Tuesday thoughts

No quiet peaceful country or clifftop walk today but a walk alongside the busy main road into town for my Knit and Natter group.


I have just finished reading a book by Sarah Challis whose stories I enjoy in which she mentions Yeovil and you might think it a really horrible town - indeed I don't know anyone who ever says Yeovil? How lovely! And yet we are lucky enough to have so many wide verges and so many thousands of daffodils alongside the roads that I think it is actually quite a lovely place to live. Who wouldn't if their walk to town was like mine?

As I walked I pondered on the miracle of the sense of hearing and indeed of sight...

I hardly noticed the sound of traffic thundering along the busy road as my mind was concentrating on the birdsong I could hear.

I didn't notice the ugly road and the traffic because I was thinking about the beauty all around me.

Aren't these tiny blue speedwell (if that is what they are) pretty but only if you take the time to actually see what is around.

Look at this lovely willow tree just beginning to dress itself in pale green leaves.

Even this little corner alongside the roundabout is lovely and my eyes were firmly fixed on the pretty flowers rather than on the ugly buildings and the noisy vehicles.

How pretty and clean these flowers look on a wall I passed.

This lovely old pump is outside the museum and tourist office (although I see that the tourist office is to be moved at the end of the month - what a shame)

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I know my husband who wears hearing aids cannot cut out background noise and even if he could hear the birdsong he would also get all the traffic noise and I was so grateful that my hearing is in fine form and I am able to pick out what I am listening to and block out the rest. The same with eyesight so that I noticed the beauty and the flowers along the route and didn't even see the rest. Aren't the human senses wonderful?!

Giving up for Lent?

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I have volunteered to join Floss in her Pause for Lent posts each week till Easter - Easter now that's a festival I feel I can really celebrate (many of you know my feelings about Christmas!). However as I am not a regular church goer these days I thought I should check out exactly what is meant by Lent before diving in with my thoughts! Apparently according to the BBC website here Lent is the period of 40 days which comes before Easter in the Christian calendar. Beginning on Ash Wednesday, Lent is a season of reflection and preparation before the celebrations of Easter. By observing the 40 days of Lent, Christians replicate Jesus Christ's sacrifice and withdrawal into the desert for 40 days. Lent is marked by fasting, both from food and festivities.
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Catholics are being urged to give up meat for Lent by the leader of their church here in England and Wales according to the BBC here and I know many people decide to give up things like chocolate for the period of Lent but I wonder is that really going to make me a better person or more in tune with God? Might it not be better to think about what we eat and where it comes from and whether or not there are those who are being exploited in its production and to strive to alter the terrible waste of food that goes on, the damage to the planet that occurs by intensive farming, the people in other parts of the world who are starving so that land which might grow crops for them is being used to grow crops either to feed cattle or to provide out of season delicacies for us here in the West? Lent is indeed a time for reflection but giving up chocolate is probably not the answer and I guess that what is more important is to think WHY you are giving up whatever it is.
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Easter in the Northern hemisphere comes in Springtime and so we can see it as a time of rebirth and renewal but what of those in the southern hemisphere for whom it comes in the Autumn at the same time as Harvest Festival?
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Rev Laurie Campbell on the Methodist Church website suggests that giving up Lent might be appropriate occasionally - now there's a thought!
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Refreshed by his experience of worship in New Zealand, the Revd Laurie Campbell suggests it would do us good to give Lent a miss once in a while. "In the Southern Hemisphere, the approach to Easter can hide itself under other church celebrations. In 2008, the first Sunday in Lent in St George’s Church, Auckland, was also Harvest Festival Sunday – quite a challenge for preacher and people. There was no hope of using new spring growth from the cold soil as a lead into the death and resurrection of Christ because it was early autumn and leaves were fading and dying. But I’m not personally a fan of celebrating Lent every year anyway. The repetition sometimes disables spirituality, especially if it is dominated by a tired liturgy or pious priests. Poor Jesus is rushed from childhood to death at speed every year! Let’s have a good Lent once every four years, and between time, let’s open up a wider range of readings from the biblical gospels between Epiphany and Easter." Do you agree?
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I leave you with a prayer:
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Do all the good you can,
by all the means you can,
in all the ways you can,
in all the places you can,
at all the times you can,
to all the people you can,
as longas ever you can.

