Well, this week has been a refreshing blast of actual winter cold between Storm Henk disappearing and Storm Isha landing. Short of snow, gorgeous cold sunshine is my favourite sort of wintry weather, with frosty mornings and ice on puddles to crack. We drove back across from Brittany to Calais on Monday, with Tan delivering a running temperature commentary as we went - zero degrees was the high point. As I’m doing both highs and lows on the temperature stitch this year I should be able to show contrasts in a way that I haven’t before. 
The needle minder felt appropriate for this pattern!
This year’s tracker is the ‘Goth Stitch-a-Long Temperature Cabinet‘, by GrandmaBeWildin. As you can probably guess from the title, it’s a little less of a colour explosion than the last couple of years though for consistency I am going to use the same thread range for the temperatures. I’ve chose a printed aida fabric again, this time a parchmenty colour which reminds me of old library books. The cabinet is underway (only 4500 black stitches to go!) so hopefully by the end of the month I’ll be ready to start tracking. This year it’s a ‘book’ for every day in the high temperature, with a band that shows the low.
Of course this lovely cold snap also meant that Redricks Lake was frozen, with ice a good three inches thick. Yesterday’s dippers had fun with mallets breaking enough of a hole for people to dip, and despite the rise in temperatures today we still got to dip with the ‘bergs. It was our coldest dip yet at just one degree, so we were in for about three minutes before running for our robes and a hot chocolate!
Note the northern tans….
Other things making me happy this week
Tea and cake with my gang of ladies, with the best china. Plans were laid for an alternative village WI which doesn’t meet on a weekday afternoon and which has interesting speakers.
The Brothers Sun on Netflix – Michelle Yeoh on top form
Restocking my supply of Surf-fizz at Carrefour
Lots of reading. Lots.
Breakfast meeting at Bench to start planning National Illustration Day 2024
Getting on top of the paperwork!
Meeting the Education Committee at Copped Hall Trust to talk about their schools programme
And now it’s time for a quick nap before the Things start demanding feeding…
Same time next week?
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading
The Prayer of the Night Shepherd/The Smile of a Ghost/The Remains of an Altar/The Fabric ofSin – Phil Rickman
Here we are at post number 200, which is quite a lot and probably I should look back at the last 200 weeks and be all marvelly at what I’ve achieved. 200 posts is what I have achieved, despite Covid, labyrinthitis, new jobs, children, and general life happening all at the same time. Thanks to all of you who have been with me since the beginning (hello Mum, hello Dad, hello Fi), and to everyone else who’s dipped into my ramblings, roamings and adventures with the sewing machine.
Anyway, this week I am coming at you from a cold but sunny Brittany, where London sister and brother-in-law and I rocked up on Friday evening to surprise my mum for her significant birthday. I can’t tell you how old she is as she may make me sleep in the garden. Dad had managed to keep the secret, even sneakily making up the beds, hiding the extra baguettes in his office and putting the fizz on ice without Mum noticing.
A snowy coffeeWinter fun in Le Shuttle terminal
Having left Ealing at 6am for a morning Eurotunnel crossing, we made good time across a snowy Normandy and a not-snowy Brittany – spotting the dozens of birds of prey, deer and trees full of mistletoe (at least while I wasn’t snoozing) and only running into a bit of traffic on the Rennes rocade where a combination of roadworks and rush hour conspired against us. At 7.10 Tan dropped me off at the bottom of the drive so Mum wouldn’t hear the car, and clutching the magazine featuring Irish sister Steph* I knocked on the door. Dad had apparently delayed their dinner as long as possible, so when the door went he said he hadn’t finished and made mum get up. She opened the door and stood and looked at me for about 30 seconds in total silence while her brain processed the fact that the daughter who was supposed to be in Essex was on her doorstep. And then I told her I’d hitched a lift with Tan and Darren…there were tears and hugs and much joy, as well as cursing Dad for being a sneaky so-and-so**.
On Friday Tan, Darren and I went for a walk along the Blavet to see if we could spot a coypu in the lagoon. We didn’t spot a coypu but we were lucky enough to catch a glimpse of a kingfisher, a heron, a kestrel, any number of ducks, a buzzard and a cormorant in its favourite tree. It’s a canalised river which flows through to Lorient, and the towpath is popular for walking and running. Last winter we did a 10 miler along there with a total ascent of about 3 metres, which tells you how flat it is!
