Sunday 26th April - Nearly another week

And how time does fly...

It seems that my extended 'holiday' is over; and I'm getting a real taste of 'working from home', which is what other members of my family have been doing all along. Did they get a long weekend over Easter, or just keep going, through the Bank Holidays, I wonder? As I have been freelance piano teaching for so long, I find it impossible to separate out 'work time' and 'non-work' time. There has always been 'teaching time', 'travelling between schools time' and then hours of admin as a consequence of teaching, all done 'as and when'.

Last week I taught zoom piano lessons on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. That part of my decision-making about which days I would work and which I would not, went well. Then came 'how many lessons a day?. In 'normal times', this could be anything up to 12, starting around 9 or 9.30, and finishing around 6 or 6.30, with longer or shorter gaps between schools and home.

Zoom lessons are another kettle of fish - for a start a 30 minute lesson uses up 45 minutes of time, geting the connection sorted out, finding music, arranging the tablets or computers or phones, and the actual lesson is very distracted; glitches in the conversations and piano playing require more concentration, and it is harder to get things across. I decided on a maximum of four lessons per day, so I am quite pleased to have kept it down to five a day so far.

Each lesson then generates another load of activity - emails to set up the next lesson (I know you can schedule repeat 'meetings' but the parents are still finding their way through the home school schedules), and detailed 'lesson notes', as the students haven't yet mastered the art of making their own notes - that will definitely be a teaching point in the near future - and then checking that the payments have come through. Then I need to write up my own notes and keep a tally for income tax purposes next April. Finally, I need to tidy up! After a day of teaching there is music everywhere! Three days of zoom piano teaching is plenty at the moment.

After the peace and quiet of the previous few weeks it felt as I had gone from this;

http://photoeverywhere.co.uk/tropical_escape/slides/tropical_sandy_beach.htm

to something more like this!

https://guidetoiceland.is/travel-info/river-rafting-in-iceland

That's work... but also I have been on three outings since Tuesday.

Our house backs on to a network of cycle tracks and footpaths through woodland and a golf course. Well, we've been waking up ridiculously early these past few days. I suspect it's because quite a few neighbours are on shift work. On Friday we looked at each other at 5.30 am, made the decision and were out on a walk by 6am! Unheard of!

But it was a really good idea. We managed to force our way through the 'shrubbery' - ie laurels gone wild - that conceals our back gate and emerge into the early sunlight. There were very few people around, so keeping 2m away from people was not a problem, even at 'pinch points' like the bridges over the stream. We didn't go far, just 'there and back' and home for breakfast.

I don't know how many times you have to go out to make it a habit. Saturday morning dawned dull and uninviting, but brightened up into 'Summer' by the afternoon. Himself usually route marches round to the post box every day with a card for a housebound friend, but this I time went too. It was the usual intricate game of gently swerving to avoid other people out enjoying the sunshine - like one of those milder computer games where you try not to crash into obstacles. I was delighted to see this  just near the corner shop;

Morning constitutionals were not possible this morning, as there was zoom church and I was playing one of the songs so couldn't be late for church today (How Deep the Father's Love). After lunch however, instead of posting the card, I printed off a free Johanna Basford colouring book which you can get from her website here  Just click on the picture (on HER page, not mine!)

We then walked round to the address where I send the cards; she's a good friend in her 80s, but not a computer using so it is phone, text or letter to contact her. But she only lives a mile away - further thanI like to walk when it is cold and dreary, but today was great - warm, sunny... So, with Himself scouting the way ahead to warn of obstancles on the form of walkers, joggers and cyclists so that I could give everyone a wide berth, we enjoyed a very pleasant afternoon.

The Johanna Basford drawings are all rather whimsical, but I find them useful for ideas. I took these photographs of a tree ready to be copied and embellished

and this pattern of leaves, maybe for the embellishments - who knows.

That's three times in a row we have gone out for a walk...

And it has made me Very Hungry for my supper!

Tuesday 21st April - Nearly a week

Friday - Saturday - Sunday - Monday - Tuesday -Something happens each day, to be sure, but I have to go back through calendars and journals and diaries to extract the details...

