Still seeking stability...

When I locked the door for the last time on my little house on 27th January, waved most of my belongings off into storage and began a period of nomadic living until I could find my next home, I could not have imagined that almost 7 months later I would still be hunting. I thought maybe by Spring, early Summer at latest, I'd be in but no... Frustratingly, I had found somewhere and almost got to completion, then the seller changed her mind and pulled out. The English legal system is rubbish where house buying is concerned and the money spent on surveys and legal feels is meaningless if the other party lets you down. My personal view is that there should be some compensation - it shouldn't be possible for you to get so far down the line and then have to start again just because someone is a bit fickle. 

For the most part, I am living a 75 mile commute from work, thanks to the kindness of a friend, the rest of the time I am on my son's sofa bed so I can spend a bit of time with his little family. It has been challenging, not least because the pandemic has sent the housing market into some kind of madness, but also the lack of certainty about when I can finally settle down again. 

It has made me think about what really matters. With almost all my things out of reach, I am questioning how much I really need. Surprising how little you need day to day really. I miss my kitchen and my own bed but everything else? Not so sure. Perhaps I will delight in it again when I finally get to unpack. The things that have really kept me going - and I have felt pretty bleak at times - are the less tangible things... blue skies and sunshine, my grandson's first smiles, the kindness of friends. And always, running through like a thread, the constancy of nature. I think I really understand now how my Mum found solace in the garden - there is something very steadying about losing yourself in the physical and creative effort of painting with plants and then watching the bees, butterflies and birds appear, as if by magic.

Mum loved sweet peas and the first blooms were ready to cut 2 years to the day that she died. They will always make me think of her, with their delicate petals and sweet scent.

I renewed my National Trust membership and took a trip to the rose garden at Anglesey Abbey. The fragrance hung in the air and the photos don't do justice to these beauties.

In the 'resting bed' in the rose garden, bright cosmos with their feathery foliage...

The house I have been staying at was a new build 5 years ago and has the typical 'building site soil' with poor grass. My friend is, of her own admission, no gardener and was happy for me to turn her patch of weedy grass into a garden. This project has probably kept me sane over the last few months. From painting the fences...

To the first few trips to the nurseries...

Marking out the design...

Then hours of digging out the beds, shifting sacks full of builders lime, adding topsoil and well rotted manure (I have never dug a garden before and not found a single worm!) and finally beginning to plant up.  The plan is to provide some year round interest and some height to, eventually, shield from the overlooking windows.

Amazing how a little splash of colour begins to make it look like a garden...

Summer sunshine saw the cheap and cheerful bedding plants come into their own and the beginnings of a flower bad taking shape...

And as summer, sadly, draws towards its evening, the grass, deliberately filled out with white clover, looks greener and healthier, the perennials are beginning to spread and the trees are slowly filling out.

It's a long way from 'finished' (what garden ever is?) and I have stopped adding up how much I have spent! There is always space for just one more plant and as the seasons change, I'm sure we will want to keep adding to it. Next plan is Spring bulbs, need to plan and order those, then plant in a month or two. It has kept me looking forward, when there have been days when the future feels a bit pointless and we joke that even when I have my own garden again, I will have to come back every so often to keep this one tidy!

Nature has been therapy in so may ways.

S x

Reflections and moving forward...

I am left with a strange sense of not knowing how to remember 2019. There were trips to Edinburgh, Harrogate, Canterbury, London and Bristol - each with special moments with friends and family. Walks on sunny days and crisp cold days. Gardens and galleries. A homecoming, an engagement and a graduation.

And the loss of the family anchor, whose quiet strength was much more the glue to our family than any of us realised, my dear Mum...

She is missed every day. And I have to remind myself she is with us every day too. I see her in the mirror, I hear her in my voice; she is in my rituals - my knitting and my baking, even the household chores. You don't realise how much of a 'way of doing' you absorb without even realising. The void has been huge over the last week - she was a keeper of Christmas traditions and the focus of family gatherings. Some I continue because it feels wrong not to, others I can't manage without her. Or at least, not yet.

And as this new year starts, with 5 months gone by, I know she would want me to find positives. So today, much like last year, I walked. And found blue skies and early snowdrops. 

Redefining life with familiarity, step by step.

S

chaos...

Seems to be unending muddle at the moment. Doesn't do much for my spirits to be honest but I keep reminding myself this is all just steps along the way and eventually, at some point, we will all come out the other side enriched by the experience... At least that's the mantra I'm trying to tell myself!

Over the last few weeks, I have been trying to empty and sort and repack. After 20 years in one place, it is astonishing just how much stuff has accumulated! And made doubly difficult by the fact that I'm not actually living in that house now so have been going back in pretty much every spare moment to try to keep on top of the house and garden and begin to make it manageable to move everything out.

I wish I was the kind of person that could just be ruthless and thrash through everything but I seem to have to open every box and sort it bit by bit. I have found some gems along the way - some things that have made me laugh and some that have made me cry - and I have got rid of loads one way and another (hurrah for Freecycle!).

