162: successful succession planning 101

(If this week’s post jumps about a bit it’s because I’m semi-watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer over the top of my laptop. Apologies in advance, but Angel keeps taking his jacket off.)

This week I was finally able to tell the rest of the team that I’m leaving Young V&A to join the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration as Head of Learning and Participation. It’s been a tough secret to keep as I am really excited about this role, but there was the tricky matter of getting some ducks in a row – we already have a jobshare role open as B has gone off on mat leave; YV&A is opening in July and the wheels of recruitment move slowly in a large organisation. My handover file is growing daily and there are things I really need to get sorted out in the next couple of weeks.

You’d think this might be things like who will become responsible for my direct report, and where we’re up to with various projects, and these things are indeed on my list. More importantly, however…

who will take over as Chief Elf at Secret Santa time?
who will I pass my Monday morning banana bread recipe to? (‘What sort of deviant puts Maltesers in banana br….oh my god, mmm’)
who will become responsible for the Futureplan Bingo card (featuring phrases like ‘across the piece’, ‘value engineering’, and ‘at pace’, among other things)

I mean, everyone has an official job description, right? But the unofficial things are just as important: making team meetings a little sweeter, for example.

I am very lucky to have been working in an amazing team for the last few years, and I’ll miss them – can’t wait to see the new Young V&A when it opens the doors in July.

Am I a tassel person?

As it turns out, yes, surprisingly.

On Tuesday most of the Learning team went to Aesthetic Laundry‘s studio at Bow Arts to take part in a workshop with Heidi and her team. A couple of us were already fans of the brand (not me) which was founded in 2014 to make size-inclusive, body positive clothing. Each piece is made to order so they’re not creating waste, they incorporate scraps into things like their tassels and confetti, as well as into their festival clothes, and their studio is a riot of colour and tactile textiles to squish. As you can imagine, I was in my happy place…

In the workshop you get to create your own jumper, learning some sewing and cutting skills as you go along, and then the AL team put it together and send it to you! Some of the team wanted to crop theirs, and Heidi was rocking one of their Phoenix cardis so they kindly worked with me to turn my jumper into a cardi. You get to choose your tassel colours (or no tassels at all!), cuff and collar ribs, where you want your initials, thread colour and the base colour. I have gone for a grey base, with burgundy, navy, white and grey tassels with dark pink ribs and thumbholes on the cuffs. Once I’d committed to the tassels there was no stopping me…

Finishing off with prosecco and biscuits was a bonus! Can’t wait to show off my creation…

Other things making me happy this week:

A walk with Thing 2 to see the baby cows yesterday morning – two so new they were still wobbly on their little legs
An afternoon with the KS2 LETTA trainees making games and inventions inspired by the Hero Arm. The ‘RAVE’ board game is definitely not one for the schoolkids.
A midweek training meander through the woods – sponsorship link here

And that’s been it! Same time next week…

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Kate Shugak Investigations 18 – 23 – Dana Stabenow

Witches Abroad – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

Desperate Undertaking – Lindsay Davies

158: butter side down

I made the rookie mistake the other day of saying how healthy I’d been since taking up the whole throwing-myself-in-icy-water thing (well, edging into icy water while cursing loudly and comprehensively, anyway). Even though I immediately knocked myself on the head and whistled, I appear to be coming down with something miserable, heralded by a sore throat and a headache. Oh joy – I haven’t got time for this, I really haven’t. This is the week where we are emptying the storage unit and taking kit back to the museum (it’s happening!), testing the last of the school sessions, and generally zipping about being busybusybusy.

Honestly, at nearly 50 I should know better than to invoke the Law of the Sod, I really should. There’s a whole list of things that trigger it, including (but not limited to):

saying, ‘Well, at least it’s not raining’
dressing my children in white
dressing me in white
leaving for anywhere with ‘enough time’ to spare
planning an outdoor event in August
washing the car under a clear blue sky

The basic premise is that fate is laughing at you, and that anything that can go wrong will go wrong. God laughs when man makes plans. Butter side down. That sort of thing. Anyway, I don’t feel well and it’s all my own fault.

Things not making me grumpy this week:

coffee and a wander with my bestie on Tuesday morning
working with the asylum seeking families and children with SEND at my local primary school
team board games afternoon – Cobra Paw was highly entertaining!
Finding a copy of Winifred Aldrich’s Metric Pattern Cutting handbook in the charity shop yesterday
Daffodils popping up all over the place, and at least one of my unfortunate hydrangeas not being dead

And now I’m going to have a Lemsip and a nap.

