Planning to get sheep!

You may have read earlier that we acquired a field. And not just any field, but the one in front of the eponymous Coombe Cottages. The process isn't quite as simple as that, so in fact at the moment the field belongs in its entirety to our immediate neighbours Pat and Richard, and they bought it with the pooled funds of us, them and Bob and Maureen across the other side of the field. When the legal stuff is sorted, it will be in joint ownership. So far, PRBM say that they don't want anything for the field other than that it should stay as meadow, so it will need grazing, and we're the people to organise that!

This morning, A and I went up the hill to prospect. Actually I have been prospecting for a while when out on my runs. I have seen:

Jacobs

Too horny.


Cheviots
 

  Too twee.


 Dorset Downs

   Too hairy faced.

And on two of the farms up the hill I had seen some lovely sheep that I didn't recognise.
We arrived at Quarry Farm just as David Caple was going out to look at the lambs in the field in front of the house. Lovely lambs! They'd do very nicely. They are Charolais

 crossed onto Mule

which is itself a cross of Blue Faced Leicester

onto Swaledale

No pictures available on-line, so A will have to take her camera up next time, and meanwhile you'll have to imagine what a combination of the above four is like.
The Caples couldn't have been more encouraging and friendly about the whole thing, inviting us in and chatting for over an hour about sheep, what different sorts are like and where to find some, and feeding us some very good shortbread with tea.
We felt very encouraged.
David said 5 ewes with lambs at foot, and we will top the field mid summer to take off what they can't eat at that time of year.
Exciting!

What I've been reading this Summer

So, summer seems to be officially over... well, it's still sunny but there's a definite bite in the air, and, for me, September 1st marks the official end of Summer. Does anyone else feel like this? I suppose it's completely arbitary, but that is how it feels to me.

So, here are the books I've read over the Summer! Quite a mish mash of different things - from YA, classics, science fiction, dystopias, chick reads, children's, modern, literary... I won't review them all, but I'll give a few highlights. (There may be some spoilers, you have been warned...)

Firstly, The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. It's one of those series of books that I have put off reading for a long time, feeling a little bit snooty about all the hype, wondering whether they were really any good. Well, I have to say that I am so glad that I read them! In case anyone doesn't know the basic premise - it's a dystopic future in which America has been split into various districts, each providing a commodity for The Capital, where the more privileged citizens live. Each year, The Capital holds a reality TV show called 'The Hunger Games' in which two "tributes" (chosen by ballot) from each district are placed into an artificial landscape and manipulated into killing each other, until one victor remains, reminding the districts of the might of the capital. Our heroine is Katniss from District 12 (responsible for the production of coal) who enters 'The Hunger Games' in the place of her younger sister, Prim. From almost the first sentence, this was a page turner - I literally couldn't put it down. I borrowed the first book, and then realised I wasn't going to be able to borrow the second one until I saw the person after the weekend, so I had to go out and buy the next one because I was too engrossed! The first two books follow a similar sort of format - they both centre around the games themselves - whereas by the third book the whole of Panem (the name for where current day America is) has dissolved into revolution and it is more of a war story. I loved these books. They were progressively more and more violent, but it was a violence that I could cope with (I'm not usually a huge fan.) Suzanne Collins writes very well - it is very pacy and the twists and turns were fantastic. You literally wanted to shout at the characters sometimes when you worked out something before they did. The ending wasn't exactly as I expected either - she didn't completely conform to expectations for a YA novel. Overall, brilliant.

There is a film of The Hunger Games on video (and the second is coming out soon) which J has bought for me, so we just need to find a nice time to watch it together.

The second lot of books I'm going to talk about is the Chaos Walking series. It seems like I've been on a real YA kick recently - it's actually made it harder to read "real" adult books as the pace is generally a lot slower and they're just... less easy to read! I feel sort of unintelligent for reading so much YA fiction, but I do enjoy them, so I'm trying to let it go.

