Slow Sunday

Yesterday the rain let up enough to go check out the garden.  I'm still not enamoured with the whole garden idea as it is a never-ending sucker-up of precious time and effort, but, gloves on and chocs away.

It's looking very green despite the recent onslaught of water.  Remember the little seedlings which were growing at the end of the runners?

Well they had developed into a carpet of green leaves and, as per Mark's warning, were threatening a takeover down there, so I pulled them up and replanted them in their own bed:

As I was doing this - planting some of the strongest looking ones and discarding others I was thinking about how, in 'the old days' of rural England every seed counted - every plant which successfully germinated could make the difference in feeding your family throughout the winter - or not.  These days if it doesn't work out, I can jump in the car at any point and go buy the veg I want from the supermarket.  This was a very depressing thought whilst pottering about with soil and toil.  When did it all get so lazy for us?  The 60's?  The 70's?  What's that saying - necessity is the mother of invention?  How about a new one:  being a lazy-arse is the death of job satisfaction.

It was a warm enough day for our number one cat to stretch out for a snoozed on here:

This is Tabba. Don't know if I've mentioned her before. She was from a farm as a kitten. I think she must have got dropped on her head at some point, because she's mad. She is very affectionate and seeks company, but does not want to be picked up and cuddled (or she'll rip your face off). She was Oliver's first pet, and slept quite happily with him on his bed until we got Poppy, who she took an immediate and all-consuming dislike to, and buggered off to live outside. She comes up to eat on a daily basis, sitting on the wall outside the kitchen and glaring in the window until I open the door and feed her. In a clean bowl, or she won't eat it. If she ever needs the vet, I don't know what we'll do - because I'm a bit scared of her. Mark loves her though. I think he senses a kindred spirit, simultaneously seeking yet rejecting affection.

Anyhoo.  Following this stint in the great outdoors, I toddled along (in the car, obvs) to visit my mother in law, who has recently moved into a residential home.  She has Alzheimer's, so sometimes conversations can be startlingly repetitive, and her negative frame of mind  means you have to brace yourself to be calm and matter of fact for the first 10 minutes or so while she complains bitterly about being in there.

This accomplished, she seems to relax, and once ensconced in the relative comfort of the TV lounge, we shared a companionable hour or so of crochet (me), cat petting (her) and tea drinking, watching tennis and odd chat (both of us).  This peaceable afternoon was only broken by the insistent pleas of Ethel (another inmate) whizzing around the whole of the ground floor with her zimmer looking for downstairs.  Her unshakable belief that there is a downstairs and that there is a conspiracy not to tell her where it is is a little alarming, especially as she did this for the entire duration of my visit, despite everyone she encountered telling her there was no downstairs.  In the end I told her I didn't know where downstairs was.  This didn't work very well either as she then lost her temper and accused us all of being stupid.  When I left there was a row brewing between Ethel and another woman who MiL calls 'a bossy boots'.  Zimmers at dawn there I reckon.  You have to make light of it - it is a bit of a twilight zone in this type of place where people have such a tenuous grip on reality. 

Maybe I sense kindred spirits here.  My own grip on reality feels a little tenuous at times too.....

Flaming June

by Sir Frederic Leighton

All of my family have always bemoaned June - there are loads of birthdays and it is considered an 'expensive' month.  Who cares I say, my birthday is in June and that's alright then.  Ha ha.  In fact, lets just talk about me me me for a moment - when I was growing up, I felt terribly special that my birthday is exactly 6 months from Jesus' birthday, therefore confirming that Jesus and I share a special connection.  This long held belief was shattered some years back by some do-gooder pointing out that 25th June is, in actual fact, the furthermost point in the calendar away from Christmas Day.  Poo.  I felt quite disconcerted for a very long time about this. 

