This week.

This week has been all about unpacking boxes and wondering why on earth we thought we would have enough space for all our c**p. Currently five rooms are free of boxes but as one is the cloakroom and one the bathroom, that just leaves the kitchen, the utility room and one bedroom looking sort of ok. Four boxes of pictures though, where did they appear from? We won’t mention the 20 or so full of fabric, yarn and crafty stuff.

Other fun has been getting to grips with the cooker- the hob makes weird noises, like it hums  and beeps, and only likes two of our saucepans- the others- our wedding presents it just ignores- shalln’t , won’t it’s, not going to let me use them. We need new pans, -but at least the hob had an instruction manual.

The oven- no manual- thank goodness for the internet- first you push one knob, then when it lights up, push again to get a box symbol with lines top and bottom. Then you push the other knob, it lights up, slowly you up the temperature- go too far and you start over. It whirrs , if I am lucky. Each cooked dinner feels like a major achievement.

You have to recall that we did see our old kitchen in the York Castle museum a couple of years ago, so this one is scary.

The hot water is too darned hot- shower on , and I’m dancing around like an idiot, squawking as I go. That doesn’t cool the water but it makes me feel slightly better.

And don’t get me started on the who to tell we have moved scenario- not helped by some things being in Mr E’s name only, and people can’t understand his speech now and won’t let me interpret. Let’s just say a very well known credit card company has had a stern letter.

Then there’s registering with the GP- I checked this before we moved, printed off the forms, got registered for Council Tax so we could prove who we were, off we bowl as per the instrauctions on the web page to register. Horror of horrors from the receptionist- “Oh we have been inundated with new patients and can’t take anymore”. “Then why does your web page say you do?” Because they haven’t updated it. Then I get “why have we moved, it’s not allowed.” “Oh yes it is “says I. More helpful receptionist gives us an address for another GP- off we trog. They have an intercom- we are to look online etc etc. The saga continues.

On the plus side, we have seen our son three times. Yippee- that’s why we moved. The sun has shone from dawn till dusk every single day- Mr E is finally warm enough and the house is deliciously cool for me. More Yippee.

There is a nesting box on the side of the house and we had the pleasure of seeing the Great Tits fledge.

This is the view of our lane from the front door.

And we got to buy a new kitchen clock

Asda we love you.

Stand by for more fun and games this week….

Settling In.

Down a tiny lane on top of a hill

lives a lion.

nearby strolls Mr E

socially distancing for permitted exercise, and a much need break from boxes.

 

 

 

Wordless Wednesday

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So what’s so special about these?

In Autumn 2018 I bought some winter flowering pansies, but never got round to planting them till early 2019. They were fine -flowered and looked lovely. I intended to take them out and replant with geraniums, but didn’t because I thought we were going to move house in June. That fell through but quite quickly we found a new buyer and I thought we would move house in October, which became, November and then December, and then we pulled out, as that house had a big problem. I left the plants in the tubs looking a bit sad. We found another house and thought to move in March and then April, and we all know what happened in April….. the weather turned very warm, and these incredibly sprang to life again and brought colour to my life. Which just goes to prove that new life is just round the corner if you just wait.

 

 

Scrap happy- May 2020

I’ll be honest I was a bit down in the dumps before the April scrap happy post. We had been packing boxes in March and fearing a lockdown I had not packed away all my projects. I thought I would be ok if we were prevented from moving. I had not forseen that I would simply be lacking in motivation to tackle the projects I had selected. The stitchbook project required the use of paints-  had packed all my paint  away.  The dining room table I would need for quilting now had Mr E’s computer on it as he taken his old computer desk to the tip. So I was well and truly cheesed off.

Then a friend started posting on Facebook. Her Dad in his 90s lived alone. He wasn’t moping. He’d gone down his shed and found all his old bits of wood and was knocking out garden planters. He’d run out of wood- Maureen was asking her local community for any old bits of wood they didn’t need to drop them off at his front gate. He made more planters.

I got a grip on myself. No, I wasn’t mentally able to tackle big projects, but my box of fabric scraps was accessable.

I spotted some aida- ( That’s the bag on top with the blue). But oh no, I had packed all my craft books. However,I hadn’t packed my craft magazines. I could do some cross stitch. Inside one of the magazines was a free kit I’d not done

So I did it. But what to cross stitch- well all three sons have summer wedding anniverseries- I’d do three cards. Is it here that I confess that some of the magazines are dated 1995- I moved here with them. Then I remembered I had packed all my embroidery floss. However, I had got a box of threads leftover from kits which come with threads included.

So that’s the first- I can’t stick it into the card yet because I have of course packed my double sided tape.

Meantime unable to buy crafty things locally I had put in an order to Hobbycraft and was now in possession of some plastic canvas to make another fabric box. I had some scraps of wadding, and away I went with some wonderfully therapeutic running stitch.

In closer detail

I even found a manky doily and retrieved some rather nice lacy bits.

The piece to the bottom left turned up in my fabric box- it was yet another free kit which I had stitched but found no use for.

Now it’s the top of the new box.

And so my scraps of fabric, leftover threads and ancient magazines have made me very happy and got me through Lockdown. Which of course is why I never throw anything away!

Please pop over to Kate’s  here for some more scrap happy posts.

 

 

Postcards.

It’s nice to see pictures of family and friends instantly on Facebook etc  but I’m sad the days of receiving a postcard via snail mail is slowing passing, and in this year they will be fewer than ever.