So, Chaos Walking. Fantastic. Again - pacy, page turner, twists and turns, believable characters, compelling plot... It was great. Originally recommended by a friend of J's, he got a Kindle sample on his ipad and then I was inspired to buy the first one - and read it in about a day or two (they're quite long books!). It's another sort of dystopia where people have left this world to populate a new one. Of course, many problems ensue. Men in this world have something called "noise" which means, basically, that you can always hear what other men (or animals) are thinking. Women have no noise, although they can hear others'. As the series progresses, it turns out that noise can be controlled, but it's a really horrible thought all the same. (It also leads to some comic moments - Todd's dog Manchee has very simplistic thoughts: "Todd. Poo. Poo. Todd." I miss Manchee...)

Now, although The Hunger Games are violent, these take violence to a new level. The Knife of Never Letting Go (book one) is violent on a sort of intimate level and it is taken further and further up as the books progress, until the violence reaches truly epic proportions by Monsters of Men. I did find the violence a little difficult, but I'm quite sensitive to violence, so maybe most people wouldn't find this much of a problem. Mostly, it was just a brilliant story. I loved the central character Todd - and watching his moral decline, his numerous dilemnas, the way in which he's manipulated... it's all so horrifically believable.

The first book I got of one edition and the other two matched; the second two had a short story at the end of each of them, and I wonder whether the first one would have done if I'd had the same edition? (That's something else that annoys me - they don't match! I'm sure I'll get over it!). I really enjoyed these short stories - they're set in the same world, but not focusing on the central characters and it made me see more of Patrick Ness' vision of this entire created universe. They really added to the overall reading experience.

These, too, have been made into a film! (it's seems to be all the fashion - what with the Cassandra Clare trilogy coming out soon.) It's still very much in the preliminary stages, but I can imagine these making brilliant films. J and I both remarked at how cinematographic they were as were reading them - I wonder if Patrick Ness was hoping for a film contract, or that's just his natural style of writing? Either way, I'll be interested to see these converted, although I do hope the violence is toned down a little.

... and another YA novel! I promise I do read other genres, honest! (And another one that's being made into a film). I joined the library close to me recently and this was one of the first books that I got out. Another good one. Basic premise: when teenagers turn sixteen, they must choose between five "factions," each focusing on a particular trait - Candor (honesty), Abnegation (selflessness), Dauntless (bravery), Erudite (intelligence) and Amity (peacefulness). Our heroine, Beatrice, goes against her family's faction (Abnegation) and chooses to become Dauntless. It follows her initiation into her new faction and the gradual discovery of corruption throughout the society. I'm looking forward to the next two in the series - I have them ordered at the library ready to read next.

This one isn't a YA novel - see, I do read other genres! Jodi Picoult is my fall back for easy-reads, I always go for them when I'm finding it hard to get into other books, which I was finding the case after reading so many pacy YA novels. I didn't have great expectations for this one actually - it was another one from the library, and I hadn't heard particularly positive things about it. It's her debut novel, originally published in the US in 1992 when she was 25. It is different to her other novels, there's no doubt about that. Most of her novels are characterised by medical or legal issues - they mostly centre round court cases - and huge twists and turns in plot. This had one character, Rebecca, telling the story backwards, so you already knew the general ending at the start. It is told from the point of view of a number of different protagonists - Rebecca, her mother Jane, her father Oliver, her uncle Joel and two other men who work with him. Despite knowing the outcome, it still managed to be very compelling - I couldn't put it down. I was very pleasantly surprised - and this might actually be one of my favourite Jodi Picoults (and I've read a lot of them!).

Congratulations if you have made it this far! The final book I'll talk about is The Marrying of Chani Kaufman by Eve Harris, which has been longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2013. As A talked about in her post earlier, the Winscombe book group are collectively reading the "booker's dozen", but since there are only twelve of them, I get to be a part too, and this was my allocated book (we chose randomly). Again, I really enjoyed this book. I worried it might be dry, but it wasn't at all. It's basically about ultra orthodox Jewish life, in particular the marriage of a young woman named Chani Kaufman, but there are a lot of other stories interwoven - the Rabbi's wife who coaches her, her betrothed, the Rabbi, their son who strays from orthodox life... It was really eye opening for me actually - I didn't know very much about the details of an orthodox Jewish life and this was presented in a very accessible way. Eve Harris managed to explain things without it just seeming like you were being taught, you were actually shown things through the way the story progressed. Ultimately it was a sad and happy book, and made me think a lot. I think it's a brilliant narrative and very skilfully told - I'd be pleased to see it make the shortlist, but, as I haven't read the other books (yet?), I don't know what it is up against. I would definitely recommend reading it either way.