One of the great mysteries of French life is when the polite passing greeting changes from ‘bonjour‘ to ‘bonsoir‘ – if you open with bonsoir, you can guarantee that they’ll come back at you with bonjour, so mostly we’ve given up and just start there. Yesterday’s walk was no different. On the outward stretch we bonjoured away merrily until we’d almost reached our turnaround point. Tan bonjoured a French gentleman who responded with ‘Non! Bonsoir! Nuit est arrive!‘. When we met him again close to his turnround point in Pont-Augan, I bonsoired him….to which is his response was ‘trop bonsoir!’. Er, what…. had we bonsoired him too many times? Was it too evening, in which case was there a third option of ‘bonne nuit‘? Duolingo – or, indeed, Mr Morgan French (to distinguish him from any other Mr Morgans at the school)- never covered this clearly tricky aspect of the language. Is it some secret French thing designed to catch out the tourists? Answers on a carte postale to the usual address, s’il vous plait.
We are here till Monday, when we’ll make the marathon trek back across to Calais. By then I confidently expect to be approximately 75% baguette.
*Women’s Weekly, since you ask, in a feature all about her live interpretation business, Time Steps. Steph had promised to send her a copy….
**censored, for the delicate ears of my readership
Other things making me happy this week
A great meeting with Little Angel Theatre about where we could work together
Kicking off a new project with our illustrator Alaa Alsaraji and Holborn Community Association’s Digital Arts Club
A swim with Sue and Rachel – the temperatures are heading downwards to extreme sports levels again!
Getting organised for this year’s temperature tracker and starting a new Hydrangea blanket as well as mounting last year’s.
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)
This week I am feeling uninspired, which is not like me at all. The Things are off on their school holidays, the weather is nice and – as my role is formal learning – there are no teachers out there to harass so in theory I have lots of time to catch up on the to-do list. In theory. In reality, as always in August, my head is relaxing on a beach with a good book instead of focusing on the GEM conference presentation I ought to be writing. My butterfly brain has been fluttering from item to item on my to-do list, and lots has been started but not much finished. The first 800 words of the presentation are tweaked to perfection though…
Luckily my sewing mojo has come back so I have at least accomplished something this week. Sometimes sorting out the shed throws a fabric to the top of the pile and reminds you that you had a plan for it. I had a lieu day to use up so took advantage of a rare meeting free day to indulge in some midweek stitchery.
The fabric in question is a lovely dark red cotton with daisy-ish flowers all over it. I love the By Hand London ‘Anna’ dress pattern, and have made a couple of versions previously: a maxi length in a yellow floral digital print viscose (lovely feel, horrible to work with) and a knee length version in a black polycotton where I’d experimented with extending the sleeves. You can make it in a range of lengths and there’s a couple of neckline options to choose from.
I wanted this one to be maxi length but with the longer sleeve so I could wear it for work, and I chose the V-neck option for a change. Rather than front darts for shaping, the dress has a couple of vertical pleats on the front, with darts on the back. The waistline sits high and the skirt is panelled so it’s a flattering flared shape rather than the current trend for tiered flounces. I extended the sleeves to just above the elbow into a flared shape to echo the shape of the skirt, and I was really happy with the outcome and wore it to work on Thursday. Apart from the zip insertion bit where I diverged, the instructions are really clear so if you’re looking for a beginner project with a good result I’d recommend this.
Anna dressBo topMoomintrollAs you can see July has been HOTTravel by TardisNot a bad looking back
I also used a cotton voile to make a red square top using the Seamwork Bo pattern, a black shirt dress using the Seamwork Jo pattern (and another Bo to use up the double gauze!), added a Moomin iron-on to the bag I made last week, and in the evenings I finished the Travel by Tardis cross stitch from Country Magic Stitch and updated the Climbing Goat Designs temperature galaxy.
Jo dressLook at those gathers!
Other things making me happy this week:
Absolute Classic Rock not playing Peter Frampton at any point while I’ve been listening
My beloved’s birthday
Swim and a bacon sandwich this morning in the sunshine
Lovely afternoon with board games and friends yesterday
Lots of dog walks with Bella-dog, Loki the puppy, Dobby and Kreacher and their lovely owners
Paper Girls on Amazon Prime Video
Same time same place next week? This week I have three days out in Tower Hamlets with actual people and the blue blocks, a new cross stitch to do and I’m half way through the current crochet project.