John Wesley

PS - I have just discovered that I am ahead of myself here and this post should have been posted next week! Oh well - I did say I wasn't a regular church goer didn't I?!!

Santosha

On Monday at yoga our teacher told us we would be concentrating on 2 principles one of which was "santosha" which apparently means contentment. This made me think about contentment and what it means and why so few of us seem to have it.
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According to my dictionary contentment means a feeling of happiness or satisfaction. I wondered why when so many of us have everything we need (note the word need not want!) we still feel the need to search for satisfaction elsewhere? Foreign travel, new things for our homes, clothes and so on never seem to fill the void we have and leave us wanting more.
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I went for a walk today with my friend - we went to Eype near Bridport which is part of the World Heritage Jurrasic Coast. The day was bright and sunny but with a bitter North wind so we looked and felt like the Michelin Man togged up with all our layers, with hats pulled down over our ears, scarves wrapped round our necks and gloves on our hands! Our walk took us along a lane up onto the clifftops and then down onto the beach.
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But once we got down on to the beach it was more sheltered and we sat on one of these large rocks enjoying the sun, watching the waves rolling in across the pebbles and chatting and I was truly CONTENT in the moment.

Isn't this just breathtaking?

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The wild flowers were brightly shining in the sunshine ....

The perfume from these lovely violets was fabulous.

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The sky was blue,

Sadly the coast is being eroded and my friend was telling me that she had seen some photos of this area years ago and that this little hut was actually surrounded by grass and not as it is now near the edge - it is for rent but by the look of it you'd better be quick!

Just look at that sky.

No one was paddling - I wonder why!!!

Lunch was a bowl of soup in the conservatory of they Eypes Mouth Hotel - we seemed to be the only customers till a couple of other walkers arrived as we were leaving but the soup was hot, the view over the sea great and to be out of the wind was wonderful.

Was I content? YES!!!!

The answer my friends...!

I think I've discovered the answer! The question was where does the time go and why don't I seem to get as much done these days as I used to?

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Today I am having a rare treat - I am on my own for the whole day - DH has gone to London to a stamp exhibition (yawn, yawn!) I decided that rather than going with him to London and amusing myself there I would take the opportunity to have the house to myself for a change. Before he retired he was gone from home at 7.15 and rarely back before 7.00 in the evening and occasionally he was abroad for his firm - usually for several weeks at a time so I was used to being on my own and I have not yet quite come to terms with his being here all the time!

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The alarm went of at 6.30 this morning and having taken him to the bus station I was home just after 8.00 am. When I got back I set to and tidied the kitchen, did the breakfast dishes and I now have two loads of washing blowing on the line, have dusted and vacuumed the whole house and tidied and sorted out the stuff which seems to take over every available surface in our home, had all the windows wide open for a while to let the Spring air in, had a cup of coffee in the garden listening to the birdsong, done Tuesday's ironing and had a wander round the garden with my camera and it is still only just noon!

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The answer my friends is to get up early and to get on with it and not spend half the morning faffing about and checking e-mails etc as I usually do!! Sad but true!

There are signs of spring everywhere now - the birds are singing fit to burst, the leaves are softly unfurling in that wonderful pale spring green, the sun is shining and all's well with the world just at the moment!

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After lunch I intend to go for a walk and when I get back to get on with something creative - not sure what just yet but hopefully something will inspire me by then! I am alone till the bus gets back about 9.00 so still have plenty of time before I don my wife's hat and go and fetch DH from the bus!!

Better go and get myself something to eat and not spend too long at the computer.....

Hope you too are enjoying a sunny spring day - or at least those of you in the Northern hemisphere!

Remains of last week's fresh flowers - picked over this morning


Here they are when I bought them.

