This week has passed by in a haze of nothing very much at all: so much so, in fact, that I have no idea what, if anything, I have achieved. It’s been a bit of a brain-fog week, where sentences have wandered off after getting lost in the middle of a conversation and things have been left half done, like making cups of tea or sorting the laundry. My butterfly brain is in full flight – the joys of menopause, eh?
I do know I went to a lovely workshop with Toya Walker at the Museum of the Order of St John where lots of families came and explored their garden of medicinal plants before learning about botanical illustration. I also had a great chat with Andrew from the Museum of Walking about one of their new projects. There’s been a lot of crocheting of tiny mice on the tube and the odd cactus, and yesterday was a jewellery making day.
This weekend I have been pet-sitting for a neighbour, and basking in the reflected glory of Bella who bears more than a passing resemblance to a TV character called Waffledog. We’ve been for some long walks around the Common and chilled out binging Chuck on Amazon Prime in between. I love Bella, as she’s always pleased to see me. Her one fault is raging jealousy of the car she lives with, so when Ziggy decided to come home at 3am after hanging out in my garden with the wildlife last night I was rudely awoken which I could have done without.
At some point I’m going to have to bring my brain around to the idea of school uniform and (oh god) shoes for Things 2 and 3, but that can wait till the week after next when I’m off.
I can’t say I’m overly impressed with the weather this week, to be quite honest with you all. It’s August and I have had to wear actual socks and actual shoes and think about whether to take an umbrella. And then it gets hot but it’s cold in the morning so I have to think about layers. It’s like being on holiday in Wales and having to be prepared for all eventualities, up to and including hurricanes, tornadoes and the Central Line.
July was cool, as can be seen in the temperature supernova update – last year was all hot reds and oranges; this year cool greens and yellows dominate. September will probably be tropical. Huh.
There have been many good things about the week, however:
Getting to go to a workshop at All Change Arts with Alaa Alsaraji, one of our Community Illustrators, and poet Rakaya Fetuga
A creative meeting with storyteller Olivia Armstrong about a Quentin Blake inspired session
A new haircut
Barbie. I loved it. I really loved it. I may never listen to Matchbox Twenty in the same way again.
Getting round to making this pair of extremely dramatic self-drafted trousers from a tutorial by Tendai Murairwa in Simply Sewing magazine in a gorgeous teal and purple wax print fabric. I even made a toile for these to test the fit.
Jukebox hero
Robbie Robertson, ex-member of The Band, Dylan stalwart and solo musician died this week aged 80. I’m not going to pretend I’m a massive fan, but rather I’m someone who sings along when his songs come on the radio – apart from his first, eponymous, solo album which I love. Featuring collaborations with U2 and Peter Gabriel, among others, it yielded his biggest hit (this week’s title) and also the gorgeous Broken Arrow which Rod Stewart had more success with.
Somewhere Down The Crazy River was a fixture on the jukebox in a village pub I used to spend a lot of time in, usually selected by one particular person. A few times in your life, if you’re lucky, you meet someone who fills a space in your soul that you don’t even know exists. They are the folded beermat underneath your wobbly table leg (and there have been times when my tables were very wobbly, believe me); someone who gets you on your level. I’ve had several of these people in my life and I thank my stars every day for them. I lost touch with this one for 13 years but reached out (with a Blues Brothers birthday card) on his 40th and we remained in contact for the last couple of years of his life. I’d bought and written a card for him every year but never sent them until this one, and I will forever be glad I did. I still raise a glass every year on his birthday – yesterday would have been his 51st. Hopefully he spent it duetting with Robbie Robertson over a lager with a lot of lime.