You find me at the end of a week off, in which I have done very little that was useful but a lot that was good for my soul: afternoon naps, long walks with friends, family and dogs, relaxed coffees, crafting, reading and a bit of cooking. My beloved claims that there is no such thing as a day off, but that is because he takes Monty Don’s ‘Jobs for the weekend’ section to heart as well as all the other things that a garden requires. I, on the other hand, am of the opinion that if you take a day off the jobs (and the garden) will still be there afterwards and the weeds probably won’t have taken over the world. Unless it’s sticky grass or wild garlic, in which case all bets are off.
On Sunday, post-blog, I met up with a friend in the wilds of Hackney to see Damien Jurado playing at EArtH (Evolutionary Arts Hackney), a gig which had been postponed at least once and possibly twice thanks to the pandemic but which was well worth the wait. Jurado plays small, interesting venues – we have seen him previously St John on Bethnal Green church, at the Emmanuel Centre in Westminster and this time the venue was a reclaimed Art Deco cinema auditorium reached via a most unprepossessing doorway on Stoke Newington High Street. After a pint at the Brewdog bar a couple of doors along and up a few flights of stairs you arrive in the auditorium, which was locked up after the last film showed there in 1984 (Scarface, apparently) and left derelict while the rest of the building went through the usual ex-cinema permutations of snooker hall and community venue – not Bingo, for a change.
It’s a lovely space, still in need of a lot of restoration but the original Art Deco features remain and with simple bench seating and a wide stage the acoustics were wonderful. Add in an atmospheric setlist and good audience engagement and the result was a great evening. We particularly liked the young man at the end who begged for his favourite song, with plaintive pleases, and got his way – I liked the proper last song, too, with snatches of the Grateful Dead’s Morning Dew scattered through.
Damien Jurado (r) and Josh Gordon
On Wednesday my beloved and I dragged the Things out for a family walk. Thing 1 sulked all the way up the hill but was won over by the tiny calves in the field and the friendly pig – I think we all were, to be fair. We’ve been very lucky with the weather this week, and on Friday the garden was full of one of the Timeshare Teenagers and friends, painting henna tattoos on each other and recovering from what seemed to have been a pretty heavy night out. Other walks have been in the early morning, finishing with coffee and croissants at M’s house in the garden while fending off the muddy paws of Dobby and Kreacher, who assume all laps are for sitting. These are two rescue dogs, who are now so used to the sight of me that they have given up barking when I walk in to the house for D&D sessions. M and I also had a mooch around North Weald Market yesterday, where we marvelled at the sheer quantity of polyester neon on display, pondered the possibility of all the blingy pictures refracting sunlight and starting fires, and were bemused at the current fashion for wearing fluffy mule sliders out in public with socks.
Family walk – the return leg
I’ve also been messing around with making some very geeky earrings from D20s and meeples, am up to date on the Temperature Galaxy and ‘Travel by Tardis’ is halfway done. There’s half a simnel cake left (it was a most welcome apres-swim treat this morning!) and Thing 2 and I tried our hand at making macarons the other day as well. I did do some gardening, weeding the wild garlic out of my little patch and planting a couple of saxifraga and a Bleeding Heart. I can see the shoots of this year’s physalis coming up, hollyhocks are poking through, and I don’t seem to have killed the hydrangea so with any luck I’ll have a nice show this summer.
On Tuesday I am back to work, so I am off to top up my nap. I blame my father. I must also do my Easter bunny impression and distribute some eggs, as the natives are getting restless.
See you next week!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
In a Dry Season/Cold is the Grave/Aftermath/The Summer That Never Was/Playing With Fire/Strange Affair – Peter Robinson
This week I was sad to hear that the incomparable Meat Loaf has died at the age of 74. London sister and I saw him at the O2 on the Last at Bat tour in 2013 and he was struggling then – the voice was going and he was using oxygen off stage, presumably to help with his asthma. It was still a great show – it was celebrating the Bat out of Hell anniversary, so interspersed with the songs were video interviews with Jim Steinman, ‘Mighty’ Max Weinberg and others. It was a memorable show but we were pretty sure we wouldn’t be seeing him live again.
