Tuesday 7th July - at last! Post!

 There was a muffled thump in the hall - post!

we were eating lunch; sea bream with roasted onions, peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, herbs etc. Plus some purple sprouting broccoli for 'greens'.

The new revised second class post delivery schedule is beginning to bite; Ang posted this last Wednesday, or maybe Thursday morning;

a pink and maroon slip stitch pattern with some suffragette safety pins - purple and dark green. Plus a postcard of an amazing quilt. She describes it here.

Knitting is Not Happening at the moment. Too Hot!

 Otherwise it's been a fairly quiet day. I sat in the shade first thing this morning and watched and chatted and answered questions while Vicky sorted out the chaos of all my pots, abandoned for nearly a year now, ever since we decided that this extension was more than a dream. It was an education watching her at work; even if I was physically able enough do to this, I would never have been able to match her quick, quiet efficiency.         

Then I came in, and while BB was out sourcing a new key safe for beside the front door, I defied the Builders by working out how to open the patio door, and then fixed a string to the handle in such a way I could open it, and haul it back closed without ever stepping down to my doom. The half open door is now completely blocked by the chair, and we can operate my door control system without moving it.       

So that was most of Tuesday... here's the whole poem about peace dropping slow...

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

By William Butler Yeats

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

By William Butler Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,

I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

from the poetry foundation

Monday 6th July - peace descends, dropping slow

 I had meant to post yesterday, but after all the activity on Saturday I ground to a halt. No surprises there.

But it was a good day to read Ang's post for Sunday 5th, and right now is a good time to read it again; 

A reworking of Psalm 23, published back in the 1960s and written by the Japanese poet Toki Miyashina...

The Lord is my pacesetter, I shall not rush.
he makes me stop and rest for quiet intervals.
He provides me with images of stillness
which restore my serenity.
He leads me in ways of efficiency,
through calmness of mind, and his guidance is peace.
Even though I have a great many things to
accomplish this day,
I will not fret, for his presence is here.
His timelessness, His all-importance,
Will keep me in balance.
He prepares refreshment and renewal
in the midst of my activity
by anointing my head with the oil of tranquility.
My cup of joyous energy overflows.
Surely harmony and effectiveness
shall be the fruits of my hours,
for I shall walk in the pace of my Lord,

and dwell in His house forever.

Today started with the builders arriving around about 7.30am. They have worked steadily, fueled with tea, coffee, biscuits and plenty of water until the last bits were tidied away at 4.30pm, with a few short breaks.

 I think the most exciting part of the day was moving the shed - entire, intact, complete with contents still on the shelving!

'Have you done this before?', I asked the Man in Charge.

'No, but he says he has,' pointing at Second-in-Command.

So they set the two young men to work...

They managed to lever a pumped forklift trolley under each side, and sort of push-me-pull-you the whole shed from here... 

To here, about three or four metres. If you compare the trees in the before and after pictures you can get the idea. It's now sitting where my veg patch used to be.

I took a photograph to say 'goodbye' to the Fatsia

 But one of the young men has extricated quite a lot of the roots from the raised bed. It's currently sitting in a tub of water at the shady end of the garden util I can work out what to do. It going to have to live in a large tub, I think.

We've now hit a snag, first of many, no doubt. Work has more or less stopped for the rest for the week, as they can't do anything much until the building control inspector has inspected a small section of the footings to agree the proposed depth. That can't be until Monday.

'Please make sure you lock you back door,' said Man-in-Charge several times. 'People forget, open their door and fall out as the steps have gone. We'e seen it happen so many times.' He gave us a considering look....

and has left one of his machines parked right across the door! I think it is rather sweet of him, and don't resent it at all. We can get out safely from the front door and walk round so it is not much of an inconvenience, and we can leave the door open to get a through breeze without worry.

  

  Peace is all around now...

Evgeny Kissin, Chopin Waltz in C# minor op 64 no 2 

(Yes, we are with the AA!)

Saturday 4th July - So much to do...

 I'm enjoying the last few days of the garden... it won't look like this later in the week! The patio, and everything on it, will be the first to go; pots and furniture to the bottom of the garden, papers to be stacked somewhere for later, and as for the border, I shall just have to look away!

I've moved my herb pots to the front door

They are all supermarket herbs, and cuttings (apart from the geranium!).

I'm hoping they can bevjoined by a bay tree - small bush really - which is probably completely toot bound in its wooden half barrel. I say hoping; a couple of our half barrels totally disassembled themselves when the iron hoops dropped, enabling the wooden staves to open like flower petals and cease being any use as a plant container. I've a replacement tub in mind should this happen to ours, or we might make hurried trip to a garden centre. 