Same time next week, but less germs,

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

The Bullet That Missed – Richard Osman

Peace Talks/Battle Front – Jim Butcher

Unnatural History – Jonathan Kellerman

The Truth – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

153: je suis revenu!

Well, here I am back on my sofa with freezing toes after a lake swim – the parents are probably basking in the post-grandchildren peace. Happy birthday to my Dad, who has been impressed by my afternoon nap skills for the last week although is now probably relieved to get his favoured sofa back. We’ve had a lovely week in France: the kids have put away their entire bodyweight in baguettes (daily), Aunty Tan has scienced at them, and the cupboard is stocked with Nutella.

Sunday: after a marathon sleep (even I crashed for the best part of ten hours) followed by an enormous breakfast we had a peaceful day, dragging the Horde out for a walk along the Blavet in the afternoon to stretch their legs a bit. We said ‘bonjour’ to everyone we met (because that’s what you do), saw cormorants and listened to the coypu shouting, and explored the little beach below the lock. I even managed to take some photos of the Horde where they aren’t pulling faces. We walked downstream to the little bar (closed) and back, which is around 5k. The Horde surprised me by wolfing down Dad’s coq au vin – anything in a sauce was unheard of a couple of years ago, so this is progress indeed.

Monday: after another marathon breakfast (I have never seen croissants disappear so fast) we headed for Pontivy to the Lantern Rouge, a buffet restaurant offering saveurs d’Asie. If there was a prawn in it, Thing 2 tried it. Over the week she also tried Patagonian garlic scallops, crab rillettes, galettes, camembert (she’s already hooked on Brie), Port Salut and pretty much anything else on offer. From a very early age she has always been my foodie child – if you took her eye off her in a restaurant she’d be peering solemnly at other people’s dinners over the edge of their table. Her Aunty compares her expression at these moments to the T-rex in Jurassic Park – “clever girl!” I think it’s more like the Velociraptors in the kitchen.

Later that day they explored a French clothes shop where they were spoiled by their granny, Decathlon where Thing 3 spent his birthday money on ‘cool trainers’, and they got to go to a supermarket where we were all overexcited by shelves with no gaps in them, fresh vegetables and the sheer variety on show.

Tuesday: saw the beginning of my vendetta against the angry cockerel over the road, who started crowing about 6am and just kept going. He was very lucky I didn’t turn him into a chicken casserole, quite frankly, as this anti-social behaviour continued all week. Dad described me as a little oasis of calm when he came down: audio book on and embroidery in hand while I enjoyed the peace before the chaos.

After breakfast Tan and I decided we’d get in a bit of training and headed off on a walk along the river – the plan was to do 90 minutes and then turn round and come back. We covered just over 10 miles, with a total elevation gain of a whole 6m, which of course is the joy of walking along a nice flat river. The return journey was downhill all the way…

We saw loads of cormorants, herons and various birds of prey, practised with our walking poles, snacked on Tribe bars and coffee, and bonjoured everyone we passed. The river was so still it was throwing off perfect reflections of the trees.

After a nap (me) we dragged Things 2 and 3 off for another walk to the lock and back, and were delighted to see the bridge lizards out enjoying the sunshine. Less fun was Thing 3, who appeared after his shower…

‘Aunty Tan, we have a….situation…’ This turned out to be a shower disaster, where he’d managed to create a waterfall with the shower curtain which flooded not only the bathroom but the sous-sol underneath, where water was pouring through the ceiling. It took many towels, mum, Tan and I to mop up and he was restricted to baths for the rest of the week.

Wednesday: the temperature hit 17 degrees and we – along with lots of French families – hit the beach at Port-Louis. Only one idiot went in the sea though. The kids explored rock pools and collected seaglass and shells, and we walked along by the fort to see the Resistance memorial.

In the evening we ate at the Vieux Bon Temps in Baud: galettes galore, and a burger for Thing 3. The kids were impressed with the flambe-ing of the dessert pancakes (grown ups only!).