While I wouldn’t say Mr Loaf was one of my all time favourite artists, he’s not far off – not just because of the the music but because of the memories that go with them. Dead Ringer for Love casts me back to the Nag’s Head in Monmouth, while Paradise by the Dashboard Light is a road trip favourite. All his songs – dramatic, not theatrical according to Meat Loaf in an interview with Terry Wogan in 1982 – are perfect for singing along to in kitchens, pubs and cars even when you are not a singer (like me). His style has been described as ‘blustery, wounded romantic-on-the-brink-of-a-breakdown’. Loud is the key – ‘everything louder than everything else’, in fact – and with passion, much like himself. Meat Loaf was larger than life himself – funny, personable, engaging, entertaining.
Primordial Radio were playing a lot of Meat Loaf yesterday while I was crafting and each song raised a smile. Many friends have shared their own favourite songs on social media, referencing pubs and old friends – recollections of VI form or college, in many cases. Could you ask for a better legacy as a singer? RIP, Marvin Lee ‘Meat Loaf’ Aday.
The rest of the week
Has been pretty much business as usual, to be honest – a trek to south Kensington, another one to Hackney Wick and a lot of meetings in between. My favourite geeky friend has her birthday today so yesterday I had fun making her gifts while singing along to the radio – a dice bag and a pair of earrings. I made mermaid scale ones and bat wing ones – using dolls house miniatures – and took a vote on which I should give to her. Her husband had already ordered the Lego bat ones! The dice bag has Lord of the Rings fabric with purple (her favourite colour).
LOTR fabricMiriam had the batwing ones – I took a vote!A commission by a friendLego bats
My adorable nephew/godson is in a Harry Potter phase, so a snowy owl winged its way over to NI for his birthday this week, and the 9 and 3/4 cross stitch (with glow in the dark outline and Gryffindor colours backing) is off to Yorkshire.
Neon Pikachu is going slowly….black aida is a pain to work on but the colours look amazing.
This morning the lake was 2.5 degrees and the swimming lane was limited by sheets of ice – we lasted 10 minutes (most of which was getting in!). Madness but the mental reset is so worth it.
Mummy tummy and all. L-R – Isla, me, Sue, Jill. No Rachel!
See you next week!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
The Sapphire Manticore/The Golden Basilisk – Maria Andreas
Back in prehistory, before there were children, when I was young and mostly irresponsible and drank far too much Mad Dog 20/20 on nights out and other such unwise things, underwear was mostly impractical, lacy and – in the case of the Wonderbra – designed to make the most of my very limited assets through the cunning application of scaffolding and cantilevering and other miraculous feats of engineering.
How times change, eh? These days what I mostly look for are underwires that aren’t going to stab me halfway through a meeting and multipacks of pants in the right size and shape in Tesco. No one should feel too much sympathy for my beloved at this point: I am sure he’d far rather I wasn’t being tortured by my bra than anything else. My frustration often lies in the fact that the sizes left in the supermarket are either for skinny twigs or the larger trees – or if there are any in my size they are enormous ‘granny’ pants in some hideous shade of beige or soon-to-be-grey white. Supermarket pants also tend to be made of very thin cotton lycra fabric and trim which has a lot of stretch but frays easily.
Solving this problem became much easier when I bought an overlocker and began to make my own. You can make your own underwear with a normal sewing machine as long as you have a reliable stretch stitch and the ability to vary the length of your stitches, but at the time my basic Brother machine didn’t have that capability. The overlocker means you can whip up multipacks of your very own in short order.
The first ones I made were the amazing Wonder Undies by Waves and Wild, closely followed by the Speedy Pants for the children – Thing 2 absolutely loves them and I have made multiple pairs for her since. I love the fact that you can choose the waist rise and the leg style and that once you have the hang of it you can make them really quickly. I also love that you can use sensible colours or take advantage of all the mad prints out there – Thing 2’s favourites had unicorns all over them and I love my rainbow ones. This week I discovered Rad Patterns (another NY resolution gone….) and their Lucky Booty pattern. I really like the fact that Rad offer accessible patterns – wheelchair friendly skirts and tops with medical port access, for example.
25K bralette and Lucky Booty shorts by Rad PatternsSuperstar Bra by Waves and Wild and Lucky Booty cheeky cut by Rad Patterns
You also get to make matching bras/crop tops – Waves and Wild came up with their Superstar Bra last year and Rad patterns had a few styles already. The rainbow one below is the Watson bra by Cloth Habit. The Watson also comes with a bikini pant pattern – I haven’t tried that yet but I’m sure I will. This afternoon I’ll be making up the Lucky Lingerie bra and some Wonder Undies for Thing 2.
