Perseverance and progress

A day spent online has produced results. Not a lot else has been done but I have discovered a great deal more than I could possibly have hoped. Sadly, not all records are free of charge but I managed to make considerable progress with the Williamses. Lessons have been learned, not least of which has been to make meticulous notes at the time. I thought I had noted some things but obviously had not. I thought I had added some information to the relevant record but it was not there. I am now wondering if I have been looking at an earlier version of a tree. Moving from one computer to another, backing up laptops, transferring data is rarely done with military precision and now I am paying the price. Some months ago I sat down with a fellow family historian and we cleansed the data for one branch of a family tree. It took a considerable amount of time but, at the time, felt entirely worthwhile and today, with the wonderful benefit of hindsight, I know that this is what must be done. I sometimes like to refer to a "work in progress" but if that means slipshod records then it is not worth the extra time it then takes to reassess and reassemble and wonder why it wasn't done right in the first place.

A name like Williams

My family history research today is concentrated on the surname "Williams" - one of the most popular surnames in the united kingdom and particulary in Wales where this branch of the family originate. My delight at the first names of Edward and Inkerman was short lived when I discovered two men of exactly the same name born in exactly the same registration district in exactly the same year. Fortunately for me, though not for him, one of them died prematurely I eventually discovered and it is now the family of the survivor of the two Edwards that I am investigating. Family legend has one child moving to the US and marrying "Fannie" - but it may have been another great uncle. Perhaps it was the one who was the taxidermist asked to go to the Antarctic with Scott but who declined? Then there may be some connection to the cousin who somehow became a colonel in the American army during the civil war and latterly became the American consul in Wales? Endless family stories but little fact upon which to establish a link. Some lateral thinking and the use of google maps to establish proximity have extended the family one generation and now there is the wonderful added element of what could be an unusual first name to investigate if only it was more legible on the 1911 census record.

Clocks

After 31 years and two months the carriage clock on the mantlepiece has stopped. Changing clocks back an hour every October has never been my favourite pastime. I hate dark mornings and dark evenings in equal measure and today, whilst altering the cloc,k that was a wedding present from Charlie and June, it stopped and cannot be persuaded to revive. I find myself disproportionately anxious and cross when things do not work and the clock stopping was quickly followed by the printer deciding not to print - again. Patience won on this occasion and the recipe for apple chutney has now printed - twice. Back to clocks. The gap had to be replaced and a search revealled a pleasant carriage clock which would not look amiss. A previously undiscovered plaque on its back identified that it had been given to my mother as a retirement present by the children at the school where she taught for many years. It seems appropriate that it should replace the defunct wedding present. A further clock, with a clearer face, was then brought back to life with a new battery and that is now alongside the Wedgwood box which was always kept in my parents' bedroom and is now in my sitting room. The box has a chipped lid and I never recall it being in perfect condition. I imagine that it was meant for keeping "trinkets". We don't talk about trinkets any more but it is a lovely word. I imagine that my son would have loved that word as a child. Some words are quite delightful: delicate, delightful, squashy, bubbling,juxtaposition. Changing the clocks as a term only brings thoughts of frustration that, yet again, I did not make a note last year about how to change the time on the range, the microwave, the boiler. I actually don't think that the microwave has ever had the correct time but does it matter? I understand that in Russia they are staying on summer time. As someone about to fly across a number of time zones I wonder why it all seems so complicated.

Muddy hens

Going down to collect the eggs today wearing a pair of mules was not a good idea. The grass was wet and my feet were soaking by the time I reached the mudbath that is the hens' home for those months of the year when rainfall exceeds sunshine. A trip back to the house and shaking out the summer detritus from the wellies. The wonderful pair of Wellington boots - the mainstay of the garden and  the field for most of the year. Easy to slip on; not great for walking great distances but perfect for collecting eggs and generally seeing to the hens. Three eggs today - all covered in mud - a blue one from a Columbine, a speckled brown from either the Speckled Star or the Brown Star and a pale brown from one of the Bluebells. A couple of handfuls of corn as an afternoon treat and some fresh water and hens fed and watered and as comfortable as they can be for the rest of the day. As the days have grown shorter and they have been spending more hours inside it is evident that the pecking order has resumed and a couple of the hens have noticeably lost feathers around their necks. Their insistence on all going into one henhouse at nighfall does not help the crowding issue. Yanking out a few to equally share accommodation is a dirty option at this time of year. Always a case of getting a balance right.