This is turning out to be one of the best memory joggers;

along with photographs on my phone.

The piano keyboard is Wednesday of last week, when I signed up for an on-line piano course on practising techniques. It a 'how to practise' rather than 'how to learn these technical skills' and I'm finding it very inspiring;  the course, and also starting piano teaching again after a break, has got me playing much more than I ever did over the last couple of years. But I might have written this in the last post.

On Thursday as we looked out of the kitchen door we saw a very bright star in the sky directly over our garden gate.

'Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight,
wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight'

is a song I have been teaching for around 10 years... a simple, rocking tune using just two notes.

I was having a zoom chat on Friday morning with a friend when an ENORMOUS parcel arrived - we looked at eachother in blank amazement, wondering who had ordered what without saying anything to eachother?

It was addressed to me -  and came from Canada, and inside was this;

There's a hardware store there called Lee Valley follow the link and get lost in a world of wonder for several hours. We've bought 'essential must-buys' from there every time we visited. Search on 'music' and you will see what our friends started with - and with skill, persistence and determinations turning into this beautiful glockenspiel! If you want to play the starlight song, pick G and E and play

G E   G E  G EEGGE   

GGE   GGE  GGEEGGE 

The rest of Friday and most of Saturday were screeds of emails, letters, telephone calls, catching up with friends, completing the last pieces of unfinished business from being furlouhed by one employer, and setting up the schedule for on-line zoom piano lessons starting on 22nd April.

Sunday was 'zoom church' -  an oddly moving and chaotic time of songs and Bible readings and sermon and prayers; one person is the Controller, from his study, another person 'assissted' by her ten-year-old son does the powerpoit screens, the Bible readings, prayers and songs all came from different households and our vicar gave the sermon from his house in Kent because he hasn't been able to move here yet. It was well 'attended', many still finishing their breakfast, drinking coffee (me) colouring, doing crochet (me - I was delighted as I got four rows done!) The square for Sunday is a merging of the colours of the blanket I am making as a wedding present for some friends. The deadline was august - now - who knows...

Monday is when I did gardening, and we also discovered that our drains were blocked - again. Himslef and two neighbours and a set of rods managed to clear it, just in time for the water authority man to turn up and say - 'it looks fine now'. He did check it with a camera, and disinfect everywhere so his time wasn't totally wasted.

I made a tiny sketch on the bottom of a post card I sent to my father. I also took pictures in the garden; the lilac is in flower, the apple blossom is wonderful, the camelia has two more buds 

The anenomes have come back to life (I thought they had been eaten by slugs or pigeons)

and Leo has a new favourite spot, balanced on a wooden beam and leaning against the fence after the sun has warmed the surfaces for an hour or so. 

I did a tiny watercolour of the anenomes for another postcard

Today I've had a zoom chat with friends, and then we went out for a little 'tour' - dropping books off for my father, who islooking very well, I might add, and collecting some plants from a friend who is handing out 'extras'. I've two courgettes to plant up, and four hollyhocks which she has to 'weed' out of her borders.

Tomorrow I have to try and be a piano teacher again - so far I will have two pupils on Wednesday, five on Thursday and four on Friday, I reckon three - five pupils on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays shouldn't interefere too much with my 'retirement'!  

Thursday 16th April - Sunny - Chilly - Sunny - Chilly

It's very clear to me that energy levels and cheerfulness are affected by the weather. My grandmother, who qualified as a doctor back in the 1920s, always declared that barometric pressure should be taken into account.

Yesterday was a bright, sunny, day - today is cloudy and cold. That could be a pretty accurate description of me yesterday and today!

I'm finding my day-to-day list of things that I could do, might do, should possibly do, is a great help in keeping me going. I don't necessarily do all the things on the list, or only do things on the list, but it gives a slight structure, and helps nudge me away from the cake tin!

I do feel a bit of a 'teenager' doing all the doodles and so on in my notebook - but hey - it's my book!

A page of postage-sized doodles picking out one thing from the day;

Colouring the squares as I complete each suggestion gives me a ridiculous amount of satisfaction.