Speedy boxersSpeedy pantsWatson bra
The only trouble I have found is that home-made pants look absolutely ENORMOUS next to shop-bought – but they feel amazing (‘like a hug for your butt’ as one sewer put it) and last forever. If you haven’t had a go at making your own yet, you’re missing out.
It is, of course, only a small step from pants to swimming costumes – I embraced my inner mermaid this week and made a completely mad two piece using another Rad pattern (the Renee swimsuit) for the top and the Oasis pattern by Ellie and Mac for the bottoms. I wore it this morning for our winter swim (5°c in the water, 1°c out – brrrr!). The fabrics are foil prints from Pound Fabrics in emerald and a fabulous fish scale print which changes colour when it moves.
This week saw the last leaves added to the 2021 Temperature Tree – it’s been quite a ‘flat’ year for temperatures, so let’s see what 2022 brings. I’m doing the Climbing Goat Designs Rainbow Temperature Galaxy this year. I should probably have used the same colour palette but I have gone with the same one as the designer used.
Anyway – I need to go and defrost a bit more, so I’ll be back next week!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
Bridgerton (1-6) – Julia Quinn
The Unhappy Medium – T J Brown (badly in need of a good editor)
This week my walking buddy Jill (cover photo artist!) and I have made the most of being off for Christmas and headed out ‘early doors’ (she’s from Yorkshire) for a couple of welly walks. We love our walks: we put the world to rights, appreciate the scenery, stomp on icy puddles and squish our way through the muddy ones. Some weeks she is grouchy, other weeks it’s me. We test out ideas for work or catastrophise in the knowledge that we can go into the office the next day with our heads back on straight. It’s like therapy. There’s something about walking next to someone, not facing them, that allows stress and those wake-you-up-at-3am thoughts to spill out.
Some days we go further than others: round the roads to Tawney Common, or across to Toot Hill, or round past Dial House and the farm to see the cows, or the old golf course and flood meadows. Sometimes it’s the short 5k through the woods and back, or to the end of the village. Whatever, I always come back feeling better and ready to face the week.
It was a week of extremes: one day it was -4°c and the world was white. The sun was coming up in spectacular fashion, the puddles were frozen and we crackled our way down to the farm and home via the station. The plan was to check what time the light fantastic train was running that day so we could drag the kids up to Marconi Bridge to watch it go through, but they were only doing the Santa Special till after Christmas. We allowed ourselves to be seduced by the smell of frying bacon from the station cafe and indulged in a bacon roll and tea, listening to the brass quartet playing Christmas carols and watching overexcited kids waiting for Santa’s train to arrive.
SunriseA horse posing nicelyMorning, baby cowsCrackling puddlesFrosty grassSignpostHardy blackberry blossomWell earned breakfastSignal boxSanta’s on his way
The following day was much warmer so the puddles were squelchy once more (as you can see from the cover photo). That day’s route took us through the fields to the radio station (hence Marconi Bridge) and past North Weald Redoubt, finishing up at Jill’s house for tea and a rummage through boxes of craft stuff from a friend’s house clearing. I was very good and only came home with a few balls of yarn and some toy eyes. My plan this week was to try and destash some craft things from the shed, not bring home more – I did send some yarn up to Jill’s mum, and got rid of a whole lot of jewellery making stuff, which was a start.
I hope you’ve all enjoyed at least a few days off and will be grabbing the opportunity for a Boxing Day welly walk – we have A, H and the grandchild over today, but I’m looking forward to a few more walks this week.
All can now be revealed…
The last batch of the pigs in blankets….Yes, I made them open it before ChristmasOne of two tiny owls with Hogwarts letters
As it’s after Christmas I can share the gifts I made – the wall hanging was for our Dungeonmaster and his wife and I made them open it while I was there playing board games on Monday. The ‘Eira Owls’ were for their daughters. The little pigs in granny square blankets have been ridiculously popular and I ended up making more than 20 of them as Christmas ‘cards’* for colleagues and my swimming buddies, and then as requests for people who’d seen them on Facebook. They’ve gone off to Wales, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire and London. I still have several to do after Christmas but I have to get two presents out in January and a couple for February first!**
(* I don’t send cards to anyone but immediate family, but donate to a charity every year instead – this year it was the Trussell Trust. I make little decorations that can be brought out year after year – I love seeing people’s photos of their trees with my work on!)