Moving on, June is also the month that my little cherub was born (nuff said about that hideous tale of a shitty point in time for me) and said little cherub will be 10 in a few days.  Whilst sat watching him in a swimming lesson last night I suddenly locked onto a train of thinking about how he was changing, growing up and getting better at things, and then, out of the blue, I was struck by the realisation that realistically I have about four more years with him before his childhood is - unsurprisingly, over.

This thought struck me with such a force that I started to cry.  Not sob, obviously, but a welling up and flood of tears that caused major sniffling and profuse eye-wiping to take place.  The thought that I have less years of sharing his childhood ahead of us than have already passed has upset me terribly.  The thought that I have just three or four more summers and Christmases to enjoy closeness and shared enjoyments left me feeling quite distraught.  Obviously whilst I don't imagine this to be an overnight thing - the distancing will happen, and this will be a distancing which must happen in order for him to learn to be independent.  I am so filled with sorrow about it I can't tell you.  I suppose it is the type of thing which makes you start to think about another baby.... but I don't want another baby.  I  just want him again.  I want his childhood years again.  I know what I must not do - I must not and will not allow these feelings to cloud the present and the happiness I have with him at this point in our lives.

Enough gloom. 

Today we went to Clip'n Climb - a treat for Oliver and his friend at the start of Oliver's birthday weekend.  He loved it.

I paid for him to have a go at the 'leap of faith', where you climb up reeealllly high onto a platform and then leap across a huuuuge gap to grasp a trapeze suspended in mid-air:

See that platform on the right there?  It is a leap from there across the grand canyon to grasp that flimsy red handle on the left.  Er, no.

I know Oliver was scared about this, and after gee-ing him along with words about positive thinking and such bollocks, I walked around and up the stairs to the balcony almost level with the leap of faith platform.  I looked down and thought to myself that there was no sodding way I would ever be having a go at that, thank you very much.

Unsurprisingly, both Oliver and his friend climbed up to the platform, took one look, whimpered, and had to be rescued by the climbing staff.  Don't blame them at all.

After this was the birthday treat meal - the ubiquitous McDonalds.  I pulled up in the car park, only to realise that I had left Oliver's insulin at home, and he could not eat without it.  Balls.  This turned into a drive-thru followed by a hasty dash across Exeter in the rush hour traffic.  Spiffing Friday I call it.

We have bought Oliver a box of Pokemon booster packs for his birthday - 36 packs in all, each containing 10 cards.  So lots of new cards.  The hope is that there will be some great cards in there to help him build his 'ultimate' deck for the National competition at the end of the week.  In poking about on the official Pokemon website, I was stunned to see that Oliver is ranked 13th junior in the UK!  This has really boosted his confidence, and I am really happy for him.

Mooooving along to crochet world, I have just passed the halfway point in my Daisy ripple. 

I am quite relieved this is turning out OK, because I have had a lot of misgivings about just using purple shades, and it is not the design I originally planned to do.  Still - it's all gonna be OK. 

And here is my progress on the Babette, which looks rubbish, but in my defence, I have chucked away several wrongly sized and wrongly shaded squares thus far, and every time I pick it up to do again, I forget the pattern, size hook and shades I have decided on, and this feeling of having to start over every time makes it all very laborious.

And no, I don't iron my duvet cover.  Can't think of anything more pointless.

Rained a lot lately hasn't it?  Can you just feel the irony?  I change the habit of a lifetime and make a conscious decision to welcome the summer with open arms, not moan and enjoy my sun-filled days and it pisses with rain and blows a hoolie for days on end with temperatures to rival Autumn.  Sacre bleu.

PS: I didn't return to the exercise regime from hell.  After stewing and fuming for a few days, I sent him an email telling him that I wasn't coming back and that I thought it a bit much to demand input and effort from his customers in order for him to make the sessions 'interesting and enjoyable', since it is his job, and he is getting paid for it.  I also said I knew what I should be doing fitness and foodwise, the problem lay in the fact that I am not doing it.  I finished up by saying I was looking for motivation and support, not to become Private Benjamin.  Think some bridges have definitely been burnt there.

feel the burn

Weight loss, exercise and I are fickle friends.