Well, here are a few highlights of my summer reading! It has made me realise that I possibly read too much YA fiction and should read more literary things in the future, but maybe I shouldn't worry too much. Joining the local library has been a joy - and I hope to discover lots of interesting new reads there.

Happy autumn everyone.

Preparing for the Michaelmas Fair

Our village has a traditional fair to celebrate Michaelmas at the beginning of September. It's a conglumeration of exhibitions and competitions to honour the season of fruitfulness and harvesting,  an opportunity to raise money for our community centre and the usual eclectic collection of minor children's entertainment, dancing dogs, and local brass bands. For some reason I have run the photography exhibition for the last 10 years which has over 500 entries which have to be pinned on boards on their classes, judged and rearranged with all the award cards displayed in the right place by 1.45 and the opening of the festivities. This means getting together a band of volunteers to meet me at 7am and accept photos, number them carefully with the exhibitors individual code, and allocate them to the appropriate board for the 25 classes. It's a long hard day as we have to then do the same at the other end of the fair!

I also have to set the classes and some of you may have noticed that I do tend to do everything in the colour blue so it's no surprise that last year one of the classes was indeed the colour 'blue'!

Despite the hard work and the marathon of the day its always a really happy occasion and I do get round the giant vegetables, jars of jam, elaborate cakes,  crocheted hats, wonderful calligraphy and exotic flower arrangements and see which of my friends and acquaintances have won this year. We have also exhibited ourselves over the 16ish years of living here, but have never won the elusive family trophy! We have had other major successes. In the past it has been giant pumpkins and  children's art work, and this moved on to cheese scones, shortbread and craftwork.

For the last 2 years E has won the Thomas Trophy for Creative Arts for her knitting, pottery, collage, card making and paper creations. Her knitting in particular has been outstanding.

Sadly this year the trophy will move on as she has not been able to do any craft work since last Summer. I have polished the beautiful cup in the sunshine of the garden, and returned it to the butchers (the rather bizarre collecting place for the trophies to be handed in to in readiness for the next fair). Here it is 'growing'  in our garden. I have real hopes that it might return to her again in the future...

So the preparations this year are primarily my making posters and class headings, finding the right sticky tape that doesn't mark the back of the photos, and reviewing with the other volunteers our tried and tested system. We await the influx of eager exhibitors clutching tickets and pictures at 7am on the 14th! !

A herringbone cushion for Cornhill Terrace

I have always wanted to be a great seamstress but feel my careless attitude to measuring has always resulted in inexact sewing. This often doesn't live up to my expectations for a usable product and the whole un-malleableness  of fabric in comparison to paper or wool makes it hard for me to find my haphazard trial and error approach ok. However I did make our curtains and bed spreads nearly 2 decades ago and am approaching the task of replacing them as they are both faded and chewed or torn by all our animals ! These are big projects and I'm struggling to find the fabrics I want that suit our dark small roomed cottage but yet are bright and bold.

I'm not very good at completing these big craft tasks ( so watch this space) but I have completed a cushion for L's birthday, and have squashed it into my hand luggage and squeazy-jetted it up to Edinburgh. I started it at Millie Moons in Wells last year with my friend Kate, but had just never found the time to finish it off, but here it is complete! The sewing is a bit squint, as ever, but the cushion itself is great and I really like the choice of pink spots to complement the blue and greens of the patches. The patchwork pieces were from a 'jelly roll' of precut pieces and the herringbone pattern was really very quick to do. 

The booker long list ...