I will be able to reach the herbs easily by the door; if they were moved to the bottom of the garden with everything else then that wouldn't be at all convenient. 

We've hung new bedroom curtains! They are nothing flamboyant. I refuse to spend money on expensive bedroom curtains when we hardly see them! They will improve the look of the room though; the light had faded and rotted the red blackout curtains we've replaced.  I never liked them anyway; we bought them in a hurry because neighbours had installed a motion sensitive security camera which was reacting to every passing fox, waking us up several times a night.  Both the neighbours and the light have changed, so at last we can go back to ordinary lined curtains. No picture yet...

We've also played with our new 'toy'; BB had the joy of assembling it, fitting all the pieces together (he does enjoy making up kits) and then we took turns...

It's a Flash Spraymop! And it made very short work indeed of the kitchen and bathroom floors, without leaving them too damp. We could be entering a new era of cleanliness around here...

Friday 3rd July - this is getting ridiculous...

'Synchronicity ' is a lovely word. I like the sound of it, and the meaning as well; 

Synchronicity (German: Synchronizität) is a concept introduced by Carl Jung, founder of analytical psychology, to describe events that coincide in time and appear meaningfully related, yet lack a discoverable causal connection.

(Wikipedia)

This keeps happening with Ang and me. I could have called this post 'Many a slip' like Ang's...

She's posted today about the Double Knitting Collaboration square on it's way to me - the link is above - and here's the one I've sent to her;

also a slip-stitch pattern, also knitted in two colourways. Mine's a two colour stripe; the left hand is blue as main colour,  cream as second, the right hand reversed with a paper blue as the second colour. 

This pattern comes out looking completely different to Ang's because the rows knitted in the second colour are interrupted by two main colour stitches being slipped - carried up without knitting - creating the continuous vertical stripe. These slip stitches also pull these rows more tightly together, making a very dense, firm texture. Good for a winter sweater!

Here's the back - the horizontal lines of yarn show where it has been passed behind the slip stitches rather than knitted in. It's much easier to knit this pattern than explain it.

Apart from Ang knitting the cable square last time, we seem to have been remarkably in sync with our choices so far; something I noticed that kept happening during our previous collaborations. I promise we don't ever confer before we decide what we're making!

Which colour did I send? I could make up my mind. So I closed my eyes, shuffled them and picked one. You'll find out tomorrow; my parcel arrived with her yesterday. 

Which square has she sent me? I don't know; we both posted them on Wednesday afternoon but hers hasn't arrived yet... hopefully I'll find out when the postman gets here around lunchtime. Things seem to travel quicker going from west to east than east to west. Riddle me that one if you can!

Wednesday 1st July - cock-a-doodle-doo!

Here are my step totals for this half of the year;

What a massive difference for May and June!

I'm very grateful to RusticPumpkin for inspiring me to stop being such a blob.

Wednesday 1st July - Bad Ideas, better ideas

 Good idea;

Bad Idea;

I tracked down the name of the wonder app; it is called mellowflow and the reviews are SCATHING;

Following up on the Reddit forum, I've come to the sad conclusion that my gut feeling of 'if it looks too good to be true, then it really is too good to be true'. My advice; stay away, and just stick at lesson no 1; 'tidy three things in your line of sight'.

Sadly, for tidying up and keeping it tidy, there's no way around actually... tidying! There doesn't seem to be a magic method, especially for butterfly brains like me. 

I do try to;

• Set small, quickly achievable goals, like 5-10 mins, or one surface, or one task at a time.
• Take time to gloat and congratulate myself on the little successes.
• Never, ever, berate myself if I don't manage to do 'it', whatever 'it' is.
• Never push myself too far beyond what I am already able to do.
• Switch between types of tasks fairly frequently. 

These have all come from the way I've learned to teach piano over the past 40 years, the main idea being to try and always

• Build upon successes; start with a low bar and raise it slowly.
• Associate the activity (even scales and sight reading!) with positive emotions.
• Avoid all negativity, crossness, tension, distress in learning.
• Gamify Just about everything.
• Constantly cheer oneself on.

Now, what three things can Iput away next? Oh dear, I'll have to find somewhere to put them first...

Now, here's a little 'spot the difference' game;

Before;

After three things were tidied;

I seem to be on a roll; three minutes later;

Happy happy happy! 🌞 💐 🏆 

.......

I've shared this before but here we go again!

Chopin Minute Waltz, Luca Sestak Trio