Good old spag bol

I am a great believer in cooking in bulk. My 30 year old le creuset casserole is nearing the end of its, very useful, life and high on my list of Christmas present requests this year is a new one. The second casserole is a Dutch oven and this too, over the years, has received a battering and the lid no longer fits tightly so it is only useful for meals prepared on the hob. The third implement is the stock pot which, during the year, can be found in use as a bread bin - or bread shed as it is known in our family or storage for any manner of goodies when it is not  bubbling away on the range with its huge capacity to make soup for a party, mulled wine for a multitude, chicken stock to fill a freezer and a spaghetti sauce to provide meals for a week.
Today the le creuset is in use with the ubiquitous sauce for spag bol. My typical plan would go as follows:
Equipment - 2 large casserole type pans and an extra saucepan
Ingredients - onions, peppers, garlic, mixed herbs, tins of tomatoes, mushrooms, leftover red wine, chilli flakes or powder or sauce or fresh, leftover vegetables, courgettes in season, beef mince or lentils and aubergines, red kidney beans
The last ingredient would raise an eyebrow before the explanation that I do like to cook in bulk but I also like to vary the meals we may have in a week. A basic tomato sauce is easily divided and extras added to make:
A sauce to have with spaghetti
A base for a lasagne
Chilli con carne - with added red kidney beans and chilli
A base for burritos
Without the beef mince but with the lentils and added vegetables for a vegetarian option of any of the dishes and with any leftovers blitzed with additional liquid for a lunchtime soup.
I like to chop 3 onions and fry them gently in olive oil, adding a little salt to stop them browning. I then divide the onions in between the 2 casseroles - or 3 if I am making a vegetarian option. Into two I will add the mear and brown. I am using frozen garlic at the moment which comes in blocks and I will add a block or two at this stage. Then any chopped peppers or other vegetables and any herbs and spices followed by tomatoes and extra stock or just water. Into one pan I will add the red kidney beans and extra chilli and then they can all just simmer away for an hour or two. I have a stock of small plastic containers with lids which can take the sauces for the freezer or just to store in the fridge to be brought out to be added to pasta, rice, a jacket potato or a tortilla wrap. Economical and tasty and home made food.

Banana bread

Some basic recipes are so delightful that the word "irresistible" is taken quite literally. Today I saw a couple of very ripe bananas in the fruit bowl and my first thought was Banana bread. Not something I make very often and  no default recipe so a quick trawl through the myriad cookery books to find a recipe to adapt to ingredients in the house - rain making a journey out to the shops unattractive. An adapted Nigella recipe produced a light, moist and quite wonderful cake. So difficult to resist that three slices were quickly consumed - a lesson to be learned - never bake something delicious then go without lunch, the result being the consumption of three slices in rapid succession.
I am reminded of tastes that seem to need "more than one": olives, anchovies, capers, dark 70% plus cocoa solids chocolate,oysters, mussels, langoustine, strawberries, blueberries, cookies, slices of blueberry pie, lemon meringue, chocolate brownies, crab sandwiches, chips, salt and chilli prawns, cookies, cups of tea.

Kedgeree

My childhood food memories are of oatcakes, baking and leftovers. There always seemed to be a Sunday roast followed by a week of leftovers or egg and chips. My grandmother made rissoles with leftover beef minced with onions, sage and leftover mashed potatoes. Cottage pie would usually appear during the week with the mince now augmented by thick gravy. Any leftover slices of beef would make sandwiches with thick slices of white bread and maybe onions and the last of the meat would become the standard Potteries' one pot stew known as lobby. Lobby would be made, out of preference, with fresh stewing steak or mince which would be browned and then left to simmer with onions, potatoes, carrots and any other root vegetable,s in stock, until meal time. Everyone had their own particular version of lobby and I remember it being served in large pyrex bowls.
I have not make lobby for over 30 years but occasionally make rissoles and cottage pie. Sunday roasts are rather a thing of the past or the special occasion but I still have a love of leftovers and prefer my fridge to be full of bowls of leftover mashed potatoes, rice, a small piece of salmon, some leftover vegetables, a tomato sauce, half a chicken. Today there was a bowl of leftover rice with some garden peas. There were a couple of hard boiled eggs too and my immediate thought was kedgeree. I have loved smoked haddock since visiting my Uncle Johnnie who worked on the docks in Fleetwood. He would bring home a piece of smoked haddock wrapped in newspaper and I just adored the smell, the texture and the taste. I can poach a piece of smoked haddock and just eat it as it is with no accompaniment. I have to be careful not to pick out just the odd flake or two once it is gently poached in milk and waiting for me to assemble the kedgeree and, yes, I have just "tasted" more or less half a fillet. The recipe I use is simple. I poach the smoked haddock in milk and leave it to cool slightly. In the meantime I fry an onion in a little oil until soft and then add a spoonful of curry paste. I like the Korma paste for a gentle curry taste but anything to give that spicy flavour. When we are ready to eat, I add the cooked rice ( with garden peas today which is not in any way authentic but they were there) to the onions and then add the flaked smoked haddock with some of the milk and heat thoroughly. I like to add chopped fresh coriander towards the end. The boiled eggs are quartered and added to the pan - I use a wok. I prefer freshly boiled eggs which are just a little soft but leftover eggs from the fridge are quite acceptable. Quantities are fluid but more is best so far as the smoked haddock is concerned.

