Attic24

Back Yard :: 2021

It's about a month or so since I purchased these little pots packed with floral potential and brought them home to the Attic. It's always such a thrill for me to do this (on the years when I pull my finger out and make it happen at the appropriate time) and this year was no exception. Oh, the J-O-Y in the choosing, in the imagining of it all! I loved picturing the colour combinations in my mind and anticipating a whole summer full of living, growing colour right outside my back door.

Before I could get stuck into the actual planting, I had some tidying up to do in the yard. For those of you who aren't familiar with my outdoor space, let me tell you it is teeeeeeeeeny. It's a very, very small L-shaped enclosed yard - there is a square of paved space directly outside my kitchen door which measures 2.5 m², that's part of it in the above photo. Then we have another even smaller area which measures approx 2 m x 1.5 m and that bit sits just underneath my equally teeny tiny kitchen window. So yeah, not much room to play with at all. It's west facing which means we get the sun in the afternoon, although there are parts of the yard which are in permanent shade all day. I'll show you some more photos as we chat along so that you can maybe get a better idea of the space, but when folks talk about small gardens, they actually have no idea what small really is until they've seen a Victorian terraced back yard.

Once upon a time I lived in a 2nd floor flat backing onto a high speed railway line, and believe me, a small back yard where I could sit in the sun and sip a mojito surrounded by flowers would have been heaven to me back then. So I try very hard to be thankful for this space, to appreciate it and not feel too envious of those who have grassy gardens with trees and wildlife and abundant borders.

Anyhow - an afternoon was spent shifting our dilapidated furniture about, sweeping and de-weeding the rather ugly concrete slabs and getting rid of an accumulated pile of gardening bits and bobs which were no longer fit for purpose. Then it was time to plant up my pots - these are all many years old but are still mostly intact so I simply changed out the compost and gave them a bit of a clean up.

Ahh....that's looking a bit better, a few colourful crochet blankets always makes everything look better!

We had an old folding hardwood chair down in the cellar so we dragged that up to put in the very small space at the end - this is the spot that gets the sun throughout the whole afternoon and it's very sheltered and warm there. I really wanted a lovely comfy chair to be there as it's one of my favourite places to sit, so I measured the space and started to have a look online for something that might fit.

The warm sunny weather was enticing us all outside, including Little Lady who decided that a spot of sunbathing might help her revision along (I know, teenage logic, don't bother questioning  it). As you can see, sunbathing options in our back yard were very basic - a picnic blanket on the hard concrete floor was pretty much the only option. 

Did you notice that I said "was", as in past tense? Uh-huh, well after I had a few mojitos tucked away I confess I went a little cray-cray with some online shopping......

....and this ↑↑ landed in my basket. Oh boy. Please say hello to the Allibert Jaipur Sun Lounger with Graphite Grey Cushion, and picture my face when a huuuuuge box arrived on the doorstep and I had yet to inform J of my purchase. Luckily all was well, and although J said I was "absolutely mad" for purchasing a giant piece of plastic, I was positively overjoyed with it.

I mean, just look how well it fits, and imagine how warm and comfy this tiny space is now...just perfect for some sunny afternoon idling with a spot of crochet in my lap.

The above photo shows where the lounger sits in relation to the shady table and chairs - you can see we don't have much privacy, actually er, we have zero privacy. I guess I've learnt to accept it as part and parcel of living so closely with our neighbours in a terraced row of houses, but I really would love to add some height to our boundary wall and gate so that we can relax a little bit more in our small outdoor space. 

Despite the lack of privacy, I've been getting on just fine with the business of lounging around in the sunshine. I've been making very good use of my new giant piece of plastic seating and let me tell you I LOVE it. Absolutely love it. It's just a delight to sit with my feet up in this little sunny nook, an escape from the house and a bit of time to be alone with my thoughts for a while. I've had one or two afternoon naps here too, well I did have to try out the lounger in it's fully flat position to see how well it worked....I can confirm it works a treat. The only downside to having this one delightful piece of furniture is that I have to share it with Little Lady. We haven't (yet) had to fight over it but that's not to say that I haven't found myself on occasion waiting impatiently for her to get too hot/bored with sunbathing so that I can have my turn.

During the past month, my flowers have really started to fill out the pots. Most of the flowers are situated on top of the wall as they get full sun that way, and it gives me a smidge of extra privacy from folks walking up and down the cobbled back street just on the other side.

I water with a watering can which is a bit slow and laborious but it does mean I can add a liquid feed to the water once a week to keep the flowers blooming well all summer (I hope).

I'm waiting impatiently for the "prolific cascading" which is supposed to happen with some of these flowers...come on, come on!!

Two weeks ago I realised I had one large empty pot to fill, and I started to ponder what to plant in it. I wanted something tall/climbing as the pot sits in front of an ugly drainpipe, so I decided in the end to try growing something edible. I settled for climbing french beans as the blurb on the packet said that they'd have pretty purple flowers so I thought it was worth a try. I planted a handful in a pot indoors on 11th June....