Plastic v Vintage

It's been a lovely day here today and this afternoon I was out in the garden pottering for a while. I moved this white plastic seat onto our tiny patio until I get the little bistro table and chairs painted with a fresh coat of wood preservative and put in position for the summer. It was very dirty having been outside all winter and I set to scrubbing it and whilst I did I pondered on how an old wooden seat even if worn and tatty would be attractive whereas this one just looks horrid (it wasn't much better when it was new as then it was too sparkling white!)

This got me thinking about plastic and UPVC and to wondering why it is that natural things have the ability to look beautiful even when worn which plastic things never have. How much nicer would a proper wooden barrel look here instead of this horrid green plastic water butt? But have you seen the cost of such barrels?!

And here is another one outside the kitchen door along with a plastic watering can - doesn't look like the sort of vignette one sees in Country Living magazine when they have a wooden butt and an old metal can does it?

How much nicer is our beehive compost bin than the bright green plastic one (why is everything green do they thing it will blend in with nature? Some hope!) ?Our beehive will look better when it has weathered a bit and when there are plants growing over the fence behind but that plastic one will look like that for ever!

Pictures from an old CL magazine

Look at these lovely old buckets - not a plastic one to be seen...

and here's a real shed with vintage tools etc - doesn't it look great?

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My thoughts then turned to the house and its UPVC windows, loft and wall insulation and so on - all of which were here when we bought it. Now there's no denying that UPVC windows keep out the draughts, keep in the heat, and I never have to take a mallet and the rolling pin to them to get them open in the spring after a wet winter either! But there are disadvantages - when they get dingy there can be no coat of paint to freshen them up, we are stuck with white and the doors are white too which I would never have chosen. This house will never become a pretty tumbledown place like stone built homes of yesteryear will it - what will happen to all that plastic, glass fibre and foam? Is it more ecological to have a warm well insulated house like this or a draughty badly insulated old house? I fear the plastic in our home is here to stay for hundred of years long after we have gone.

BUT .. then I thought that plastic has its advantages as I moved these green chairs into a patch of sunshine (doesn't look very sunny in the pic I know) and we sat and had a cup of tea in the garden - wouldn't have wanted to sit for long but it was beautiful to be outside in February drinking tea and listening to the birds in the wood alongside our garden for the few minutes it took to drink our tea. Plastic is light which is why we changed the old metal watering can we used to have for a plastic one. I suppose that as with most things in life it's a case of swings and roundabouts and whilst the old vintage stuff might look better sometimes the modern plastic has its advantages. Just a pity we inherited quite so much of it from the vendor when we moved here - we will gradually change some of it but I guess we are stuck with the wall insulation and the doors and windows!!

Hope you have had a sunny day too.

Hands

Note - only one hand is shown as the other was occupied with the camera!

Yesterday I went up to London to meet a friend and to see the Evolving English exhibition at the British Library. I went by coach - a two and three quarter hour ride with nothing to do other than look at the passing scenery. Lovely, and how I relished the time spent just sitting and letting my mind wander something I rarely allow to happen normally. I noticed my hands resting in my lap and I got to thinking about hands in general and mine in particular. As you will see my hands are not going to win any awards nor will I be offered a job as a hand model (unless it is for the "before" picture) but they have served me well. These hands have peeled thousands of potatoes, typed millions of letters, cleaned up all sorts of things, knitted dozens of garments, lifted numerous cups of tea, planted hundreds of plants .....


They have expressed love, support, pointed out directions, clapped to show my appreciation of lots of performances both professional and otherwise, soothed many a fevered brow, changed many a dirty nappy, picked thousands of flowers held many hands both as a gesture of love and to protect from danger, they have even smacked on occasion!

