We moved into our home in quite a hurry in 2010 with a toddler and a newborn – a proper little family. We hadn’t time time or the money to spend on major renovations, so it was very much a case of do what has to be done and moved the furniture from our rented apartment over, sharing it among the rooms as suited us at the time.

The Bavarian wouldn’t be an interiors fan, so the matter of how to decorate was largely left to me. I’m not complaining. It was fun and, being on parental leave for the first nine months in this house, I had time to settle in, see how the light fell and the rooms changed during the day. My collection of interiors magazines increased immensely.

Early in that first Winter – a cold, snowy Winter that I will never forget since it saw us stranded at Frankfurt airport for three days – I decided we really needed curtains for the three street-facing windows in out livingroom/playroom. Off I went, with my small budget, and bought three pairs of red linen curtains in Ikea. Hung in time for Christmas, they immediately gave a festive air to the room and my love affair with red began.

But red is not just for Christmas. The vibrancy of it works so well with other colours – bold blues and greens, stark white or black for instance – that we now have pops of red throughout the downstairs of the house. From the tea cosy’s red apple pattern to my tea tray to my precious Kitchen Aid mixer, from the children’s vintage chairs to the hall floor to lunchboxes, reds abound in this house.

The latest addition is our VQ Retro mini digital radio. You might know that I was on the lookout for a radio for the kitchen for a while and fell in love with the Emma Bridgewater Blue Daisy pattern. The thing was though, that it just didn’t suit the kitchen and the red would pretty much fit in in any room or even outside in our summer kitchen. Even our shed is red!

With bluetooth, digital radio (DAB) and FM and the possibilty to use battery power or a power cable, this radio is a lot more versatile than our last one.  The boys love to grab my phone and put on some music or a story on You Tube and listen to it through the VQ over their after school snack.

I on the other hand love to use the bluetooth function to hook up with Irish radio and have a taste of home in the background as I do my boring household chores on Friday, my day off. In fact one of the first uses the VQ got in our house was listening to Mayo play Dublin in the All Ireland Final. We, of course, we on the Mayo side.

Right now, Driving Home for Christmas is sounding through the kitchen on Cork’s RedFM (hah, red again!). We won’t be home for Christmas, that is to say not in Ireland, but we will be in our own home – the eternal emigrant problem, where to call home – no doubt listening to some broadcasts from our favourite stations, thanks to the wonder of bluetooth.

Depending on what we are up to, the radio can be moved about with us. I even took it along on my craft weekend with the girls a few weeks back, so we could have music in the background as we sewed, crocheted, chatted and generally enjoyed ourselves.

I’m not generally one to treat myself or self-gift but this little beauty was a good buy. After much humming and hawing about a new radio, I’m delighted that I went for something pretty as well as functional.  A bog standard radio wouldn’t make me smile as often as my VQ does.

[We bought this VQ radio online from a German online retailer for approx. €75, in case anyone is wondering about the price].