....and six days later, ta-dah!!! How quick was that?! It was extremely exciting I have to say, the thrill of seeds growing into actual real plants never gets old.

I didn't have any tall sticks to hand, so I made some string supports (tied to the top of the drainpipe) for my beanlets to help them in their journey upwards. I'm hopeful for flowers and beans later in the summer that will cover up the pipe, I'll keep you posted. Also, you can see how fast my sweet peas have grown in the blue pot there - no flowers yet, but we do have buds. Super exciting times in the back yard. Buds!!

I love the ritual of stepping out of the kitchen door every morning to check on my flowers and see how they're doing. By the way, I'm still managing to keep with my morning routine in which I get myself out of the house at 7am each day for a brisk "wake-up walk". I'm pretty sure that I've now set that habit for myself (trying to remember when I first began? Ok, found it, it was 24th March so three months ago - is it a habit now then? I think it must be.)

I have to say it's really lovely coming back down my cobbled street at the end of my morning walk and seeing my pots looking so blooming pretty. I'm really happy with myself for making that happen. Well done me.

I leaned right out of my bedroom window to take the above photo for you, so you could better appreciate the small-scale of my yard. Teeny-tiny indeed. Incidentally, the big black box thing there is a very handy storage box which I purchased alongside my sun lounger. Oh, J had a LOT to say about that I can tell you. But it's such a good thing - it means we can easily store blankets and cushions and other gardeny bits that we want to keep dry. And like I said to J, it's waaaaaaay cheaper than a shed, plus you can sit on it or use it like a table. Versatile and useful.

And I leaned very precariously out of the bathroom window to show you the little bit of my yard where my lounger sits. 

So there you have it, it's all bit a rough and ready but it does make me happy. At some point in the future if we decide that this is going to remain our home for many more years, we'll spend some money making this into a proper courtyard garden I think. I have lots of ideas (of course I do), but for now I'm content to enjoy what we have.

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The Here and Now

Last week I was having a conversation with a good friend of mine about the business of how to return to ones blog when one has been absent for a period of time. She was telling me she hadn't blogged since February and really wanted to find her way back to it. My advice went something like this ::

1. Don't get caught up in the reasons for your absence. Don't feel you need to explain if you don't want to, and definitely don't fall over yourself to apologise. Blogs belong to the blogger, and gaps in the narrative are a natural part of writing a genuine, truthful blog which follows the ups and downs of life. There is no need to say sorry, or feel guilty.
2. Jump right in with something short and current rather than trying to back track and create a hefty "catch-up" post. Your blogging voice may well be a little bit croaky after a break and keeping things short and of-the-moment will be a good way to un-croak yourself. Lengthy catch ups and more specific posts can happen when you get back into the general swing of things.
3. Let the photos lead the way if the words aren't coming easy.

So......this is me sliding back gently into blogland and taking my own advice. Hellooooo!! I've missed this space, and am very glad to be back. The above photo was taken this morning on my daily tramp into the woods. It's been a warm and muggy day today with a heavy feeling in the air, as if it needs to really pour with rain but can't quite manage to make it happen.

I found a beautiful feather on the woodland path today and had to bring it home to add to my collection - it's the super-tall dark black feather in the above photo. Actually, it's a very, very dark blue rather than being black but you only see the blue hue when it catches the light. Needless to say, even though I tried to be very stealthy about introducing it into the house, Tilly has already sniffed it out and had it onto the floor. I have no idea why I'm so surprised.

I've had a jug of white stocks on my table this week and the scent they bring to the room is heavenly. 

I took the above photo to share on Instagram this morning, for no other reason than to document the joy my dining room shelves are delivering to me at the moment. After a very long spell of them making me feel very frustrated and irritated, I finally decided last month to put some effort in and and sort them out. I performed a major declutter, re-organised all my things, and finally managed to tame the chaos. 

I had a long overdue clear out of my books and donated some huge bags to our local Oxfam Bookshop which felt wonderful. Owning less books has given me more shelf space and now that it's pretty tidy and clutter-free on those shelves I'm working hard to try and keep it that way. Daily diligence is needed, honestly, it's a full time job. I check on them every single day and make sure to re-home anything that lands there and doesn't belong. Who even am I??!

Funny thing, I took some before and after photos whilst this was all going on because I also tackled the twin Cupboards of Doom at the same time. I've just looked back at the photos and gasped out loud - it was really pretty bad here for a while last month when everything was in utter chaos. I might be brave and show you - is this something that you'd be curious about, the behind the scenes state of my messy home that you don't usually get to see? Would you like to see inside my cupboards which are no longer doom-filled? Let me know eh?

I'm currently dragging myself back into healthy eating after way too much over indulgence during the past few months. Artisan sourdough bread has a lot to answer for, as does chocolate. I've discovered that gluten and sugar are really not good for my body these days, both my mood/energy levels and my joints really start acting up if I eat too much of it. So I'm diggin' deep for some self discipline this week and thankful for our weekly trips to the market and the delicious fresh produce we can purchase. Natural fruit sugars are wonderful....I keep telling myself this, as I sit and fantasise about eating a piece of cake.