Elusive families

Family history research is rewarding and, at times, frustrating. Sometimes it seems that families completely disappear and no matter how much "thinking outside the box" is done they remain elusive. I have been attempting to track one family in South Wales for a number of years. They suddenly disappear in the early 1900s - all of them. Yet I find the death of the mother in the 1920s in the appropriate city. What happened to the rest of the family? Did they emigrate? Possible. Did they succumb to an epidemic, influenza maybe? Possible. Did they simply move? Never marry? Change their name? So many options so intriguing.

A lack of eggs

The two White Star hens laid beautiful, large, white shelled eggs. When the fox despatched Simon Garfunkel stopped laying and she has not resumed. Over the weekend we noticed her, once proud, red comb had paled and she looked bedraggled and unhappy. Closer inspection revealled fine twine wrapped around her feet. Very careful untangling and snipping removed what must have been constricting blood supply and she now looks much happier. No eggs of a white variety have yet appeared but it feels so much better that she has had the twine removed. We cannot see where it came from but the netting over the coop has come detached and, although it does not seem to have fallen into the coop, that is the only possible explanation we can think of. Constant vigilance is needed even when the hens are in their protective environment. I miss being able to let them roam free in the garden but their welfare must be paramount and, unless I can be with them all the time, I cannot risk letting them wander.
There are still a few eggs each day and, when not baking, they mount up. The freezer is running low on bread and cakes so that is maybe a message about what I can do this week. Yesterday's wholemeal bread did not turn out to my liking and it can be demoralising when things do not work out. I have to try to forget about the failures and try again. I seem to have far more success with white bread than brown and the easy option would be to stick to white. A defeatist attitude will not promote a sense of achievement, however and I know that the answer may lie in actually reading a recipe for wholemeal bread and following it.

Five films which can only be guilty pleasures

Batteries Not Included
Every Which Way But Loose
Sweet Home Alabama
You've Got Mail
Love Actually

Soup and comfort food

October and, coming up to Halloween and Bonfire Night, thoughts turn to warming and comforting food and one of the best is a bowl of soup. It is not the ultimate comfort food in my world. That accolade has to go to oatcakes and cheese. Staffordshire oatcakes, not Scottish ones. The oatcakes that you used to be able to buy in many small shops on street corners in Stoke on Trent; the thin pancake like oatcakes made simply of oatmeal, salt and water and cooked on a griddle. The staple diet for breakfast and lunch for those living in Stoke in the 1950s and 60s when I was there and possibly so today. Oatcakes with melted cheese and perhaps tomatoes and mushrooms, with bacon and even sausages but the simplicity of oatcakes and cheese can sooth a pain, warm a cold day, fulfil a basic hunger, mend a broken heart. On a recent visit to West Wales to see family from Stoke on Trent I was not surprised to see a  pack of oatcakes brought out of the freezer at lunch time. I know what a cousin in Germany would want to have taken over by any family visitors.
Today, though, it is soup. The house is filled with the smells of the various stages of soup production. Gently frying onions followed bt the more pungent chilli and garlicky aromas of a minestrone soup bubbling away on the stove. Finished with a grating of a good parmesan it makes an unorthodox Sunday lunch but just what is needed on a chilly October day.

Train journeys

One of my favourite train journeys is going north towards the midlands from South Wales. Leaving Newport and travelling across to Chepstow and then alongside the Bristol channel up to Cheltenham is quite beautiful. The scenery is not as dramatic as the journey from Sheffield across the Pennines to Manchester but the view over the Severn has a certain serenity. One day I may see the famous Severn bore and watch those who attempt to surf with it. Mostly the water is calm and still and I can ponder the days of the Severn ferries before the 2 crossings and wonder at the lives of those in the nineteenth century who crossed the river from rural Wiltshire and Gloucestershire to find work in the industry of South Wales. The train is a relaxing alternative to driving but then the road from Goodrich in Herefordshire to Newport is again one of my favourite journeys. Today is a first for me. The first time I have had my laptop and dongle with me on the train and, as we pull into Gloucester, I find that the time is going quickly and I will soon be back to the hens and a new batch of baking. The more time I spend in Wales the more I know that I want to be there all the time, not for periods of time but permanently. There seems to be so much more sky and that makes me calm and relaxed. If a house and garden could somehow be magically relocated then my life would change. I must wait to see what will happen.