J and I have been involved in a book club in our village since 2008.  E has also occasionally joined us when home or from a distance. Initially we invited people we knew read and were interested in literature. This has expanded and we have had the real joy of meeting and getting to know an extended circle of neighbours and colleagues. We meet once monthly in each others homes and, not knowing how other book clubs organise their choIces, we decided that each month in turn someone would suggest a book we read, they then 'present' why they chose it and what was good/provocative/informative about it to the group and we then discuss it in detail. Each meeting someone also chooses and brings along a poem to read to the group, often reflecting some of the themes presented by the book being explored or championed that evening. Tea and wine are integral to the discussions!

I am always impressed and touched how courteous and sensitive everyone is to each others choice, yet able to be truthful and positive in criticism of the books we read. We rarely have the same opinion about the books and I don't feel I can, even now, predict who will like each choice. We have also read many different genres - including  historical, western, crime, science fiction, magical realism, nature/observation, classics, autobiography - and I feel I have read books I would never have picked up if they had not been prompted by the group. As I sometimes have reading 'deserts' when I just can't seem to concentrate enough to read a book it's also been something that has really forced me not to give up and find a way thorough these times at least once a month.

This year and last year we have also had an extra ploy. We are each reading a book on the Booker long list - 13 novels published this year and chosen by the Booker judges - and will meet to each very briefly present the books individually, (without giving the plot away) and propose, from each others judgement,  which will make the short list of 6. There is then a gap of a month before the winner is announced and we each then all read as many of the six as we can to then be more informed and involved when the winner is announced in mid October. It makes such a difference to have read the  books to then listen to and be involved in the discussion of the most important literary prize of the year.

This year I have recruited our village library into the whole event and the meeting to discuss the announcement is going to be open to any one and in a special open evening at the library ! Lets hope my organisation and publicity is going to be up to it with the help of a lovely community librarian, Dave from North Somerset. 

The Tale of the Amazing Blanket

Once upon a time, E had an idea. For J's 50th Birthday (2012), she contacted friends and family to all knit bunting! Sounds like a mad idea - but it worked really well. They had a weekend long party and it finished with a magnificent caleigh where the bunting was hung:

(here it is laid out on the floor being put together)

This had been such a fun project to do that in the summer E wanted to do another joint craft project. But what to do... The idea came at once! E had always wanted to knit a blanket herself, but had never quite been able to commit to the sheer volume of knitting. But if you have 10 or 20 knitters all doing squares...? Well, that's quite a different matter.

E cast the request far and wide, and the squares came in thick and fast...

The squares could be any colour and any stitch, the only requirement was they be 5x5 inches. It was amazing to see the variety of wools and colours and patterns - what creativity all these people had! Before too long though, E had too many squares and she had to tell people to stop! Now, with two large bags full of squares, the blanket was ready to be formed.

One Saturday back in the autumn, A and E discussed blanket designs. They thought for a long while and then started experimenting with colour combinations and patterns. Here was their idea in the end:

Sadly, there were too many squares to use all of them - this is already a double bed size blanket we're talking about! But the other squares will be put to good use in time, don't worry. (E and A have ideas about joining them together to make cat blankets, but that may be a different story.)

Originally, E was going to learn to crotchet. But, plans changed and she asked the magnificent K to do the honours of fitting the blanket together. K worked industriously over the Winter and early Spring months and, pretty quickly, the blanket was finished. Some of the squares weren't quite 5x5 inches, so there was a lot of stretching and ingenious manipulating to be done. But she worked wonders. And what a sight to behold.

(beautiful blanket on the beach at Lyme)

This story is not quite finished yet. The blanket is being raffled to raise money for Studio Upstairs - a brilliant charity that provides a space for people with mental and emotional health difficulties to come together as a working community and express themselves and their talents. There are two studios - the original one in Bristol, and now one in London as well. They allow people access to materials and exhibition space as well, offering the potential for real careers in the arts world.

So... the blanket will be finding a new home soon. E secretly wishes she could keep it, but she hopes that whoever it goes to will love it as much as she does and everyone does who has contributed. It may not be a work of art, but it does represent a community - a community of people brought together through knitting. May the spirit of the blanket live on!

