Properly Northern

Although we have lived in Saddleworth for more than twenty years now, I am still very much a “comer in.” I actually come from further north which I don’t think the locals really believe is possible, but my northern credentials are sometimes in doubt, not least when it turns out that I have only paid a couple of visits to Blackpool.

To be honest we didn’t have a particularly northern reason to visit – we weren’t buying a whippet or going to hear one of the regular brass band competitions, we were actually there to buy a cello case from the closest thing to Ollivander’s Wand Shop that I have ever encountered, but after that there was time for a paddle on the beach, some delicious fish and chips and then a drive along the sea front to see the famous Illuminations and you can’t get much more northern than that.

my imaginary new best friend

I love an old fashioned show.  I may have told the family too many times that Whitley Bay used to have a wonderful flower show when I was a girl, with marquees full of improbably fat onions, and incredibly overwrought floral arrangements.  I may even have mentioned to them once or twice that I won a prize for my miniature garden.  So I was very excited to visit the show in the nearby village of Denshaw yesterday.  We were definitely not in marquee territory, although it did just about fill the village hall.  There were classes for flowers, vegetables, baking and a small craft and needlework section, even a children’s miniature garden class, scene of my erstwhile triumph.

We all enjoyed checking out the entries – seeing if we agreed with the prizes, and at that point it became very apparent that without my imaginary new best friend there wouldn’t really be a show.  She had won first prize for scones, second for jam and for lemon curd, and had done well in the sponge sandwich class too.  When it came to growing vegetables her consistency was second to none.  Some classes just wouldn’t have existed without her entries, and even when she had competition, she usually won.  I don’t actually know her, but I’d like her to be my friend – if nothing else tea at her house would be good.

Coming up for air

Well Hello Advent! I know, I’m a bit late cottoning on to its existence this year. Well that’s not completely true because I’ve had the ever-present reminder of the village Advent Calendar, but I don’t seem to have fully got to grips with that like I usually do.

Despite an initial flurry of interest I managed a new low of only actually definitely having a fully calendar on December first, and I didn’t actually know all their addresses, so we started Advent mapless. The Marvellous Mummy is now our mapper extraordinaire, but she was busy, then I was busy, and we needed to be together in the same place to do it, as I know where places actually are, but she knows how to make them be in those places on the map.

All good, map done. Then we discovered that one person’s window wouldn’t be visible from where they originally said (and we’d put on the map) and we needed to switch from advising people that one area wasn’t really suitable for driving into, and switch to telling them that somewhere else wasn’t.  The joys of village life.

So, today, with still a whole 10 days to go until Christmas, we actually have the proper, definitive map, and I’m about to print some out and distribute them round the village.

Happy Advent!

Making Waves

I do think Old Shale (which I always thought was exactly the same as Feather & Fan, but apparently it isn’t, but I’m not quite sure why) is one of my favourite knitting patterns. It’s incredibly easy, but not actually dull because of that every fourth row where you pattern. It provided some soothing knitting for journeys over the summer and I produced the first of two blankets for baby twins – grandchildren of the Patchwork Perfectionist.

So far, so good. The thing is we had been told that one of the twins was going to be a boy, but then there was a news embargo regarding the second. Plan A was to knit the second blanket in a gender neutral colour, I rather favoured green. This plan was however dashed when the only greens at the shop were rather dreary, in fact none of the available colours were particularly appealing – on to Plan B. This was to take a punt on Baby 2 being a girl, and knit up a matching blanket in a purple I rather liked and already had. Two thirds of the way up the babies were born: two boys, back to the drawing board. Plan C was to use the same wool as the first blanket, I was pretty sure I had enough, and knit a blanket with a similar wave theme – I chose the traditional Shetland pattern print o’ the wave, one of my favourites. Looking good but I was wrong, I only had enough yarn for three quarters of a blanket, and then I couldn’t find any more.

Finally plan D, same blanket, same colour, different shade – done!