(** Yes, I am taking orders. They are £6 each plus postage!)
I hope you’ve all had a great Christmas with family and friends, that you’re all safe and warm and looking forward to 2022. By the time next week’s post appears we’ll be in a whole new year!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
The Untold Story – Genevieve Cogman
A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens (Audible)
A Spool of Blue Thread – Anne Tyler
The Toast of Time – Jodi Taylor
The Long and the Short of it – Jodi Taylor (Audible)
Well, that was a week of unparalleled misery, quite frankly – topped off by Thing 3 testing positive for Covid on Thursday. Thing 2 was off with the dreaded corona the week before last, I was knocked for six by labyrinthitis (which is not, sadly, a surfeit of David Bowie’s startling trousers) and now Thing 3. Enough already!
Labyrinthitis is a definite -1,000,000/10, do not recommend. It was so horrible I didn’t pick up a crochet hook for a week, or even a book for several days. That bad. NHS 111 recommended taking something called Buccastem, which is supposed to relieve nausea and vomiting related to migraine, and other people recommended Stugeron which made things infinitely worse. A tweet from a lovely museum person crediting my blog from a few weeks ago with making her feel reassured about her upcoming colposcopy made me cry, but so did the lovely Norwegian postal system’s Christmas advert celebrating 50 years since Norway decriminalised same-sex relationships.
Furry nurses are the best
It was Wednesday before I started feeling semi-human again, and Friday before I felt safe to go out of the house. My Beloved did a most excellent job with laundry and keeping the Horde alive, and the furry fiends did an excellent job of keeping me warm. Friends were amazing at relaying Thing 3 home from school, which at least we don’t need to worry about this week as he’ll be off with me isolating.
Lack of new output does, however, mean I can share a piece I finished a while ago but which only got handed over this week – despite the fact that I have seen Heather several times. We were supposed to have a ‘Grumpy People’s Supporters Club’ night out on Friday (well, they did, I stayed on the sofa watching Cowboy Bebop): the last time we saw each other all together was on the hen night back in June! The pattern can be found here and the seller was kind enough to offer to chart the names for me to personalise it as well. I’m told the bride liked it – she loves Art Deco and had a 1920s car to take her to the service, so it should be a good reminder of the day.
Finally managed to hand this over!
When I did manage to pick up a book again, it was with the intention of working through some of the digital shelf of shame on the Kindle – in the mood for something easy, I chose Colin Watson’s Flaxborough novels which were published between 1958 and 1982. Police procedurals which would probably be tagged with the awful ‘cosy mystery’ label these days, these are witty and terribly British, featuring the Viking-like Inspector Purbright and the eastern town of Flaxborough. I had three on my Kindle already and luckily the rest were cheap as I quickly got addicted.
Lying in bed unable to do anything meant I had a lot of time to do mental crafting, which is at least cheaper than the normal kind. I have a head full of ideas and no way to get to them, as my crafting space (OK, the dining room) is still full of stuff we haven’t put back after the heating was put in. My beloved has taken the opportunity to do small jobs upstairs while the place is already in chaos. I’m not saying I’m getting itchy fingers here but I have things that need making! Things 2 and 3 want new pants and there’s Christmas making to be done. This Hobbit Hole piece needs finishing, too: the pattern is by Vetlanka on Etsy. It’s been a while since I’ve worked on such a high count fabric, but the effect is so delicate.
I’ve taken the opportunity to set up a Facebook page for this blog as well, where I can sell the various bits and bobs I make that aren’t destined for gifts, at least from me. You’ll be able to find it here and I really need to take some photos to get things online! Watch this space.
Anyway, I must head off – there’s PCR tests to do and a book to get back to.
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
Speaking in Bones – Kathy Reich
Coffin, Scarcely Used / Bump in the Night / Hopjoy Was Here / Lonelyheart 4122 / Charity Ends at Home / The Flaxborough Crab / Broomsticks over Flaxborough / The Naked Nuns / One Man’s Meat – Colin Watson (Flaxborough series)
An early start day as I was heading back to one of my regular schools, this time to deliver the Think Small sessions – a 9.30 session start, preceded by an 8.30am meeting at another school about the Kids in Museums Takeover Day happening on Friday. Takeover Day is, in terms of organisation and the level of buy-in from the rest of the team, the biggest day in the formal learning year. Also, to add to the fun, this year we are doing Museum Takeover Day with half the usual staff and – to make it really fun – no museum, If I’d had any sense at all I probably shouldn’t have booked in two days of teaching and the central heating fitting.