Same time next week!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading
The Echo of Old Books/The Last of the Moon Girls – Barbara Davis
Amongst Our Weapons/October Man – Ben Aaronovitch (Audible)
Paint Your Dragon – Tom Holt
The Mercenary River – Nick Higham (I keep dropping in and out of this one)
Yesterday was my Beloved’s birthday and so despite the rain we all trooped off to Toot Hill Show – once he had dragged the Things out of bed at noon, anyway. Toot Hill is a small village over the next hill, and they have a proper village show (this year is the 70th anniversary, in fact) complete with local handicrafts, home grown fruit and veg and flower displays like ‘three dahlias in a vase’. My friend Jill’s Victoria Sponge was highly commended – she’s been threatening to enter for several years now and there may have been a riot if she hadn’t got some kind of mention. I’d thought about entering the handicrafts section but forgot. I’ll remember next year. Probably.
I was very taken with the alpacas, but apparently they weren’t for sale. They make the weirdest noises – quite like a whinging teenager, come to think of it, but quieter. There were the usual motley crew of rescue ferrets and a fun dog show; a sheepdog demonstration and allegedly BMX riders but we missed them. In previous years there have been Indian Runner ducks being herded by the sheepdog, and the local hawk and owl sanctuary display, but Storm Antoni was making its presence felt.
My Beloved brought home enormous quantities of interesting cheese, and I did not bring home an alpaca. Not even the little one.
The rest of the day was spent taping and cutting pattern pieces out ready to add to fabric. I’m going through a dramatic trouser phase at the moment and at some point my beloved paper bag waist black ones from H&M are going to give up the ghost. Possibly I need to learn how to do that thing where you make a pattern from your existing clothes, but there just don’t seem to be enough hours in the day. I am off to see the Barbie film this morning and hope to get some sewing in this afternoon.
Other things making me happy this week
A trip up to see the future home of the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration – honey bees and butterflies galore thanks to the buddleia which abounds on site
A picnic lunch with Amanda – no cocktails or cemeteries but a ridiculously small dog to watch
A somewhat misleading title but does lead nicely into one of my work visits this week, which saw me heading to north London for a visit to the Emirates Stadium. It’s not often a single meeting puts me within a hop and skip of the 10,000 daily steps target but this one did, with a whistle-stop tour taking in the changing rooms, the press conference room, the post-match interview bit (which looks a lot more glam on the telly, I can tell you – in reality it’s a corner under a concrete stairwell), the stands and various corporate spaces, as well as the pitch and the Hub.
Not shown: any football players changing
The Hub was what I was there to see, really: having spent 17 out of my 21 years in museums knocking about Tower Hamlets, I’m now being let loose on Islington as we’re embedding ourselves in the borough while we develop the new Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration at the old New River Head site. Islington isn’t somewhere I know very well, other than sneaky visits to drool over yarn I can’t afford at Loop and hanging out at the Crafts Council occasionally. Islington, in my head, is a literary thing: Douglas Adams and Nick Hornby, Charles and Carrie Pooter in middle-class Victorian Holloway. As it turns out, it is quite literary, but also full of actual people as well. Who knew! So I am on a bit of a mission to talk to a lot of them in the hope that we can work together.
As well as the Hub, I found myself at the Museum of the Order of St John this week, where I was enveloped in an enormous hug by lovely Maggie, an ex-colleague from Museum of Childhood. Coming as a nice surprise to someone instead of a terrible shock is a good thing! If you haven’t been to this little gem of a museum, it’s worth a visit: full of interesting medieval things and housed in a fascinating building, and they have a lovely family programme. Time it right and on the same day you could do The Charterhouse and wander through to St Bartholomew the Great, tucked away behind slabs of modern brick and concrete, and the Postman’s Park.
A conversation with illustrator/author and fellow South Walian Isabel Benavides who launches her first picture book in August and who is coming to do a family workshop for me at Finsbury Library
A 90-page conservation plan for the site which was full of fascinating information.
An early morning walk with Thing 3
Far too much crochet and my new Banks jumpsuit covered in otters. I sewed it on my Aunty Jo’s old Singer Samba sewing machine, freshly serviced and a dream to use.