Thursday: another early start thanks to that damned chicken, but I did get to finish the embroidery. Later on, abandoning the Horde to their grandpere, mum, Tan and I headed off to visit Barbara (hello Barbara!) who likes reading my blogs, and we put the world to rights over coffee before heading off to pick up dinner and other bits and bobs. UK Lidls always feel a bit grubby, but French ones are shiny and full of exciting biscuits so I stocked up. I also got some chouquettes for the Horde to try – not choucroute, which they would not have appreciated. The boulangerie was chaos, but the religieuse made it worth it, and the bread was amazing.

Wonderful Women – Swimming (kit by Hawthorn Handmade)

The rain set in over the afternoon so we stayed in and relaxed (I had a nap) and hoped for better weather the following day…

Friday: having asked the kids what they wanted to do (a choice of a visit to Vannes to see a historic town or Larmor-Plage for the beach). The decision was unanimous, so we headed off to Vannes where Thing 3 had a s Nutella crepe, Mum and I had kouign amman and Things 1 & 2 showed no interest whatsoever in the beautiful historic buildings. Sometimes I am not sure they are mine.

Saturday: I frogged all the crochet I had done over the week as it was too small, after another cockerel alarm woke me at 6am. Damn. The journey back to Calais was mainly uneventful apart from some patchy fog – and we even got put on a slightly earlier train much to the perturbation of the man in the car behind us who clocked that he was Z and we were A, and therefore why were we on the train ahead of him? The terminal was packed with post-half term returners, many of whom were sporting ski racks and snarfing down Burger King. It was reassuring to note that all teenagers in cars seem to sport the same stroppy faces as my own dear Horde….

The cats were pleased to see us, I think – Thing 3 was definitely pleased to see them…

Back to school/work tomorrow! See you next week…

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Dead Beat/Proven Guilty – Jim Butcher

Jingo/The Fifth Elephant – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

Family favourite films watched – Young Frankenstein, City Slickers, The Princess Bride

152: a breath of French air

I have just woken up from the longest sleep I have had in what feels like FOREVER, probably aided by the fact that yesterday London sister (aka Aunty Tan), the Things and I waved off my Beloved at 5am and headed off to France to see my parents (aka Granny and Grandpere, depending on who you’re talking to). They’ve been living in Brittany for almost 20 years, enjoying retirement with the aid of good wine and excellent baked goods.

The view from the Pont in Pont Augan yesterday evening

Specifically, they are in the Blavet valley, in a tiny village bisected by the river which is currently not in flood so Tan and I have some walking planned this week. I have also rather optimistically brought my swimming kit – neoprene boots and gloves, a woolly hat and my bathers – in the hope that we’ll pop over to Port Louis, where there’s a restaurant serving excellent hot chocolate right on the beach.

The last time we were out here was when Thing 3 was about 2, and he turned 12 last weekend so it’s been a while – in the intervening years we have all gathered in West Wales with Irish sister and her family instead but thanks to Covid this is the first time we have seen my parents since 2018. Zoom and Skype just aren’t the same.

Things 1 and 2 now loom over their Granny and it won’t be long till Thing 3 joins them, especially if he keeps eating the way he is! He’s just had a growth spurt and is now taller than his aunty and catching me up fast. Soon only the cats will be shorter than me, as the Things like to tell me.

Anyway – we were on the 7.35 crossing from Folkestone to Calais, and arrived in Pont Augan about 4.30 after a picnic lunch just past Caen. Travel sickness pills meant the kids slept most of the way, waking up only to demand a sherbet lemon or chocolate lime (travel sweets of choice) and so Tan and I could sing along to the travel playlist and spot a LOT of birds of prey who were perching on posts all along the roadsides. Sparrowhawks, buzzards, kestrels, a merlin and a hobby, and even some harriers – the cloud and fog were keeping them at ground level but once we crossed into Brittany and the sun came out (justifying Tan wearing her sunglasses on her head since 5am) we started to see them soaring instead. The kids were supremely uninterested, but there we are.

The Things and I went for a quick walk to stretch our legs and see the goats before dinner (lasagne – a traditional welcome from Mum). Thing 2 made friends with the dog next door and we wandered over to the bridge and back to see the river. Bed was before 9pm for everyone… Today will be a quiet day, I think!

Seconds later the dog had all 4 paws in the air for tummy rubs

So, the out of office is on and I am looking forward to a week of downtime. I have brought a new crochet project and some embroidery, the kindle is stocked and no one is to ask me anything about storage, interactives or museums in general.

