Monday Musings

My brain has seemed to slow down over the last few weeks. Equally it has started to race too, especially at around 4a.m. I find it hard sometimes to 'take things in'  as easily as I used to.  I think the slight hearing loss plus the tinnitus and hypercusis don't help.  Also not going out, other than for a walk, isn't really helping either as I find I'm anxious about being outside. 

Anyway, onwards and upwards.  I've been testing the new blogger.  Has anyone else tried it?  I know from some of your blog posts that one or two of you have.  I'm sort of working it out but I do hate change, it makes me feel inept.   Anyway I found a few issues with the new blogger which confused for a while but the main one is the Reading List on the dashboard not the sidebar.  If you click on a blog post you want to read it takes you to a redirection page first before being taken to the actual blog.  Two clicks instead of one.  Very irritating.  I wonder if this will be ironed out soon or if it is a permanent thing.

On Saturday night we watched the film 'Goodbye Christopher Robin' just as it finished the heavens opened, it thundered and lightened and outside there was a rainbow.

 This was the best photo I could get of the strange light and the rainbow without getting soaked through.

 On Saurday morning we walked across the fields and I took my camera so I could photograph the foxgloves for 30 Days Wild so some of you will have seen this and those below before.

 It was warm yesterday so the butterflies came out to play.

As did the foxes and badgers which were picked up by the wildlife camera overnight.

It's sunny today and I have washing drying outside.  It's got to be a good day.

Observations

Bright sun this morning couldn't lift the sadness I felt as I watched the funeral car of our friend and neighbour go silently down the street at exactly 9a.m.   There were very few people up and about to see, I said a silent goodbye.  Her friend and carer from across the road was allowed to travel with her. I expect one or two family members were waiting at the crematorium.  No one else could be there in this time of virus. I was also thinking about a friend who at about the same time was being taken into the  theatre in a Sheffield hospital for a serious operation. All alone and again in this time of virus, no visitors allowed. I hope all will be well.

Clematis Montana

In the garden things are changing daily.  I've been doing my 'five spotted' things each day all very similar I'm afraid although today I was happy to see a Speckled Wood butterfly in the garden instead of the usual Small White.  Yesterday a male Sparrowhawk flew across the garden, swooping low,  but it didn't take any of the garden birds here, perhaps he wasn't hungry or hunting for food at that precise moment.

 Dunnock

 Camassia

Wild Garlic

Valerian

Self Heal plus bee

Plenty of dandelions and daisies in the side lawn.

Both greenhouse and conservatory are full of seedlings.

Planted in all sorts of containers.

We'll see how they grow

Tomatoes are doing well so far.

Spinach, too.

I'll be back later in the week.
Stay safe and well.

This and That

I've been trying to focus on small things whilst all around me a world I no longer recognise or understand seems to be in turmoil.  I find that it's hard to find anything worthy to say here when there is so much uncertainty and suffering  everywhere. I could rant about my frustrations with politics but this isn't and has never been a political blog so therefore, to quote the wonderful Alan Bennett, I'm just going to 'keep on keeping on'  and try and record the things that I have been doing and seeing around here and elsewhere over the last few weeks and hope that is okay with everyone. 

The Wednesday before the Bank Holiday weekend here in the UK we travelled  to meet friends for lunch at Wightwick Manor near Wolverhampton. We all wanted to see the new gallery which is now a permanent home for the De Morgan Collection.  No photographs of the exhibition but it is a wonderful collection of the ceramics of William De Morgan and paintings by his wife Evelyn De Morgan. 

The collection was founded by Evelyn's sister Wilhelmina Stirling.  After her death in 1965 the De Morgan Foundation was established.  Below are a couple of links to follow to find out more

Guardian Article/National Trust Page   

Scenes from Wightwick Manor

On the Saturday of Bank Holiday weekend we visited Little Moreton Hall to see a new exhibition on the history of sleep in Tudor times

The exhibition showed how people approached sleep in those times.  Their beliefs, fears, ways of sleeping and what they ate and drank particularly before bedtime and also remedies to combat sleeplessness.
 

There was also a wonderful exhibition of replica Tudor ceramics

 Our garden has also been the focus of attention recently and I've been constantly pulling out grass and trying to keep the wood avens and buttercups at bay, they seem to have taken over this year.  The Chive flowers, Geums, Valerian and Hardy Geraniums have been covered in bees, I've never seen so many at one time.  We've had a wonderful array of birds feeding at the feeders including Gold Finch, Robins, Green Finch, Blue tits, Bull finch and loads of starlings and sparrows.  Mrs Fox visits every evening looking for scraps and one night, just as dusk was falling,  she honoured us with bringing her three little cubs to visit, it was lovely to see them.

Last Wednesday we headed out to Matlock Bath to visit the little Chapel I featured in my last post.  We also walked along the River Derwent into Matlock through the park and back along the main road taking in a mooch around the antique centre on the way back to the car.  We stopped at the newly refurbished National Stone Centre on the way back for a late lunch at their new cafe which is called Gastro Pod.  The food was delicious, quite pricey but the portions were huge so we shared a Veggie Club Sandwich which was quite sufficient for us.   I'd left my camera in the car so can't share a photo with you.