My house is in chaos. Only one person at a time can watch TV and all my craft kit is hidden behind a pile of god knows what. The company told us they’d be sending a moving team down on Monday to – you know – move things, but by the time the poor lads had arrived from darkest Yorkshire my beloved had moved everything possible and they were at a bit of a loose end. He had a lovely time over the weekend being all ‘but they won’t know how to empty a fish tank!’ and ‘they won’t know how to dismantle the railway/small nuclear reactor/quantum leap thingy’. Gentle suggestions of ‘well, perhaps you could do those bits and they could do the furniture’ were unwelcome, apparently, and he had a great time hurling things into boxes and piling them up.
Today’s sessions were great fun, though: we had started the school year here with the giant blue blocks, so it was lovely to see the kids again. The appearance of the museum team means fun, apparently, which isn’t a bad thing to be known for! It’s such a warm and friendly school to visit, and the children are kind to each other. The Y6 teacher and his teacher trainee clearly have something going which they probably need to keep a bit more to themselves in front of kids and visitors (it was reaching the ‘would you like to be alone?’ stage while I was setting up my session) but there we are.
Parrot perched in a ‘tree’
Tuesday
Central heating day! No 8 is being dragged (kicking and screaming, naturally) into at least the mid-20th century! With two key Teams meetings scheduled for the morning which would almost certainly not be improved by background drilling! I decamped to Miriam and Roy’s house, round the corner, and where I can more usually be found on Thursday nights playing D&D. Dobby, one of their mad but adorable rescue dogs, took possession of my lap as soon as I sat down and stared intently at the screen till she was properly introduced. She kept my knees warm and her mistress passed me coffees to keep my spirits up. Two meetings and a visitation from their other lovely hound Kreacher later, I headed home to inspect the chaos. One radiator had been fitted and a lot more furniture had been moved as it is apparently not the done thing to put radiators under windows – also, they didn’t have any skinny radiators. The singing Yorkshiremen spent the day hammering and drilling under the watchful eye of my beloved, who was feeling a bit surplus to requirements as there was nothing much he could do. He did go and get them samosas for lunch from the bakery, which I think they enjoyed. The samosas are excellent but the owner is a bit creepy with the females of the species.
Technically, I had a block of time set up in the afternoon for prepping the Takeover Day session. I did manage some admin but failed utterly to do any of the resource prep: we do at least have an activity pack to distribute to the teachers and a timetable. Still, I now know what everyone wants for lunch and just how excited a museum team can get at the thought of fish fingers and chips (samosas again for the vegetarians) followed by school sponge and custard.
Two cats were shut in the kitchen and one in the extension so the fitters could work without interruption from furry fiends intent on homicide. Lulu was distinctly unimpressed, slashing my thumb when I attempted to move her from her perch and I remained unforgiven for the rest of the day. I eventually managed to feed everyone about 8pm, and then sent them to bed.
Things to do when the museum team is elsewhere!
Wednesday
Up with the lark, or at least my beloved who was on an early shift. Yes, I had a bath and the kids and I revelled in the heating in much the same manner as the Aardman Animations tortoise in the electricity adverts. Yes, that was electric and we are now on gas central heating but it is, as they say, easily turn off and on-able. The bath was so good I almost forgot that I had three kids to get to school.
As it happened, there was an epic bus fail so I had to spend some time having words with the bus company about buses that either don’t turn up, turn up 15 minutes late and then don’t stop, or which just disappear off the tracker. I was late for my own meeting, the kids were an hour late for school but I did at least get the resource prep done.
True to form, just when you need the printer to behave itself it decides to throw a wobbler. Paper jams, communication breakdowns, random cancelling of jobs, refusal to print from powerpoint/word- or printed one and then not the rest. Much threatening of said printer with percussive maintenance, replacement with a pen and paper failed to do the trick Eventually I fooled it by printing to PDF, emailing them to myself and printing from the PC which was apparently acceptable.
