Thursday 31st October

 There was a brief gleam of sunlight this morning, enough to catch my attention, but gone before I thought of going outside. 

I'd been out for a bit already, just to look around. Of course it wasn't long before I'd pulled a few weeds, tidied some pots, cleared a garden chair and brought it over to my veg patch. 

Spring next year MUST be better than this year, surely? Instead of trying to follow the 'Veg in One Bed' plan in 2025, I'm just going to grow what I want to, or what I want to grow. I'm feeling a bit more positive about the veg patch after half an hour in the fresh air.

At lunchtime Ang's Cover Story stitching dropped through the letterbox. She's found some fabric with vintage advertising printed on it, and cleverly embellished the pictures with a variety of stitches using variegated threads in Autumn colours, 

I love the way she decorated the face! I have no idea what lime water is but it sound horrible... for indigestion, maybe?

She included a Lent book which I'm definitely going to use. I have an idea of playing the Carol for each day through December.  I noticed on the back cover the blurb said the author is the pastor of a church in a town called Kalamazoo, in Michigan, USA. What an amazing name for a town!

This is the dedication page, clearly designed by a non-musician.

 It's the first line of the famous Carol 'Joy to the world'. If you sing the first line while following the notes, you will see what I mean 😁 

Wednesday 30th October

 I got as far as photographing and packing up the stitching to send to Ang for the Cover Story Collaboration. The weather outside was so cold and grey and dank and miserable that it hasn't made it as far as the post office.  

The weather forecast promised a sunny morning, but...

However BB discovered these at the bottom of the garden 

The cyclamen in the front the garden are all but over, so these feel like a bonus.

Tuesday 29th October

I have to confess to tapping out this post under the influence of a small glass of port which was actually a little on the large side.

It's been a l o n g, l  o  n  g day... starting with the alarm going off at 5 am.

I didn't resent yesterday's early awakening, due to the clocks changing, as much as I might have done as I knew today would have to be an early start. We left the house at 6 am to drive to London for a 9.30am routine hospital appointment,  my first face to face at this clinic appointment since video appointments began in 2020. It looked as though we were going to be 2 hours early, until we reached Putney Hill. That's when I was able to admire the variety of architecture, observe the myriad different types of bicycles and motorbikes weaving through the stationary traffic and add several rows to the sock I am knitting 

We were only a few mmiles away from the Brompton Hospital at 7.30 am, but in the event BB had to drop me off near the entrance and drive off to park the car as we were only just in time!

The consultation, lasting a scant 30 minutes, was well worth the three-hour journey though, and I don't begrudge the time or the effort. It is well worth a face to face meeting to be sure that we are both clear about how it is going, and for us to come away feeling confident and reassured. 

We didn't want to go straight home, so we walked a little way round to a local church which I knew had a cafe with outside tables. Perfect, as the last thing I wanted to do was get straight back in the car again! 

Before visiting the cafe we went into the church; it always seems rude not to enter and pay our respects, as it were. There was definitely a trace of incense in the air, and also a place to light a candle. So I lit a candle for my family and friends (that includes you, anyone who is reading this post, by the way) and took in the atmosphere for a little while.

Then, resisting the 'Full English Breakfast £8.95' we settled for coffee each (very good too) and relaxed in the tranquility of the space. 

The trees were completely still with beautiful autumn leaves.

The churchyard has been turned into a park, with tennis courts, all-weather table tennis,  and play areas. I was enchanted by the climbing area, with Real Rocks and a soft landing surface area 

I wish we had had something like this in our local park when my children were small! What a brilliant idea.

We were very pleased to find that there was a cut-through to the cul-de-sac we were parked in, saving us from walking round three sides of a square. We've taken to booking a driveway in this delightful little street when we come to the Brompton but we'd never walked down to the end before. 

These lions might have been on guard duty but they looked quite friendly to me

So, we were home seven and half hours after setting off; back in time for a slightly late lunch... but still worth the trip in our minds.

