Today I’ve been finishing up my latest little mosiac project in the shed, doing the grouting, my least favourite part as it SO messy 🥴 It’s been quiet at Fraggle Towers, no visitors today. I’ve been busy though, preparing everything for Sunday Dinner, today Herby stuffing Roast Chicken, roast spuds, cauliflower & broccoli with cheese topping, and honey & mustard glazed carrots. Oh and a Yorkshire pud too. Also baked bread, made tomato soup and did the ironing. Back to work tomorrow for a rest! 🙂
I miss the sun, no light and shade, just more grey and dull. It’s to be expected of course, this is England after all. So I must adapt and evolve, and I’ve been making my own light and shade by prettying up the shed with fairy lights. 🙂
Apparently, there’s going to be a lunar eclipse at 5 O’clock this morning and the moon is going to look red. No good for black and white days, so I can stay in bed! 🙂
Men are in my kitchen replacing the boiler, I have no water until tomorrow and my car is blocked in by their vans. It’s blowing a hooley outside and I had to chase the garden furniture and plants around the garden – currently, we are in the throes of Storm Hector or is it Howard, I forget, whoever it is I’m not going out there until it stops! I am keeping out of the way and hiding in my shed or in my study. Haha, study indeed! How middle-class does that sound!!?? I’ll be voting for Jacob Rees- Mogg next. (NOT!!!) Anyway, it’s really a converted bedroom which houses my computer and camera stuff, books and useless knick-knacks.
I started a new photography project today, as part of the 50 pictures Project group over on the Ipernity photo site. The only parameters are to use one object in 50 different shots, or you can use 50 different objects but have the same title- i.e 50 different chairs,. No time limit to do the project so it’s all very loose, which I like. I have decided to do 50 mirror shots, though I haven’t quite decided yet whether to do 50 of the same mirror or change it up a bit and use/find different ones. I like having a project to work on. It hones creativity I think or at least focusses the mind to think creatively. Having a time limit would focus it more of course, but I’m not one for limits. I chose a mirror because it makes you think about composition, and it helps to tell a story so the viewer engages with the photo, you can tell me if that works.
Still waiting for my roll of film from the rollei to come back, patience is not my thing really! So back to the SX70 for today though really there isn’t enough light with the ongoing cloud and rainy stuff. Supposed to be better tomorrow so hopefully out with the Fuji and my pal Sophie.
Anyway here’s a couple from the shed and the garden
and Happy Celebrations to my Canadian pals, it’s 150 years since they got a country!
Most of my thoughts this week have been scary as I’ve had an unprecedented headache since Sunday night, though headache doesn’t really cover it. Severe pains in my neck muscles and a banging throbbing thing go off in my head when standing up from bending or sitting, followed by a dull ache when it’s finished beating my brain up. I am not a headachey person as a rule so this is uncharted territory for me. Of course I googled the symptoms (rather than go to a doctor) and ended up with a possible migraine/brain tumour/stroke but finally settled on Tension Headache as that one fitted the symptoms better than any of the others. Painkillers have turned out to be useless assassins and so I’ve been ‘putting up’ with it all, but not that well. Poor Phil must have a headache from me moaning on about it. Anyway, today it seems to have settled down somewhat, though I don’t trust it to stay away completely as yet. Fingers crossed it’s gone by tomorrow. The thing that’s most upsetting is that I’m NOT tense about anything, so don’t feel I deserve it really. If I was a freaked out stresshead I could at least accept my fate, but 5 days of it for no reason in particular seems most unfair. Still, life isn’t, and we must soldier on. Phil thinks it was due to the mad hot day we spent walking out to The Toppings (Universe blog report to come on that) on Saturday, as I really had a bad time with the heat that day, and maybe he’s right. No more tromping about in 33 degrees heat for me!
Luckily we in the North only got 3 days of the heatwave that has been sweeping through GB for the past week, and yesterday and today have been back to normal temperatures, with rain due tomorrow, which I quite like as I won’t have to water the plants. The cauliflowers and potato plants are are doing well, though I think something is eating the leaves. I will be off to buy a Bug Gun tomorrow, death will come to the munchers.
It was Fathers Day here on Sunday and Phil’s son Carl visited with two of his brood,
but Shelley and the others couldn’t make it.
