Therapy

Knitting in progress - ribbed scarf
Originally uploaded by travelling at lunchtimes

One of the most theraputic activities known to humanity must be knitting. Especially rib. There's something about knitting four and purling four and feeling the soft doubleknit flow through your fingers which makes one feel better.

time to eat cake

time to eat cake
Originally uploaded by travelling at lunchtimes

This is my latest complete thing! I used Amy Butler's Chelsea Bag pattern. (This is the smaller of the two options, the handbag).
I am always buying novelty print fabric and not always sure that the projects I make up are particularly successful but in this instance I really like the result.

wedding photography - blurb photobook

I have already mentioned that we were guests at a wedding this summer what I haven't done is post a link to some of the photos - one is posted here below and others can be seen by clicking on the title of this post which is a link.

I was asked by the bride to take photos as the groom and his friends dressed the venue with flowers and her family and friends helped her get ready at her home just outside the centre of Cambridge. This was a big responsibility and slightly more stressful than I had anticipated. In the end, I found myself riding to the wedding in the car ahead of the bride sandwhiched between the bridesmaids. In the end, the whole day went off very well and I was even pleased with the result when I sent away for my first ever photobook from blurb in which I tried to tell the story of the bits of the wedding preparations and the background to the formal portraits which I witnessed.

working title

I don't yet have a proper title for the painting that I am working on. The building - part of the Spinningfields development which faces onto Deansgate - houses a bank, offices and a restaurant. I took the photo which I am working for as the light changed at Dusk on an early winter evening. I am taking artistic liberties with the colours but trying to retain something of the feel.



At the time I took the photo, the news was full of talk of nationalising banks and the death of consumerism and consequently, the High Street. The image of this modernist building looming above anonymous female figures appealed to me in this context. (I decided to remove the third figure because she wasn't on the path and thus wouldn't suggest the lostness that I wanted to capture).

At the moment, I am worrying about how to get the colours right in the ceiling of the building around the lights and how to capture the trees on the bottom right of the picture.

travelling at lunchtimes

Although I sometimes visit other buildings to drink coffee with friends elsewhere on campus and occasionally, go outside to sit in the sun when we have good weather, most luchtimes I rely upon my computer to transport me out of the office.
The web allows me to catch up with news from both sides of the Atlantic and to virtually visit festivals and reunions I have been unable to attend. However, official websites and newspapers do not compare to the e-mailed holiday snaps or the wedding photos of old friends whom I no longer get to see as often as I would like.
Last weekend, I had the happy experience of attending a wedding in a place I once called home and catching up with many friends some connected to the wedding and others not.
These are just a couple of the places to which I often find myself imaging I would like to travel at lunchtime. It is a bittersweet thought that they are now so far from home.

Finally, some sun in the garden

The weather has perked up which makes it even more pleasant to spend the weekend at home after a trip away. It was great to return to find my zucchini plants had at last produced appropriately sized vegetables. (I'd been kidding myself that the tiny ones I had harvested thus far would classify as "baby" in the supermarket and were therefore desirable). The picture above shows a courgette worthy of the name.
Even Sakura spends time outside chasing butterflys and climbing the smaller trees once there is weather worthy of the season. She is very taken with the vegetable pots on the patio. (Perhaps jealous of the attention they get). Anyhow, here's a picture of her in front of the prize worthy cabbage.

learning creativity

Recently, I have been going to a few weekend courses run by our local art gallery. When I booked I was of the opinion that these days in a studio would provide welcome relief from the frustrations of the working week. This has turned out to be an unimportant part of the experience, somewhat surprisingly. Even though I am not sure I will continue with some of the new techniques or continue to explore the work of some artists I have been introduced to, some element of the experience has been apparent in completely unconnected projects I will discuss later.

time sink

Recently, much of my time has been taken up supporting Noo who has been creating a wedding dress for one of her best friends. It's been interesting discovering how much of what I do I didn't learn from her. If I say "That's not how Gran did it." She retailiates with "Susan Khalje says." For those without a background in couture-esque evening wear, no one argues with Madame Khalje.

It's been a revelation to both of us to produce something to order, as it were. The bride had her own ideas about what she wanted (unsurprisingly). There was no way on earth my mother was going to turn her hand to producing a lace-up back for a gown to be worn for a nuptial mass. The compromise is a modest, interesting gown which tries to combine elements from the "traditional" white dress with the red and gold of a wedding sari.