Mind you,  we haven't done anything much this afternoon or evening!

Monday 28th October

Oh what a creature of habit one becomes as time flows along!

I wasn't surprised to find myself wide awake at 5:20 this morning, bearing in mind I usually woke up around sometime after 6am all through British  Summer Time. Hey ho. BB was awake too, although I didn't mean to snap the main light on as I went to the bathroom. Force of ...habit, I suppose!

But it's no big deal, now that we're retired. Lie-ins don't have the same significance now that we are, on the whole, not as bound by daily schedules and routines as when we were both working.

I spent 20 mins on hold when I rang the surgery today, and my call took about 2 minutes. The receptionist sounded willing, but tired and harassed so I didn't hang about but just took the first time and date she offered. The telephone answering system opened with the message that they were short staffed because of sickness, and asked us to be patient,  so I was. I was quite happy anyway flicking through 'Please Mrs Butler ' which arrived today.

 Here's the title poem;

I promise you the children in the year 1/2 class knew this one by heart as the teacher used to quote from it when they exasperated her with unnecessary questions.  However I never saw any of the children sitting in the sink, swallowing their rubber or trying to lock themselves in the cupboard... 

These days she might be risking being taken aside for a quiet word...

I'm anticipating a fair bit of hanging around tomorrow and have Taken Steps accordingly.  The blue sock has been stalled for months, and I have fathoms out why. I was bored with plain blue, and having to carry around such a huge ball of yarn when the whole sock will only use a quarter of it made the knitting far less portable, which one of the main joys of sock knitting. 

I reckon I have solved both problems in one go. I've wound a couple of smaller balls; two plain, two variegated, and I'll continue in random stripes. The knitting will now fit into my bag so I can take it with me to while away any waiting time.

As a bonus, for some reason winding wool always adds steps to my step counter...

Sunday 27th October

 I came upon this quotation today;

Jeremy Taylor was a cleric, born 1617, died 1677.

Saturday 26th October

Rain rain, go away, come again another day...

It's been a day of two parts.

For his part, BB rushed around 

vacuuming, replacing the dead battery on the vacuum cleaner, fixing the cleaning head because it had stopped doing its spinny thing.... 

Changing the filters on the oxygen concentrator and fitting clean new cannulas...

Two loads through the washing machine...

Clearing up in the kitchen...

As for me, I just sat and stitched and watched YouTubes and stitched some more...

The October stitching for the cover story collaboration with Ang is about done. 

To have a break from it, I scrolled through YouTube, and found this

Halfway through I thought - I've got everything literally to hand; I'm going to give that a go... I found some scraps and cut a rectangle about 5 x 3 inches, sort of. I laid the scraps on top, pinned, tacked and sewed them down.

Then came the origami bit. It looked simple enough. I tried it with a piece of paper. Fiddly,  but doable.

Not quite that simple when you try and do the same thing with fabric. I suppose it only took three, or four, maybe five goes, including a pause for a pot of tea!

I think the main problems were having a smaller fabric rectangle and it not holding a crease like paper, so it kept unfolding itself all the time! Still, for a trial run I'm pretty pleased.

I was using cotton perle threads. Years ago when Ang and I did our first collaboration (the Postcard Project) I ordered a variety pack on Amzn. It seemed pretty cheap...

I wasn't too impressed when these boxes arrived, all faded and stuck together with ancient yellow curling sellotape! You get what you pay for? 

The contents looked OK. The boxes were lined with pristine tissue paper, and at first sight it seemed a wonderful selection of colours. Although I was disappointed with so many whites and blacks.

 

I didn't notice the problem with the colour selection for several months... I know my Canadian friend will spot ot at once!

(I'll put the answer in the next post... but I expect it will already be in the comments)

Friday 25th October

Oyez, oyez, we are speeding towards Christmas!