As well as daily shelf-clutter checks, I'm now also performing daily plantlet checks as I've got actual living things growing in my back yard that are making me so bloomin' happy. Lots of flowers are now in residence, and I'll show you some more photos very soon. For now, please do appreciate how healthy my sweet peas are looking - this is one of three big pots I've got going on out there, and I am mothering them to death. My plant babies. 

And in crochet news, my Yuletide blanket is slowly but surely growing and I am very in love with it. Coopers café re-opened a few weeks ago after being closed since the start of the year, and I am so happy to be back. It's not back to the full social group of old yet as we are still restricted to sitting in small groups of 6, but it's a step in the right direction.

This week I'm also working behind the scenes on the design of another blanket project but annoyingly I can't show you just yet. On the whole though, I've been enjoying some slow down time during the past few months and haven't done much crochet at all. I've been percolating some ideas though, and there is a list of things I want to make - an actual list written on paper, not just free floating inside my messy head space, so that's something. I very much hope that June will treat me better than May did, I lost my way for a while last month, it' was a tricksy, emotional month for various reasons. 

Well, I'm so happy to be back here and I promise to not be so quiet and croaky-voiced and will come back very soon to chat some more. Back soon...........xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

 

 

Blogtober 2020 :: Day 10

Helloooo my lovelies, so good to see you in the Attic on day 10 (ten!) of my Blogtober journey. Today has been so, so nice in a very gentle, quietly productive weekendish way. Firstly, I relished not having an alarm waking me up and slept in until almost 8 o'clock which was heaven. During the school week my alarm goes off at 6.30am which is actually OK for me as I am most definitely a morning person. 

I'm really happy with my weekday routine and love getting up early and doing my morning workouts, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy my weekends off! I love the change of pace at the weekends, and Saturdays and Sundays still hold something of a special feel for me even though I spend every day of the week at home.

Around 9.30 J and I walked into town together to do our rounds of the market and local shops. We visited the cheese stall and the fruit/veg stall on the market, then called into the baker, the butcher and finally a quick whizz into M&S foods for a few weekend treats.

Saturday is generally the only day of the week that I don't always cook from scratch - we bought pizzas for the Little People and J and I had a ready-made meal tonight, a really delicious Thai veggie curry from the M&S "Plant Kitchen" range. Often I do cook for J and I on a Saturday when the LP have pizza, and I choose something that would be harder (and way too expensive) to do for a family of five. It might be steak for example, or pan fried seabass fillets which are a fave. But honestly, I do really appreciate the times when all I need to do is cook up some extra veggies, pull a pizza out the oven and wait for the microwave to ping.

After our shopping we walked home with heavy bags full of fresh produce, stopping off on the way to recuperate over a coffee (ohhhhh, can you see a pattern emerging here? Please don't judge my coffee habit!). I don't need to tell you that it was outRAGEously good haha! I practically inhaled it, well honestly at one point I really did literally inhale it because J was making me laugh so much.

We always buy looooooads of stuff from the fruit and veggie stall, enough to last us almost a whole week. I load up on masses of fruit as all of us eat fruit daily so I fill two huge fruit bowls in the kitchen with apples, pears, satsumas, bananas, and then berries and grapes etc in the fridge. I buy whatever veg looks good as the variety of produce varies from week to week. Today I bought the most beautiful looking red pointy peppers which inspired me to make my "Red Soup". The Little People named it the red soup when I first started making it years ago as it has red peppers, sweet potato, red onion and tomatoes in it, making it the most glorious colour.

I bought a basil plant to use in the soup, and to (hopefully) keep growing on the kitchen windowsill - I wonder who remembers my crochet herb pot which I made forever ago? I still really love that quirky little make.

I had soup on my mind when I came home from the market so decided to make it straight away so that I could enjoy a bowl for a late lunch. Here is the recipe in brief....

Chop up 2 red peppers, half a large sweet potato, two large handfuls of baby plum tomatoes, 2 onions and 2 cloves of garlic. Spread it all out on a baking sheet, drizzle with a little olive oil, then season well. I used this salt which I recently bought after reading an article about the Dorset Sea Salt Company in Country Living Magazine, it adds a real depth of flavour to cooking which I love. Plus, it comes from Chesil Beach which makes it extra special, a little taste of home.

Roast the veg at 200C for about 40 mins, giving it all a toss around at the half way point.

Make up 600ml of vegetable stock and stir in 1 tablespoon of tomato purée.

Mix the roasted veggies in with the hot stock, then whizz it all up in a blender, doing it in batches if necessary.

Last year we bought a new blender and it's one of our most well used kitchen gadgets - we absolutely LOVE it and use it almost every day. The Little People regularly make smoothies (we keep a bag of frozen berries in the freezer at all times), and I use it to make cooking pastes and sauces, pancake batter, and of course soups. It has a powerful motor so doesn't complain at the frozen lumps of fruit and ice cubes, and it whizzes up a very smooth soup in no time at all. I can highly recommend this one if you are looking for a multipurpose blender (find it on Amazon HERE, it's the 1200W one).