But there is just so much stuff... 

I seem to have enough duvets, sleeping bags and blankets to warm a small army (this is only some!) to say nothing of the endless airbeds... Why???!! No idea! This is pre the days of crochet so all of these came from various trips, family etc. Which is my problem! Everything I find has a memory attached - was given by someone loved or is associated with particular events and there is something very tangible about feeling those memories come back to life as you handle everything. I really struggled to part with the blanket on the top - I think it came on every beach trip or car ride and had every conceivable picnic item dropped on it at one time or another.

But... space is definitely an issue and I have to let things go so I had the bright idea of donating all these to the homeless charities... Only, can you believe it, they don't need them!!! Just as we head into winter it seems they are inundated with similar donations, though I struggle to understand how there can be no takers for a bit of warmth. Tom and I were tempted to take one out with us each time we go into the city and hand them out that way! Looks like they are going to pet charity instead - oh well, might keep a poorly pooch warm somewhere!

We did find this motley crew...

My childhood cuddly toys - from the left, my teddy bear - modelled on Teddy Robinson (anyone remember him?!) complete with dress and pants (no issues with cross dressing in our house!), a rather grubby knitted cat that I don't think I dare wash and a dog that never quite stood up because his head is a bit top heavy for his body! Tom has arranged them on my bed to keep me company!

We also found my Mum's bear...

I remember being slightly frightened of this rather cross looking koala as a child but he must be over 70 years old so I can't really part with him now can I!

Always a bit alarming when you come across a box labelled like this...

You just know that won't be a 5 minute sort out!

My tiny living room quickly descended into this chaos...

I have had to be a bit ruthless and I have scythed my way slowly (is that a bit of a mixed metaphor?!) through it. 

I had piles of Prima magazines - dating back to the very first issue in 1986!!

These were a bit like reading a social commentary of my adult life - with their range of hairstyles, make up and clothes. Some of the content is interesting to as an illustration of how much attitudes have changed - its a reminder of how recently, women were still primarily expected to be homemakers and family cornerstones. Not that there is anything wrong with that, and to a degree it is still true I suspect, but there does seem to be a thread of 'don't worry your little head about anything more serious' in the earlier copies.

I came across some fabulous old patterns too. This one sticks in my mind...

I made it in white mohair (I still have a ball that was left over!) and wore it for the first time at my 18th birthday party. Traumatic. Hadn't accounted for white underwear being much more responsive to the ultraviolet light at the disco... Mortified on the dance floor.

Thank goodness I never subjected my sons to any of these...

I'm not sure they'd have made it out of school alive if I'd made them wear 'Ski Cap' or 'Helmet (with brim down)!!

And I was obviously tempted enough by this stunning jumper pattern to cut it out of the magazine...

But I did find some fabulous pre war embroidery transfers that belonged to my Nanny and a linen tablecloth that has had the embroidery started, plus a baby blanket I started in March 1993 (what was I thinking of trying to knit a complicated pattern for baby no 3?!!) and some incomplete patchwork and a whole load of bits of fabric 'just in case'... So some things have gone back into storage for when the dust has settled and I need a 'project' and some I have jettisoned after a lengthy reminisce.

I have pored over my boys reception writing and paintings, and a whole box of Mothers day, Christmas and Easter cards...

Most of those I just cannot part with...

I still have a box of my diaries, dating back to about 1981 to look at! I should probably just throw them - I know there is going to be a fair amount of teen angst and a lot that will bring a lot of emotions to the fore - but I feel compelled to put myself through it. I can't really explain why. In a way, I think there is a sense of understanding who I am and how I got to be this person in this place in time. And although bits of it are painful in the extreme (notes and cards my husband and I wrote to each other, some before we were even married, my wedding dress...) in some ways they are at least a reminder that it wasn't all a disaster and that we did get married with conviction and for all the right reasons. I'm just at something of a loss to know quite how and when we allowed all those feelings to slip away.

But they did, and we are where we are. I have to believe that once all this muddle is over we will both be in a happier place and can cherish what we had and the contribution we have made to each others lives. 

In the meantime, we are at the mercy of solicitors and estate agents and I just have everything crossed that the t's will be crossed and the i's dotted before too much longer.

life goes on...

Just a quick update...

In the last couple of weeks, I have moved house and started life over again. It all feels very strange and a bit surreal (and to be frank the timing could have been better!) but I think it will be for the best in the long run. I miss the boys all the time, but they know where I am and I hope will soon feel they can treat this as a second home in town. 

And of course, Christmas is still happening, work continues unabated and the day to day 'stuff' still continues... 

For the time being, I have no home internet connection (feel like I've had my arms cut off!!) hence the erratic nature of posting, and looks like my good intentions to complete the December photo hunt may be thwarted by general life stuff and lack of access to the web! Think perhaps I will just give in gracefully and try to get back to some kind of normal when I am 'reconnected' in mid-January.