I go through periods (usually annually for the last three years) of feeling hugely fed up with heaviness around the arse and belly and drag myself off to a diet/fitness club (Rosemary Conley for the last three years) to lose around half a stone-ish and then lazily allow it to re-attach itself to my arse and belly over the next twelve months. 

This year is a bit different.  I haven't put on as much weight as I have done over the last year, although it is creeping up that way.  Normally by now, I have made my appearance at RC and am coughing up twenty quid a month to be weighed once a week by a complete stranger then bounce around with a bunch of like minded tubbies and oldies for forty minutes.  This serves its purpose, and off we go again.

Whether it's because I haven't put on as much weight as normal, or whether it's because I don't feel that concerned about being a little chubbier,  or whether I am just wearing bigger clothes, I don't know, but I haven't felt the annual urge to diet yet.  It may even have something to do with the fact that eating 'healthily' does not happily sit alongside the kind of food Oliver needs to be eating, crackers though it sounds.  For example, last night I bought a lovely piece of salmon to go with some asparagus.  Lovely, lovely healthy summery eating you would think.  But - no.  This, on its own, as Oliver would like to eat it, is no good for him without some carbohydrates.  So he had to be coerced into having potatoes too.  Bloody diabetes.  Some days pisses me off more than others.  Anyhoo, I can't always get my head around thinking of a meal, adapting it for Oliver, taking out the fat for me and the wheat and dairy for Mark.  Really, some of the instantaneous pleasure in cooking has been dimmed somewhat!

Meanwhile, back with the plot, I saw an internet offer recently for a 12 week weight loss and fitness programme for £19.  Bargain at £1.60ish per week I thought to myself.  So I signed up and went along last night to some little outbuilding in some lane on the edge of town to sit with 9 other likeminded individuals to receive our induction and be weighed.  I have to say that, contrary to the normal enthusiasm and 'new hobby feeling' which usually accompanies such an event, I feel very cross, un-enthused and downright rebellious.  The room was filled with torture devices like medicine balls and free weights.  The 'programme' is led by 3 blokes who are clearly fitness freaks, one of whom is a nutritionist who advises the Exeter Chiefs on diet and nutrition.  I started to feel a little out of my depth after about 5 minutes, and after fitness freak 2 started his diatribe on how he expected us to put in the effort because he was putting in the effort working out the programme for us (yeah, you are getting paid for your trouble mate) I could feel my lips beginning to purse in irritation.  Making us write down a 4 week goal and a 12 week goal was annoying beyond belief.  It felt like I was back in the days of office seminars and SMART goal setting which I despised.  Next week we have to turn up in exercise clothes ready for our first session which is apparently going to involve 'own body weight work - aka press ups.  News Flash guys: girls don't do press ups.  I don't care if that's sexist (actually - I can do press ups, but only because I have a weird teen-year athletic thing in my past going on)  Normal girls, who have led a normal life, can't do press ups.  Why the fuck would anyone want to.  See, now I'm getting all hot under the collar.  Fitness freak 2, btw, is newly qualified at fitness training, and ex-marines.  Imagine my surprise.

Nuff said.  If it wasn't for the fact I cannot bear to imagine Mark's reaction when I tell him I'm too cross and it's not for me, I would chuck it in and send them a caustic email right after finishing this blog post.  It is also a little pathetic, even by my standards, not to give it one session, so I feel I am duty-bound to go at least once more.  I even went into town today to purchase some vaguely acceptably sporty bottoms, but after thrashing my way into 4 different pairs and sizes, I had to admit they made me look more like a lightbulb than a sports devotee, and I have had to admit defeat in that department.  I don't even want to think about how snotty and cross I am going to feel by the time next Thursday comes along. 