So yeah, I put half of the stock/veg mixture in the blender at a time with a large sprig of fresh basil and whizzed it all up.....

Oh. My. Goodness. SO GOOD!!!!!

This red soup has a very rich, satisfying flavour - I grated a little strong cheddar cheese on top and had it with fresh sourdough bread. I think I'll be making weekend soup more regularly from now on as I really, really enjoyed it - do tell me, what is your favourite soup to make?

My lunch was a late one (2pm ish) and afterwards I noticed the weather was bright and I fancied pottering outside for a little while. I had a sudden urge to bring some colour into the front garden, it was honestly a MaJoR compulsion to go do it right there and then. So before I could even question myself, I had pulled on my coat and was racing down the hill to find me some floral colour. Just like that - one minute eating soup and the next minute I absolutely had to go buy plants!! I do wonder at myself sometimes.

Twenty five minutes later and I was home again with five little pots tucked in my bag. They cost £1 each from the supermarket - two ivies, two cyclamen and a winter cherry, aren't they cheery?

↑↑ This was the place I had in mind for them - this little old wall basket sits to the right of our lower cellar door at the front of the house and it's been making me feel a bit sad just lately. It still has the old stalks in it from last year's deceased geraniums and every time I caught sight of it I would feel bad about it's neglected state. 

Time to make amends!

↑↑ This little pile of green gorgeousness made me so happy because it is Home Grown!! There is a patch of grass beneath our old wooden bench in the front garden that has become more moss than grass, so I was gently able to lift some of it up to use in my wall basket, to stop the earth tumbling out of the gaps. You know how much I adore moss (like I love it very, very much) and so to have my very own growing mossy stuff is like a dream come true. 

And this is how it looks after my £5 investment, plus a little bit of time and minimal effort really. There is still a bit of a gap at the front so I think I might look for some pretty violas to go there as I do love those cute little things. 

Whilst I was searching for floral colour in Morrisons I found this ready-planted terracotta pot for only £4, so that came home to number 24 too, to sit on my front step.

I love the little splash of colour that greets me now as I climb the nine steps to my front door. Note to self - do not forget to water the new growing things. Must. Not. Forget. 

After all the gardening activity, everything came to a sudden halt inside my brain, and I needed to sit down and re-group for a bit. I think I just got over excited being all domesticated, what with making (and eating) soup from scratch and gardening all crammed in together...well, I needed a small frothy coffee and a little bit of gentle yarny stitching to quiet myself. 

I finished off the second half of the gusset decreases on the second sock (I'm knitting two socks together), so that was a good job done. Now I've got the pleasure of whizzing down those easy foot rows and before long I hope to find myself at the toes. J will be pleased I think, he's wearing the other two pairs I made him every day on repeat.

Just as I was cooking dinner retrieving food from the oven and microwave, J shouted to me to come and look out of the window. We'd had a sudden heavy rain shower and the most beautiful double rainbow was arcing over the rooftops right in front of our house. It was so beautiful, a real uplifting sight for sure.

I hope your day has been wonderfully weekendish, do tell me a little of what you've been up to, I'd love to hear......

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May End

Last week it was half term and I tell you we were all so ready for a change of pace and a break from routine. I'm sure it's the same in every household with school age children, that deep-down need for some respite from the clock watching and the nagging that comes with trying to get the offspring ready for the day and out the door on time.

On top of the usual school stuff we're in the midst of GCSE exams with The Teen, so the slight ease up last week was especially welcome for him, and for me too. I'm trying really hard to trust in his very laid back approach, trying my level best not to keep questioning his commitment or the amount of time he's spent revising. 

All will be well, I'm sure. 

So last week was all about laid back relaxation, which I'm happy to say that we all rather excel at here. However for me personally, I would have dearly loved a trip to the coast in amongst all the laid-backness, I'm feeling a strong emotional pull to be beside the sea at the moment. But when I put the idea forward to the family I was met with a complete lack of interest or understanding. I even offered to down-grade my expectations to a day trip to the West coast instead of an overnight stay on my favourite East coast, but nobody wanted to go and I have to be honest, it broke my heart a little. My Little People are growing up so fast, and most of the time I absolutely love to see their independent and strong spirits thriving. But every so often, oh I do so long to have them little again, when trips to the seaside would be met with such joy and enthusiasm.

Once I got over my disappointment and realised that we wouldn't be going anywhere at all, I settled down into our home space and made the most of the warm sunny days. We did some more to Little B's bedroom which is still an ongoing thing, and we had a bit of a clear out of rubbish in the cellar and the back yard which was very therapeutic. We bought bags of compost and I refilled all my back yard pots before planting them up with some colourful annuals. We worked at the allotment, cutting back overgrown pathways, weeding the main growing beds and preparing to plant out various little pots of veggies and herbs that we've collected from kinds friends and the garden centre. I saw an idea on Pinterest for creating a trellis for sweet peas out of bamboo canes and twine, and that's going to be my next project. I've already got the seedlings waiting patiently to put down their roots into deeper soil - gosh my to-do list really is humongous. 