I have three boys and our old home in Oxfordshire was a bungalow- the rooms had connecting doors. So they could chase each other round and round and round- kitchen-hall-lounge-dining room-passage-kitchen. In the hall was a cupboard between the kitchen and lounge and if that was left open, which it was frequently- well bosh! And that is why I started to display postcards on the cupboard door inside and out, so that the fiends didn’t bash into it. And it worked.

So when we moved here, where there is another door in the hall which someone not looking where they were going could career into, could injure themselves on , I employed the postcard solution again. Family and friends knew that my favourite postcards depict sunsets and sunrises and my sunny door was born.

Yesterday I took them down and packed them away for the move.

 

Oh my, the memories of the last 18 years that were evoked. Postcards from my parents, now both gone, from the cruises my Dad and step-mother took, the coach holidays my Mum had with her buddies to Guernsey, Ireland and Beachy Head. Just seeing their handwriting was lovely.

Then there were the ones from my sons-Mr J’s gap year and his impressions of life in Spain and Berlin. The growing family of Mr T’s first just three of them, and memories of a step- granddaughter attempting a Zorba dance in Greece, the addition of little brother, then little Miss F as a baby. Mr B and his gap year and his travels to New York. I had weekend away , just me and and Mum, and we went to Bath, tried the waters, trod in the footsteps of Romans and Jane Austin.

All there in postcards on the back of a door- 18 years of precious memories.

Once we are allowed to visit places again just for the sheer pleasure of it, I shall be buying postcards to send , and I will certainly be starting a new sunny postcard door in the hall cupboard of the new home we are moving to next week.

Love to know if anyone else has a postcard display- did/ will you still send postcards?

Silent Sunday

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Friday Jottings#6

Not quite sure where this week went too. Here in the UK it’s a bank holiday, moved from the first Monday in May till today for VE Day- 75th anniversary. Yesterday would have been my Mum’s birthday, she would have been 92 this year, I don’t think a day goes by I don’t miss her.

We have resumed packing boxes. Thought you might like to see my spare room which doubled as my craft space- this is what it has looked like since the end of March. Might explain some of my grumpiness. I have no idea where we are going to put the boxes we pack next week.

I found a diary I had written when I was 13. I kept it going for a whole year so I have started to transcribe it onto the computer- careful editing- not giving up all my secrets. It surprises me to see how many of my interests now were present in my life then. I seem to have lived at the library- sometimes going two or three times a week. I’m already chopping up bits of paper for scrapbooks- I’ve only got as far as March and I seem to have at least three on the go already- topics are my penfriend in Madagscar (pre-cursor to blogging perhaps?), fashion, and pop stars- couldn’t care less about these two subjects now, but I do still chop up old magazines.

I also bang on about the castle and walks. I’m doing a thrift badge at Guides. I made a pompom, and a suit of clothes for my brother’s Golly.I’m making Yorskhire puddings and a jam sponge-  I used the wrong flour! I comment a lot on noise and people in bad moods.

There’s a lot about Mum there too- she had gone back to teaching – and was clearly having problems juggling home and work- I don’t say this, but she later said how hard it was and I can see it now in my observations. I was being asked to take on a lot of household chores and was getting resentful. I wasn’t very good at it either- seems I was polishing the door furniture ( brass knobs etc) and broke the letter box. I was surprised to see that when I was off school for over a week with tonsillitus, on the last two days I note Mum had gone back to school and I was cleaning. Not exactly being poorly and I could have been in school myself. My relationship with Mum over the next four years was iffy-teenage daughter and a Mum who was struggling. It’s good to know that once I left home, and we could give each other space we got on so well- well at least for 48 hours at a time. I miss her a lot, she was a mighty fine Mum- most of the time.

Has anyone kept any diairies from their childhood? Would love to know if you can recognise the person you are now from the one you were then.

Next Friday is the 15th of the month, so scrap happy day. I have a scrappy project underway for that. We’ll be coming to the end of box packing, ready to move the following week. Taken a lot of time this week to get everyone on board, but I think we are there. So maybe this will be the last Friday jotting for the time being…. but as Arnie said, I’ll be back!

Keep washing those grubby paws and stay safe.

Cathyx

 

Yarn Along- May 2020

I am finally knitting something from my 2020 Gonna do list- any guesses what that might be? I have chosen a book from my own TBR pile- might as well use this time to tackle the classics. Apparently it features on many lists of books people say they have read but haven’t. Not quite sure why people want to pretend to have read something they haven’t but there you are. Just for fun, you can find such a list here There are 200 on it, and in case you were wondering, you weren’t? Anyway I have read 73  of the 200 listed, which apparently makes me number 938 out of 6429 people, I assume of books read by me , anyway it gives me lots more to read, although there are some I wouldn’t give house room too, let alone read. I’m rambling, too much time locked down.

Do pop over to Ginny’s for some more yarning along

Yarn Along {May}

A weekend stroll

I just wandered the lanes yesterday for my “permitted exercise”, love to take you with me.

Up the hill, and a warm sunny day, keeping a good eye on those clouds.

Looking out over the fields and the Vale of Pickerng. For lovers of Spot Harry ( Dartmoor Yarns) I bring Find the Cows!

Cowslips in the hedgerow.

View down into the quarry below. I was so good and it was so hard not to, but I didn’t go near the edge.

On the way home now and the view in the other direction towards the town, you can just about see the church spire.

Down the bottom of the lane is this oasis of someone’s. It has intrigued me for years upon years. Whose is it, have a good look at the arch to the right- picture below.

Was it a lime kiln, clearly this is part of an old quarry, and it is limestone here. One of life’s mysteries.

And what goes on in those sheds?

Have you had a walk this weekend, where did you go, do feel free to leave us a link, do you have any mysteries on your walk, or have any ideas about mine?