Scenes around Matlock.
 

Monday Miscellany

A few days before our recent trip into Wales we met up with some friends from Nottingham to have lunch first at the Denstone Hall Farm Shop and Cafe and then to have a look at Croxden Abbey which isn't very far away.

I've taken you to Croxden a couple of times before  - here -  and - here - but this time it was great to share the experience with friends.   

We wandered around together and then on our own just taking in the beauty of it all.

We thought about those early times as the Abbey welcomed its first few monks to the area.

We thought about and indeed talked about how it must have been for them.

We spotted masons' marks and marvelled at how hard they must have worked to provide a suitable place for those monks to worship and to live.  Sometimes the building of these places would span a whole lifetime.

We also thought about those who had passed through the buildings as residents or visitors, about the farmers, labourers and animals who had sheltered here and about those who had walked this way when the building became the ruin you see today.   

My friend Robert wrote a post, wonderfully called A Tapestry of Stone, about Croxden on his blog - here - is a link to his thoughts on his visit.

Pink

I love these blossom trees

The sheer blowsy magic of them

After the last few dark and uncertain days

They were bright, cheerful and full of hope

I'm sure that underneath they felt warmer too

Beneath their overloaded boughs it felt safe and secure 

I felt detached from the  myriad of unsettling thoughts in my mind

The sun was gently peering through the pink blooms

Making me feel glad to be alive - easing, for just a short while, the helplessness and concern I've felt for what the future might hold.

No matter what happens we will still have beauty in the world to ease our cares and enrich our minds.

The One Where.........

........the content of the post bears no relation to the photograph accompanying it! 

Swan on the lake at Trentham Estate taken last Sunday morning

 In a week where everything has been about the glorious weather, (except yesterday but we did need the rain!), woodsmoke in the air,  Halloween pumpkins and pomegranates in the market, ghostly and macabre apparitions in shop windows, children off school on bikes and scooters down the road, Diwali fireworks and a 'penny for the guy' collector we have received our first Christmas card.   I wasn't in the least surprised to receive it so early, knowing from whom it came, but what did surprise me was to receive one for 2012 as well.  Let me explain!

We have a dear elderly friend who, each year sends or gives us a package containing an Easter card, a wedding anniversary card and two birthday cards and I keep them safe and open them as each event comes along.  Our friend is now 86 and is concerned about losing her memory - I have to say when I speak to her each Sunday morning she is as bright as a button and when I can't remember something like a name or place she is quick to fill in the blanks. She also tells me that non of her family have ever lived over the age of 87 and so she has sent us a card for 2012  just in case she  a. loses her memory or b. doesn't get to the end of next year.  Half of me is amused by this but the other half feels quite sad, disturbed, uneasy - what other words can I use to describe the whirligig of emotions?   I expect I will put the card somewhere safe (not too safe or I'll never find it!) and open it  when the time is right and hope I can still 'phone her to say thank you.  

On a brighter note don't forget it is 'Feed the Birds' day tomorrow.  Here is a link to the - RSPB - site.  I shall just carry on as normal as I feed the birds every morning - I love to sit and watch them through the window as I eat my lunch.  Also tomorrow is the end of British Summer Time so the clocks go back an hour.  Remember Spring forward and Fall (Autumn) back. This of course means the evenings getting darker earlier which I don't like very much.

We've got a busy weekend ahead with a first for me of a Saturday funeral - I've never come across that before - so I'm going to schedule my post of photos for the October Scavenger Hunt and hope that blogger works as it should.

Well, whatever you have planned or not as the case maybe,  I hope you all have a wonderful weekend:)

The End of August

I don't know why but a great wistfulness always overwhelmes me at the end of August; it seems like the end of something important, something special. Maybe these feelings are influenced by the fact that I've just become a year older, if not wiser and also because I chide myself for not fully appreciating and utilising all that summer has to offer. This year, as last, we haven't really had a proper summer, those long remembered summers of childhood and youth, of day after day of warm sumshine, of late light nights and warm early mornings are now just a distant memory; but surely I could have done more with the one we had? I wandered around the garden this morning and already it is completely autumnal; the air is misty and heavy with damp, little droplets of moisture soaking me through, but it wasn't rain, it was too gentle for rain. The unmown grass was wet, soaking into my shoes making my toes feel cold and damp and leaving tide marks on the soft leather. The delicate cobwebs glistened in the bushes drifting across the paths and I had to be on constant spider alert. For the last two days we have had a pair of buzzards circling overhead, thermaling in the hot air and calling to each other with their eery, mewling cry. Today they have moved on. I always know when the sedum flowers start to turn pink that it really is the end of summer and I drift unconsciously into a few days of listlessness and dissatisfied longing. Then, like the buzzards, I move on, hoping for dry autumn days, when trees are full of colour, hedgerows are full of plenty and all is safely gathered in. Then, and only then, can I fully appreciate the last, lingering beauty of it all.

In the meantime, on a more practical and cheerful note, I do have help with the laundry.