Along with the endless ‘Thanks to my wonderful Dad’ posts on Facebook I had a fair few thoughts on Fathers too. I can’t relate to any of it as I never had one. Well not a real one. I mean, of course someone (who already had a wife and 2 kids) donated a bit of you-know-what to my Mum, but that was what was known as ‘out of wedlock’ back in the day, and my Mum was sent off to the next county to produce me so as not to bring shame on the family. Luckily I was a bonny baby 🙂 and my Mum’s parents fell in love with me and brought us both back into the family 3 months down the line. I had an idyllic childhood growing up in the wilds of Yorkshire, my grandparents and Mum looked after me, and when first grandma then grandad died, the neighbours stepped in when Mum was at work, and I never even thought about not having a Dad. Then when I was 11 my Mum met and married my step-dad, who I wasn’t keen on. I loved my life as it was, and where we were. But we went off to live on RAF camps which was cool, a whole different world, and when George left the RAF we moved to Bedfordshire. By this time I was a teenager and I didn’t get on so well with him. After a couple of years I left home to go into nursing accommodation and was relieved to get away. Later on, my Mum found my step-dad kissing her best friend and declaring undying love for her on the stair steps of Mum’s house at her 60th Birthday party, and that was the end of having a step-dad. The only thing ‘father’s’ taught me was the perfidy of men. So I was never anyone’s protected little princess, and I never had a heroic role model to base my future relationships on. I’ve not looked for a ‘father figure’ to fill the void, as I never considered there was a void. My Mum brought me up to be strong minded, self sufficient and independent, made sure I could survive a life on my own if necessary, (which I did for several years) and rely on my self awareness for approbation or criticism. I don’t think I’d be the person I am today if I’d had a ‘real dad’ so in my mind they’re quite overrated 😀
Today, as with the last few days I’ve been taking things easy to try to circumnavigate the head-banging, a bit of house work and shopping but no big movements. This afternoon I did some still life photography in my shed, and was quite pleased with the results.
This has been a blue-arsed fly day, I was in Asda for 8.30am and home by 9.30, done loads of housework, & changed all the flowers in the house. I was tempted by more lilies I do so love them, but £8 for 1 bunch that lasts 5 days is a bit of a treat, 3 bunches of carnations for £2 a pop and last for 10 days is much more cost effective. 🙂
carnation day
Had my lunch, lovely chicken and avocado sandwich in my own home made bread, so yummy.
This afternoon I transplanted the rest of my seedlings, took ages!
Cauliflower City
It’s not just caulies, theres some coriander and chives and rosemary and mint growing in there, the tiny Broccoli only child is holding fast but not really progressing. Just out of shot is my grow bag with potato’s growing in it. Am quite impressed with how they are coming along.
Potato Bag
So far no slugs or snails or bugs, might be a bit early for them to come out yet, but I am ready to go to war when they do. 🙂
I started sprouting garlic cloves then found out it’s a bit late or too early to plant them out for a good result as they prefer colder weather, but I wasn’t going to kill them obvs, so I’ve planted them out anyway and put them in a shady spot, at least it’s practice for when I do it at the right time of the year. 🙂
My shed is looking spiffy,
some nice artwork on the wall by my friends Kathy in USA and Clare in Ireland 🙂
I made a start on Tigger’s face this week..you get a better idea of it if you squint at it through one half closed eye, trust me 🙂
I find I’m quite zen when mosaic~ing, photographing, doing garden things, and am ‘in the moment’ as they say. I concentrate on the task in hand, but it never works that way with housework. I suppose I’ve been doing housework for nigh on 40 years so there’s not that much to think about it. So instead I find myself mulling over the world, the universe, the election, or Trump or the family. Today I had all the windows open to let air blow through the house, and as I was cleaning the West Wing 🙂 the door gently blew open and for a split second I thought Skye was coming through to see what I was up to. Of course then the other half of the second kicked in and suddenly I felt the tears burbling up, managed to stop myself though, and I got to thinking about grief. It’s just another word for pain really. I remember when my Mum died in the hospice, I was offered ‘grief counselling’ but refused, I didn’t want to talk about my grief, and shut it away somewhere I couldn’t get to in my brain. I couldn’t, wouldn’t, didn’t think about her for two years or so after. Guilt played a big part in that, I thought I should have done more for her, been there more for her, and I didn’t want to tell a stranger that. You’re not supposed to do that apparently, you’re supposed to let it out and all that, catharsis and self forgiveness etc. etc. etc. but I didn’t. Not long after she died, Ben moved out to house share with pals, so now looking back I was an orphan and an empty nester in a short space of time. Lonely times. So I moved up north to be with Phil and here I still am. I can think about my Mum now, remember her good and bad bits (no-one is perfect, not even your Mum!) and smile at the photo’s I have of her and Ben, her and me, of her life before us, when she was younger, and there isn’t any grief now. So maybe my ‘wrong’ coping mechanism worked out OK for me. I only miss what she is missing, on her behalf, she loved Ben and I think he suffered from her passing on more than I realised.
I am not a great fan of housework, and that in part is down to Mum who was always doing housework when I was a kid, or so it seemed, drove me mad as I had to help when I had nicer things to do! Then she’d do it all again the next day, and that was never going to be me, and isn’t. My previous husband used to say I was allergic to the hoover, the current husband would probably agree, but I do more than he thinks I do, and nowhere near what a house proud housewife would 🙂 but when I do do it, its blitzkrieg!
Lessons of the day:
Housework makes you think too much
Garlic should be planted in cold weather
Gardening ruins your nails and you can’t transplant seedlings while wearing gloves.