Not jumpingRear viewCovered button with otterShy cactusChrismouseCatcus
Things making me sad this week:
The death of Sinead O’Connor, who I loved as a teenager. The Lion and the Cobra is a hugely powerful album. Hopefully, whatever the cause of death turns out to be, she’s found some peace now.
Same time next week!
Kirsty x
Cover image: “The Laurels”, “a nice six-roomed residence, not counting basement” – Drawing of “The Laurels”, the fictional home of the Pooter family. First published in The Diary of a Nobody by George and Weedon Grossmith. London, J.W. Arrowsmith 1892.
What I’ve been reading:
Heir of Uncertain Magic – Charlie N. Holmbury. Also started The Will and the Wilds but it was bloody awful so I stopped. Life is too short to read books you’re not enjoying.
Museum of Magic – Beth Revis
Odds and Gods – Tom Holt
Broken Homes/Foxglove Summer/The Furthest Station/The Hanging Tree – Ben Aaronovitch (Audible)
…both of which knock me for six these days which at least means I have slept well!
On Monday I was fifty, and while for the past few years my birthday has been celebrated in the garden with barbecues and coffee tequila, this year I’ve been training hard for the Race to the Stones so I didn’t plan anything. My lovely neighbour Sue had invited me round for a hot tub in the evening, which turned out to be a surprise mini-gathering with cake and fizz and presents, which was most unexpected and very lovely!
The cake did actually catch fire, thanks to Jill’s sparklers and decorations – not down to the number of candles: all we in the garden heard was “happy birthday to AAAARGGH!”.
Presents included a selection of plasters and a voucher for our local salon so I can book myself a post-Race pedicure or massage – bless them!
The second prosecco event was the private view of Young V&A on Wednesday evening, at which I was so excited I didn’t take any photos.
Even knowing what to expect (having worked on it for five years!) I still had a wow moment when I walked in and saw it full of colour and people. Last time I was on site, about two months ago, it was in full chaos with cases and objects being installed, and it seemed very unlikely that they’d ever be ready to open on time.
The mission – thanks to a throwaway comment by a snarky pre-teen – was to create the most joyful museum in the world. There were definitely moments during the five years that joy was in very short supply, but the end result is wondrous. At the event I attended there were adults and children interacting in the all the ways we’d hoped and my new colleague Cassie who joined me at the event was enchanted too. The museum is bright and full of colour, yet definitely not a play area. Opening up the roof lights has changed the atmosphere in what is essentially a Victorian greenhouse. The huge gallery titles bring colour and playfulness to the central space – not to mention the flying Microlino car – and there are still enough ‘I had one of those!’ moments to draw in the adults. Clever moments like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ house being added to the dolls houses make you smile, as do the poems commissioned from people like Michael Rosen and Valerie Bloom to illustrate the letters in the ‘Apple is for A’ section.
The Design gallery – the one I worked on and which at times felt like an afterthought – does exactly what we wanted it to do: brings the stories of the design case studies to life, and highlights the work of young people. Works by teens are hung next to work by Issey Miyake and Bethany Williams, and I was sneakily thrilled to see the border panel I made as part of the quilt. The open studio was filled with people, the ‘boob carpet’ is in place (go and see what I mean) and the Shed walls were filled with amazing pieces by the resident Clara Chu.
The overall shine was tarnished for me by the discovery later in the week that for some reason the V&A’s director, Tristram Hunt, had ordered the removal of two posters from the ‘Design gives people a voice’ display and some books from the shop. The space limitations in that area of the gallery meant that every single object had to work hard to get its message across, was included after much debate and the gallery had been through multiple presentations to the directors and various trustees before this point. Our ethos throughout the project had been to reflect our audience in what we showed and to be genuinely inclusive. To have a Stonewall poster removed and the books from the shop – on the anniversary of Pride in London – denies and devalues the work we did towards this. Kristian Volsing, who was lead curator on this gallery, wrote a brilliant blog post this time last year about the pieces. Please read it and understand what our mission was.