A leaflet from COOK dropped through the letterbox; I am sorely tempted by the Christmas Dinner bundle for 2;

Not cheap, but how much would a Christmas dinner cost in a restaurant?  Admittedly it doesn't include a starter or the pudding, but we never have starters and usually can't manage a pudding on Christmas day.

 I'd seen the buds growing on my Christmas cactus, but even so the first flower managed to come out without my noticing. I wonder if the flowers will keep arriving until Christmas? 

I've moved it to the kitchen windowsill a the buds and flowers were going to get knocked as we went up and down the stairs when it was on the hall windowsill. 

Today I've spent time browsing on the second-hand books website. I just needed something to make up the 'buy three, get another free' offer, and I remembered this;

One of my colleagues,  a firm favourite with her pupils, used to read this in a loud raucous voice to her class; they loved it! I was lucky enough to hear her reading the one about the dog in the playground  - what a performance! 

She used to quote chunks of it back at her 5 and 6 year old when they came asking  questions with obvious answers... 'please miss, what should I do with this?' as she had pretty robust expectations for them in regard to of thinking for yourself,  remembering without being continually reminded and so on. Woe betide any who didn't write their name on their work before handing it in!

I remember teaching a music class with a young lad who paid no attention to class instructions; you would always end up saying 

'OK, stand up everyone, DAVID stand up. Push your chairs in and line up at the door, DAVID push your chair in, line up at the door DAVID...'.

No, he wasn't deaf,  or neuro-diverse, or anything like that. Just... never paying any notice unless personally addressed and called to attention... his class teacher got his measure and he got the message after a few weeks of careful cajoling!

Watching my colleague with her class was a real joy. I shall be hearing her voice in my ear as I read the poems.

Thursday 24th October

 Time seemed to go so slowly through Spring and Summer, and now it is racing away. It's not as if I was busy or anything...

In a week's time I shall start reading Nigel Slater's 'Christmas Chronicles' - have I said that already? It popped up on my auto-complete bar suspiciously quickly. He starts on 1st November with making liqueurs to be ready at Christmas. I'm not a great drinker, but the idea of a tiny indulgent glass of homemade apricot or prune and raisin liqueur does appeal. I think I'll give the dried figs version a miss. I'm not keen on figs, fresh or dried.

I plan to buy the ingredients in time to make them on 1st November, all being well.

The leftover fruit makes a luxurious topping for ice cream, or yogurt, or even muesli or porridge in the dull days of spring. 

My annual review with the pharmacist at our GP surgery was fine, apart from flagging up raised something or other level, meaning I was approaching (but not actually arrived at)  type 2 diabetes.  'Be sure your sins will find you out', I muttered to myself.  One biscuit with morning coffee or tea (or both, let's be a little bit honest here) has crept to two, and one chocolate at 'chocolate o'clock' has also become two. Sometimes 'chocolate o'clock' comes round in the afternoon as well as the evening if it has been a particularly gutty sort of day.

I haven't thrown out the biscuits and chocolates, but am determinedly going back to one, morning or afternoon. And just one 'chocolate o'clock' per day.

Look what I've done to the last of the chocolates! Snip snip snip with the scissors, and I've cut them all in half!

I reckon these two small changes will make a difference. 

Also, two of the meds I take may be giving slightly inflated results for the blood test; I shall ask when I get the opportunity. 

Still, it will do no harm to my weight, waist measurement, blood tests or purse to rein in the biscuit/chocolate consumption. 

Wednesday 23rd October

 Hello again!

I'm back! Not quite as springy as a jack-in-the-box, but feeling quite human again.

There's nothing to blog about,  because apart from a bit of stitching on the cover collaboration project, nothing has happened today.... reading,  one piano lesson  this afternoon, and now Book Club.

Nice and quiet. 

Tuesday 22nd October

Today didn't really happen.

I woke up feeling definitely seedy after a broken night due to coughing (sorry, BB, you won't have slept well either). I don't get headaches, but this morning was the exception that proves the rule.

