laughing out loud

I'm listening to Rainbow Valley and this made me laugh out loud:

"As for Norman Douglas, he is a perfect heathen. When the last minister asked him why he never went to church he said, 'Too many ugly women there parson, too many ugly women.' I should like to go to such a man, Mrs. Doctor dear, and say to him solemnly, 'There is a hell.'" - Susan Baker.

knit and natter returns

Well, it has been a month of silence here on the blog... 50-60 hour work weeks and trips to Paris just aren't that conducive to writing, at least for me! I hope to do a few catching up posts, but for now this is what I am knitting and reading this week. Or, more correctly, what I finished knitting and reading!

Over the weekend I finished a hat for my sister's birthday on Saturday. It's the Purl Beret and I knit it up in a pink/purple alpaca. She moved to PA about a year ago and as far as I know has yet to purchase a winter hat. (This knowledge is based solely on the fact that in the pictures of her outside in the snow this past winter she is wearing a scarf like a babushka...)
I'm hoping that the colour of the hat matches the colours in a woven scarf I brought back from Ireland for her about five years ago.

This week I finished reading Anne of Ingleside by Lucy Maud Montgomery and The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. I've been listening my way through the Anne books via librivox this year, but Anne of Ingleside is not in the public domain so I was happy to find it in a wee shop across the street from me that gives cash for old clothes and sells second hand books for 50p. I have been "reading" The Woman in White for the better part of this year with Heather on the CraftLit Podcast. We finally reached the end this weekend and it was SO good! Highly recommend both the podcast and this not-so-well-known-in-America British classic. (Rosie, if you're reading this I think you would really enjoy this book and hearing it read by some great voices...)

I feel like I should have lots to natter about today having been gone for so long, but all I can think about is that the sun is shining and I want to get outside and enjoy it! (We have had precious little warm, sunny days this summer here in Belfast.)

You can see the other yarn along posts this week here.

knit and natter

Better late than never with this week's yarn along post!

I had a crazy week last week. I went from maybe getting about eight hours at McDonald's to starting two new jobs and getting 45 hours. Quite a change! On top of that I was manning the prayer room at Summer Madness, a Christian youth festival, over night on Monday and had my first night out with Street Pastors on Friday. I think I'm still catching up on sleep!

So, all that to say I'm still working on the bunny. She is almost finished. Since this photo was taken I finished off the second leg so I just have ears and assembling to go. Baby Elloise's due date is getting closer so I'm hoping to get bunny in the mail this weekend.

I'm reading Developing Learning in Early Childhood by Tina Bruce which is obviously for school. The coming year of our course is apparently very demanding and we were advised to do research work over the summer to help lighten the load a bit. Advice taken!

I had a funny moment while eating Mexican with some friends on Tuesday where I was pulling out things about egocentrism and other technical jargon from what I've been reading... I guess it's really getting in there!

That's all, not much nattering this week. I will have a post in the next few days about the 12th of July celebrations here in Belfast. This was my first year here for them and my observations were very educational.

You can link up with the other yarn along posts here.

paris apartments

I'm heading to Paris for the first time in a couple weeks and this is (as near as I could get to) where we're staying!!! SO excited! 5 minutes walk from the Louvre and 15 from Notre Dame!

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a little ivy

I just finished watching the BBC drama/documentary Vincent van Gogh: Painted in Words. It's really very good. Such a sad story and the combination of it and the nostalgia it awoke in me left me in tears. I used to paint and draw. Years and year ago. I had an amazing teacher who inspired and provided freedom and space. When we asked her opinion about a work or what we should do to improve it she always said, "You are the artist, what do you think?" I learned later that such a teacher is a rare and precious gift.

But we moved away and besides leaving this amazing teacher behind my time was also taken with school and work and a long commute to both. And we lived in such a little house that we were all on top of each other and there was no space for creativity. So all my art supplies stayed in boxes. Every once in a while I'd pull out a sketch book and some pencils, when the urge grew too loud to ignore. But after time it became easier and easier to ignore, until it was hardly ever there. And now I go years at a time without even sketching.

It's been nearly 13 years since that move and in all other respects it has been one of the best things that ever happened to me individually and to my family as a whole. But there still is, locked away inside of me, an artist. An artist who longs to feel the swirl of oil paint on my brush and smell linseed oil and follow the curves and lines of my subject and blend just the right shades of colour. An artist's whose eyes still know how to see.

source

The closing shot of the film is of van Gogh's grave in France which is covered in ivy. At my last lesson my art teacher gave me a clipping of ivy. She had a large, lovely plant of it grown from a clipping she had taken from his grave and smuggled through customs in her bra. I don't have much of a green thumb and my little clipping thrived for a while but died about four years ago. But I still have a little sketch I did of it when it was young and green and I will never forget what it represents.

veg box

It's so much fun to receive my fruit and veg box that I thought I'd make a little feature of it here on the blog. What I got and what I made with it. This is my box from two weeks ago as it's been rather busy around here. I had cabbage and cauliflower and grapes and all kinds of goodness.
A conversation with someone at my new job at Debenhams inspired the idea of stuffing my beautiful red pepper. I haven't done a proper grocery shop for a while so didn't have rice or ground beef or the typical ingredients for stuffing. No worries! I cooked up a bunch of veg; carrots, cauliflower, onion, garlic, cabbage, mixed it all together and stuffed it with that.
Pretty tasty!
There was plenty of extra "stuffing."
Which I had for lunch one day with oatcakes and for dinner another with sausages and the last of the sparkling pink lemonade which I bought as a 4th of July treat.
Nothing too exciting or fancy. Just simple, hearty, healthy meals. That's good stuff!