The first thing I’ve been thinking about today is a 3 part series I’ve been watching on BBC. It’s called Three girls, and is based on the true stories of victims of grooming and sexual abuse in Rochdale. It’s a hard watch, brilliantly acted by the 3 main young actresses and with the great talent of Maxine Peake taking the part of a health worker who worked hard to get police and social services involved to stop what was going on, to no avail at first. The exposure of the grooming, sexual assault and trafficking of young girls in Rochdale – and how their case had been systematically ignored by the police and social services for years – shook the country when the scandal was made public in 2012. It eventually resulted in the conviction of nine men for serious sexual offences, including rape and human trafficking, inflicted on girls as young as 13 between 2005 and 2008. So not an easy watch, but on reading an interview with the lady who wrote the drama it became apparent the victims she interviewed wanted their stories told. It IS an appalling story, but worth watching if you have the BBC Iplayer. Link HERE
The second thing I’ve been thinking about is my shed 🙂 and today Frego made an appearance and is living there now, of course she came with Skego, and seeing them together affected me somewhat unexpectedly and I spent a good few moments weeping for the the loss of Skye, I hadn’t realised I was still not over the crying part of missing her.
The third thing I’ve been thinking of is the things that are growing in my garden. I have a plant I bought to put over where Yoyo and Herky are buried in the garden, I can’t remember what it’s called. It hadn’t really done very well over the past couple of years but this year it’s really doing well, and the first flower is out, with lots more buds about to come out too.
My cauliflowers are beginning to pop up but are so tiny yet, can’t believe they will grow into big round veggies
Whilst topping up the bird bath I noticed some tiny blue flowers behind it under the leilandi hedge I’m thinking they are Forget-me-nots,
and under the other end of the hedge I found a little purple flower but have no idea what it is
This morning saw some nice weather so I put some washing on, and then all of a sudden the room went dark, had a look outside and saw this
dodgy Iphone pano
and decided not to hang the washing out, which was just as well as that big grey monster dumped all over us.
Still this evening we were treated to this
which kind of made up for the earlier stuff. 🙂
Done thinking now, time for a glass of wine and finish watching a DVD documentary we are doing at the minute, which will also be written about at some point.
Today is Postcard from the Shed. It’s another busy day here in Fraggleland, Phil is putting me more shelves up in between applying stain varnish to the window frames, door and overhangy thing. I’m busy packing up my room indoors and storing it in the spare room, so Phil can take over my room and then I can move into his. 🙂 Never knew there was so much to do to have a shed! 🙂
Today I started a photography course that I got quite a while back. Every day has a 10 minute assignment, and it lasts 31 days. Most of the topics I’ve already done along the way, but practicing never hurt anyone and I like the tips and the way it makes you think about what you are shooting.
I put off doing it for a long time because the first assignment is ‘self-portrait’ and I do not like being in front of the camera, I do not like pictures of myself one bit. I wish I was photogenic but I’m not. Phil would say ‘get over yourself’ but I can’t, so very few pictures of me get to see the light of day. I turn up in family get togethers on other peoples mobile phone shots and of course had to be in my wedding shots, but that’s about it. Part of the assignment said “Try to capture something true about yourself.”
Well that IS the truth, I don’t like self portraits! So I did the assignment the best way I could, because I want to do the other assignments.
My shed is really coming along now, Phil is out there any day he can be, and the walls are now painted, the first flooring is screwed down and the next job is to do the laminate flooring. It’s looking fab. I find that I am doing a lot of waiting these days, waiting for my shed to be finished, waiting to buy the things I need for it like light fittings and furniture, though I’m being given some desks and a chair. Waiting for my herbs to grow so I can plant them out, waiting for my tax rebate cheque to clear on Monday so I can order all the things I need from my wish lists on Amazon and Ebay! 🙂 I am not, nor ever have been, a very patient person, so it’s a new skill I’m learning! 🙂 I can’t wait (but am) to start doing mosaics again. My wish lists consists of a lot of tiles. 🙂
I have a weird thing that happens when I type, for some reason my fingers very often manage to put a space between the t and he when writing ‘the’. Don’t know what that’s about. Someone pointed it out to me the day after Skye died and I was like ‘WTF? do I care? My cat’s gone!!’ but I fixed it, and find now I preview every post to make sure I pick up those stray ‘t he’s’ and they are legion 😀 so if you spot one let me know!!
So back to the SX70 for today though really there isn’t enough light with the ongoing cloud and rainy stuff. Supposed to be better tomorrow so hopefully out with the Fuji and my pal Sophie.
I have a weird thing that happens when I type, for some reason my fingers very often manage to put a space between the t and he when writing ‘the’. Don’t know what that’s about. Someone pointed it out to me the day after Skye died and I was like ‘WTF? do I care? My cat’s gone!!’ but I fixed it, and find now I preview every post to make sure I pick up those stray ‘t he’s’ and they are legion 😀 so if you spot one let me know!!
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