As well as all the Doing, there was plenty of idling for us all and I guess that's the whole point of these short one week holidays at home. To rest, recharge, and to seek out the little things that make us deep-down happy. I spent lots of time in my back yard, either crocheting or reading, or sometimes (especially first thing in the morning) just sipping coffee and listening to the birds.  My reading was all about drinking in the May and June magazine issues which I had been saving especially for this week of down-time. These are my most favourite issues of the whole year (well this it my favourite time of year in general) and they did not disappoint. Such a lot of visual happiness in those pages, all light, fresh, summery colours to inspire and bring on the happy vibes. Just lovely in a dreamy, slightly unreal kind of a way.

Although I had hoped for some days out last week, in the end we didn't venture further than where we could walk. We walked in the woods, walked to the farm shop and we spent quite a lot of time at the park. 

One evening I took Little B with me on one of my regular buttercup appreciation walks, and on the way there he'd asked me how many buttercups there were in the meadow. I told him to guess how many he thought, to which he answered "maybe around two hundred?" His face was a picture when he saw the true scale of the meadow, it really is breathtaking and his wide astonished eyes reflected it perfectly.

I love the light at this time of year, most especially at the end of the day. I love that a walk in the park at 8pm feels so special when the sun is low and golden and night time still feels a long way off.

Last week I picked my crochet banner back up, and after a few weeks break from it I know straight away what I needed to do for the border. During the school holidays we try and keep our Creative Coopers group going on a Friday morning at the cafe, and I think I appreciate those happy hours even more during the holidays than I do during term time. It's just a fabulous way to round up the week and I dearly love spending time with my creative friends and any visitors who happen to drop in to join us. 

Once I'd finished the 6 border rounds it was time to stitch on the letters. This didn't go smoothly, in fact, it was probably the hardest part of the whole project and took for EVER to complete. My fingers protested at all that stitching (I used back stitch around the outer edge of each letter, so it was very labour intensive), but I stuck with it and am so so happy with the outcome. I'm crocheting an additional piece all along the top now so that I can insert a piece of wooden dowel for hanging purposes, but I promise to show you very soon when it's all done.

So that was the end of May, and although I'm a little sorry that my most favourite month is over for another year, it's been absolutely spectacular. I've never known a month to have so much continuous sunshine and so little rain and I've loved every minute of it. I've loved the abundant greenery and the flowers (how can you not love a month that contains blossom, bluebells, wild garlic, cow parsley and buttercups?!) and most of all I've loved the length of these warm golden days.

Here's hoping that June is just as lovely all round!

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Head Above Water

Walking home after the school run this morning, the shopping bag on my shoulder suddenly felt hugely heavy and I realised I was struggling. So I sat myself down on a nearby bench to rest a while in the dappled shade of a large tree. Breeeeeaaaaathe. Inhale, exhale. Stop rushing, just sit still and catch my breath for a moment.  

I looked up and realised with a start that the trees are now full of green leaf, so when precisely did that happen then? I've obviously not been looking properly around me recently, and that realisation gave me a bit of a jolt. It seems that in the bustle of daily routine I've forgotten the importance of slowing down and being mindful of my surroundings. It's all been rush, rush, rush. Tut tut Lucy, that will never do!

I've had family staying with me for the past week, my Dad and Lady B journeyed up by train in order to celebrate my Dad turning 70. Before they arrived I spent two whole days like a mad woman, racing around sprucing up my back yard, tidying and cleaning the house. It was shocking how bad things had gotten around the house, how messy and yup, how dirty. Cobwebs everywhere, piles of stuff everywhere, oh so much stuff. And dust. Piles of stuff and dust. Cripes. But hey ho, I did my best and after two days of slightly manic clearing and panic-cleaning it came together as passable.

As an extra surprise for my Dad, my brother also journeyed up from Kent, so we had quite a jolly family time of it here last week. We took them to Bolton Abbey to take in the bluebells.....

....and had a trip out to Brimham Rocks too. I have to say it was most odd to be at the rocks without the Little People, to be able to stroll around without a permanent knot of anxiety caused by scrambling, climbing, jumping children. Lovely, but odd! The drive there and back was spectacular for my visiting family, the first time my brother had been to the Yorkshire Dales. I saw it through their eyes and felt so blessed to live in such a beautiful area.

Back to normal this week, I waved goodbye to them yesterday morning, running along the platform grinning at the train which caused some elderly ladies to wave and laugh through the train window at me. I've noticed that people keep asking me if I'm OK and I wonder if I wear a look of permanent tiredness on my face? I am desperately trying to keep my head above water as work, home and family responsibilities pile up and up around my ears. It's end of year exam time for Little Lady right now, with all the associated strains, and The Teen is also needing some close parenting as he pushes at the boundaries. The Little People grow and change so fast, don't they? So so so fast.

Ahhh my beloved planner, it is pretty much keeping me grounded during these full and hectic days. I am convinced that pages lined with washi tape and filled with stickers are the way to a harmonious life. I must just try harder to actually look in the pages and act on my lists though. I am hopelessly forgetful at the moment, still a bit below par it would seem.