And then the stapler gave up. Paper clips to the rescue!
My beloved was replacing plug sockets in the afternoon so no gadgets for the kids. Instead I bribed them with cold hard cash to help me cut up the t-shirts for the takeover day session into strips for rag rugging. My mistake was to give them the cash before the job was finished. I eventually finished about 8pm, with my shoulder frozen. My work table was still inaccessible so most of the work was done on the floor which probably didn’t help!
Thursday
Started with a late bus, followed by a long gap between tubes so I was running late from the moment I left the house. The school emailed and asked for my DBS number at 9.15am, so of course I didn’t have it with me and had to be escorted everywhere. I missed the 12 o’clock meeting as I was still teaching (must remember to build in contingency time to my diary!). Thank heavens for my line manager who lives round the corner from the school and who fed me coffee and lunch afterwards and restored my sanity. You can’t beat a cheese bagel and salad with a friendly cat.
The electrician phoned on my way home: could he come and fit the spur for the boiler, which was currently plugged into an extension cable, in the next half hour. Nothing like a bit of notice, is there – we compromised on 45 minutes and when he arrived we couldn’t find where he was supposed to be connecting the thing to. I missed another meeting and was late for the next…but we made it to the end of the day.
Thursday is D&D night and as lots of us had an early start we kicked off early – it turned into a board games evening which was just what I needed. A couple of games of Bang! (during which I was forced to shoot both the kids several times – I refuse to sit between them again if we’re playing that!) and a couple of riotous rounds of Scrawl later I was a lot more relaxed. Dobby and Kreacher are very democratic and take turns climbing on everyone’s laps: I think they just like having their ears rubbed.
Friday
Awake at 4am once again, which has been a bit of a pattern this week – argh! Takeover Day and I haven’t done this, I haven’t got enough staff and I haven’t got a bloody museum to do it in! There will be an ‘official’ blog over on the V&A site at some point so I won’t go into it too much here.
I abandoned Thing 3 with wonderful Miriam to take to Breakfast Club so I’d be able to get to Bethnal Green on time – bless my lovely friends (like Toby, who also retrieves Thing 3 when I can’t get back in time!) – and headed off on the 7.13 bus which was mercifully on time. I treated myself to an almond milk hot chocolate (try it, it;s delicious) from Starbucks on the way past and headed to Globe where most of the team were there before me.
True to form, as the blue blocks were involved and I was due to be outside it rained, so we hijacked the hall for the morning. Helen the director and I worked with the nursery and reception classes all day and we had great fun building and adding in things from the mountain of recycling that parents had donated. I was given a new dress made from gold and bubble wrap, went on a road trip to Australia in a car, slept in a mermaid’s cave, watched a small child disguise herself as a sausage roll and was also treated to the sight of my director being a cloud. The other team’s sessions were equally successful and many, many parents were dragged upstairs to our ‘museum’ by their excited children at the end of the day. We ate school lunch with the kids, who were outraged that we got extra fish fingers and lots of chips.
I don’t usually instagram my lunch….
Museum building underway!
Jazz hands joy at the end of the day
Highlights of Takeover Day
The traditional debrief followed at The Florist Arms, where they do excellent pizzas and where some of the teachers were a bit bemused to see the museum team reviving themselves with a tequila slammer before 5pm. We were also saying goodbye to our creative practitioner, Fran, who was my first recruit after I joined and who is leaving us to be a freelancer. She’s brilliant and we will miss her very much – she’s kept me sane for the last few years, is wonderful with kids and adults alike, creative, and extremely accident prone. I was home by 9pm and blissfully unconscious on the sofa shortly afterwards.
Fran’s crafty leaving gift
Saturday
Started with a positive Covid test handed to me by Thing 2, leading to LFTs all round and ordering PCRs for the family. If anyone wants me for the rest of the weekend I am in the bath (and thanks to Miriam for the bath bombs!) and I’m not getting out till Monday.
See you next week!
Kirsty x
Windswept and Interesting- Billy Connolly (Audible)
Dreams Underfoot – Charles de Lint
London Bridge is Falling Down (Bryant and May) – Christopher Fowler
The Thursday Murder Club – Richard Osman
The Long and the Short of It – Jodi Taylor (Audible)
Saving Time – Jodi Taylor
The Quantum Curators and the Missing Codex – Eva St. John
What Kirsty did next 