cyclamen.

Emily's Parlour Candle Tin is equally beautiful to burn at this time of year with notes of spicy cinnamon, juicy apple and orange and hints of ginger and nutmeg. Perfect in October and November whenever it feels just a bit too early to burn a Christmas scent.

Bring the Outside in:
Finally, don't forget to bring some some winter foliage into your home. Ivy and eucalyptus make for beautiful centrepieces. These gorgeous images from Pinterest make it looks so simple:

It can be difficult to adapt to the colder weather and darker nights but at least if your home looks welcoming and cosy, it makes it a pleasure to return to and stay in after facing the outdoors.
You can view the whole Field Day range on this link and why not check out our sister brand, Field Apothecary also? It's our luxury range of essential oil candles, hand poured in small batches with stunning fragrances like Ivy, Peat and Rain. All available on this link.

Until next time,
Ax

Field Day Fireside Candle.

However, unlike some peat fire candles on the market, Field Day Fireside has enough fragrant notes to ensure that it does not create an acrid smell in your home when burned for longer periods of time.

Our Fireside candle has been in shops since April and the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive in terms of the strength of the fragrance and it's throw in large rooms. It's also great in a kitchen space to help mask those post dinner smells (or in my case, burning dinner smells!).

The Field Day Fireside Candle comes boxed inside our signature Field Day floral packaging and will give you approximately 40 hours of burn time. It retails at £13.95/€17.95 on this link. Free delivery is offered on all orders over £30 within the UK and €40 within Ireland.

The full Field Day range is made in the rolling hills of County Down using a vegetable wax blend and cotton wicks. Previously called Bog Standard, Field Day has been making candles for over a decade and all of our products are inspired by the beautiful Irish countryside, with indigenous fragrances throughout the collection. Our full range of hand care, home fragrance, soaps and candles can be found on this link.

Ax

1. Join a Gym - September is one of the busiest time for gym memberships. Many people take time out from training and healthy eating over the summer and September is a great time to kick start a healthier lifestyle. It's also when the organised among us start thinking about the upcoming Christmas party season. I always think if you look after the fitness between September and Christmas, you can better enjoy the indulgences of the season.

2. Do a wardrobe cull - it's time to get all the heavier clothing out and be really ruthless about getting rid of what you didn't wear last winter. Charity shops are crying out for winter stock at this time of year so go on, give up that fancy coat you never wore or those high heel boots that were too impractical. If you have valuable/designer items, why not look to see if you have a consignment store near you that could try to sell it on your behalf.

3.  Cut back in the garden - the growing season is largely over now so it's time to prune back your flowering perennials to allow them to prepare for winter and come back even stronger next year. If you don't do it now, some plants like lavender will become woody and less leafy in preparation for winter and won't look as pretty next summer when they flower again. Get as much as you can into the compost heap before the weather gets too cold so it has a chance to start breaking down.

4. Get your boiler serviced - too many people wait until the cold weather hits to suddenly realise that the boiler is playing up or not heating all the radiators in the house. Get someone out now, while they're not too busy, to check it over and make sure you're ready to roll for the winter and not burning oil or gas inefficiently.

5. Burn a candle - obviously! What better way to lighten up the darker evenings and bring some warmth to your home.
Our Fireside candle, with notes of Tobacco, Vetiver and Amber, is perfect for cosy evenings by the fire. Read more and buy on this link.

Welcome Autumn - we've missed you!

Ax

It's Summer BBQ season and I'm loving that you can legitimately use the grill every day, even if it's raining! So with that in mind, I'm here to inspire you with my favourite recipes for gorgeous salads to serve alongside your meat, fish and vegetables.