I've got lots going on in my back yard right now, lots of seedlings and little plantlets growing away like billy-o. Strawberries, chillies, cucumbers, tomatoes, broad beans, french beans, sugar snap peas. Cosmos, nasturtium, marigolds, zinnias. So much growth, so much potential!

My sweet peas desperately need planting out now too, I've been babysitting these seedlings since they arrived in the post back in March. Out in the day, back in at night. Out, in, out, in. They are looking strong and healthy and I am excited for the flowers to come.

So all these seedlings and plantlets, and a book about allotment gardening. Oh ho ho ho, yes indeedy my friends!!!! After eight patient years on the waiting list, we finally made it onto a small half plot. Lots of work to do mind you, it's a weeny bit daunting at this stage. More soon, I have lots of pictures to show you!!

I'm knitting in the early mornings, these are the stripy socks that I'm making for my Mum {the yarn is Opal Viridian Schafpate, colour Thelma} 

In my crochet bag I've got left overs from the re-make of my Granny Stripe blanket (which I must remember to show you, do remind me?!)

I'm using these scraps to make a small string of Summer Bunting for the caravan, and I'm really enjoying it. This is an easy project which I can bring out at knit and natter mornings when more nattering than crochet happens and my hook pretty much works by itself without needing my brain to engage. 

I've also got a new stash-buster blanket in the planning stages........

..........I have this vision in my Creative Mind, I can see it very clearly. The idea has been itching away and demanding attention, so I finally gave in and planned it all out. Scratched that creative itch (which felt so good). I've got in mind a simple colour-block blanket to use up all the odds and ends of yarn left over from recent blanket makes. I'm going to start it on Friday as I've got a train journey and a special weekend away with friends.

My days are full up, and I don't always feel like I cope very well, bobbing around on the wide surface of my life, keeping afloat as best as I can. I could do with a rest, a respite from the daily bobbing. I'll just keep my head above water and hope for the best eh........

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Slow Spring

Ahhh look, the first signs of Spring have arrived here in Atticland, what a joy to behold!

In the eight years that I've lived in this picturesque part of the world, I've learnt that March does not mean Spring for us, however much we might wish for it. Most years we get snowflakes thrown at us during this month (the first March we lived here, it snowed on Easter Sunday! We built a 5ft snowman!)

These snowy scenes arrived without warning during the first week of the month, giving us two days of the white stuff which quickly melted away down here in town....

....but stayed for days like a dusting of powdery sugar on the surrounding hills. And so this is the view from my Attic window in early March, definitely more than a hint of winter remaining. I really must try not to wish the days away, Spring will come in it's own sweet time. Mid April if we're lucky. So I quietly say Roll on April, I will be so, so, so ready for a taste of Spring by then.

Despite the chilly temperatures and snow dusted landscapes, we've had a fabulous and very welcome dose of sunshine here just lately.

Early last week J had a day off work so we headed out into the Yorkshire Dales to stroll across the hilltops. It was wonderful to be out and about, my first Proper Walk since the start of the year. I was so relieved to discover that my legs were back in action again, yippeeeeee for some energy in my muscles, if felt great! I confess I was very, very tired afterwards, but I was so glad that I felt strong enough to take on a five mile walk. Progress indeed.

We've been doing this short circular walk for about twenty years, J and I, often alone, sometimes with the Little People in tow. The combination of high hills, wide open grassland, pretty woodland and gorgeous riverside make this a real favourite jaunt at all times of the year - in Spring the woodland floor will be filled with bluebells here.

Even the short walk along the road is a pleasure,  I got a little bit excited over this glorious expanse of mossy wall. Like you do.

J and I have always loved this bit where large flat limestone rocks spread right down to the water's edge and we've had countless picnics and coffee stops on this sun warmed slab over the years. We saw a kingfisher flit past here last week, a quick flash of brilliant blue and then gone. Funnily enough the first thing that sprang to mind was sock yarn! I need to get out more.

The slow spring start has some definite advantages if you are of yarny persuasion, and during the past few weeks I've enjoyed a very welcome amount of sofa time ensconced with my Cupcake blanket. It's really coming on, only twelve more stripes to go (squeee!). I've also designed and sampled a new edging pattern for this blanket which I'm super happy with, can't wait to get onto the edge of the Edge with this Spring beauty.

The cold weather is also perfect for those of us who love cafés, and really there is nothing nicer than coming in out of the cold to settle down with a cup of something hot, delicious and frothy. On Sunday I went out into town with Little Lady, I needed to pick up a few bits from the shops that I'd forgotten in the week, but really it was an excuse for us to jaunt out together for an hour and sneak a quick café stop into the late morning. I tell you, that girl did not stop talking, even as she was spooning cream into her mouth from her loaded hot chocolate she was nattering on and on, it was a delight! Tales of friends, school, guinea pigs, manicure tips (I'm trying to grow my nails, she is my nail guru), ideas and plans and dreams and random thoughts came tumbling forth. Sweet girl of mine.