Flowers

Every week I visit Ellie I bring flowers....  It's now heading  towards September but I still to find her a little bunch each time. I have an almost perpetual supply of coloured raffia to bind them. We have also got transporting them down to a fine art with a large plastic clear pot full of life preserving water sitting in the cup holder of the car all the way to London.

Each week 

I bring you flowers from the garden

From home.

Snowdrops and posied primroses,

Shy cyclamen from underneath the rose tree

Sweet narcissi

Paper plum blossom

The blue brilliance of forget-me-nots

Faces of acquilegia

Your wig wammed sweet peas and

Clouds of 

Mother goethes white stars.

Sprays of white tree roses

The scented gold from outside your window

Stout ever forgiving valerian and orange day lilies

Silvered sage 

And playful catnip and lavender.

And the summer plantings of 

Cosmos, antirrhinum, zinnias ,dahlias

And giant daisies and lemon balm.

Tall Japanese and omens

Rattling statice

Fennel heads from the triangled patch

Seed pods and haws and 

The ivy that cements our stones

I bring myself each week.

Home always come to you

With love.

And the kittens are still growing

Moo and kosh continue to grow! The most amazing development is that Kirry is now having her face washed by Moo, and Kosh is continuing with her whole body rubs and wraps to greet Kirry and plays a batting game with her which doesn't end with Kirry rushing off in disgust! It's better than I ever could have expected as adult cats often really struggle to get on with new cats sharing their territory. Kirry has tolerated other cats in the past but LC was a struggle for her as she was jumped on unexpectedly and erratically bullied as she went in and out the cat flap. Despite being introduced to the smell of the kittens for 4 weeks before they arrived, and then their smell and sound for a week,  she was horrified when she actually saw them. So they are a beautiful trio and I feel hopeful for them living contentedly with each other.

The kittens are 12 weeks old tomorrow and have their final vaccination so we can think about them going outside in a fortnight or so. They are incredibly settled in the house - favourite places for sleeping are the warm spot on the wellies in the conservatory, the blue basket wherever it is, and on the bed between us... The cat activity centre I made them with a cardboard box isn't enticing but a red snake gifted to them from a friend at work, marbles and cotton reels and the bowls of shells and stones around the house keep them busy.

Kosh is still bigger than her brother and still has her wonderful 'chirrup.' She rushes around the house musically and purrs every time you talk to her. She spontaneously jumps on your knee and settles down these days.

Moo most enjoys batting and his favourite toy is still a tiny pretend mouse that now doesn't have a tail but still has its rattle. He also likes poking at some huge blue and silver marbles when you put them inside a box but they often end up stuck under the piano.

Ten pm is kitten banana-time and they go ballistic for an hour, and will run from one end of the house to the other, then roll about in play fighting until exhausted. I wonder how people manage to entertain a single kitten? These two certainly seem very happy with each others' company. 

They then actually sleep soundly on our bed or with Kirry under the window of our bedroom until 5.15 am. It's almost completely reliable that they start to play fight and bite our toes some time between 10 and 20 past 5 and at this point we have to shut them out of the bedroom to get a final hour or so' s sleep! 

And T had a birthday...

Birthdays have always been really special in our family and a chance to celebrate the person in good style! I have never completely understood the relaxed unpersonal approach to birthdays other families have. So we have had so many wonderful adventures and occasions over the years and this year, despite E not being able to join us in person we met up for a luxury picnic in a beautiful perfectly proportioned basket found in a second hand shop in bristol. it was filled with home made and bought goodies and we sat in the sun on the grounds of Wadham College Oxford, were entertained by the Merrry wives of Windsor http://www.oxfordshakespearecompany.co.uk/ then returned to T and Hs for a home cooked Indian and vast chocolate cake. The play was fun despite some misgivings about the modern hooded rap like interpretation of a couple of the characters, and the day good despite awful news for H on our return.

Pictures to follow!

