The Weekly

I think winter might be here. And despite winter often accompanying some of my darkest days it is one of my most favourite times of the year too. An oxymoron perhaps, loving those days in which I mentally struggle so, but I love the peaceful candlelight, the bright festive lights and cosy knits, blankets and fires. Perhaps I need the darkness to fully appreciate the light. Who knows.

Anyway, the dark evenings allowed us to fill our flat with both candlelight and our friends, in honour of our daughter's naming ceremony. I will write more about the actual ceremony over on The Little Pip, which should, crossed fingers, be back up and running, but as this is my diary blog etc etc, I thought it appropriate to mention it here too. Lifts the spirits somewhat it does, seeing your sitting room cleared of furniture and instead filled with nearly 50 of your friends and family. I rather recommend it, actually.

The other thing I have spent time doing this week is planning a potential trip away for a weekend with my sister in a couple of weeks. I would rather appreciate your help actually. Can anyone recommend somewhere that they have actually stayed which is warm(ish) in mid December, near enough that we can go for only 4 days, is lovely enough that we can stay in the hotel if the weather is miserable but is perhaps interesting enough so that we can leave it too. Ideally, there would be a spa or hamman in the hotel, or nearby. Crucially, it must be reasonably priced. And sadly, sadly, not Morocco as we are planning to fly using my Dad's airmiles and we can't fly to Morocco for the dates we have in mind on airmiles. I'm not counting out the UK either, so please, share anywhere nice that you've been in December...

{photos of Pip's party taken by my father}

The weekly

i love autumn. The colour of the air and the leaves are beautiful. on saturday we walked across hampstead heath to hampstead village in the late afternoon sunshine. the baby slept in her pram, the wheels encased in mud & then we joined our good friends for hot mulled wine and beer, sitting at a table outside in the gathering dusk.

the baby has been driving me a little mad recently, and my little pip blog has been hacked for the third time, which is why it's offline again. i've been feeling a bit rubbish really, so the walk across the heath really helped. sadly, it was raining again this morning and my migraine still wouldn't shift. i tried to dose it with a strong monmouth coffee at my favourite scandinavian cafe followed by our weekly sing and sign class. no luck. i thought waiting in the rain for a taxi, accompanied by a baby in a carseat, shouting, and a cat in a basket, might do the trick. not even the taxi never arriving and having to hail a black cab for a trip to the vets to check on delilah's bloods helped. never mind, there's always tomorrow ...

The Weekly

All weeks should include two bank holidays. Wednesday felt like Monday and then it was the weekend. As a bonus, this weekend was also half term, which meant that my teaching friends were around to hang out with. In other exciting news, I went on a bus on my own with Pip in her pram, and bought an amazing vintage dress (post coming soon once I've taken some photos in better light - if you follow me on twitter you may already have seen some rather poorly light snaps taken in the shop). The shop itself is a newly opened vintage shop just down the road, which pleased me no end, as I do like living close to a well edited vintage shop.

This weekend, the baby meets her third great-grandmother (and second great-grandfather). This time, it is my maternal grandmother and I look forward to having a photo of 4 generations of daughters. It also happens to my grandmother's birthday. On one of my excursions pottering around my local shops, I came across these cards by Anna Wright. I fell in love with her drawings, and could have happily bought the whole series and framed them for my wall. Which if we did not live in a rented flat where we have yet to even hang the paintings and prints we already own, I would have done. Thankfully, I am starting to learn my limits. Instead, I bought a couple. A Prickle of Hedgehogs for my sister; the Chinoise Ladies for my grandmother. 

Her present? Jubilee Lines. A book of poetry commissioned by Carol Ann Duffy for the diamond jubilee. 60 poems, one for every year of the Queen's reign, written about that year, by contemporary poets. My birth year is by Simon Armitage, about the Falklands. I do hope that Grannie hasn't already got it, or read it. It was she and my grandfather who introduced me to poetry as a young child (literally, about 3 or 4, and we had books of poems for 4 year olds and so on) and with whom I have shared years of poetry books and discussions. Carol Ann Duffy is a particular favourite of mine. I have written, I'm sure (although I cannot find it) of stumbling across a collaboration at Glastonbury between Duffy and jazz musician Eliana Tomkins called Rapture, where first Duffy recited the poem, then Tomkins played/sang her version, accompanied by a guitarist. I had left my husband and friends doing their own "thing"and had wondered off on my own, and it was the perfect thing to come across. I remember being particularly taken with the juxtaposition of poety, dried mud, wellies and waterproofs, listening to words of text messages being sent like bullets, the phone as a gun in a holster, words able to wound. 

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There the great gathered with gallant allies, 

massing on the foreshore, fitted out marvellously. 

Dukes and statesmen, some strutting on their steeds, 

Earls of England, armies of archers, 

stout sheriffs shouting sharp instructions 

to the troops who rallied before the Round Table, 

assigning soldiers to certain lords 

on the seafront, in the south, at their sovereign's say so. 

The barges being ready they rowed to the beach 

to ferry aboard horses and fine battle-helmets, 

loading the livestock in their livery and tack, 

then the tents, the tough shields, tools to lay siege, 

canopies, kit bags, exquisite coffers, 

ponies, hackneys, horses-of-armour . . . 

thus the stuff of stern knights was safely stored. 

And when all stock was stowed they stalled no longer, 

timing their untying with the turn of the tide; 

ships of all sizes ran up their sails, 

all unfurling at the moment of their monarch's command, 

and hands at the gunwales hauled up the great anchors, 

watermen wise to the ways of the waves. 

The crew at the bow began coiling in the cables 

of the carriers and cutters and Flemish crafts; 

they drew sails to the top, they tended the tiller, 

they stood along the starboard singing their shanties.