I’d be interested to know what prompted the decision to censor objects in the gallery and in the shop mere days before opening and what apologies will be made to the communities being hidden by the V&A. I hope Hunt is challenged and the objects are reinstated. So far he has refused to retract the decision despite representations from the LGBT staff forum and the union.
As for the Piriton…bloody mosquitoes.
Next week’s blog may be late as I have to go for a walk…
What is it about Clerkenwell and Farringdon? This week I have managed to get completely lost (twice) in the maze of streets surrounding them while trying to find my way back to the office. I think perhaps I get distracted by interesting alleyways and cut-throughs and – once – by a very beautifully executed sculpture of David Beckham’s naked torso, complete with tattoos. I had to go back and look twice, in fact, as it was so well done. Anyway. Where was I?
Oh yes, I didn’t know where I was, and that was my point. The first occasion was on Tuesday morning after having coffee with Amanda, who pointed in the general direction of Farringdon and I still managed to get lost. Eventually I found my way back with the aid of Google Maps, which is FINE if you can make it stay in the direction of travel. If not then you have to walk thisaway and thataway until you work out which way is the right one, and then reverse it in your head.
I got lost again on Friday afternoon after a visit to the Zaha Hadid Foundation and the ten minute walk back to the office on St John Street took half an hour. I didn’t realise how lost I was until I found the Mount Pleasant sorting office – I love that building but it was a long way down Farringdon Road from where I needed to be. It is a bit of a maze of narrow lanes and rookeries round there, and tucked away in all of them are lovely old Georgian squares, Victorian houses and funny little nooks.
I did, however, manage to walk successfully from the office to Bethnal Green and was only a bit distracted by Lady Dinah’s Cat Emporium with its window full of furry friends.
This week we also had an ‘all-in’ day at work, when everyone comes on site. In the afternoon we had a workshop on class and class dynamics, run by Tonic Theatre, which was fascinating and uncomfortable in equal measures. From the reaction of our non-UK team members, the British concept of class is more than a bit weird. One exercise was around stereotyping: we were asked to give a working class/upper class sport, saying, food, art form, clothing and name. Another was to think about our own contexts in terms of education, economics, cultural capital and more – and about how that’s changed over generations. Turns out there’s a lot more to it that knowing which knife to use and not calling napkins serviettes or whatever.
Possibly one of my favourite aspects of the new job is being able to do a deep dive back into London history – especially the New River, which is neither new nor a river. The trouble as always is knowing when to surface…
Other things making me happy this week:
Long walks in the sunshine: this weekend I’ve covered 40k over two walks. The first was the Moreton and the Matchings walk I did in the rain on the coronation weekend, the second was a slow loop around Tawney Common.
On a related note, farmers who cut the public footpaths back in have made it to the list. You know who you are (well, I don’t). If you could see your way clear to hacking back the nettles too, that would be great. Nettles are not on the list.
Overhearing one of the trustees talking to ACTUAL QUENTIN BLAKE about ME.
Crochet octopi and a Totoro cross-stitch update
Ox-eye daisy seasonThe church and wedding feast house in the sunshineFlag irisThis one has gone to live with some kittensGiant octons at Clerkenwelll Design FestivalTotoro
Now I’m off for a shower and a nap…
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
A Dying Light in Corduba/Three Hands in the Fountain – Lindsey Davis
Back last November I opened the front door to a very distressed Thing 1, who – on her way back from walking her friend to their job in the pub round the corner – had been accosted by an adult who had tried to kiss her. Thing 1 is 16, she’s polite and friendly, and she answers when she’s spoken to which is how she’s been brought up. We live in a village, we see the same people on a regular basis and so you say hello, because that’s what you do in a small community. For the last couple of years this adult has been making comments which erred towards the inappropriate, but could be brushed off as just overly friendly.
Comments on appearance, on how she was growing up, asking if she was still at school. The sort of thing you’d laugh off as being a bit creepy, followed by ‘say hi to your mum and dad’. Innocuous. Then she turned 16, started at college, and the tone changed.