Yesterday I finally completed sewing up a cardigan that I knitted over the course of last year. I had got stuck, as one of the seams was all wonky and lost the will to fix it.

and yesterday it was warm enough to wear it. Today I'm back in my winter fleece jacket.

Sorting out how to keep the household supplies coming in has been a bit of a challenge. We have neighbours and friends who will add a bit of shopping to their list, and we've ordered a box of meat from an on-line company. The pet shop half a mile away will let you buy and pay for cat food over the phone, and then bring it out to the car - you can part right outside their door. We discovered that during Tuesday's CATastrophe with the catflap. 

I've found a local company that used to supply local restaurants and caterers. They have re-organised themselves to sell boxes - choose fruit, or veg, or salad, and you get enough of what's available to feed a family of four. I added eggs to the order - they come in trays of 30!  I've shared the contents of the boxes and the eggs with a friend, and also gave some eggs to a neighbour who has been adding things for us - like breakfast cereal - to her list when she goes out. The boxes each have enough for a family of four; now that I've seen what's in them, I'll know what to expect next time.

I ended up with a sort of greengrocer's shop in the garden while we shared out the produce, keeping a safe 2 metres apart;

This is a tiny-weeny sketch that just fits beside the stamp on a postcard I sent to a friend. Himself goes to the post box for me as part of his daily exercise.!

Tuesday 14th April - What day is it?

That was a question posed on twitter (humouroursly, I hasten to add) this morning.

Every day seems like 'today' at the moment...

Although today has already had its moments. We both felt a bit 'hustled through a hedge backwards' by the end of the morning;

The catflap has been playing up for a couple of days. New battery time? No, that didn't sort it. The latch was operating at random intervals regardless of whether there was a cat anywhere near.

Himself spent a gruelling half hour changing batteries, doing factory resets and generally fiddling about with the contraption - uncomfortable work when you are crouched down at cat-flap level. Then we both spent a hectic time trying to re-programme the catflap. The cats are microchipped, and it is this that unlocks the door. So we have to catch a cat (easy, the frst time, just nab it while it is asleep) and then feed it through the flap several times in each direction to register the chip. This gets trickier as you go on. At least He had removed the contraption from the back door so we could contain the cats in the sitting room and work in the warm.

This process proved unsatisfactory. Well, to be blunt, it didn't work - replacement catflap time. Luckily the nearest pet shop had something that would do the job in stock. so He nipped out and returned in triumph.

'Right', he said, a short while later, 'just grap a cat and we'll get this sorted.'

Yeah, well, I'd just started a pre-scheduled zoom session. The first participant was greeted to the sound of extrememly cross cat and both of us making 'persuasive noises' of the 'oh just go through you stupid animal' type. Then, with one hand on the screen and another on the cat the phone went, because the other participant had lost the email with the password for access...

Oh well, we got it done - everything - catflap now installed, zoom call accomplished and password re-emailed.

First thing this morning, when I was still at the breakfast-in-bed stage, and all these excitements where yet to arrive, I watched this tutorial

http://koosjekoene.com/working-with-a-fountain-pen-and-soluble-ink/

and thought - 'that looks easy enough'

and it is;

I drew that while I was waiting for Himself to pause from fixing the new catflap and work out why my connection to the zoom meeting had dropped, and how to restore it.

Later this afternoon, I added to my collection of learing to draw figures

and I'm pretty chuffed with this too. Especially as several art teachers at several schools informed my that I was no good at 'art', and I believed them. I rather think this comes into the same bracket as telling people that they are 'no good at music'. Sure, some people are 'naturals', 'pre-wired' to be able to do it. Like some people (most, actually) can sing in tune, just like that.

Drawing, for me has just been a case of learning how to do it, and then being accepting of the results.

Singing - to an ordinary, everyday standard, is first and foremost about listening to the sound you are making, properly, which often needs to be taught. I'm coming to the conclusion that drawing, to an everyday, ordinary standard, is first and foremost about learing to look at what you are doing, properly.

Like cooking. Read the recipe and do what it says? Learn enough technique to be able to get along?