Annoying, because it looked set to be sunny and I liked the idea of getting out for a bit. However I spent the morning mostly asleep in bed, which was all I was fit for. 

Occasionally I would telephone BB who was downstairs and ask for another glass of water or cup of coffee - he is SO kind and patient. 

That seemed to be all that was needed; a morning in bed sleeping off whatever lurgy was brewing. I came down for lunch and I've been sitting reading all afternoon. 

Tomorrow is another day, as I always mutter to myself when a day hasn't goneas planned! I've a piano lesson to teach in the afternoon, and Book Club in the evening, but I reckon I'll not be hurrying to get up in the morning. 

Monday 21st October

 I've been ordering books again... and all second-hand, I hasten to add. (Because that makes me feel fractionally less extravagant)

I've had my eye on this Shakespeare book by Judi Dench ever since it was published, and it has been well worth waiting for. 

Judith Dench looks at various characters that she has played, and just seems to chat about them. She's also a mine of information about the inner workings of how to understand what's going on, as well as seasoning the writing with fascinating and amusing anecdotes. The first chapter is on Lady Macbeth. I remember 'doing' Macbeth for O-levels but never enjoyed it. Judith Dench's take on her is a revelation. 

This wa a bit of a make-weight, as wob.com do 'buy three and get a fourth for free' which I nearly always fall for. There are some useful ideas in the book.

Another Judi Dench! Again, reading the book feels like listening to her talking, like a television interview. I'm enjoying dipping in and out of it. 

Lastly,  I have bought a second hand copy of The Kitchen Diaries II by Nigel Slater. I thought I had taken a picture but obviously not. I'm trying to be strict and only read the entry for today's date, so that I can make it last for the year, starting from the recipe for today.

Sunday 20th October

 This is the final day of the international week of prayer for world peace.

We began our zoom church service today with this prayer;

Peace starts in our own hearts, in our own hearts; it doesn't seem as though I can do much in the way of creating peace in the wider world, but one has to start somewhere.

Saturday 19th October

 Yesterday began with a proper Autumn mistiness. I would go so far as to say fogginess. But we weren't deceived... we clung to the promise of the weather forecast.  At just after 10 we in the morning we collected my father, ignoring the seeping damp cold and fog, and set off for a local cafe. 

These undertakings are always weather dependent as I can't really go inside cafes etc safely. My father was wearing 2 pairs of trousers for warmth, and I had packed extra blankets, and a hat and scarf to wrap him up snugly. I've even knitted warm chunky 'gaiters' as he calls them for his ankles.

The forecast stayed true,  and the sun came out, burning through the mist, and we able to sit out in the sun and enjoy coffee together. Perfect! All the blankets and woollies stayed in the car.

In the afternoon a friend came round with a jar of her freshly made whisky marmalade 

which I'm very much looking forward to.

And my lovely gardening lady came round with bags of bulbs and trays of violas to plant up my tubs and pots.

Today was a round of what my Northern Irish relations call 'messages', or 'errand' to us Southerners;

We had a couple of packs of logs for an open fire that's never going to happen for us now, and I'd promised to a friend with a woodstove, and one of the planted pots went to other friends who have had a hard time recently. Finally a tray of Egyptian Walking Onions have been handed over to keen vegetable gardening friends.

It's a great feeling to have actually carried out good intentions instead of leaving them hanging around.

We finished the evening with a zoom catchup with our overseas friends. 

A lovely day.

I've been getting on with the Collaboration stitching; one and a half motifs ready, and the background stitched down...

And I've chosen the yarn for my chunky cardigan 

And the Adult surprise cardigan grows, slowly slowly. Each row takes 10-15 minutes now with 200 stitches and still increasing. The good thing is that somehow each row is along the back and the fronts and up the sides. The pattern is weird, but should resolve into a garment,  eventually... you just have to remember the magic incantation at the end as you fold it in an impossibly origami-style way.