I wasn't put on this earth to bake white bread

We've spent a lot of time recently discussing work, art and what makes us happy after dinner. If I had a pound for everytime someone has said "in the current economic climate" to me at work, I'd be able to achieve the eudaimonia I can't get my family and friends to agree could be achieved if I could work half-time, garden an acre while the sunshines and paint or sew in my sunroom on the days when it didn't. I still think it would be worth trying!

At a course I attended recently, the key speaker - ad-libbing admirably as the lighting, projector and microphones failed on him in turn - said he thought the only explanation he could offer for his amazing creativity was that he wasn't put on this earth to bake white bread. I am not sure that I'd go along with the notion that style is innate or somehow destined but am sure some of us are simply less satisfied with the ordinary than the rest of the world.

At the moment, as well as tackling the numerous ufos or unfinished objects - the oldest of which are over seventy years in the making and inherited - in my possession, I am also trying to decide what it is that I make that gives me the most pleasure. Is it the cushions I and the cats use everyday? Is it the paintings I invariably recycle once I regard them as finished or unfinishable? The quilts on the bed? The clothes I wear or the gifts I make for others?

Much of what's been on the radio - could we please have a more intelligent rent a philosopher than Alain de Boring she pleads - has concentrated on the status and interaction with other people work brings. Having had the misfortune to read Marx and Engels at school, I am not keen to define people by what they make. However, there is something about the tangible making of stuff that I do at home which transforms labour into lesuire despite the tight deadlines I seem to find myself trying to meet!

Things Made

These are the two projects I've made so far from Amy Butler's 'Little Stiches for Little Ones.' I originally made the jumper dress/pinafore because I found the gorgeous Liberty print in my local fabric shop. This was before my cousin let me know that her baby was a boy - hence the switch to the Kimono PJ's pattern and the tractor print. My eldest younger brother loved "tadders" as a baby. He's slightly less fun to make for now as his tastes are pretty dull:

I've just got a copy of Heather Ross's 'Weekend Sewing' and am looking forward to making various gifts ands her summer blouse.

Thrifty Gardening

I've been really impressed by "Thrifty Gardening" by Alys Fowler - one of the presenters on Gardener's World. It's a very timely publication as the country's twin obsessions seem to be GYO and the credit crunch. And even if it weren't with the zeitgeist, no one wants to grow strawberries at £2 something each!
Luckily, I know a number of very keen allotment gardeners and inherited a pile of useful things behind the garden shed from the previous custodian of the garden.
Thus far, I have created a fruit cage to contain the strawberries and fruit bushes from net that came with the property and value plastic clothes pegs:

I also managed to cobble together some netting over the Link-a-board raised bed which came cheap on a newspaper promotion using plastic hosepiping to support it purchased for a pound from the local poundland:

To the left you can see the progress the onions, rocket and Osaka greens are making in the top of the larger bag garden. I'll post an update when I plant the dwarf french beans into the sides of the bag.

Step by Step Bag Garden

The literature and video from Send A Cow give clear instructions for how to construct a bag garden. Here's the picture of how I made mine (with help).

It all starts with a coarse hessian sack with some gravel in the bottom.



Next, you take a tin can which you open both ends to make a tube. The can is placed in the centre of the sack and filled to the brim with more gravel.



Then you pack the area between the sack and the can with compost (I used a mixture of stuff from our heap and some bought from the ironmonger in the village). Once you are almost level with the top of the can, you wiggle the can up until it is a hollow tube once again, taking care not to pull it right out so that compost can creep into the cylinder of gravel. You fill the can with gravel again and then add more compost around it.



You end up with something like this which is ready for planting. So far I have just planted the top surface of my bag. Later this month, when there is no further risk of hard frost, I will make incisions in the side of the bag and plant dwarf french beans to add to the leaves and onions that are in so far.



Much more comprehensive instructions can be viewed online either through SendACow's website or on their Youtube stream:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ul0kQ_2lvrE

Early Spring Patio Garden

Early Spring Patio Garden
Originally uploaded by travelling at lunchtimes

This is a quick update to show how the great weather we've been enjoying has progressed the garden.