I'm 'cooking' supper tonight - baked beans on toast, reasonably within my current capabilities. I've also put the last egg to good use - it was a bit too elderly for me to want to eat it boiled or fried, but baked in a cake for an hour and a quarter should render it harmless enough.

Sunday 12th April - Easter!

He is Risen indeed! Alleluia, alleluia!

(Jesus, obs. He's the one who has risen)

The first Easter without Easter eggs since - since I was born? Probably. I made a chocolate cake this afternoon - I'm out of practice, and it's a bit dry, but will make an excellent chocolate pudding with custard tomorrow.

The days between the last post and today's post seem all to have been fairly similar - a mixture of

gardening
I've planted seeds, planted out seedlings, trimmed the edges of the grass, all those bitty jobs. 

knitting
A couple more of these flower squares for a mystery 'knit-a-long'. I'm getting better at reading the instructions, and also knowing when to stop and put it aside before it all goes wrong

I've finished one slipper, and am part way through another, which I will post to the Daughter probably in time for her to lose them over the heatwave and be unable to find them again when it gets cold!

crochet
I've done a lot of research and thinking about how to join these granny squares which I made throughout last year. I've finally come to the conclusion that I need to border each one in a plain colour and then join them together with the same yarn. I chose a dull air-force blue, and I'm really pleased with the result. 

I'm also trying to do a couple of rows most evenings to make this blanket in time for a present to give to someone (she already knows about it) in August

It looks as though I'm keeping busy, but actually a lot of time is spent sitting around, reading, frittering time away here there and everywhere.

I've played the piano - a few times. Had a go on the saxophone - oh yes - that was a bit of a laugh - I turned out for the first time on Thursday for the 'clap and cheer the NHS' time, and let loose with a blast of 'Lean on Me' and 'O when the Saints'. Quite a few people appeared - I think the row I made might have had a bit of an effect... So I'd better practice again for this Thursday. Something EASY.

Ah well. Another week - a few more zoom lessons, more zoom meetings with friends and family - phone calls and texts to keep in touch - time passes, and another week beckons.

Take care - stay safe...

Wednesday 8th April - Spy Wednesday

In Holy Week, I have discovered, all the days have names.

Fig Monday - because Jesus cursed a fig tree
Temple Tuesday - because Jesus overturned the tables in the temple at Jerusalem
Spy Wednesday - because Judas went to arrange the betrayal of Jesus to the High Priests
Maundy Thursday - because Jesus gave his disciples a new commandment - mandate

These names come from the Bible reading for each day in the old Lecionary.

and then it's Good Friday, Black Saturday and Easter Sunday

I'm finding this a far more reflective time that usual - I guess there's more time, and indeed more, to reflect upon than usual. There's no scurry to buy Easter eggs, no arrangements to make for a special family Easter meal, no creating a menu, buying the food etc.

Bank holiday Monday has no special meaning this year for me.I'm rather enjoying the change.

Today I spent several hours drawing an Easter card for a friend, so that another friend could deliver it this afternoon. I've also, no what have I alsodone? Read a bit, done some other drawing, read a bit more, watered half the garden (He watered the rest) and made lunch and supper to give Him a break.

We have decided to try and arrange deliveries for all food now; a third letter arrived from a hospital instructing me to batten down the hatches for 12 weeks (I go to three different clinics, and each one has written to me). That was the final straw; He has been getting increasingly twitchy aboutthe risks associated with going to the supermarket, even though they are making great efforts to protect staff and customers, so we have drawn a line under that activity. I'm hoping to be able to arrange a fruit and veg box delivery, and the milkman still comes, and the freezer is full of portions of meat so we should be fine.

I promised to post pictures of the garden for the Daughter;

The lilac has huge buds now

The sauerkraut I started last weekend is looking promising - couple more days to go before it is ready

The cree has come up - I've just taken it out of its bag.

   
I'm planning to put the naturtiums seeds in tomorrow, hoping they will climb all over the fence..

Lent Inspirations 5 - Sunday 5th April - Palm Sunday

Many of the bloggers and facebookser and tweeters that I follow are churcher-goers of one style or another - Quakers, Catholics, Lutherans, Anglicans (that's me), United Reformed Church, Baptist, Methodist - have I left anyone out? Almost certainly, because there are as many forms of Christian Church as there are types of cuisine, genres of music or film, styles in art.