Thursday 17th October

 Hurray! The bits I need for the October Cover Story Collaboration stitching arrived yesterday and I got going straight away. Now that I've made a start I've got a reasonable idea of how long it should take me to finish. Hopefully I'll get it done over the next week or so, in time to post at the end of the month.

And Hurry! The pattern for the very easy cardigan in super chunky yarn also arrived yesterday. I've spent some time browsing the super chunky yarns but not made up my mind yet. I'm encouraged by how few stitches are needed, just 52 for the back. Excellent. 

The Elizabeth Zimmerman Adult version of the famous Baby Surprise Jacket which I picked up again last week currently has about 180 stitches, and I'm still in the 'increases' section, adding four stitches every other row. I think I keep going until I have 244. Each row takes forever...

And now for The Rant...

Honestly, the background music in The Repair Shop is INSANELY INANE. Are they mending a clock? Cue the ticky tocky pizzicato strings. Are they mending a doll? Obviously glockenspiel music is needed. Some kind of spinning thing? Let's have round and round music. 

I'm finding the background music simplistic and annoying enough, but then, because they switch from item to item every few moments, they switch the background music too!

Robot  doll  clock  whirlygig 

 stop Stop STOP with the aural nonsense!

Rant over.

I'll creep back into my corner now...

Wednesday 16th October

 This poem by Thomas Hardy blew me away. The idea that just 'a year ago, or less than twain' these song birds were 'only particles of grain, And earth, and air, and rain.' is just astonishing to contemplate.

Tuesday 15th October

 After a relaxing day yesterday I wound up my oxygen to max and tackled a job that's been winding me up for weeks...

The kitchen windowsill was in desperate need of a clean. Now just look at the shine! If cleanliness really was next to godliness I'd be very close to heaven. 

I bought those brown Betty teapots in my first term at university, nearly 50 years ago. That makes them almost vintage teapots!

I've discovered that cillit bang power degrease spray does a good job on windows as well. I think they've dried without streaking. 

I stop and admire the improvement every time I go into the kitchen. 

This is the little pile of notebooks (and also my kindle) that I continually carry around from the settee in the sitting room to my tiny worktable in the dining room.

From top to bottom;

Pencil/pen case, kindle, current Commonplace Book, books was notebook and daybook where all sorts of notes, lists, phonecalls etc get jotted down.

Although the stack does vary according to what I'm planning to do!

Monday 14th October

What happened today?

Nothing much.

 It rained.

I taught a very enjoyable piano lesson. 

I sent a couple of WhatsApp messages.

I read.

I wrote.

I knitted.

I ate biscuits.

BB cooked meals and did a jigsaw.

Some days are like that. And that's fine. Not every day is filled with exciting events (thank heavens!)

Sunday 13th October

 This was the opening prayer at the zoom church service this morning;

It's the phrase 'and find that he is already here' that caught my attention.

Saturday 12th October - knitty gritty

I haven't used that title for a post for a while but knitting is pretty much all I've done today. 

Apart from bestirring myself to get up and admire the moon just now...

Poncho number 2 is as knitted as it is going to be, and I've sewn up the first seam (there are only 2!). I did ought to finish it tomorrow,  surely? 

I've been hunting for a really easy garter stitch pattern in chunky or even super chunky yarn. This should be arriving on Thursday;

I like 'very easy' in the description. Hopefully it will be a 'very quick' knit too. All my winter clothes seem to be in darker colours,  and I've been hankering after something BRIGHT and slightly wacky. This ball of yarn has been lying around for a year or more - why did I buy it? No idea.

But it's the sort of colour mix I have in mind. I remember someone commenting on another blog that it's always a good idea to have a brightly coloured project on the needles over winter.

Meanwhile I've got going again on my adult surprise jacket. It's been 'resting' for a couple of years at the 'increases' stage. 