Living, loving, leaving

I recall someone describing country music to me in terms of living, loving and leaving and whenever I am about to leave those I love the phrase comes in to my head. Life is full of useful sayings which say it all but are not always recognised as helpful at the time:
Move on
One day at a time
Live and let live
Let her/him/them/it go
Whatever will be, will be
Enough
That last one looks so strange having just typed it. Enough phrases and the term itself is a good one. Whenever something is burning away inside me just that one word is enough to pour in icy water and extinguish the fire. Holding on to destructive thoughts and feelings eats away and is never needed. Enough.
Tomorrow I leave. The leaving is temporary and I move on to others I love. My time here has been fulfilling and objectives have been met. Tomorrow brings a new day and whatever comes along with that. For the moment I have done the best that I can here and it must be enough. Today I am grateful for that.

Some things puzzle me

The post brought an electricity bill which shows that a) I am in credit by a substantial amount and b) they will be increasing my direct debit from next month.
I bought a new laptop - the same make as the old one and so assumed that the power cable would have the same fitting.
I can remember to carry with me a variety of plugs and cables - plug to charge i phone, in car charger for i  phone, charger for one particular nokia phone, battery charger for camera, dongle, usb stick, usb connection to external hard drive.....but not the one cable I need to download photographs from camera to laptop.
The petrol tank is always on the opposite side of the car to the side nearest to the pump when I am driving an unfamiliar car.
Pegs just somehow disappear.
My glasses are never in the place where I am quite certain that I have left them.
Why do we sometimes continue to do the same thing and expect different results?

Decisions

Some weekends require no other decisions than what to eat and what to watch on the television. That can be difficult enough. Do we eat in or out? If we eat out then where? Do we eat out for lunch or dinner? If we eat in do we invite friends? If we invite friends then is that for an informal supper, an afternoon tea or a takeaway? What about combining eating out with an invitation to friends? Then there will be the shopping to coincide with the decisions. Do we shop locally or get into the car? Do we shop online if we can get a favourable delivery slot? Often no decision is made and each meal time is greeted with a query. Television viewing is rather more straightforward. At some point during the day the papers will be glanced through and the comment made that there is nothing to watch on any of the myriad channels and a DVD may be a good idea. By the time meals have been organised there is no energy left to decide on a DVD and the televison invariably drones on in the background whilst we read or knit or fall asleep.
This weekend is different. There is a Wales game to watch, unfortunately at 8am. This involves a number of decisions. Do we watch at home? Do we wander along to the Millenium stadium and watch on a large screen amidst the normal, wonderful atmosphere? Do we sleep in and watch it later? Decisions then about meals will be dictated by the crowds milling around after the game. Will getting a meal in town be easy or just too busy as it would be on a home game day? Who will be around for lunch? What about later in the day? An added influnece this particular weekend will be the need for those running in the half marathon on Sunday to bulk up with carbohydrates on Saturday. Not the day to go for a light meal or a platter of seafood.
Then Sunday. Another early start for the half marathon. Will the runners want a large lunch? Will they want to go out to eat or recover at home? Decisions.
I am eternally grateful that I feel no need to make precise decisions about my weekends. Taking each day as it comes can be seen as a cliche but it is by far the easiest way to approach life. I know what there is to eat tonight and tomorrow is another day. There will be food in the house; shops are nearby; restaurants abound. The day will unfold.
Now what will the weather be like and what to wear?

A good family name - Enos

One of the many frustrations of family history research is the "ordinary" name. Surnames of Jones, Williams and Smith added to popular first names of John, Thomas, Henry etc make research well nigh impossible at times. Speculation and educated guesses may the nearest to accuracy one can hope for. Hence the delight in the discovery of Enos as a family name. Biblical in origin it does not seem to be one of the perennially popular first names. Added to an uncommon surname the potential for easy and accurate research seemed inevitable. One of the many lessons for the amateur family historian - never make assumptions about ease of research or easy names. How likely that there would be 2 people of the same name in the same location? Inevitable. How likely that the one with the most obvious age would be the wrong one? Inevitable. How many variations on a simple name can there be? Many. In this case - Anas, Enis, Ennis, Eunis......plus variations on the surname. How can a name such as this be abbreviated or made into a nickname? Easy - think Ernie......
It is a good name as is any slightly unusual name but then come the added frustrations. How can one person give quite so many places of birth on census returns? Sometimes the only answer seems to be to prevent future generations from finding him. A multitude of seemingly unrelated occupations makes life even more complicated and the ultimate distraction in being buried with a grandchild and not the other way round.
My genealogical obsession began with Enos and he still fascinates me. I doubt if I will ever discover why he was baptised as a child with his brothers and sisters into the Church of England when his family had been Baptists for generations. It is unlikely that I will find a photograph of him now. I will be surprised if the name is revived in the family in future generations. Yet he is pivotal. He sparked the interest and over a decade later I am still as fascinated by his story. Thank you Enos.