Thing 1 has just surfaced and informed me that she misses the cats, but unlike when her brother got homesick at Scout camp for the same reason I don’t think her dad will drive to collect her. Of 2 and 3 there is no sign as yet. Happy half term!

What else?

DPD and Parcelfleet joined Evri on the list of couriers from hell – Addison Lee are on a last warning.

I did finish my crochet socks though. I love a crochet sock.

Pattern is Magdalen Sock by Vicki Brown, main yarn is Lovecrafts Paintbox Sock

Next week, what I did on my holidays.

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Blood Rites/Dead Beat – Jim Butcher

Feet of Clay/Jingo – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

148: customer disservice

This week I have been wrestling with the delivery company formerly known as Hermes – now rebranded as Evri, as presumably the god Hermes was too well known for actually delivering stuff. I expect deities have firm views on this sort of blasphemy and threatened them with a good smiting unless they changed their name. Usually, I have no issues with Evri as the local couriers are helpful, friendly and reliable.

The problem, it seems, lies further up the chain. Between Christmas and New Year two parcels were dispatched by two different companies – one arrived at the Evri local depot on New Year’s Eve and the second on 4 January. And there they stopped. ‘Sorry, your parcel has been delayed’ was the tracking update. ‘We’ll get it out to you on the next working day’. Readers, this was not the case. The courier said that there was a big backlog at the depot. Evri didn’t say anything, and continued to say nothing.

The ‘help’ pages – and I am using the term ‘help’ in the absolute loosest sense of the word here – said that if the parcel has been with them for seven days then to contact the sender. The sender, not the people who actually have the parcel in their possession and who are, therefore, presumably better placed to know where it is. So I contacted the senders, who then have to contact Evri. One sender responded within 24 hours to an email saying they couldn’t help till seven working days had passed (not what Evri’s site says, but there we are) since the last update. The other sender was also gatekept by a digital ‘assistant’ but eventually let me chat to a real person who said they could ‘urge’ Evri to deliver the parcel.

I tried Evri’s digital ‘assistant’, Holly. I am qualifying the word ‘assistant’ in the same way as the word ‘help’ above please note. Holly is able to ‘help’ with sending a parcel, receiving a parcel, or ‘something else’. Help with receiving a parcel allows Holly to tell you the same tracking info that you have already seen on the tracking page, which is what caused you to click on the chatbot in the first place. ‘Something else’ allows you to report damage to your house or vehicle and you get to upload photos. So I uploaded some photos of the tracking numbers and eventually got a reply saying they couldn’t see any damage in the photos. I emailed the ‘customer service’ (see previous disclaimer) email address that had emailed me, and received an auto response informing me that Evri didn’t do customer service by email and to use the digital assistant. It was all getting a bit circular by this point.

Eventually I received a response telling me they would see what they could find out. This felt promising. Evri could redeem themselves, I thought. Hope triumphant over experience!

Two hours later I received another response saying ‘after an extensive investigation we can tell you the parcels are lost’. They were sorry I was disappointed. Contact the senders who will be able to refund or replace the items. Not, mark you, sorry that they had disappointed me. No offer of compensation. No promises that this would not happen again and no suggestion that they might actually take steps to find out how these parcels got ‘lost’ in the local depot. The onus was placed on me to contact the sellers to tell them someone else had lost the goods they had dispatched in good faith. Clearly Evri don’t update the sellers either, as I had an automated email from them asking me to review the item I hadn’t received.

Another parcel, for which I had paid next day delivery on Thursday so I could use the item over the weekend, is at their hub and didn’t even make it to the local depot. As someone pointed out to me yesterday, Evri have won plaudits two years running for being the worst delivery company on the planet – which in an industry of terrible service really does take some doing.

Things making me happy this week

An online course run by the V&A Academy – visible mending with Restoration London, on sashiko and boro stitching.
Waltham Abbey Wool Show – we have a spinning workshop booked
Finishing the 2022 Temperature Galaxy cross stitch
Giving my 20-somethingth pint of blood
Seeing the face of my Whovian colleague when she found a crocheted TARDIS on her desk for her birthday
Making more daft crocheted items and some earrings
Plotting 50th birthday shenanigans (to be revealed soon)

And now I am off to Tesco to stave off starving teenagers

Kirsty x

Gardens/Favours – Benedict Jacka

Kill the Farmboy – Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne (struggling with this – I loved the Iron Druid series but this is amateurish)

Night Watch – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

Storm Front/The Law/Brief Cases – Jim Butcher

147: what the heck was that?