All the above taken into account, I think I am, actually, quite OK with my own body image.  How I imagine I look (willowy and graceful) and how I really do look (stumpy with thighs like a rugby player) are two very different things, and although I know it - I don't feel it when I am out and about, and for that, I feel very fortunate.  It reminds me of this from Benidorm:

One chubby middle-aged man to another talking about self-image:

Chub 1: 'When I look in the mirror, I don't see a fat person.'

Chub 2: (in amazement) 'really?'

pause.

'Where do you buy these mirrors?'

Ha ha.

attitude, attitude, attitude

As a self-confessed summer-hater, I have tried very hard this year, employing much conscious effort to 'enjoy' all things outdoors and warm in order to make Oliver's life a little less stressful by giving him a break from my seasonal whingeing.  It really has felt like I have closed my eyes, raised my arms heavenward and thrown myself foward into the abyss, hoping to be caught, and I am very pleasantly surprised by the outcome. 

It started with this post, and the decision to take on the garden.  I am a self-confessed gardening-hater too, but, in for a penny.   Since Easter and the hefty outlay on garden furniture, the weather has been tres froid, and I was able to take respite in jumpers and indoorsiness once more.  Suddenly, out of the blue, the tide has turned, and - lo!  There was sunshine.  I girded my loins, de-fuzzed, (no mean feat I can tell you), and dug out my (thank you O Primark) £2 in the sale linen trousers to beat off the heat.  Out came the flip flops and sun cream (yuk, yuk, YUK), and out went the desire to hide away.  I threw open the windows and doors (literally) and went outside.  We have been over to the local park to meet friends, down the local 18 hole pitch and putt, and yesterday - gulp - The Beach.  I even managed this feat of largesse without spoiling it for everyone else.  Yah for me.  Ha ha.

My change of attitude has made such a difference to how I feel about the coming summer months.  I think years ago I had decided to rail against it, and got myself actually a bit scared of summer.  Twat. 

Morning vista:

Last weekend we took our first break-ette of the year, and went to North Devon.  We trollied along on the first day to Ilfracombe, and the Tunnels Beaches.  This was very en vogue in victorian times, and there is loads of info about the gentlemens and ladies beaches (separated by a cliff, of course)

It was bloody freezing, cost us about a tenner and there was nothing doing in the rock pools.  (I caught Mark grumbling that they should be stocked with salmon for the entry price). 

You can't beat a bit of anenome-poking.

Sunday was warmer, and we braved the sea (with wetsuits and body boards) which was exceptionally cold for this time of year.  We played pitch and putt, which was a really nice family activity and I even got to do a bit of this.

French Kiss - cool film.

An evening stroll out to Baggy Point.

By stroll, I obviously mean piggy-back. Clearly Oliver has lumped  'walking for pleasure' in the same category as 'reading for pleasure' - not really for him and to be avoided at all costs unless absolutely necessary.

And so to the garden.  I have been keeping an eye on the state of play, and this week the runner beans and courgettes were planted out.  Now, I know this is no biggie for a normal person, but for me, previous despiser of the great outdoors, this has been a real event.  I am ridiculously proud that I have grown this green stuff from seeds, and that we should be able to actually eat food I have grown.  What a brilliant concept. 

Check out my sexy Spear and Jackson tools.  And my dirty gloves.  Real proper grown up gardening stuff.

In the midst of this, a large spider scuttled across the earth, causing me to shriek like a girl (I know), throw myself backwards, nearly impale myself on my sexy Spear and Jackson and stumble out of my flip flops onto the path.  I really must work harder at my summer mantra: Befriend The Spider.

I put them canes up, I did.

I am interested in these little things:

They have sprouted from the veg peelings/bits from the compost which I dug into the ground to help the runners along.  I thing they are growing from squash seeds from the leftovers of a queensland blue,  and I am impressed with their quiet but steady determination to reproduce.  Keep it up younglings - I will watch over you.

Oliver's bit in the garden is doing well too, despite his inevitable waning interest.

Ignore the weeds, I've got them buggers in my sights - he has carrots, flowers and spuds in here.

