Catching up.

A quick summary why I haven’t blogged so much, a broken tooth with an abscess underneath and the visitation of family over Easter weekend.

Couple of weeks ago I felt unwell, nothing specific just felt grotty, lack of energy, jaw became painful, saw an emergency dentist (thanks to 111) who identified an abscess and broken tooth, attended my usual dentist, tomorrow the tooth will be extracted, no general anaesthetic this time compared with September 2014 when I last had a similar problem with a mouth infection.

Other reason life has been busy is the grandchildren and their parents came to stay last weekend, Edward had had chicken pox, on Saturday morning Alice succumbed, poor mite it was worse for her coupled with eczema and warm weather so much so that her temperature shot up that she ended up at local hospital’s children’s A & E. Meanwhile Ian and I enjoyed caring for Edward, supper, watering the garden, bath time and story time.  Apart from Rosie’s hat he asked for Macavity, I hadn’t read Eliot’s work since first year of secondary school, did my best with intonation whilst wondering whether the 1930s references would mean anything to a twenty first century child. Alice is recovering, no nursery this week.

Whilst  family stay we try to make their time restful and a break from routine so they don’t have to worry about domestic and catering, hence our busyness before, during and after their visits, hence little time for blogging, emailing, crochet, reading or sudoku, but so worth it to spend time with those children.

Will add photos at end, if I add them with text cannot scroll up!

Growing

I’m going to type my thoughts then hope I can add two photos at the end, both pictures will be of relevance to growth, one natural, one crafted.

Ian has been growing flowers for both our garden and for the church grounds from seeds, not easy when one doesn’t have a greenhouse or cold frame, so our porch shelves and floor have been filled with trays of begonias baby sweet peas, upstairs on a wide bay window cill are nasturtiums, phlox, campanula, more sweet peas and more begonias.  Such joy to see the minute dots of green peeping through the potting  compost. The fragile  pots apparently will dissolve away once they are planted into the flower bed - no plastic here.

So what else is growing? Crochet, the moorland blanket has grown now I’m using the easy trellis stitch and a larger hook, the photo shows the larger open stitch compared with the tight tension of the neat wave pattern, the colour sequence hasn’t changed.

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Happiness

Last weekend was one of the times that become embedded in family history and memory for all good reasons. Son, Daughter-in-law and grandchildren came to Pixie Towers for the weekend, Son was to attend an old boys dinner at his school on Saturday night, Sunday included me reading at church, grandchildren came too, Grandson went to junior church where the main activity was planting cherry tomato seeds, he proudly told all that he had been planting bulbs with Poppa (Ian) so he knew what to do!

Linked with last Sunday was another family tradition, we call it East of Brighton. Imagine, a boy, I think aged 10 and a girl aged 8 being told they were going on holiday but not where, just east of Brighton, imagine parents driving south on  M23 deciding they needed caffeine in the form of a coffee, parking up at Gatwick as cafes always open here,  parents suggested taking luggage as it would be risky to leave it in the car while elevenses are consumed, inside terminal instead of going to cafes our family join a queue. Suddenly a child’s voice pipes up:- Are we going on a plane? Great laughter from other travellers going to Almeria.  The tradition has continued, last Sunday was the latest, as Ian said I’ve been had! The one sacred rule is no lies, always honest and rely on normality, absentmindedness and unawareness, so we have been part way to North Wales, Brussels and just casually walked past the Adelphi theatre, popped in to look at the publicity photos as requested before producing tickets for the show.

This time Ian didn’t notice the chicken planned for Sunday was eaten on Saturday, no lunch preparations were made on Sunday morning before church, the norm is to chuck ingredients into the slow cooker and go. Even Son’s request to drive our big car, he’s on the insurance was met with

acceptance to go for a drive round, then a walk that just happened to be past an Italian child friendly restaurant we often frequent so when Ian mentioned this, Son said why don’t we go in.

Days later we our still smiling about it, his birthday celebrations continued on the Monday with an unexpected visit from Daughter bearing gifts, a two hour drive from Dorset arriving at 7.20 the time we’d scheduled a FaceTime call on the actual birthday. Not so much of a surprise, I took Ian out for lunch at Petersham hotel, after which we drove at 20mph around Richmond Park, have to accustom ourselves to this speed all over our Borough even though a small majority were against a blanket speed limit the council are implementing it anyway. What’s the point of asking residents’ views then ignoring them, a majority is a majority even if it is only one vote - was it Churchill that said this?

