Birthday Cake

Better late, than never! 

Having written about missing not having a birthday cake on my birthday, I decided to make a `special` cake for tea today with my Mum.   So yesterday out came the mixer, tins, ingredients and I got baking.... and this is the result.    Not as professionally or artistically decorated as it could have been but time was short. 

The sponge, with a thick layer of chocolate buttercream filling and chocolate on top, was delicious, and thoroughly enjoyed by both my mum and myself!   Anyone fancy a piece?!

No Birthday Cake

Today is my birthday, and after spending the morning working as normal, I took the afternoon off. 

It was a nice sunny autumn afternoon, so I took my Mum out for a ride along the coast to Burnham Overy Staithe and we sat in the car by the water.  Very surprisingly for a sunny afternoon there was only one other car on the whole of the car park, so it was very quiet and peaceful.  As the sun went down there was a beautiful sunset.

Funny enough the one thing I missed this birthday, was not having a birthday cake - I don`t mean a highly decorated iced one with candles, but not having a home-made birthday cake of any kind.   Obviously as a youngster my mother had always made me a cake, and then when she became unable to stand to cook, I always made myself one.   Not a fruit cake, as I`m not fond of fruit cake, but usually an orange chocolate chip one, with chocolate on top to decorate it.    But, this year I`d not felt inclined to  bother to do that. I`m getting older and I didn`t think I`d miss it - but when it came to tea time - I did.
It`s strange isn`t it, how a small thing like that, which has been a part of the pattern of life, can be missed so much.  

Ring, ring!

I was sound asleep and dreaming, dreaming something about a piano being delivered and they`d then got to the front door and were ringing the door bell.

 The sound of that bell was so real.

And I awoke, and could still hear the bell ringing, it sounded like my front door bell.   It couldn`t be.  I looked at the bedside clock it was quarter to three in the morning.  It was dark.   Then I heard it again, yes it was my door bell.

I was alone in the house, I felt alarmed.   Whatever it is, I`m not going to answer the door I thought.  It must be teenagers on the way home playing about.   It went again.    So I stumbled out of bed and went into the other room to look out of the window and down to the front door.    I couldn`t see anyone there, nor anyone in the road.   Did  I imagine it?   I looked at my car, yes that was still there ok.    I went back to bed.

A few minutes later my phone rang.    What to do?   Should I answer it or not.   By now I was feeling more alarmed, I could feel my heart thumping,  perhaps something was wrong and someone was really trying to get me.   I looked at the number showing on the phone, it was a mobile number, so that didn`t tell me anything. 

To answer it or not?   I decided I`d better answer it, so I picked it up and said a very curt  `Yes`, not my normal way of answering the phone.   I somehow expected to hear no reply, but a voice said, It`s Xxx...... I`m so sorry to ring you in the middle of the night, but I`ve just driven all the way up to here (the house next to mine) and I`ve been trying for half an hour to get my key to open the door and it won`t, can I bother you for the key you hold. 

Putting on my dressing-gown I went downstairs and got the key for him.   So relieved that it wasn`t bad news or anything like that.    Then I went back to bed, but sleep was a long while returning.

All Saints Day

Today is All Saints Day and is the day that was also my Dad`s birthday. Tonight our church held its special service for All Saints Day and the coming All Souls Day.

As we entered the church we were all given a stone. During the service we were encouraged to think about that stone as our loved ones who were no longer with us and to think of the journey of our life that they had shared with us. We then brought these stones to the front of the church and built them together into a cairn.

Following the very moving sermon by our minister, we were invited to come and place lighted tea-lights on the cairn in memory and giving thanks for our loved one. The church lights were then dimmed and we sat as long as we each wished before quietly leaving the church.

It was a very special, emotional, meaningful and moving service.

What is Life?

I was very challenged today, when a friend, who was obviously feeling a bit "down" on having discovered that something he had hoped for most possibly wouldn`t be able to happen for them (and I`m not refering to material things), suddenly said a very serious "What is Life?"

How to answer?
- I thought for a moment and then said "that`s a very deep question".   I sat and thought, but I couldn`t find words to really answer it, and I ended up saying "that`s something that very difficult to describe and to put into words".  

I felt that I had let him down, by not being able to give a better answer.  And that he was probably expecting a better answer from my faith.

I wonder what answer others would have given or what any of you would advise me to say if a similiar situation arises again?

Thank God for a bus

One of the memorable things about my recent holiday was something that happened on the second morning there.