Fortunately I left my notes in the bag with the knitting 

and even more fortunately I was able to work out where I had got to, and what the pink, red and white stitch markers were all about... I reckon I've got about 68 rows of increases, and then I'll be into the final phase(s).

Friday 11th October

 Today's activity was getting vaccinations done.

BB had one for flu last week, and I've got my flu vaccination booked in next week.

So this morning we went off for Covid vaccinations, and took my father along to have both at once (brave soul!). They've got it down to a very slick operation at this centre, at a village hall about a 10 minute drive away. door to door, including the driving it took barely an hour.

So far I'm feeling OK... apart from a slightly sore arm. And so's BB and my father.

Fingers crossed it stays that way...

Thursday 10th October

 There are some days when I  want to hide from the world and take refuge in bed (today isn't one of them, I should add)

and coincidentally 'draw in your bed' was the the last of the 7 prompts for the illustrative journaling trial.

I didn't draw this while in my bed! Neither was I having an 'out of body' experience,  just doodling it from memory. 

Taking a picture of the doodle made me think 'however did we manage without phone cameras?'

This morning BB sent me a picture of my father’s eye, which looked very inflamed, to help decide what to do next.

Providentially my brother was coming over to take him out to lunch. The pair of them went round to the local hospital and waited for several hours. Eventually they saw a very efficient nurse who treated the eye, gave instructions for future care, provided them with ointment, gauze wipes and saline solution and sent them on their way to a belated pub lunch. Excellent! 

I took pictures of half a dozen extracts of piano music and emailed them to a student as suggestions for our next study

I take pictures for the blog; the cake looks good but was ( you have to say this in a Paul Hollywood accent) "over-baked, what a shame". So I'm not sharing the recipe. Yet.

Pictures of family, of flowers, things I want to look at in close up...

You name it. It's no wonder that every so often I get a warning about using too much space and have to do some serious pruning. 

Wednesday 9th October

 I'm still writing up my holiday journal; we got back on Friday 27th September! I know why I stalled. It was because I was putting off trying to tackle copying the couple of photographs of Ely cathedral. 

We only had about an hour to look round; just time to walk right round and light a few candles. I can never resist lighting a candle in a church.

We didn't venture far into the famous Lady Chapel as to our surprise there was a mother-and-toddler group in full cry, so the huge space was echoing to the sound of happy children.

I was fascinated by the way some of the most ancient doorways were treated when the cathedral underwent alterations in layer centuries. Would this be permitted nowadays?

Even this spectacular and important door appears to have been brutally cut diwn.

I had a go at copying it. That was really difficult,  but it did mean I took the time to look closely at the amazing carvings.

And then back to the cottage and pumping engine house - not as isolated as it looks. We passed quite a few houses and cottages along the lane, and there is a farm beyond, hidden by trees.

Tuesday 8th October

 Rain.

Sun.

Sun and rain.

Rain and sun.

In other words, English weather!

I've sorted out the plants that need to come indoors for winter, and found bowls for them all. Two salvia cuttings and eight pelargonium. BB carried all the pots upstairs and found spaces for them on the windowsills.

Another job done.

Day 6;

Monday 7th October

An odd day.

I spent a good deal of the morning wandering around the house in an 'abominable no-man' mood... there were things that needed doing or that I could do, but I didn't want to do any of them.

A colleague of mine coined the phrase for a particularly unhelpful man at work. I think he was a premises manager. After failing to obtain a number of essential supplies from him, such a a replacement for a broken chair, an extra filing cabinet etc, he was always referred to as 'the abominable no-man'. 

That was a long, long, long time ago now...

The sun came out in the afternoon and everything changed for the better! Perhaps I need a big light-up yellow sun 🌞. Light the one in teletubbies?

I've kept the illustrative journaling going. Following the prompts feels a bit artificial but I'm only trying it for a week.

Copied from the Internet;

The picture is on its side;

Sunday 6th October

I saved this prayer from the opening of a service at the zoom church in Leics that I join on Sundays;