I have loved welcoming back my little patch of front garden crocus this week, the abundant sunshine  makes them open their petals right out (I feel like that too when the sun shines). The sight of them at the weekend inspired me to do a little bit of planting in my very small front garden....

I bought some cheap bulbs from the supermarket (two trays for £3, bargain), so I was able just to do a bit of digging and weeding with a small trowel and plop the shooting bulbs straight into the earth ready to grow and flower. I bought a tray of narcissus Minnow (little pale yellow narcissus) and some Muscari (grape hyacinths)...oh pale yellow and purply blue, I think it's going to look very sweet. I am so excited for them to  bloom, this is the first gardening I've done in an absolute age, and it feels fabulous to have an element of sweet floral anticipation back in my life.

I also planted out some tete a tete narcissus that had been blooming away in a corner of my backyard. These are the small pots of flowers that I have growing on my mantel indoors each year - I used to throw them away when they'd finished flowering, but then I realised that if I simply put the pots in a sheltered spot in my back yard they might possibly shoot and flower again the following year. What do you know, it actually happened! So into the soil they went this year, and I hope very much that they'll reappear again next Spring.

There is a bare patch of earth in the above photo, well it looks bare, but I sowed some seeds there.....

....I planted some Pot Marigolds in that small patch,  one of my most favourite summer flowers. I was going to put some nasturtiums in too, but read the seed packet and realised it's a little too early for them, so they'll go in once the bulbs have finished flowering. I haven't felt inspired to garden for a few years (my back yard had one of it's regular "fallow" years in 2015), but this year, I am keen, keen as mustard! Watch this space........

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Floral Delight

Autumn here this year is proving to be right up my street, and I am seriously loving these mellow, sunshiny days that still have a very slight tinge of summer to them. I bought myself some new socks yesterday, but much of the time I am still going sock-less, which really makes me feel oddly carefree and still very vaguely summerish. And yet it's November, and I can still manage to wear my red mary janes with no sockage! Happy days.

My back yard pots are beginning their sleepy descent towards hibernation now, but I just had to show you what my alive-not-dead clematis is up to......look! Look, look!! The buds are popping open one after another and I have a whole load of beautiful blooms to gaze at as I trundle in and out of the back door. I am so, so happy about the unexpected rising from the dead of this brave plant! I attempted to identify the flower this morning, and I think possibly it might be this one : Madame Julia Correvon. What do you think? Any knowledgable clematis lovers out there who can confirm? Anyhow, it really doesn't matter what her name is, but I just love that she is flowering at long last.

As I mentioned, the rest of the pots are looking green but sleepy. We've had some very cold nights just recently and now that we're in November I know that Jack Frost will be paying a visit very soon.

It means that gathering a small posy of flowers for the table is even more special than usual, as it may well be the last for this year.

I can never get enough of these intense bold colours, I really love them a lot. The reds, oranges, pinks and purples with a splash of yellow thrown in just sings Summer to me.

I've been thinking today about all the little back yard posies I've shared on my blog over the years, and how they always make me so happy.

Having a small jug or jar of homegrown blooms on the table really is one of life's true pleasures.

And yes, as you can see we're smack bang in the middle of a rekindled Hama bead obsession here at number 24. In her search on the www for cute little Kawaii designs to translate into Hama bead form, Little Lady has this very day discovered Pinterest. She has been genuinely thrilled to suddenly find all this amazing inspiration at her finger tips, and I know exactly how she feels. And I can also see a whole load of cute plastic animals and foodstuffs in my immediate future, awaiting my assistance at the ironing board. I've already melted a pencil (with personality), a cupcake and a pony. Could be worse I suppose, it beats ironing shirts.

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The Here and Now

Popping by to share some little snippets from the past week as I've been attempting to slow myself down and appreciate the here and now amidst the changing seasons. The gentle light, the glowing colours, the drift of leaves as they descend from the trees, the very feel of Autumn in the air. It's soft and mellow for the most part, and as I walk from school to town to home I find I'm beginning to enjoy the onset of Autumn. I'm even wearing woolly socks today which feels rather blissful actually after many months of bare feet, and they are bright scarlet (my socks not my bare feet).

Things in the back yard are slowly winding down, although I've just discovered that the clematis I had long thought was a gonna has suddenly sprung into belated action and is covered in several promising looking buds! I'm guessing it must be an Autumn flowering variety then, no wonder it was looking so dead during the summer. I cannot wait for the buds to open as I haven't a clue what the flowers will look like (I had even forgotten I had planted it), happy days. I'm absolutely delighted that my pots have done so well this year and that each week I've been able to pick a small posy to bring inside for the table. It makes me incredibly happy to do this simple thing, and has inspired me to try and plant even more lovely things in my back yard next year. We have a small squash sitting on the table at the moment, just because I saw it in the supermarket and loved it's shape and colours. Little B's pumpkin is currently the size of a smallish tomato so I don't think we need worry about the word "mammoth" just yet. He remains pleased as punch with it's progress though, which is just ace.