If you’re an Old Shale fan too, mine was knitted over a repeat of 18 stitches as follows: Row 1:  knit;          Row 2: purl          Row 3: pattern          Row 4: knit

The pattern is: (knit 2 together) x3,  (yarn forward knit 1) x6,  (knit 2 together) x3

Still Waters

We took advantage of a break in the weather this weekend, to visit the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust up at Martinmere. It’s a lovely place, that we clearly hadn’t been to for longer than I thought – there had been some changes, but the canoe safari was happily unaltered and Super Girl and I spent a lovely hour doing a spot of desultory paddling and enjoying the tranquillity. The signs did seem a big goose-ist though!

I am having something of an existential crisis

To be fair, I’ve been gone so long you might have been doubting my existence entirely. We’re just going to gloss over that hiatus, but now it’s all feeling a bit serious. So much of who I am is tied up with the Pictlets, and it won’t be long now until they have both flown.   In theory this is an opportunity to get my act together and do a bit of reinventing, in practise we all know how very poor I am at managing a new plan for more than the occasional day, which is beginning to feel more than a little old. As am I.

There’s another couple of months with Super Girl home, but I had a bit of a taster today: Mr Pict has taken Boy Wonder back to university, and stayed overnight with family, and Super Girl was out all day with another Scouts group. A bit of a slump ensued – I’d planned to tidy the sitting room, but let’s face it if I was any good at making myself tidy up I would already have a presentable room.

the raccoon and I are having a quiet day

I exaggerated somewhat this morning. I texted a friend to say I couldn’t go for a walk I’d been looking forward to because I have a bit of a chest infection and it felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest. Now I don’t have a small chest, but it certainly wouldn’t accommodate an elephant, and anyway that isn’t really an accurate description. I don’t feel absolutely pinned down, just somewhat flattened.

I’ve decided that the most accurate analogy, is that I have a raccoon settled there – that seems like the right sort of weight. I thought it might be a red panda, I’ve always loved the ida of a red panda, but I’ve decided they are a bit too cute, and although fundamentally cuddly looking, I have a suspcicion that if I tried to dislodge a sleeping raccoon it would get kind of scratchy. I’m feeling a bit like that.

Thing 5

Well I finally fired up the sewing machine, after leaving it in hibernation for quite some time. Having dithered about meaning to for quite some time I was finally spurred into action by the fact that Boy Wonder’s college Spring Ball was coming up and I found this rather cool pattern for a bow tie. I had the idea and found the pattern a bit too late for it to arrive, but it at least provided a bit of impetus and he’ll be going to other balls.I’ve had the fabric for a while, but I rather liked the idea of a bow tie covered in instructions for how to iron a shirt.

whoops!

Slipping again, although I’ve not been quite as inactive as it looks like I’ve been. I owe you a couple of updates about adventures and makes – I have to admit I’ve not been quite so good on the recipe front, but I’m hoping I might make good on that next week.

My photos don’t seem to be cooperating at the moment, so I’m going to have to leave you in suspense, and I won’t even be posting tomorrow because I’m off to spend a ridiculously long day in Birmingham – Super Girl’s school choir are singing in some massed choir fest, and as a special treat I’m allowed to go along on the coach (thereby setting off a whole 6 hours earlier than the regular parents’ and friends’ coach). I shall be taking my knitting.

as I said . . .

planning is key. It’s just not always easy to know what to plan. So, it’s back to the unsettledness I was mentioning earlier this year, I suppose. The Marvellous Mummy and I met up yesterday for the first time since before Christmas – that’s the thing about being marvellous, it does seem to make one rather busy. It was a chance to catch up with each other’s news, and for the MM to quiz me about what I would like to be doing – there was a slightly Mastermind-esque chair involved, but it really wasn’t much of a quiz:

“So what would you like to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“Ok. Would you like another coffee?”

Still, it probably is something I ought to give more thought to. I can’t just keep waiting for inspiration, and the whole what shall I do when I grow up? thing is really not appropriate at my age.

Coincidentally the Scone Queen was also presiding over her Kingdom, and she was also waxing philosophical about purpose – I was obviously looking particularly rudderless yesterday. Her advice – do what you love!

Which rather takes me back to where I started.