That was week one of 2023, apparently, which has passed in a blur of meetings, taking care of poorly child and cat (who have the same thing, it turns out) and getting back into staying awake all day. Cat had to go and have a sleepover at the vet on Thursday, where he made friends with all the staff, but they wouldn’t take Thing One. Shame, really, as getting a vet appointment is considerably easier than getting to see a doctor.

Hopefully you all heeded last week’s excellent advice and have spent the first week of 2023 thinking of nice things to do with your year. I have booked in a massage and am looking forward to next weekend’s woolly workshop and show, and to an online V&A Academy course on Tuesday.

I am not sure I managed to get the hang of last week before it was all over, quite honestly. I did manage to get as far as November in the temperature galaxy, which serves me right for not keeping up with it since August, and have finished the Mk II TARDIS (slightly bigger on the outside, at least). I made the roof more domed and outlined the windows as well as the panes, but I think I prefer the smaller one which has now gone off to a new home with a Whovian colleague who had a birthday this week. Hope she likes it!

Having said I definitely wasn’t going to do a temperature stitch this year, I went back to Climbing Goat Designs to just have a look and ended up buying this one and, after this year, I will use a larger range of colours in case of extreme temperatures again. I have also ordered some printed space fabric to stitch it on, for a change, and I might brave the glow-in-the-dark thread for the stars. I am definitely not doing one next year though.

I also did some work: planning a new session for schools and thinking about what we’re missing from the handling collection. Suddenly the six/three/one month before opening to-do lists are NOW and not a future countdown. This sense of ‘ARGH’ wasn’t helped by this Time Out article on things to do in 2023 – we are number 13. It’s all starting to get a bit real… there’s such a lot that needs to happen before we open the doors, including getting all our kit back out of the various storage spaces and catalogued, working out how to store it all in my shiny new learning centre cupboards, convincing schools that even though we’re not doing historic toy sessions any more there’s still a good reason to come and visit, and at the same time as business as usual we’re also working on the first of our paid exhibitions which opens in October.

The session I was planning this week is based on Rachel Whiteread’s Place (Villlage) installation which was one of my favourite objects in the museum, and which is being redisplayed in the new space – the problem here is that trying to create a gallery based session before the gallery is installed is a bit tricksy as it all may change down the line. I really dislike dolls*, but this collection of dolls houses is atmospheric and magical, and provides excellent potential for literacy sessions. I can’t wait to see the new installation.

We’re also planning game design sessions, architecture, storytelling, and more – it’s all very exciting, but the marketing to teachers is keeping me awake at night!

*yes, it’s been suggested that I may be in the wrong job. I am also scared of masks.

This week I am bored with…

All things royal. Every time I turn on the TV or open Google there is some new ‘revelation’ from Prince Harry’s book which was allegedly leaked this week. Enough already. Siblings fight and there’s no law that says you have to like your sibling’s choice of partner. The trick is not to tell them and hope they work it out for themselves. Also, no one likes someone who constantly whinges that it’s not fair and everyone is horrid. Grow up.
‘Train cancellations’ on the Central Line. Which appears to be yet another excuse for constant delays.
Laundry. Where does it all come from?
Work. It is cutting into my nap time.

On that note, the washing machine has finished, so I will sign off!

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

The Paper Magician/The Glass Magician/The Plastic Magician – Charlie N. Holmberg

Kill the Farm Boy – Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne

Gardens – Benedict Jacka

Thief of Time – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

Watching: Black Spot (Netflix)

146: Practically perfect in every way

Not really, of course. I have a butterfly brain, a yarn habit that requires two sheds for storage and an insatiable urge to try all sorts of new crafts, an addiction to books and shoes, a callous disregard for excessive housework, and a very strange sense of humour.