Living in Norfolk we have few, if any steep hills around where I live, so although I had been to North Yorkshire several years ago, I`d forgotten quite how steep some of those hills were.

When I arrived I safely navigated my way down steep hills to the flat where I was staying.  The next morning deciding to go out for the day, I ofcourse had to drive up the hill, so knowing the road I had come down was steep and twisty I decided to try the other one out of the village.   But, that was just as steep and I found myself stalling the car and struggling to get up it.

So, the next morning I was very apprehensive about going out with the car, as which ever way I went I had to go up a steep twisting narrow road.   I knew I couldn`t stay in the small village for every day of my holiday, for one thing there was no grocers or butchers and I needed some food!  And common sense said to me, you`ll have to go up the hill when you leave on Saturday and the longer you wait the worse you`ll get about it.

I got into the car, praying that I`d get up the hill ok.  

As I left the driveway of the flats, a bus was just pulling away from the bus-stop in the road, `Oh, no`, I thought `I`ve got to follow that bus I just hope he doesn`t have to stop at a bus-stop on the hill`.   But, as we began the ascent of the hill, I found myself thinking `Well, if he can get that bus safely up the hill, and he`s much bigger and heavier than me, I must be able to do it`.   And I did, very easily!     I found myself then thanking God for sending that bus to guide me up the hill that morning. I think it`s something I shall always remember of God answering prayer.

Holiday favourites

Here are a few of my favourite scenes from my holiday

Yes, the sky really was that colour, and shortly a heavy shower fell!

Memories of bygone days

An old village street.....

An old village store and post office.... 

....inside the village store......

....what memories it even brought to me of some of the items on the shelves. It made me feel quite old!  All the village from the chemist shop with all its wooden drawers and glass fronted cabinets full of pills, potions and equipment, the dairy with its churns and butter pats, to the wash-house with its old mangle and dolly tub was an intersting insight into how different life was years ago. How much harder even the ordinary everyday tasks were.

And, at the bottom of the garden was ....Lila Cottage.....

So named, it was said, as lilac bushes used to be grown all beside it, to try and mask the smell !

No. I don`t remember using one of those!  



To see more of this fascinating place click here

Steps and more steps

One thing that came to me during my holiday was a great admiration for the people of past generations, for how fit and active they must have been, to have lived daily climbing all the hills and steps of this small village. 

And, as to the workmen who had built all the cottages and houses in such a hilly location, bringing their materials up and down the hills and the narrow passageways, what muscles they must have had.  Or, did they bring the stones, tiles, wood and other materials by sea to build with.   Yet, either way they would have needed to either go up or down the steep slopes.




What, I wonder made them decide to build where they did.  And to build such tall thin houses.   No planning rules and regulations in those days! 

It was a lovely, quaintly beautiful place to stay for a holiday and to explore with all it`s nooks and crannies - but would I want to live there all year, especially in the winter, with snow and ice on those hills - no thank you!

I`m Back

I`m back, and once I got used to driving up and down lots of hills and climbing steps and hills (!) I had a great holiday.

On arrival at the place where I`d booked a flat to stay in for the week, I opened the downstairs outside door, and immediately wondered if I`d done the right thing, it smelt musty and was rather dark.  I couldn`t see a light switch (and never did the whole week!), but I climbed up the twisting carpeted stairs to find the door of the flat, opened it very dubiously.  On entering I was faced with four closed doors, again it didn`t feel welcoming and my immediate thoughts were, I want to go home.   But I opened the doors one at a time, and found the rooms to actually be light, bright and big and airy.  I propped all the doors open and immediately it felt better.

I enjoyed the freedom of staying in a flat as opposed to a B&B or hotel, which I`d always done in the past, especially on one morning when it was very windy and rainy, so I just stayed in and relaxed with a book and didn`t fell obliged to go out, in the way I would have done in more formal places.  The whole holiday was very relaxing and just what I needed. (except for all the many, many phone calls from my mother!, but more of that another day)


I kept my camera busy all the holiday and have taken lots and lots of photos - will post some in the next few days. 

Just One Day to go!

Just one more day, and I shall be off on holiday.   

I eventually plucked up enough courage on Sunday afternoon to tell my Mother - at first I thought she hadn`t taken it too badly, she seemed interested and asked me several questions, but as I left her that evening she began to get tearful.