Happy Easter

This Easter, I decided that my craving for chocolate was not going to dictate our purchasing decisions. I wasn't taken in by the chocolate eggs in the Co-op cleverly wrapped with marketing which shouted about their lack of excess packaging and decided to do something actually connected with new life with the seasonal budget. It's not rocket science to realise that we - in the priveliged first world - should be aware we need to take responsibilty for the miles our food is transported not just the packaging it is wrapped in. And support the sort of community projects that train the poor in Africa in ecologically viable subsistence faming.
So, instead of buying Easter Eggs we made a donation to "Send A Cow" and received a:

Sometime soon, I will post the photos I tooko of the steps we've taken to get our "Send A Cow" Save Our Soil Bag garden set up. As usual, I had to restrain myself from planting all the seeds that came with the kit at once. I am reliably informed the dwarf runner beans won't do very well if they go in before May.

Emily or Beth?

When my latin teacher described me as a home body - at the tender age of 17 - I was a little offended. However, over the years, I have come to terms with my personality. What I occasionally wonder is whether I am the home-lover of this:

For there we loved, and where we love is home,
Home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts,

Oliver Wendell Holmes sp?

Or the home of Beth - the sister in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women - the family for which she would pine even in heaven:

"I never wanted to go away, and the hard part now is the leaving you all. I'm not afraid, but it seems as if I should be homesick for you even in heaven."

But for me, the ideal of the home loving, responsible person is not Beth but Emily:

Bagpuss, dear Bagpuss
Old fat furry cat-puss
Wake up and look at this thing that I bring
Wake up, be bright
Be golden and light
Bagpuss, Oh hear what I sing

The little girl who doesn't want to keep the things that she finds but would rather they were returned to their owners - people who might be reunited with them when they pass by the window in which her cat sits. I've had a number of Emily moments. I've handed in things - on a couple of occasions and in differnt towns in my life - and never quite recovered from discovering that the responsible copper advises you to be an anyonymous MOP in case the person who lost the item holds you responsible for what they do not recover or claim to have lost. At times, it is a sad world.

Spring Cleaning

Airing the quilts and washing the blankets are among the more pleasant jobs when one is spring cleaning. I particularly enjoy taking virtually everything out of the bedrooms and trying to remove every trace of the furry girls. I have to admit I have limited sucesss.

In fact, I am sure that Sakura's fur is still visible on the quilt in the picture above. (Incidentally, in use it is usually covered by a woven cotton bedspread and a polyester fleece overblanket chosen because it is so easily washed in the machine. The moral of the tale is probably that no one should have a cat with such fine, silky fur.

On the other hand, I am sure Saky's attention to the Rhubarb has been helpful. My garden has been very much inspired by the amazing kitchen garden maintained - not so very far from where I live - at Quarry Bank Mill, Styal. That garden also has helpful cats:

Although, I think the workload of Wisp and co is rather less arduous - what with all those volunteers to help them and fabulous, happily established plants like this:


Thankfully, I have the imagination to believe that this:

will soon look as good.
However it may just be the effect of the first sunshine of April.

I bought some "plugs u grow" from GWM

There was a very good offer in Gardener's World Magazine for strawberries. Despite the salutory warning of the poor gent whose crop worked out at £2.63 per fruit. He was magnanimous enough to write in to The Times to warn others - which presumably cost him the additional overhead of a first class stamp - I carried on!
The plugs have seemed to grow before my eyes since I planted them and the containers found amongst the things left behind at the bottom of the garden (and so not costly) are ideal.

I will, however, be counting the strawberries I get and working out the cost of the yield. Thankfully, I got the compost on a buy two get one free. Hence the upfront cost for these strawberry tubs is only £16 including plugs and compost.

The First Signs of Spring

I am pleased to report that the first things I have planted in the garden have begun to show signs of life.

Following the guidance I found in the gardening book I took out of the library, garlic was the first thing I planted out. I put some in a clay pot and some in this raised bed.

It's all come up and has made me feel positive about container gardening.

The Garden in Winter

These are the snapshots I took of the garden we inherited when we moved up North. I thought the gorgeous rime frost in the pictures was worth recording. At the time, I had done a little to sort out some of the planters that had been left behind in the garden but I hadn't decided to sort it out properly.

As you can see from both pictures, the previous custodians of the house had been great gardeners and there is, albeit neglected, a lovely plot designed especially for garden bird. I have slightly mixed feelings about attracting them to the garden as Imelza is an avowed hunter. However, if I follow sensible advice about minimising the risk when feeding birds, I am convinced I can create a space that is amenable to both.

Therefore, motivated in part by the efforts of the nice people next door and also inspired by the example of the allotment aunties, I decided eventually that the ugly slab of concrete was crying out for a container vegetable garden and the rest - lawns and a number of beds - would also need to be taken in hand.