Leaving aside whether these are 'terrible and tragic' divisions, or reflections of different cultures and historical events, all of us seem to be honing in on Prayer at this time.

I've got an old copy of the Pocket Oxford Book of Prayer besde the bed; I flick through the section headings, choose and turn to a page, and see what catches my eye. I've been annotating, colouring over, or drawing pictures beside the prayers as I use them. It helps me to remember them.

Like this;

The section is 'Listening to God", and I srumbled upon this extract from the Revelations of Divine Love, by Julian of Norwich, a 14th century hermit.

I've coloured the words that were most important to me in yellow and orange,

'Then said our Good Lord Jesus Christ:

'" I am the ground of thy beseeching... Pray inwardly, thou thee thinketh it savour the not: for it is profitable, though though feel not..."

If find my prayers are flimsy and shallow and unfocussed, this urges me to continue, even if they seem to have no savour, for apparently they are profitable, even though I feel that I'm doing anyting useful.

The next part of the extract seems rather more ominous,coloured in storm tones of blue and red and purple. All those double negatives do bend my brain a bit, but 'Thou shalt not be overcome' is a great promise to hold on to. Yellow and gold again.

The other bloggers joining in with Angela Almond's Lent Inspirations can be found here;


 

 

Saturday 4th April - The First Warm Day

I'm defintely a warm weather person. Cold weather saps my energy, resilience, whatever you want to call it.

Today was warm and sunny all day.

I have spent the day doing this that and the other

 - cleaning the bathroom

 - reading

 - sitting in the sun; this involved moving a cat basket out of the way - an action which met with total disapproval from said cat

 - a few rows of knitting

 - planting seeds (tomato, basil, cress). The cress seeds needed to be sprinkled on some damp kitchen paper laid on a plate, and then kept in a dark place for a week. I've put the plate in this biscuit tin, reckoning that if I put them in a cupboard I would forget where they were.

I was a little taken aback to find there were only 6 seeds in the packet. They had all jolly well come up. 

 - making sauerkraut, ah, that also needed a dark place for 5 days. So I have put it in the bottom section of the cupboard in the dining room. On top of the tablecloths.

 - planting out my sweet peas into a container (The forecast is 5-8 degrees tonight so hopefully they will be fine.

 - walking to the post box and back, zig-zagging between both sides of the road to dodge other people out in the sunshine

 - weeding part of a flower bed - that was the hardest activity.

 - a few rows of knitting

 - playing the saxophone - I don't think I have opened the box for about six or seven years. One clue, is that there isn't a tag for saxophone on this blog.

 Everything was still there, including a couple of decent reeds. I had forgotten some of the fingerings, but even so

it didn't take me too long to work out how to play 'O when the saints' and 'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot'. Playing the sax is an excellent work out for my lungs.

I expect I shall pay for all this activity tomorrow... 

Friday 3rd April - day, er, which day?

I saw an amusing picture on facebook today

shared from the Dumfries and Galloway community website by a friend. Actually, I saw lots of amusing things on twitter and facebook today but you can go and hunt them out for yourself.

This sums up the week quite well. Not and entirely strange phenomenon  in my life, ad the school holidays tend to be like this anyway, especially the Summer holidays. But never in 'term time' - and the Spring Term 'ended' today.

This is a     l o n g   post, so don't feel you've got to read it all at once! Or even at all!

I 'zoomed' a couple of piano lessons to private pupils; after the shambolic series of emails from The Office cutting off teaching 'their'pupils I've moved my attention to the private ones. I'll issue invitations to a few more next week, and increase the teaching after Easter, (DV, as the nuns always said when making plans for the future. Or even for the morrow)

I wrote the last post on Wednesday morning; I've done a fair bit of this and that since then.

So has Himself.

His first Grand Engineering Success was to fix the shredder. Did I mention that a few days ago (maybe at the beginning of the week? - it's not important, anyway), I sorted through my stacks of bank statements and hoard of receipts which were overflowing out of their 'temporary' to-be-filed-basket. Dating back, in some cases to 2006. At least they were in date order. I filled a carrier bag with ready-to-shred, and He ordered a shredder.