After getting home, she rang me full of tears and full of "reasons" why she didn`t want me to go - didn`t want me driving all that way on my own, and couldn`t I at least not go so far;   who was going to look after my little pet bird (I`d already arranged for a friend to do that!) etc...etc...

Monday was much about the same with her.   On Tuesday I went over to see her, and she seemed more like her normal self.   That`s good, I thought, she`s accepted it.

But, come Wednesday morning I had her on the phone early in the morning full in tears again, this time I think a combination of worry about me, and also her carers had told her that a blood test and water test which she`d had taken a week of two ago had got lost so the needed to do it again.   She ofcourse didn`t think that they`d lost them, but that something was wrong with her so they needed another one.     I tried to convince her that it was probably right that they`d mislaid them, but she was full of "I`ll be in hospital when you`re away, and you`ll be a long way away....." etc.  
She still sounds weepy today.

I`m not looking forward to having to go and see her tomorrow and especially of the reaction I`ll get when I come away.    I`ve promised her that I`ll ring her every day while I`m away, but have warned her that because it will be mobile phone, she must realise that in some area`s of the country there isn`t a good signal.

So wish me luck!

High Tide

Yesterday evening, being a nice sunny evening, I took my Mother for a ride to Blakeney, to sit by the water there for a while.

As we approached the quay, I said to her `I think the tide`s going to be in` as I could see as we went down the narrow hill into the village the water in the distance, which last night looked to be have something disticitively different about the view.    (Usually the tide nearly always seems to be out whenever we go there).   As we reached the car park, it was still quite full of cars, and driving on we could see why - the tide was in, and very high, but we managed to find just one parking space left away from the water`s edge.

I got my camera and got out of the car to take some pictures of the sights before us.

And, along with the vessels normally in the water was......

  Obviously parked too near the tideline when the tide was out, and the occupants gone off for a walk.  Quite a crowd of people gathered watching it as the tide continued to edge higher
.

Plucking up Courage

A week today I`ll be heading off for a holiday in North Yorkshire.   The first holiday I`ve had away for three and a half years. 

But.... before that, I`ve got to pluck up the courage to tell my Mother that I`m going away. 

I didn`t tell her when I booked it months ago, as I know she`d try to put all kinds of obstacles in the way and get wound up and worried.    I know she`ll still do that, but at least for a lot less time, only 7 day instead of weeks and weeks.   She always imagines that something is going to happen to me, like an accident if I`m driving anywhere (not that I`m a careless driver, but it`s all the others on the road she says! yet she loves getting the car and going out with me).    
I`m sure it`s more a case that she`s thinking of herself and what she`s do if anything did happen to me, she keeps saying I`m all she`s got.   Which is so possessive and selfish.  Where she lives she has carers on hand 24 hours a day so she`s well looked after.

I`ve never found it easy to tell my mother anything, and I`ve been trying to analyse why.   It makes me now wonder if I`m actually afraid of her, and always have been in some way.  Not that she`ll physically hurt me, although as a child she was the one who would hit me at times if she thought I`d done something wrong, I can never remember my Dad hitting me. 

I know envy is wrong, but I do so envy those daughters who have such a good relationship with their mums.  I`ve never had that. 

So, wish me luck as I pluck up courage today, or tomorrow, or the next day......

First Harvest

At last I`ve got my first Harvest of the year.   As I wrote in an earlier post all I`ve managed to grow this year is a really, really good crop of weeds, but yesterday my patience was rewarded and I got my first vegetables from the garden for this year......

Yes...just 4 runner beans!


but there are others forming on the plant - but I guess they`ll all be ready to eat on the week I go away on holiday - so I`ll miss out again.  

Floral sea

Today was Sea Sunday at our church, and yesterday was my turn to do the flowers for the weekend, so of course out came the crab pot and net from our storage shed.

On starting to unroll the net (an authentic fishing net from years ago), in front of the pulpit, I suddenly looked down at the floor, and there marching across the carpet were a whole army of woodlice!.... they`d obviously got into the net whilst it had been in the shed.   So what to do about them before they got loose and invaded all the church, I could just picture them creeping on everyone during the service!  The quickest solution  was to stamp on them.  Anyone looking in the church must have thought I was doing a war dance!    

Thankfully, I remembered that the caretaker was on the premises cleaning, so he came through with his hoover and helped me unroll the rest of the net and hoovered them all up.  I kept my eye about whilst completing the flower arrangement, and during service this evening, but thankfully didn`t spot, or feel(!) any.