So the port's proudest ships found plentiful depth 

and surged at full sail into changeable seas. 

Without anyone being hurt they hauled in the skiffs: 

shipmates looked sharp to shutter the portholes 

and tested depth by lowering lead from the luff. 

They looked to the lodestar as daylight lessened, 

reckoned a good route when mist rose around them, 

used their knowing with the needle-and-stone through the night, 

when for dread of the dark they dropped their speed, 

all the seadogs striking the sails at a stroke.

Task Force

Simon Armitage

via here

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Chinoise Ladies

Strike a Pose

The Crew

A Prickle of Hedgehogs

Speed Dating

By Anna Wright via here and here

The weekly

It's been a week of ups and downs. Whilst there have been flashes of sunshine, both literally and metaphorically, I feel like I've been wading through greyness and puddles for the vast majority of the week.

This morning though, M surprised me with a massage that he had organised secretly for me, followed by lunch, then pottering in the local shops, where we bought Pip a sun hat and a beautiful pair of organic cotton chocolate leggings (which she loved so much she immediately pooped on them). We then bought cheese, bread and salad for supper and had tea and cake in a lovely Danish cafe - although bizarrely, we actually were drawn in because they serve Monmouth coffee - that we hadn't been in before, but which I would recommend.

Yesterday, I met M's dad for lunch and then pottered in the shops, idly looking for something to wear that I can still breastfeed in and trying on boots that I can't afford, before returning home and having tea and biscuits with an old friend. As soon as I have the photos of her present, I will be sharing them, because they are too gorgeous not to.

It was only yesterday and today that doing normal things, with the addition of the baby, felt, well, pretty much normal. I'm not sure why this surprised me, that it took so long, because every time we make any changes to either our living situation or my working situation, I feel out of sorts for at least three or four weeks. And Monday will be four weeks.

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Photo by caravinagre via flickr

The Weekly

On Monday, on the way to work, I saw the first lambs in the fields. I bought two bunches of daffodils for the house; they are faring as well and as brightly as the ones that have started flowering on the verges. Spring is here, on Exmoor, briefly at least. I fear that the snow forecast for the hills and moors this weekend might put a stop to Spring, at least for a while. But it can't stop the lengthening evenings, nor the fact that it was just about light when I left work at 5pm on Friday. After the long winter nights, the lengthening daylight brings hope, new beginnings. And, all being well, new babies. I washed my first load of baby suits this afternoon, stacked the tiny pile in the airing cupboard, ready, if needed, to be transferred to a hospital bag. Or, I hope, transferred to a new flat. The tiny mitts getting ready to house the tiny hands that are currently poking away at my rib cage. But not too soon; I'm working for another 4 weeks, and then there's another 5 weeks until full term. 5 weeks which I need, to unpack two years of county living back into a London flat and to organise ourselves. By which time, it should well and truly be spring, even in London. 

The Weekly

This week was hard. But got better, ending with a lovely weekend alone with my Husband and Delilah, sitting in front of the fire and doing basically eff all. This afternoon we went to collect some nappies from freecycle, before having a rather lovely pub lunch (marred only slightly by a bunch of posh tw*ts who had booked seating for 20 and turned up an hour late, rahhing at everything) and then a short walk in the fading afternoon sunshine to Tarr Steps before driving back over the moor listening to Pink Floyd.

As you can see from the photo above, my body shape is changing. I've managed to keep my baby bump fairly well hidden until recently, but this week, I've not been able to get my coat done up all the way, and judging from my increased rib discomfort and heartburn, things are only set to get more uncomfortable. Less than three calender months until my due date though, so in no time at all it won't be rib discomfort keeping me awake...

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Tarr Steps by me using iPhone. Me, by Husband, also using iPhone.

The Weekly

It seems to be autumn, here on exmoor. We have been busy picking blackberries in the last of the August sunshine, to freeze for our Christmas jam. The annual making of jam, chutney and other food presents, which I keep mentioning but never manage to write about. We've had a succession of amazing guests this past month. We started with Cate and her family ( formerly of Project Subrosa) where we enjoyed a lovely weekend eating nice food and entertaining Talia with a trip to our local acquarium which I thoroughly enjoyed. Perhaps almost as much as Talia did. We then spent bank holiday weekend with some friends in a field at a rave followed by a day with my youngest sister and her boyfriend. This weekend, M's brother and his wife and their two month old baby are here. I have been thoroughly enjoying helping look after him and spending the remainder of the time curled up in front of the fire with my sister in law, catching up on several months worth of gossip and conversation.

The weekly

Last week I half-heartedly started a meme on insta.gram called #weekinthelife. Even as someone who documents a lot of things, either visually with my phone or "verbally" on twitter, I really wasn't very successful at it. I will try again this week and see if my efforts are more numerous/interesting.

That said, I did do some fun stuff last week. I started a pole fitness course on Tuesdays and learnt the basics of three lift/spins. Pole fitness is bloody hard work and also resulted in me becoming the *proud* owner of a rather unflattering pair of black lycra shorts. Nothing sexy about these babies. It's all about leaving enough leg to grip the pole but enough lycra to rotate round the pole with... I followed the pole course with pilates on Wednesday, which I tried once or twice when I was younger and didn't get it. But now older, less toned and far more stressed, pilates seems to be the perfect third bedfellow of my exercise triumvirate.

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Photos - iphone snaps by me

1. wine which husband brought back from France, drunk together over supper
2. watching the sunset over the Bristol channel from the perfect vantage point also known as the village hall carpark
3. moroccan evening at the local health food shop.
4. stripes over stripes for a hot evening
5. getting ready to go out (girl in cafe "wow, you look really different when you go out and have no glasses on. you look really nice". note to self - try getting up earlier and making more of an effort)
6. watching/listening to a friend DJ in a bar whilst drinking mojitos.