Sorry no pictures, too involved to take them last weekend, however this is the first time I have compiled a blog using iPad in the garden, our Utility Warehouse signal must be better than Virgin Media.

There is much discussion about links between mental and physical health, this week I had personal experience of how the two are linked. Way back last year Daughter-in-law asked me to crochet her a blanket, the grandchildren have theirs, Son has his camp blanket from Scouting days, she would like her own. Lucy Attic24’s Moorland blanket was chosen,  yarn purchased and I started the difficult for me wavy pattern.  The mantra was learnt, 2 double crochet, 2 half trebles, 2 trebles, 2 half trebles, 2 double crochet done over 4 rows so the highs and lows balanced out. I struggled, the fabric produced seemed thick and heavy, my heart wasn’t in it but I had promised a blanket and this blanket with the colour sequence matching the Yorkshire moorland was her choice.

J

Along came the Sweet Pea blanket, light airy and a very simple trellis pattern, I succumbed to the yarn pack and the CAL, so enjoying working on this meditative crochet, however as it is too big to take to a Knit and Natter, especially in a cafe with food and drink so I resorted to taking the moorland blanket instead as it is much smaller. Chatting as one does I mentioned my difficulties with the work, Jean suggested such an obvious solution, make the moorland blanket using the trellis stitch.  Wow, why didn’t I think of that? It was meant, for in my bag was the colour yarn with which one starts a Moorland, this was the next colour I should have used, The garden centre where we meet has a haberdashery section, sells Stylecraft yarn too so I purchased a size 5mm hook, for the Sweet Pea I
had crocheted a swatch so now knew that 4mm hook had caused the tension problem. I was able to crochet the starting chain, usual difficulties of making it long enough but I’m there, ready to start the next colour.

Health wise, I don’t feel sick when I think about the Moorland blanket but am keen to work on it,  for it can be a portable project for a while.

Procrastinating

Last year I challenged myself to try to fill in sudoku puzzles, Ian explained it to me, gave me hints, gradually throughout the year and up till now I’ve made good progress. I have concentrated firstly on completing the easy puzzle in The Metro, proceeded to moderate there and in our daily paper. Two moderates in different papers are not the same, the Metro appears to me the easier.

However there is a downside to this, I am not quick so much time is spent solving the puzzles, time that in my heart I know should be spent ironing, dealing with correspondence, reading the book club book, haven’t really got started on Fahrenheit 451 the latest tome selected by the public library for our group, crochet and knitting projects take second place to solving these so called logic puzzles.

One day I will be better at time management, ha ha, it is unlikely as another obsession comes along.

Tangled

Like thousands of others I’m making an Attic24 Sweet Pea blanket using Posy pattern, so just started row 44 using cream colour when the yarn misbehaved and so the yarn will have to be rewound, time that could be better spent crocheting.

As I’m working row 44, or will be when the winding up is done I realise I’m over half way through working the body of the blanket, there are seven rounds for the border so it is technically not quite half way. As long as it is complete by June 16th, our 40th wedding anniversary. 

In town yesterday

Yesterday, Saturday, daughter and I went to the Victoria & Albert Museum to see the Dior exhibition, a long planned excursion, DD purchased tickets without realising her Mama was a Friend of the Museum and we could just swan in without pre-booking. At the last minute a friend whom I hadn’t asked as I didn’t think it was her ‘thing’ came up trumps and bought the tickets, I was so pleased, no rush, no pressure of a timed entry, we had a leisurely stroll from South Ken station, knitting on the train attracted no attention, progress was made on the hexipuffs which will form a cushion cover.

There has been much written praising the exhibition, all the positive reviews are right, the styles reminded me of dresses worn by my mother in the 50s, the quantities of fabric for full skirts, tiny waists  formed by uncomfortable girdles and underpinnings. How formally everyone dressed, the gloves, the hats, the heels. As one reviewer pointed out the conversations of the visitors was fascinating, but so were the comparisons with today’s dress for going into Town compared with earlier times. Perhaps I was a teeny bit influenced by seeing a little of Brief Encounter on TV, just how smartly dressed was Celia Johnson?

Very impressed, a dress named after me, apologies for the darkness, the dress and accessories were grey which helped obscure the image. Didn’t take many photos, I intend to go back, maybe on a weekday which could be less busy.