In the meantime, amazingly (with the exception of the baking!) I think I am pretty much ready for the 25th, and I am making progress of crafty projects...

I wish you all a very happy christmas and look forward to catching up properly in 2012...

damp walls and blog therapy...

Today is not going to plan! I am struggling to find a happy place right now - I cannot make the presentation I have to give on Wednesday look right, the bathroom has sprung a major leak so as I write I have a plumber here making sucking teeth noises and running up and down the stairs, because of the leak the water is off so I can't do the washing I had planned to do today and I have had to shelve going to see my Mum or getting out for a walk until said plumber is done (he's been here an hour so far and no sign of finishing yet...). To cap it all, the bank tells me my 'net worth' is minus £14.74!! Rubbish! That means that out of all the accounts we possess and between the 2 of us working we still have no money! In fact less than no money!!! Add to that one of the cats having decided that leaving the house for your ablutions is just too much trouble - I have threatened a one way trip to the vets this morning! Fortunately for them, I a: can't identify the culprit and b: can't afford the vets!!! 

I am only joking of course, chuffed I was not, but pets are for the duration aren't they, wouldn't dream of dispatching them really.

I mean how could you...

This is one seriously relaxed cat...

I couldn't possibly be cross with him for long!

Anyway, I just had a little look round blogland and have been cheered up by some lovely posts - especially loved this one of Bunny Mummy's - I could almost feel myself unwind a bit as I looked at Jacquie's beautiful photos. I do find a little bit of bloggy time just helps me to escape a bit especially when things are a bit rubbish in the real world.

So I looked at the few photos I've managed to take this week (I have hardly managed to get a chance to get out with the camera!) and thought that maybe there have been some happy spots after all.

The poppies are out in the garden...

These are just bright red but somehow the sunlight on it made it look these fiery orange colours. They are getting a bit of a battering in the high winds today but they are lovely while they last.

These little geraniums are the most vibrant purple.

The fruit trees are all beginning to have baby fruit... apples...

...and plums...

There are so many plums coming this year we are likely to be doing battle with the wasps I expect - they seem to know just the point when the fruit is ripe and sweet and have been known to completely strip the tree!

Our little pond is full of wildlife and doesn't seem to have suffered too much from our major clean up operation a few weeks ago (you could barely see the water, it had got so overgrown).

I should probably pull out some of that floating weed which seems to be trying to take over again - no sure what its called, we call it duck weed but I don't know if we just made that up?! Just behind the iris in the foreground are several water lilies - looking forward to seeing them later in the year.

I have never noticed the flowers on this tree before (its proper name is Robinia pseudoacacia - I know it as False Acacia, but I just looked it up and apparently it is also known as Black Locust!) - not sure if they've been there and I've just not looked or if its the first year its flowered. We planted it about 12 years ago and it is probably pretty much up to its mature height now. The leaves are bright yellow green and this year it is covered in these pretty flowers - they remind me of laburnum flowers.

Away from the garden, I have to just update you on the sock-knitting progress!

Inspired by Alice, who knits the most amazing socks, and a book I was given for Christmas I decided to have a go. I am a sock knitting first timer and I'm not sure (in retrospect!) that this pattern was the simplest one to start with! Knitting two at a time up from the toes seemed like a good idea but its a bit fiddly and the two balls of yarn get tangled up all the time. However, I have plodded along and O am getting there!

Ignore the fact that these are particularly unflattering pictures of my ankles (I'm sure they don't look that chunky really! Do they???!) - in spite of the fact that I've had to juggle the pattern as I go along they seem to be a reasonable fit and I'm on the 'Knitting the leg' part now!

I think part of my problem with the pattern is that I've probably used the wrong sort of wool - although its finer than my usual DK its probably a bit chunky so they were in danger of coming up enormous. Also the pattern requires you to do a bit of measuring, tension square making and maths - none of which I could be bothered with (to be honest, I couldn't work the maths bit out...). I suspect these may end up being a 'house' pair of socks but as a first attempt I'm quite pleased so far. I think I might try Alice's pattern next time as they look so lush and a lovely snug fit. Not sure I'd go for the two at once on the circular needle next time...

And then, final happy thing...

We have finally thrown these away! After 2 theory tests, 3 practical tests and exorbitant amounts of money son 3 finally passed his driving test on Friday - hurrah! I had very mixed feelings as he set off on his own (in my car!) Friday evening but he would have been so upset if he'd failed it again and I think this time he is ready to drive safely. I just have to spend the next few months hoping that he will gain experience and not be distracted by a car full of friends - that is the scariest part. I can't quite believe all my babies are now independent drivers! Definitely another step towards adulthood - how old do I feel now!?

Oh and thanks to Pauline and Penny for your comments on my last post - I didn't really get the maths bit either but thought the crochet was very impressive! And I did think there was something interesting in the idea that everyone can learn through play - not sure that is able to happen in schools as much as it should!

Here's to blogland!

Til next time
Sx