And finally, I finished the happy flower a while ago, but thwarted in my desire to hang it in my kitchen, it has ended up here.  Not ideal, but the walls aren't finished and I cannot face Mark doing his nut over me banging in a nail into the wall before the paint goes on it.

Laters.

so so

Been pretty quiet on the blogging front, I don't have anything of particular note this week so this is to be a post of ponderings.....

After a week (last week) of Oliver being ill and therefore not doing any 'work', we were back into the swing of things on Monday with history and geography.  For geography we use laminated country fact sheets by Atlas Editions, I only have 60, but hey - that's over a years worth.  I have a random selection of countries, and this Monday we covered Brunei.  Like I say, a bit random, but interesting enough.  History is our beloved Story of the World.  This week was the end of the viking era and the battle of Hastings.  He seemed to like it well enough and it gave me a good excuse to get out my Kings and Queens of England poster to bang on at length about the monarchy, one of my favourite subjects, lol.

The afternoon is supposed to be reading, and the theory is that 'we' read a chapter of whatever book I have deemed 'suitable' for the purpose (the current one is 'The Turbulent Term of Tyke Tiler' by Gene Kemp), and I read a bit to him, and he reads a bit to me.  In practice this translates to me reading to him, yawning and eventually slurring my words as I nod off (I am not joking), and him doing everything within his power to ensure that I do nod off (tucking me up with a blanket, snugging into my side), and therefore he doesn't get to read anything at all.  Sigh.  Oliver's complete antipathy towards reading weighs heavily on my heart.  On the plus side, I am encouraged by the leap he has made in forming his writing and in everyday reading and spelling, so shoulder to the wheel and all that.

On Monday Oliver went along to a fencing club which is running for 6 weeks at a local school.  He loved it.  Real life sword play.  Does life get any funner - I think not.  It was all very energetic and it was followed by an evening of cubs, and - quelle surprise - plummeting blood sugar levels.  A few people have enquired after Oliver and his diabetes lately, and I have to say, already the inconvenience seems 'normal' for us.  But I have to acknowledge the fact that Oliver makes the whole thing easy for us.  He 'gets it', realises that there is no other way to live now and does not waste time moaning about it.  I am safe in the knowledge that whenever he isn't with us, he knows what he can and can't eat, and is confident (and pretty good at actually) at taking dextrose tablets to boost his blood sugar when expending energy.  I am grateful we had 9 years of 'normality' with him before diabetes reared it's ugly head, and I am glad that we have enough years left before teen years start to encourage him to learn good blood sugar control.  Of course I am not whoop-di-wooing here, but boy, things could have been worse.

At his last regular hospital appointment, they did what is called an HbA1c test - basically how much glucose is present in the blood.  The gist of it is that the lifespan of a red blood cell is around 6 weeks.  As glucose sticks to these cells, they can calculate an average level of glucose over this period.  Darned clever.  At diagnosis Oliver was at 11.5%.  on 19th April he was 9.8%.  At the end of this month I am optimistic this will be down by another couple of per cent.  The lower, the better, obviously.  The better control he gains over his blood sugar now,  the better his chances of not developing problems later on in life (with his eyes and his kidneys - prone to damage due to excessive insulin).  It is this possibility which looms like a black shadow on the horizon.

He has had an invitation to go for a couple of taster evenings at scouts.  He will be 10 next month, and can go up from cubs in September.  Scouts seems so grown up.  He is going to be 10.  10 seems so grown up.

Laters.

hypocritical crochet....

It was SIL's birthday at the weekend.  When the mag Mollie Makes came out last year, she and I were swept along with the whole vintage/crafty loveliness of it all, but quickly tired of the twee-ness and ridiculous impossibility of ever achieving a home/style anything like it, so 'we' stopped buying it.  