Still, it’s that time of year again when we’re supposed to kick off a new go-round of the sun by finding fault with ourselves and making resolutions to stop this, to start that, to do more of x, less of y, to be better. A quick Google tells me that New Year’s resolutions have been around for about 4000 years, thanks to the Babylonians (though they made theirs in spring when the new farming year started) and presumably people have been failing to keep them for around the same, though they had the added incentive of falling out of favour with the gods if they didn’t keep theirs and not just feeling a bit guilty. Being held accountable by someone handy with a smite or with the power to have you eaten by crocodiles or something concentrates the mind wonderfully, I expect.*

January 1st is a terrible time to make resolutions, anyway. It’s cold and dark, it’s often raining, you’re suffering from terrible indigestion after eating your own bodyweight in cheese and Quality Street and quite possibly you have a hangover from ill-advised coffee tequila shots the night before. The inevitable return to work looms large in the diary (if you’re over 30 you’ll probably still have the hangover then too), the interminable round of meetings and the long wait for January payday is ahead of you, and there’s all this expectation to be all self-improving while you’re at it. There’s an actual date in January – the third Monday of the month – called Blue Monday which some bright spark of a professor calculated was the most depressing day of the year.

I have decided that this year we should have a New Year’s Revolution, not resolution. The adaptation of the very sweet (but a bit smug) The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy tells us (or the fox does, anyway) that ‘you are enough’. Let the revolution be to be moderate, not to give up or to change your whole life. To be a bit nicer to ourselves and the people and the world around us. None of us will ever be perfect, and let’s acknowledge that rather than making grand ‘THIS is the year I….’ statements that will be profoundly depressing by the 16th bowl of overnight oats with skim milk and no golden syrup.

If you have to make a resolution, make it something you’re excited about: a new adventure for 2023, take up a new hobby (I have booked a hand-spinning workshop at the Waltham Abbey Wool Show, for example – not that I plan to take it up, but why not have a go when it’s on offer?), make a plan with friends that’s realistic. I have two more of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries to visit, so they are on the list. Set a challenge for yourself but make it one that you want to do, not one you’ll hate the idea of: I want to do a long walk, either the Essex Way or the Race to the Stones. Resolve to treat yourself once a month, to a massage or a cinema trip. We are in the middle of an energy crisis, a cost of living crisis, strikes galore (which I support wholeheartedly) and the gloomiest part of the year – give yourself something to look forward to.

Have a Happy New Year instead.

*I may be mixing up Babylon and Djelibeybi at this point.

The long dark teatime of the year

Timeshare Teenager Two and her partner presented me with five metres of Moomin fabric as a Christmas present, so I spent a day sewing this week – at the stitch show in October I bought the Folia frock pattern by Sew Different and had been looking for the right fabric for it. I also made their Scoop Pinafore in a golden cord, and have started cutting out the Sunrise Jacket in a navy twill, using a Craft Cotton Co fat quarter bundle for the sunbursts. Activity has been slightly hampered by sewing through my fingernail and out the other side, but I am soldiering on….

On the hook this week has been this TARDIS by Army of Owls – which gave me the chance to muck about with shrink plastic for the first time since we used to shrink Wheat Crunchies packets on the heater outside room C2 at Monmouth Comp. I found the door sign image on Instructables, and used felt for the windows rather than embroidering. There will be some earrings as well, as I printed some extra door signs for that reason….

And now I am off for a walk with Miriam, Jill and the hounds. You’re getting this early so you can be saved from making any unnecessary resolutions….

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Bellweather Rhapsody – Kate Racculia

1989 – Val McDermid

Keeper of Enchanted Rooms – Charlie N. Holmberg

Juniper Wiles and the Ghost Girls – Charles de Lint

145: Why don’t you…

…go off and do something more festive instead? Stop reading these ramblings and go and open a present. Watch a film or the annual repeat of the Morecambe and Wise Christmas Special. The only reason I’m even here is because I seem to have broken out in teenagers and they’re all still asleep for the first time ever at 6.30am on Christmas morning.

Normal (ish) service will resume next week! In the meantime, I hope it’s a peaceful day and that Santa/Father Christmas/the Hogfather/Saint Nick/Kris Kringle/Sion Corn brings you joy and lots of pigs in blankets.

Merry Christmas, Nadolig Llawen, Bonne Noel…

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

This Must Be The Place/Bellweather Rhapsody – Kate Racculia

Thief of Time – Terry Pratchett (Audible)

Hogfather – Terry Pratchett

Christmas is Murder – Val McDermid

144: baby, it’s cold outside

Bloody freezing, actually (my garden thermometer is currently reading -5.4) and this morning I am a strange blend of disappointed and mildly relieved as the lake is closed for the weekend. The closure is due to access, as you can’t get cars in and out of the site, rather than as a way to prevent a gang of bobble-hatted loons giving themselves mild hypothermia. The disappointment is because cold water swimming – or dipping, in this weather – is such a rush, and the relief is because the temperature has rarely made it above zero this week and that lake will be COLD.