‘Have you got a boyfriend? I bet you’ve got lots of secret admirers. I know you’ve got at least one, you’re growing up nicely’. The sort of thing you need to keep an eye on, as it’s too creepy. She would come home and tell us when he’d spoken to her, so we knew what was going on but thought he was just sleazy as she’d laugh it off.
On this day in November she wasn’t very well, so wasn’t as alert as usual, and she was trying to get home. We spent the following day at the emergency GP, in fact, with severe tonsillitis. On this occasion he started with ‘was that your boyfriend? Have you got a boyfriend?’ and then he put his hands on her shoulders and went in to try and kiss her. She reacted by stepping back and came home in a state.
This is a married man, at least in his 30s. who clearly knows what he is doing is wrong – asking her if she’s 16 yet, for example, is a clear indicator that he is aware of the legality of the situation. He is a local business owner, who has been heard encouraging teenage boys to bring their girlfriends in as ‘he likes them young’.
After speaking to a friend in the police we reported the incident and luckily they took it seriously, sending someone to interview Thing 1 and I, taking video evidence from her – and doing everything they could to make it an easy experience for her – and eventually arresting him. He of course denies knowing her (and someone else who made a complaint against him) and is out on bail, and this week – as he’s denied it – she had to go and do an identity parade which is fortunately all digital these days. It wasn’t easy: she texted me after I checked in on how it had gone, and said,
‘Yeah it was fine it was weird though all the pictures were fine but as soon as I saw his it felt like his eyes were looking right at me it was so uncomfy.’
She’s been so brave, and I am so proud of her: she is clear that she doesn’t want this to happen to someone else, who may not be as speedy or as supported as she is. She has to walk past his business twice a day, three days a week to catch the bus to college, and his bail conditions state that he is not allowed to speak to her or approach her – as he hasn’t, I assume that he does actually know who she is, despite the denials. The police have been great, keeping us updated with any developments and taking her seriously.
I’m not under any illusions that anything will actually happen to this man as a result of my little girl being brave enough to step up and make her statement: much as I’d like to see him named and shamed and drummed out of the village, I’m quite realistic. I would like the parents of other teen girls in the village to warn their daughters away, or at least to make sure their daughters know that this behaviour is sexual harassment and they don’t have to put up with it. It’s not ‘cultural’, it’s not ‘being friendly’, it’s harassment and we now know that it won’t stop there.
What I’d like even more is to know that I won’t have to write yet another blog post next year calling out sexual assault, or harassment, or even inappropriate behaviour. I think we’ve all had enough.
Things making me less furious this week:
The safe arrival of my very gorgeous new grandson this week, two weeks early, courtesy of Timeshare Teenager 2 (she’s 25, but they’ll always be the TTs). I think Grandson 1 was hoping for a baby robot for a cousin but he’ll have to put up with a regular human baby.
A good 13.5k ramble in the sunshine this morning following a footpath I’ve been eyeing up for a while, seeing my first swifts of the years and a whole family of hares.
A day off midweek, with a lovely walk round Harlow Town Park with Sue and the Bella-Dog finished off with tea and an Eccles cake
The Gaslight Anthem’s new single with an album to follow
A catch-up with an ex-colleague about attracting secondary school teachers to the museums
BluebellsA meander!Glorious blossom in Harlow Town Park
Tomorrow I have a swim and a visit to the new arrival planned, a Long Walk on Monday with London sister, and then will be spending some time this week planning another Long Walk away from all media next Saturday.
Happy Long Weekend!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
Desperate Undertaking/Fatal Legacy/The Silver Pigs – Lindsey Davis
(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…
The AL workshopSquishy stuff!Monique and JuliaHaidee and Heidi
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
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
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.
Sneaky photo of kidsCormorantMore cormorants
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.
View from the Ramparts at Vannes
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
What Kirsty did next 