Here is the arrangement, I don`t think you can see any woodlice there!

Hunt the vegetables!

Earlier this year, full of the feeling of spring I set to work on my vegetable patch and set carrot and beetroot seeds and some onion sets, looking forward to being able to enjoy home grown produce during the summer.  A few weeks later, there were tiny green seedlings beginning to appear.  Something I always marvel to see.   As the weeks went on I realised that the tiny green stems and leaves which were appearing weren`t my vegetables but were weeds.    So, a dilemna, do I pull them out and risk loosening any baby vegetable seedlings which may be starting to grow, or do I leave them until I can see what is what.    I decided to leave them.  After a few weeks still no carrots had appeared, but the beetroot had.   So I very carefully, on my hands and knees, picked out all the weeds. 

But, after a few days I looked again and the weeds were back twice as big as before, but the beetroot had got no bigger, and still no carrots, and the onion sets weren`t showing much signs of life either apart from about half a dozen of them.     I again went to work on the weeds and removed them.

After the third or fourth time of doing this, I got so disheartened that my veg weren`t growing that I gave up - so here is my veg (weed) patch!    At least the runner beans which I started off in pots and set out later seem now to be doing and have some flowers on them, so hopefully I`ll at least get a crop of them.

Somewhere in among there, should be a few onions and a few beetroot - anyone want to come and find them?!

The patch is fenced in to keep neighbourhood cats out, because they caused damage last year to my vegetables by scapping and leaving `little messages`, the fencing has kept them out but -  how do I keep weeds out??

Earliest cooking memories

I`ve a friend staying for a few days, so I did a batch of baking on Saturday, something I`ve not done for quite a while. But I found myself really enjoying getting into it again.  I made some sultana scones, a cherry cake and an apple pie, the apple pie we had for lunch yesterday.

Eating the scones and some of the cake for tea tonight, we got round to discussing our earliest memories of getting involved with baking and cooking.   And I found myself remembering when I was very little (and that`s many, many years ago now!)  how when my Mum made pastry, she would always give me a little piece of it to roll out with my little rolling pin, then I had a tiny (I think it was a silver thimble) to use to cut out little rounds, and place on a tiny tart tin, then put a minute amount of jam in them and she would bake them.  When my Dad used to come home from work I used to give him the little tarts I`d made for his tea.   Only as I grew older did I discover that he didn`t really like jam tarts!

I wonder what any readers first memories are of cooking/baking?   

 

Building space

What a difference a few bricks make.  My front garden wall and fence over the past months has been getting worse and worse.  Pieces of the fence were beginning to come loose and fall off, depite me trying to knock them back in, the bricks were flaking along the top.   So the time had come to do something about it.

Having measured up the wall, I ventured into the unknown (the local builders merchants, feeling very unsure of myself) to buy some bricks and coping stones.  A very helpful salesman there helped find what I needed, and the materials were duly delivered.

Last week my special builder, Dave, arrived, and set to work to remove the fence, the old bricks and rebuild me a smart new wall with a pillar at the end to finish it off nicely.   What a difference it makes.

As I drove my car into the drive the next day, something seemed strange..... No, I didn`t drive into the wall !.....  I seemed to have a much wider entrance.   It`s not physically possible to be any bigger because the wall and pillar are in exactly the same place, but it does seem a bigger entrance, so it must somehow be an optical illusion.  

I`m really pleased with the new look it gives as one comes along the road to my house too.   A job very well done.

Bird watching

Sitting in the car on a cliff top carpark having a picnic tea the other day, I spotted a flash of colour as a small bird sped past the car window and settled on a branch of the straggly bushes infront of it.   I quickly realised that it was a bird I don`t see many of about here, so out came my camera.   It was a goldfinch.  Such pretty little birds.    But, I think quite camera shy, as this one sat facing the sea, so all I could get was sight of the back of him.

 But eventually my patience was rewarded and he turned to look at me

It makes me admire and realise the many, many, many hours of patience and time that the cameramen for nature programmes must spend, to get some of the wonderful pictures and films which they do.

Back again

I guess it`s time I started to keep my blog up again, somehow I got so inundated with jobs both before and after a large Flower Festival that I`ve not had time to post anything - so just to start it off again, here`s a couple of pictures of what kept me so occupied for most of July.

The overall theme was "A World of Colour"

and this is depicting the "The Colour of Stained Glass".