Last week was the coldest water we have experienced at 0.5 degrees, and it was trying to snow when we got there. A large hole had been broken in the ice to enable dipping, but there was no chance of a proper swim. People were going in, having their picture taken by one of the long suffering Redricks team to prove we were complete idiots, paddling about a bit and then racing out swearing profusely. I still haven’t put my wetsuit on this year, so was in my bathers and bobble hat with socks and glove, and I lasted about two minutes. I was extremely glad I had brought thermals to go under my trousers and a lot of layers – and my trusty hot water bottle. Top tip here: stuff your pants inside the cover while you swim and wrap your towel round the outside. I may need two hot water bottles, just so I can do my socks as well – the worst part last week was the pain as my toes came slowly back to life which made me want to cry. I was wearing my 3mm socks as I knew I’d want to get them off quickly, and they were not enough!

Many articles have been written on the benefits of cold water swimming over the last couple of years (here’s one) and there’s lots of handy advice out there too. Please note I am not including Wim Hof in either of these two categories as he is clearly quite, quite bonkers. And that’s coming from me. What I get from it is a mental reset at the end of the week, time with friends both in the water and during what Jill calls the apres-swim, as we hop about trying to get dry, get our trousers on, and drink hot chocolate with marshmallows. It’s usually child-free, it’s early on a Sunday morning, and the rest of the day is still ahead of us. Redricks Lake, where we swim, is also a fishing lake so you’re sharing the environment with cormorants and kingfishers as well as the usual run of water birds (and fish); there’s lifeguards on hand and you don’t get to go in unless you’ve had your safety induction, which is reassuring. They will also rescue you, strip off your wetsuit (wear your bathers!) and warm you up if necessary.

Later in the day a few of us braved the cold again (fully clothed this time) to go and see the Light Fantastic train from Marconi Bridge at the top of North Weald Common. Thing 2 joined me, and we were out when the snow started. ‘Flurries’ were forecast, but what we ended up with was a good six inches of snow which meant a snow day on Monday and travel chaos for the rest of the week. Today is supposed to be a balmy 7 degrees and tomorrow – gasp! – double figures, so we might finally see the thaw.

As my beloved added to this it became more Donnie Darko-esque

The rest of the week has mostly been crochet, as I had a stack of pigs to make after selling out at the Christmas fairs – seven big pigs, eight little pigs, one fairy cake, a Highland Cow and I finally got round to making a jumper for my own tree. I have a few more bits I want to make and then I really, really need to catch up with the temperature galaxy which hasn’t been touched since August. Eek….

Other things making me happy this week

Secret Santa exchange at work – this year’s theme was ‘adventure’ and my gift was a gorgeous Doctor Who bag charm, which meant I knew exactly who my Santa was!
Girly gossip with Miriam and Edith on Wednesday, accompanied by baby snuggles – there’s nothing quite like a sleepy tiny cuddling into your neck
Stomping around the garden in the snow spotting the rabbit, cat and fox prints.
The latest Audible version of Terry Pratchett’s Hogfather, with Bill Nighy as the footnotes and Peter Serafinowicz as Death
Ben and Jerry’s Minter Wonderland
Thermal leggings

Less happy was discovering when we got to the work canteen on Thursday that due to supply issues there were burgers instead of lasagne. Shades of Shirley Valentine: ‘But it’s Thursday! Thursday is lasagne day!’ The gloom among the whole V&A staff was positively Dickensian.

Only another five days of work to go and I can stop for Christmas – now excuse me, I have a cake to marzipan.

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Hogfather (Audible)

Don’t Cry For Me, Aberystwyth – Malcolm Pryce

This Must Be The Place – Kate Racculia

143: ho ho no

So, the tree is up (well, down from the attic) and decorated, the turkey and components for various trimmings are safely in the freezer, the lights are ready for my Beloved to put up today, the museum Christmas party is tomorrow, and the Secret Santa is organised. The charity for this year’s card money has been chosen (Trussell Trust, ICOI). I am still surrounded by the vast amounts of yarn I need to make the Christmas orders, having sold out of pretty much everything last weekend. Who knew that the children of North London would love cuddly pigs in blankets so much? I think my best moment was the frazzled parent who ran up to me shouting ‘I need a SPROUT!’, with the five year old who asked me ‘Do you take cards?’ in a close second place.