Scilly Shells: A Tutorial

So, little M and I both found ourselves at 2 Coombe Cottages on Thursday - an impromptu and rare occurrence! A had mentioned something about sorting out her shells from the Scillies, so we did that in the conservatory as we caught up and chatted. They all looked very pretty when we'd finished... Of course, we were rather stupid, forgetting that we are sharing our house with two small kitten people, so the exercise had all been rather futile...

All our hard work wasted! At least the kittens looked happy.

Little M had to go home on Thursday evening, so it as a very short visit, but nice to see her all the same. 

On Friday, J and I decided to do something with the shells and that is what I am going to share with you all now. We didn't actually use these shells, but delved into A's stash of shells from years past (which is pretty extensive) to make a birthday present for S at J's work. Shell craft is usually A's forte, so J and I felt a little nervous at the prospect of potentially wasting her shells but we forged ahead anyway. This is what I'm going to share with you now.

This general technique can be used for lots of things - we've mostly used it for mirrors or photo frames, and have two huge A-made mirrors the bathroom at 2CC - but this time we decided to do as a sort of plaque.

So, first, you gather together your supplies. You need the thing you will be decorating, enough shells to cover it, water, polyfilla (or similar), knives for spreading, cloths for wiping up smears and a mind ready for creating!

The wood we were using was quite rough, so J started by smoothing it out with a wire brush.

We were then ready to start!

It's a good idea to have a rough plan in your head of where you want the shells to be placed because, once you've started, you have to work quite quickly. The polyfilla we had sets in about an hour - and for the last 10 minutes or so is pretty stiff to work with, so the shells are less likely to stick. Also, working in a pair, its's a good idea to plan so that you don't have arguments in that crucial stage where everything must be done fast!

Here was our very rough plan - we just thought about where our biggest shells would be and agreed we would fill in the gaps however we felt like, keeping it generally symmetrical.

Now, mix up the polyfilla. The general ratio is 2 parts powder to 1 part water, but there's no need to measure it very accurately. Make sure you use something that doesn't mind getting a bit mucky, and be ready to clean it out before it sets too hard. The consistency you want is fairly thick, but not so thick as butter, and without lumps as much as possible.

Now you spread it over your surface and start positioning your shells - couldn't be more simple! We started with the basic design we had mapped earlier...

...and then start filling in the gaps, bit...

...by bit...

This is all a matter of preference - the important thing is to keep going before the polyfilla dries! It's good to have a balance of colours, shapes and sizes, and it looks best with the least amount of white showing between the shells as possible. This means searching for little shells, like tiny yellow periwinkles, little top shells and other elusive treasures like cowries and wentle traps.

When the polyfilla gets stiff - stop! There's no point really ramming the shells in because they're more than likely to not stick properly and you can always add shells later (as we did) using glue (A told us super glue would've been better but we went for good old PVA). Now, leave it to dry properly. (At this point we went off for a walk.)

We went back and did the bit around the top of the plaque separately afterwards, and then left this to dry as well.

The last step is giving the whole thing a good varnish - we just used standard clear drying furniture/household varnish. Don't skip this step - varnishing the shells really brings outs their sheen, as though they are still wet from being washed up on the beach.

And there you have it - how to make a shell picture in a few easy steps! It's not as good as A's creations but for me and J it seemed good enough, and we just hope that S likes it. (I'm sure A would've done a better tutorial as well.)

A wonderful way of creating memories and using up shells and other bits and pieces that you collect on holiday - A also uses driftwood and sea washed glass but we didn't have any this time.

Beautiful shells, beautiful sunshine, beautiful outdoors.

x

Romance is alive and well....

The Scillies brought out the romance in our lives.... T and H walked off into the sunset along the flats of the campsite beach and M and J were a wonderfully sartorially elegant couple.

Home to cats

And now we are home again and the little cats are growing. Their names have stuck. Koshka ( Russian for cat) is the dark tortie with the wonderfully huge purr and heart warming chirrup, and Moo-sang (also meaning  a type of cat in Malay) is the little ginger boy who bats marbles and fluff with a hunting vengeance. They are learning to play gently with people, Kirry tolerates them most of the time and they scurry about the house happily when we are home. Very joyful!