No two pairs of hands are the same - every one is different and unique to the individual, there are long delicate fingered hands, strong workmanlike hands, those with carefully manicured nails and those with nails bitten to the quick as well as ones whose nails are filled with dirt/oil etc. There are hands with smooth silky skin, hands with weatherbeaten skin, white, brown or black. We can and do judge a person by their hands and if an opinion can be made within a few seconds of seeing a person's face then it can also be made when looking at hands. Hands cannot be concealed and are on view all the time along with the face - we used them to pay for things, to reach out for things. They give us feedback on so many things too - ever felt impelled to touch something? It might be the rough bark of a tree, the smooth texture of polished wood or glass, the softness of cashmere or the hard stiff feel of hessian. Seeing may be important but feeling is also very necessary if one is to know the quality of something isn't it? I wonder if you have ever thought of what miracles they are and wondered how we could manage without them - I don't think I had. I was nearly at Hammersmith by the time I had thought all this!

The exhibition was very interesting and I discovered things about our language which I hadn't realised before. We spent a couple of hours looking at everything and I wished I hadn't taken only my bi-focals as I found it difficult to read some of the exhibits (memo to self - take reading glasses as well next time) Lunch was good too and we got the last portions of soup left along with some good bread before returning to the exhibition for another look.

The British Library has some fantastic books in its collection including the Sherborne Missal an amazing book weighing 42 pounds and made in the 1400s and with magnificent art work. This book comes from Sherborne just down the road from here and I have to admit that I had never heard of it in spite of the fact that I went to school in the town (not in the 1400s of course!) There were other beautiful ancient books too from all over the world and I couldn't help thinking that the Kindle would probably not survive 600 years nor be anything like as interesting to any future generations if it did!

Thank you for your kind comments on my previous post and for those who asked about the pattern for the hearts it was from a Woman's Weekly magazine many years ago and I reproduce it here - if you can't read it let me know and I will type it out for you. Joy I do have some old patterns for knitted bikinis - not that I ever made one - but this one would be a bit teeny wouldn't it?!!

Have a good weekend.

Gratitude

I am so grateful that I live in such a beautiful part of the world, that I am fit and able to walk and that my sight enables me to see and appreciate what is around me. This morning I walked into town for my Knit and Natter group - what a lovely lot of ladies I have met there! The sky was a brilliant blue and the sun was shining.

I noticed these lovely cheerful little crocuses in the leaves near the church as I made my way to the bus stop for the bus home.

Since I don't have any proper knitting on the go I took these little hearts to work on whilst I nattered!.

After lunch I decided to go for a short walk up through the woods which are literally on our doorstep...

... and out onto the road where I knew some daffodils were already in bloom having seen them from the car on Saturday.

Round here the roadside verges are planted with thousands of daffodils of different varieties which bloom over a period of months as one lot fades another is ready to burst into flower - these were the first.

With heavy traffic thundering past I enjoyed these wonderful views - this is why I wanted to come back to England where I belong when we lived in France! Not to listen to heavy traffic you understand but to have views like this on my doorstep.

Here are some later daffodils getting ready to follow - we should have daffs in bloom for several months.

Some snowdrops in a garden I passed on my way home

And my indoor gardening - we shall soon be able to harvest a few pea shoots to add to our salads and in the other pots are some salad leaves which I am hoping will also provide us with some fresh green salad.

I have been making bread - this one is a plait made with half wholemeal and half white flour and with one end sprinkled with grated cheese (I thought we might not want all of it cheesy as we might not want it with soup but may fancy some jam or something sweet with it.)

Here is one I made earlier - on Friday - being served with some of my crab apple and damson cheese - yummmn!

Now I know the world has gone mad - in this Saturday's Telegraph was this article about a property developer who has some flats - I guess they should be called apartments when you see the prices. One bedroom flat for sale for £6,000,000 no that isn't a typing error it really does say 6 million pounds! In the unlikely event of my ever having that sort of money to spend I don't think I'd spend it on one of these, especially if that is the view from the window, and might rather have one of the sheds pictured below...

...these were in the Waitrose weekend paper and are part of an article in which you send in your photos of sheds (not your average one full of spiders and dirty flowerpots apparently) and the best one will win £1,000!

Better stop waffling on and see about some dinner!