Right, I need to dash out soon and collect the aforementioned pumpkin-child from school. Thanks as ever for popping by and sharing my humble comings and goings. I'm working on some Yarndale write-ups this week and it's proving to be an emotional experience....wow, those mandalas! Just Wow.

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Out the Back

Often when I walk up or down my back street and catch sight of the flowers on top of my wall, it literally makes my heart leap with happiness. I swear it's a physical thing, a jolt of pure pleasure that flutters my heart then lands softly in the pit of my stomach.

My pots of cheap and cheerful summer annuals are really looking great I have to say. I've had those plastic green planters for many years, since before Little Man was born (so more than 12 years) and they have just about held it together this year although are broken and badly cracked in places. I've decided that next year it'll be time to replace them with some more big terracotta pots to go with the five already there. Those are old too, but still going good, they look better as they age.

I pottered about out the back here today, hanging out all the freshly washed shirts to dry, then deadheading my flowers and sweeping up a bit.

These straggly marigolds are still flowering well, their hardiness really surprises me and makes me happy. Those of you who've been visiting for a while may remember me planting the seeds into an old metal colander (two years ago), they just seem to survive and keep going year after year.

I re-potted Little B's pumpkin vine today too, I've been meaning to do it for weeks. I didn't have any spare pots so I've planted it straight into a full bag of compost (with drainage holes spiked all around the base) which I hope will do the trick. We love watching this vine grow and Little B is so proud of it. I don't expect it'll produce any pumpkins (we were too late planting it I think), but really that's beside the point. Watching the growth of those huge leaves is enough of a pleasure.

Just recently I confess I've been suffering from a little bit of Garden Envy. You know how it is when you kind of wish that you had something more out the back? Something bigger, greener, more room, better views, that kind of thing. We've been visiting friends and relatives lately who have houses with proper gardens, sitting out amidst their greenery and taking in their pleasant open vistas, admiring their carefully tended lawns, flower beds, trees and shrubs. Wishing just a little bit that we had a vegetable plot, some decking, a lawn, a summer house, a view.

And then I come home and reconnect with my teeny back yard and fall in love with it all over again, with the ease of it (just a watering can and a little bit of deadheading), and the cosy simplicity of it. I must keep remembering how lucky I am to have this modest back yard (we once lived in a second floor flat with no outside space at all), and to appreciate all the pleasure that it gives us.

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♥...more little snippets from the Attic...♥

Geranium Love

Five Daily Happies

Autumn Colour

Monday Moments

Gardening Activity

Today I introduced Little B to the idea of planting seeds. We had this great conversation on the way to nursery about how things grow from seeds and he told me all the things he would love to grow in our back yard. Watermelons were top of his list (they are his favourite fruit) followed by Elder flowers, then bananas. Oh dear. I felt really bad telling him no, nope, er-noooo to his three most favourite requests and seeing his enthusiasm dwindle in front of my eyes. But when he hit upon pumpkins as his fourth choice, well that was just brilliant. YES! Yes yes yes, let's see if we can grow a pumpkin! So on our way home from nursery we stopped at the shops and purchased a packet of Mammoth Pumpkin seeds. Slightly worried about the Mammoth word, but we will cross that particular bridge if and when we come to it.

He couldn't wait to get started, oh such excitement!

I gave him a flower pot, then he went to fetch his old plastic spade. I said he could use his hands for the compost but he was insistent that he do some proper shoveling with his spade, so I stood aside and let him do it His Way. We used an old plastic spoon as a dibber, and very soon three hopeful pumpkin seeds had been planted and carefully watered in.

We found a lolly stick and I told him the letters so that he could write his own label.

It was super sweet, a real delicious part of an otherwise ordinary, fairly mundane Monday. The whole experience reminded me of a very similar time with Little Lady six years ago, and also reminded me that I still have many of the very same seed packets lurking in the cellar!

I fetched them outside and we had a good look through the packets, opening them up so that I could show Little B how different all the seeds look. He was so full of excitement and begged for us to do some more, so I thought, what the heck, what have we got to lose? These seeds are old and I've got no idea whether they will actually work or not, but hey ho, we will give it a whirl.

We planted yellow and purple beans, cosmos (for Mummy) and two varieties of sunflower. Now I really must remember to water them (!)

It's coming together out here now, slowly but surely, although I would still love some bigger greener stuff. I keep visualising some huge pots filled with big lush green things, but those ideas will just have to wait a while.

For now, I'm really happy with my little pots filled with cheap n cheerful annuals, and somewhere cosy to sit a while when the sun is shining. Now then, here is a question for you.........

........shall I paint that wall????????????

It's in a dreadful state of disrepair and falling to bits, really it needs completely re-rendering and my idea is to eventually have a narrow raised bed built against it (using stone to match the house) for some permanent planting. But I'm toying with the idea of a quick fix for this summer and slapping on some paint.

Maybe white, or maybe a soft blue??

Or shall I just leave it be?

x

♥...more little snippets from the Attic...♥

Geranium Love

October 2012

Autumn Inspiration

Yarndale 2013 :: The Yarn Bombing