Wishes and dreams

With all this snow and arctic ice, Christmas, with all her magic, has come a little bit early. And to get me in the dreaming mood, there's nothing better than one of my favourite poems...

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with gold and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly for you tread on my dreams.

WB Yeats

Video killed the radio star

I've been thinking a lot recently about what my world would be like without radio. A much quieter one certainly, but also a much less rich one. I LOVE my radio, I think it teaches me something new at least once a day. Radio means so much to people, all over the world. To me it is a great source of comfort and a quick route to total relaxation - to others it is a vital life-safer. Only recently I took part in Amnesty International's Radios for Burma campaign - this made me realise just how important simple modes of communication are to so many communities. I can only imagine the important role my radio would play if I were living in a remote, war-torn or politically unstable area... And as talk of switching from analogue to digital in the UK by 2015 increases, it makes me a bit sad. No more scratching and squawking as you go through the bands, no more twiddling and hissing - just a quick flick of a button. I hope radio won't lose its magic...

My breakfast heaven

Goodie goodie gumdrops

I was so busy yakking into my phone today that I took myself further along the high street than usual and stumbled across a new treasure... an old fashioned sweet shop! I'm not sure what it is about these places that makes me feel so at home - the sweet, delicious smell of buttery fudge and tangy sours or the neat rows of ordered and labelled jars lining every spare surface, from floor to ceiling. There is, I find, something deeply satisfying about walking in and having so much glorious stuff to choose from - perhaps it goes back to those childhood days when we first tasted the freedom of spending a 10p piece on whatever we chose. Today I returned to work, my brown paper bag sticky and gritty with sparkly sugar and sherbert, with a bounce - the best 90p I've spent in ages!



And, speaking of sweeties, here is a lovely birdie we rescued from the cat's jaws. Isn't she beautiful?

Bramble and berry

So, the sun is dipping lower and the mornings getting crisper. Autumn is on its way. And to welcome it in, along with the harvest moon, we have been cooking up a brambly storm of wild blackberry jelly in our lovely new kitchen. Yummmmmmm, sticky fingers...

Sundog spotting

Spotted from the train: a 'sundog'

According to my cloud collector's handbook, one of these collects 35 points!

'Sundogs can appear when a cloud's ice crystals are shaped like hexagonal plates and aligned almost horizontally. When the sun is very low in the sky, the crystals refract most light by 22 degrees, so observers see their collective sparkles as bright spots on either side of the sun.'

Blue

Wavelength 440–490 nm
Frequency 680–610 THz
Hex triplet #0000FF
RGBB (r, g, b) (0, 0, 255)

'the color of heaven and the abyss, the sky and the sea, the color of sobriety and temperance, but also the color of the imagination...' Alexander Theroux

An amazing weekend spent dunking fabric in stinky brown water and hanging it out to watch it turn bright blue still baffles me...

Glaw

We went on holiday to Wales. We stayed in a yurt and it rained and rained and rained. But we loved it!

Just good friends

There is nothing better than spending time with old friends, reminiscing, laughing, and sometimes just sitting quietly. Shared memories bring such comfort - I suppose we go through life making and banking them until they are all we have left. I hope the memories I make will continue to be happy and warm!

A perfect English weekend

Raspberry picking, Pimms, tennis and breakfast in the garden: we just had the most beautiful English weekend back at home - much like the ones I remember when I was younger. It was so nice to just sit, alternating between sun and shade, dozing and crosswording, the gentle sounds of the munching cows in the field next door occasionally drifting over the wall. On Sunday we celebrated my big sister's birthday - dad woke us up with Stevie W's 'Isn't she lovely?' at top volume. I would have loved to have seen mum and dad in those first moments with my sister - a little bundle of unknown. How scary and exciting and how lucky we all are to have her now - it was a treat to be able to spend the day with her - birthdays at home are always the best.




And to top it off, we arrived home to our first harvest of red strawberries! Yippee!

A quilting adventure

This Friday we took a trip up to London town to see the V&A's Quilts exhibition - something I've been looking forward to for months. Unfortunately, I think we picked the hottest, busiest day to go so it was difficult to read all the interesting stories behind the exhibits. But it got me thinking, what story will my quilt tell? Will it even have a story? Some of those in the exhibition were so powerful, documenting love, marriage, births, deaths, periods of intense patriotism, regional and national identity and developments in taste and fashion.


Liberty Jack, Janey Forgan, 2008

While trawling through info online, I also came across the work of Ian Hundley, from Brooklyn, NY. He transforms topographical maps into giant quilts. They are quite beautiful - and certainly something to aspire too!


Oberg White, Ian Hundley, 2006


Bierbergen Oedelum Black, Ian Hundley, 2006

And here is my modest attempt... One day... one day!

As I walked out one midsummer morning...

...to steal the words of Laurie Lee.

Yesterday was the longest day of the year so I decided to celebrate by taking a different route to work. It took me past gardens of wild poppies, dripping palms and powdery roses. I think I will go that way again...

Hello!

So... here I am, writing my first blog post. I'm not sure where to start. The weekend has been another lovely one. It is Father's Day today and, quite fittingly, I have spent much of the time pursuing interests that I share with my dad. Yesterday, we bought our first record player. I have been pretty much glued to it ever since. There is something so therapeutic about listening to music in this way. The ritual and care that comes with putting a record on means that you listen so much more carefully and with such relish. So often now, music becomes just another noise against the background buzz and hum of life. Now I understand the time and effort dad spent cleaning, ordering and playing his collection when I was younger.

I managed to while away a good hour in the record shop, before coming away clutching a handful of favourites. This, plus a spot of shopping for pens and paper, browsing the vintage shops for bargains and supping cava with friends on the beach in the sun have all made this weekend a good one to be in the city.

Happy Father's Day!