I thought these 'apple jackets' were a bloody marvellous idea for little girlies to take their apples to school in their lunchboxes, and I still love love LOVE them.  SIL thought they were the work of the devil.  From that moment, she was getting one.  The day before her birthday, having purchased and wrapped her gift, I remembered the apple jacket, and amidst much cursing, frantic trawling t'internet and a touch of eye strain, under pressure I cobbled together this:

I don't much like the colour now, and Lordy knows why I thought it would be perfect, but there you have it.  The anticipation of the eye-rolling, the resigned sighing.  Oh, money cannot buy such moments of perfect wickedness. 

Although I don't always subscribe to the heart-skippity hooky love on Lucy's blog, I will confess to being a trifle envious of her home and ability to make pretty stuff.  I have shamelessly used her patterns to make my granny stripe, my ripple and my big blanket squares.  I have also used her tutorial to join said squares, so, yay for her despite the skippity-deeing.  A little while ago she made a hanging decoration - the happy flower.  At the time I was partaking in a little eyeball rolling of my own at the seemingly pointless effort of making such a thing, but - lo!  A couple of days ago I was suddenly seized by the urge to have one of my own.  (I blame SIL - it cropped up casually during an idle meandering conversation with her).  Yesterday, in an almost fit of needing to Start A New Project, I sat for a lengthy time (can't be more specific than that, it's embarrassing),  and hooked up this:

It almost resembles the real thing.  It made Mark roll the 'ol peepers, so I know I am on the right track. 

The puss cats after being stuck out all night in the deluge:

The suite life, for sure.  (See what I did there?)

The day the Queen came to town

Yes, our little ol' town was graced with a visit from HM.  I had no intention of going and actually seeing her amidst the throng of people, the very idea shook me to my anti-social core, but then I was seized by the memory of one summer day in 1977, Silver Jubilee year when I, as a wee child, went off in a coach to the University (I think) to see the Queen, and I remember very clearly the actual moment I laid my own eyes upon her, and felt quite awed.  Selfish, lazy me, I thought to myself, and drove Oliver into town to join the throng, stand at the barrier in the high street and watch the police motorbike escorts bring the Royal car into town.  It lasted but a moment, and she was half an hour late, but the crowd was buoyant and friendly, of all ages, and the air of excitement was palpable.  Somehow it's cool to be keen on the Queen.  Oliver was beaming, and was so clearly chuffed, the whole experience warmed my heart and made me glad and relieved we had made the effort.   Our Monarchy stands us apart from the rest of the world, and I am proud to be British because of it.

Not a brill photo, I'll grant you, but hey, it's not every day you can (almost) get your son and the your Monarch in the same shot.

Today Mark is taking out the one remaining single paned window in the kitchen/diner:

This place was built in the 30s', and had a weird cast-iron sort of sun lounge thing attached to the back.  When it was double glazed, the bedroom and dining room windows still formed part of the sun lounge so the single paned windows remained.  They are a bit hideous, and run with condensation year-round.  Because some tit before our time put the curtain rails up too tight to the windows, the curtains touch the glass, and subsequently have got mouldy over time.  Same in the bedroom.  Boy 'tis grim. 

With the advent of the new window, we can now get blinds fitted.  Whilst I am not a fan of blinds per se, when the sun is out this time of year, this room gets bloody hot and bloody bright and we end up having to close the curtains so we are not summarily cooked and blinded, and then we are plunged into such darkness, we have to have the light on.  This, in turn, sends me slightly hysterical, so this whole operation is a good thing.

And so to crochet.  The daisy ripple has caused me some consternation it has to be said.  The purples alone (even with black and white) were looking gloomy.  So I popped in a little pink, and grey, and didn't like that either. 

So I frogged it right back to here:

And started again.  Now, I am not entirely convinced that I am in love with this either;

but I have come to realise that it is the width of the stripes which is throwing it off balance, not the colours so much.  Sooooo, I have started to add in some 3-stripe colours, and I like this a whole lot more.  There we have it.  After a few more stripes, when I feel 'happy' with a chunk, I will repeat it, chuck in a notable middle section and then reverse repeat the first half.  IYKWIM?

Happy(ish) days.