1 x bag of pre-cooked puy lentils (or you can cook from scratch also)
2 x peppers (any colour)
1 x red onion
3 x garlic cloves with skin on
Balsamic vinegar and Olive Oil
Sprig of Thyme

Roast the onion, garlic, peppers thyme (drizzled in olive oil) in the oven for 40 minutes at 180 C. Take out the thyme stalks and discard. Squeeze the soft garlic from inside the cloves into a bowl.
Heat the lentils in the microwave following the pack instructions (or cook from fresh if you wish) and put them in a bowl. Add the roast peppers and onions to the lentils. Meanwhile, mash this garlic with a few tablespoons of balsamic vinegar and water (or some of the liquid from cooking the lentils from fresh). Drizzle this gorgeous garlicky, vinegary solution over the lentils and veg and ENJOY!

Simple Thai Noodle Salad
This is a spicier one but it's so morish - I could eat it for breakfast (and stink of garlic for the day!). It's the simplest one to create - no excuses for the 'can't cook/won't cook' brigade.

Half a pack of vermicelli rice noodles (about 150g) - cooked to the instructions, drained and cooled
1 x garlic clove, crushed
4 x spring onions, chopped
2 x red chilli's, chopped
1 x handful of chopped fresh coriander
3 x tablespoons of Thai Fish Sauce
1 x tablespoon of Sesame Oil

 Put everything into a bowl and mix well... and that's it!
Cous Cous Salad
This is one that my kids will eat - yay! It's not easy to get wee ones around to eat salad I know but this is good one to try. Once you make it, you'll never buy a shop bought cous-cous salad. It costs pennies to make and is WAY more tasty.

100g couscous
200ml vegetable stock
2 spring onions
1 red pepper
½ cucumber
50g feta cheese, cubed (optional...I usually leave this on the side as the kids don't like it)
2 tbsp pesto
2 tbsp toasted pine nut

Pour the boiling stock over the cous-cous and leave it to soak for a few minutes, covered but off the heat. Add the other ingredients chopped up however you like them.

Kids Salad Options
One thing I find the kids do enjoy at a Summer BBQ is pesto salad so I always make up some of the prettier pasta pieces (bows or twists) with some fresh pesto and a sprinkle of parmesan and chopped fresh basil. Also for the kids, try serving 'help yourself' bowls of individual items like pickled beetroot, hard boiled eggs, sliced cucumber, carrot sticks etc.

Sticky Chocolate Bananas
My final attempt to get one of the 5 a day into the kids at a Summer BBQ comes in the form of dessert. Obviously at this time of the year, summer fruits are more affordable and the kids will generally devour them but if you've a few bananas that have gone over-ripe in the fruit bowl, this next one is sure to go down a treat.

1 x over-ripe banana
1 x chocolate Flake bar - crushed
Mini Marshmallows
1 x shot of a orange liqueur (adults only!)

Pop the banana onto a rectangle of foil and turn up the edges to make a parcel - you can peel or leave the skin on...either way works. Cut a slit down the length of the banana and with chocolate. Sprinkle on some marshmallows.
Seal up the top of the parcel and place on a low/medium heat barbecue until the chocolate melts. Add ice cream - but only if they've eaten their salad!

Happy barbecuing and dodging the showers!

These candles have been a labour of love for the past 2 years, the dream being to capture some of our native Irish scents using essential oils - scents that have never been created before. It's been challenging at times - each essential oil burns differently and there have been several iterations before Alix was happy with the cold and warm throw from each candle but we can guarantee that you are buying something very special here - unique and amazing.

Like our Field Day range, the Field Apothecary Ireland candles are hand poured, but we make them in smaller batches due to the amount and blend of essential oils being used. Our Field Day candles contain essential oils also but the blends are not as complex and there's not the same variations between fragrances.

The Field Apothecary fragrances are Rain, Peat, Flora, Ivy, Hay and Lichen and when we showed them at Showcase Ireland, everyone who smelled them struggled to pick a favourite as they are all striking and unique yet so natural. And from our test burns here, we can confirm that they will cast fragrance all over your home - not just in the room you burn it.