Now, let me make this clear - I have barely used it, maybe just three pieces of paper. He has been in charge, and shreds away in small batches, ensuring that the machine is looked after tenderly and compassionately. It rewarded him by refusing to work after about three days 

It took a while, but having assembled all the necessary tools and torches, with the exception of the right-angled tweezers which are currently in a Safe Place, he resolved the problem, extracting several large handfuls of paper shredlings reduced almost to dust. For those of technical bent, I can tell you that what happens is that the paper heaps itself up inside, long before it is full, and the top of the heap manages to involve itself in the shredder blades in the most unhelpful way. The important device for curing the problem was the cheap and tacky screwdriver, which is now stored near the shredder. Just in case.

I spent a chunk of the day watching drawing tutorials on youtube resulting in several more pages of sketchy stuff. One was a tutorial on sketching people to populate quick sketches;
 

The line drawing examples were fun, and interesting to do, but I really love the water-colour versions, which use the same construction. What I would really like to be able to do is add features - so, I searched for another tutorial. Oh my word, it turned out to be very straightforward, nothing like as complicated as I thought. You just rough out the basic shapes (circle and triangle), add the guidlelines and get going. Current efforts look very naive - teenagerish - at the moment but I shall peservere.

The starfish are copied from a page in the Almanac I bought myself at the beginning of the year. I haven't disovered the relevance of starfish to April. On Wednesday evenings I usually go round to a friend's and we eat cake and do crafting - sewing, nitting, drawing, whatever is on the go. So on Wednesday we 'zoomed' eachother and carried on as sort of usual.   

While I was teaching, He went out foraging. Waitrose was even more organised than the last visit, and people better behaved. Well, they were mostly well behaved last time apart just a few impatient idiots pushing through, getting too close, hustling about. This time they have improved their already good queuing system so that the social distancing was more clearly marked out. Most of what we wanted was there - fresh fruit and vegetables not as abundant as last month but that's hardly surprising, as some much of it was imported in the past. We don't seem to be going without, and He was able to get a few 'bonus items' for my father which their visiting grocer wasn't able to supply. 

Today I potted on pansy and parsley seedlings from little freebie kits from Marks and Spencers. I hope I haven't done this too early, but they were getting very tangled in their little starter pots.

And I tidied corner by the piano, emptying yet another bag of 'stuff', while completely ignored by Leo, even when I kept moving the chair.

Writing about seedlings reminds me that the sweet peas are still outside - at ten past eight, I outght to get them back in.

Wednesday 1st April - not an April Fool in sight

 The sun comes in to the front of our house in the morning, so that's where I am staying for the moment.

I should be halfway through a series of three back to back piano lessons right now, but I had a sudden series of emails yesterday evening from the Music Services office;

6pm these are the arrangements that will be put in place should we decide to put most of our teaching staff on 'furlough' (which means the government will pay 80% of our earnings while we are employed but not working)

6.30pm you are officially on furlough from 1st April until the end of May; NO MORE LESSONS TO BE TAUGHT FROM 1st APRIL

7pm the important bit; please send your pay claim up to 31st March in ASAP

I, for one, am not that distressed; sloth being one of my default settings I am always happy to be paid to do nothing, and it has been stressed that to qualify for furlough one must not do any work that would bring in revenue for the company. So, if I want to, I could rustle up some online private teaching. If I want to. If the children want lessons... If I'm in the mood...

What else has happened in the past few days?
Zoom piano lessons (they are surprisingly draining of energy)
Zoom meetups with friends (they are also quite tiring, but it's good to see them)
Phone calls
Online shopping for wool (Himself has bought jigsaws and U-gears kits)
Some piano playing
Lots of reading
Too much internet surfing
Some more knitting (and too much 'tinking')

I usually check through my pictures on my phone to find out what I have been doing, but I haven't taken many pictures so far.

Here's a cat instead.

She's purring at the moment, but all that's going to change in a minute when I get up and send her downstairs.