Cuddly pigs and other Christmas crochet adventures

Thing 2 has been asking searching (and knowing) questions about the existence – or not – of Father Christmas. From an early age, when her aunt and I would go off on increasingly ridiculous flights of fancy, she would ask ‘Are you telling me true, Mummy?’ or ‘Are you lying to me, Aunty Tan?’ So, for a child who was essentially born suspicious, this persistence in believing in all things Christmassy has always been a bit out of character. She is, however, a stickler for tradition and gets quite cross if Christmas films and songs make an appearance before December 1st. The tree goes up on the second weekend in December, which is the compromise reached over several years of negotiation.

This is the first year in several that she has not mentioned the elf on the shelf, which is a huge relief. Things 2 and 3 were quite insistent that we should have one of these abominations and I was secretly delighted when on December 1st I duly placed the elf on a shelf and the pair of them went into hysterics and demanded its immediate removal from the house. However, the following year they persuaded their father to buy another elf and the whole thing began again and of course the responsibility of the elf fell mainly to me.

Unlike my friend Jill who is very good with her elves, I was pretty hopeless at it. Possibly this is down to the very narrow window between putting the kids to bed and me falling asleep on the chair, or – more likely – because I just did not give a monkey’s. You can see my two best efforts (elforts?) below.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a Christmas tradition as much as the next person. There are films which must be watched while putting up the Christmas tree (the 1947 version of Miracle on 34th St, if you must know), films which must be watched early in the season (Elf, Muppet Christmas Carol) and there are films to watch nearer Christmas (It’s a Wonderful Life, Scrooged). We have added the Christmas Chronicles to the list over the last couple of years, as Kurt Russell makes an excellent Santa. I look forward to the annual invasion by Cybermen and Daleks, and will continue to ignore all speeches by members of the royal family. I read Terry Pratchett’s Hogfather and this year I will also listen to the new Audible version.

I have endeavoured to instil a healthy fear of robins into my children, in their role as Father Christmas’s all-year-round eyes on the ground. We have advent calendars. We leave snacks and something boozy out for FC and the gang on Christmas Eve and on Christmas Day Thing 2 organises stocking opening with military precision, and all I can say is thank god they’re old enough to bring us cups of coffee while they do it. Thing 1 opens the stocking and goes back to bed.

Every year I buy the largest turkey possible in Tesco – they only had mediums yesterday, which feed 8-10 people, and I seriously considered buying a turkey crown as well even though there are only five people in the house. As it was, the medium only just fitted into the freezer with some creative rearranging. Whether I can get it out again is a different question. I am dutifully feeding (with rum) a Christmas cake which I will probably still be eating in February (a Mary Berry recipe, and without resorting to Mrs Beeton you can’t get much more trad than that). I never liked Christmas cake until I realised that if I made it myself I could leave out the nuts, the mixed peel and the glace cherries and replace them with things I like (like proper cherries, and rum, and fresh orange peel grated).

We open family presents between breakfast and lunch when everyone is dressed, and after Christmas dinner there is the ceremonial ‘eat as much chocolate as you like’ opening of the Quality Street. There may be a cold turkey and stuffing sandwich about 8pm, and on Boxing Day there will be further cold turkey and a ham. At some point I will do a jigsaw.

While I will be a little sad when all pretence at believing in Santa is abandoned (i.e. they stop humouring me), I am not sorry to see the back of the stupid elf.

Other things making me happy this week

Excellent co-curation session which I have to write an ‘official’ blog for
Seeing some of my wonderful ex-colleagues at the Museum of London reunion last Sunday
Hugh Grant’s reading of A Christmas Carol (included with your Audible subscription)
Rewatching Derry Girls with Thing 1
The chance to do proper ice swimming today

Same time next week then!

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

A Child’s Christmas in Wales (Audible)

A Christmas Carol (Audible)

The Unbearable Lightness of Being in Aberystwyth – Malcolm Pryce

Don’t Need The Sunshine – John Osborne