Each candle comes in a smoky glass jar inside a stunning embossed box, illustrated with a line drawing of a patchwork of fields. Burn time is 40 hours.

The candles retail at £30/€35 and are on sale exclusively in Arnotts on Henry Street, Dublin and online at www.fieldapothecaryireland.ie. There will be more stockists in the coming months - we will update our Facebook page with these as they come on board.

Have a lovely week...from us all at Field Day & Field Apothecary HQ!

Ax

Ax

And this week, it's been lovely to see the daffodils appearing around Field Day Ireland's offices - it finally feels like the winter is over (despite best efforts to snow this week!). Check out the view we get from our offices - isn't it stunning?

Photo credit - our Jen Dickson

This year's Irish Cancer Society Daffodil Day runs on Friday 24th March and there's a ton of great activities running across the country. You can find out more on the Irish Cancer Society's Facebook Event Page on this link.

Ax

Tokyo, Japan has been hosting a St Patrick's Day parade for 25 years with over 30,000 people spectating. It was originally a way to introduce the country to Irish culture but it's really taken off and now 2000 people take part in the parade each year.

Dubai has two Irish Villages now and thanks to the huge ex-pat population, their March 17th celebrations are pretty impressive and this year is no difference with Irish Bar, McGettigan’s putting on the biggest celebration in the city. Top acts such as The Coronas, Gavin James and The Commitments will be performing throughout the day. Someone book me a flight now!

Oslo in Norway is another surprise location where a parade has been running since the year 2000. Again, driven by ex-pats, the parade is organised by the Norwegian Irish Society and is part of a weekend of celebrations called 'Paddy's Fringe Festival'

Finally, Moscow might not be necessarily a surprising venue but the history behind it is. The Russian Orthodox Church recognises St Patrick as their missionary so that's why there's a week of celebrations here too every March.

As for ourselves at Field Day Ireland - we'll be working away this St Patrick's Day getting ready to send our new branded stock out to stockists next week. But there's a wee dram of whiskey in the plan for the weekend...enjoyed while burning a suitably Irish Clover candle. Happy St Patrick's Day wherever you're celebrating yourself.

Ax

To celebrate this new candle, available from the 20th March,  we are going a little off-piste with this blog post and share with you one of our many passions here at Field Day HQ - Gardening

March is an important month in the garden with lots of things you need to start planning if you want a gorgeous summer display of colour. Here are some of the tasks for your garden to-do list:

1. Plant Summer Flowering Bulbs
This is the perfect time of year to plant out tender summer flower bulbs like gladioli and lillies. Plant bulbs as soon as possible after buying them and ideally plant them in groups of 5 or 6. They will need to be planted to a depth that is about double or triple the length of the bulb itself from top to bottom, ensuring the nose/shoot is pointing upwards. Bulbs can be planted in borders or in pots.

2. Start Mowing the Lawn
During spring, use your mower on the highest setting and only mow on dry days. Towards the end of the month, use a spring fertiliser, applying when the ground is wet or rain is forecast.

3. Give your Containers some TLC
For plants that still look happy in their pots, take away 5cm of the compost and replace it with fresh. For plants that need a bigger container, move them now before growth starts, taking away the old compost and replacing it with new - both below and above the root ball.
For plants remaining in the same container, re-pot them every other year with fresh compost to encourage good growth.

4. Start planting Vegetables
When your soil warms up to around 6C, you can start to sow directly outside. Onions and early potatoes can be sown now. But for everything else, this is the time to prepare your veg beds by mixing in lots of manure and compost on drier days. This early preparation will ensure you've got the best possible environment once it's time to start planting out everything else.

5. Prune Hedges Hard 
March is the perfect month to prune  hard into old wood hedges but only to one side only. Leave the top and the other side and they will feed the pruned wood and allow it to regrow during the summer.  Don't forget to feed and mulch your hedges to encourage this growth.

I don't know about you but this seems like quite enough to be getting on with this month! Happy Gardening, Field Day friends.

Ax