Daytime television

It has to be a guilty pleasure, watching television during the day. Sometimes the TV is on in the background with no one really watching it but it is a reassuring presence in the house; voices in the background. When I know that I will be at home all day my listening and viewing will tend towards radio 4 before 9, radio 2 until 12 and then whatever is on BBC1 until the news at one. My mother always made the same comment about programmes searching out antiques in ordinary homes -" amazing what some people have in their homes". Indeed. No doubt people are amazed by my inability to get rid of paperback books but there is equally no doubt that it would  not make riveting viewing. I understand that the curs in the BBC funding will result in programmes such as these no longer being made for daytime viewing on BBC2 but, instead, there will be repeats. I don't mind repeats but it depends on what is being repeated. I can watch, indefintely, old situation comedies." As time goes by" is my idea of perfect gentle viewing and., later at night, I can watch episodes of "Gavin and Stacey" and laugh as if I have never seen it before. I can continue to watch "The Wire" and "The Guardian" and concentrate but, for me, daytime television is not something to concentrate on. I like the sound of the background noise but I am doing something else. In one room I may be knitting whilst watching some feed on the internet and "watching" TV. I can be baking in the kitchen and glancing through the door to see what is happening on screeen whilst listening to the radio. I usually have background TV whilst doing family history research or reading. Looking back at my first sentence I should perhaps amend that  - it has to be a guilty pleasure, having the television on during the day.

Playing Scrabble online

A friend invites me to join a game, or three, of Scrabble and suddenly I find myself constantly checking to see if he has taken his turn and I can, yet again, sit looking at the screen and contemplate the letters before me. I dislike the absence of personal interaction. I want to congratulate on clever moves, groan when planned future moves are thwarted and generally chat about the game. Online chat does not have the same effect. It does help in a small way and there are advantages to playing online. As an only child I rarely had another child to play games with. Hence my preference for the solitary occupations of reading and jigsaws, knitting and sewing, baking, writing, needlecrafts and music. I am very competitive though and it is fun when challenged to a game. It would be much more fun to play with the board in front of me and my opponent in the same room, sharing food and drink and conversation but this online alternative has its place and it brings a smile to my face to see that it is my turn again and to wonder if there is any way I can make up that huge deficit in points in all three games.

Shoes

Summer equals flip flops and winter is for boots but the agony of those inbetween times, hopefully no more than a week or two when I have to consider wearing something else on my feet. I don't like shoes. If I am completely honest I don't like to wear anything on my feet. A friend who was doing some painting here a few years ago looked at me in amazement as I wandered around barefoot inside and outside the house - nothing strange for me but he continued to comment for some time. I don't like socks nor tights and that is where flip flops and boots come in, more specifically, in the latter case, Uggs. I bought a pair of Ugg boots in New York nearly 5 years ago and I adore them. They are becoming rather worn nowadays, have had the inner soles replaced and have been through the washing machine and tumble dryer on many occasions but the sheer comfort and the fact that it is recommended that they are worn without socks. Last year I bought some proper boots from the children's department at M and S. They are the only other boots I will wear but, inevitably, I have to wear socks with them and so they are not so attractive to me. In the beginning I liked them so much that I bought another pair and my daughter has a pair too but they are not the Uggs - nor the flip flops.
Weddings are a nightmare. Finding an outfit is often difficult enough but something for the feet? I resorted to dying a pair last year as I did have an old pair of shoes that were acceptable but, green, they didn't go with the orange outfit. Now I have another wedding coming along and the anxiety begins early - what can I do about shoes?

Farewell Phoenix: Hello Las Vegas

Plans change and Beryl's 85th birthday will now be celebrated in Las Vegas, not a place I have visited in the past and new places and new experiences are always a good thing. The anticipation of a booking and a destination can outweigh the actual experince but our recent holiday in Cornwall exceeded expectations in many ways and positvity is my word for today. I am so looking forward to meeting up with family members, some I have not seen for 38 years and Las Vegas has always appealled as a brasher Blackpool maybe.
My parents loved going to Blackpool and it was a frequent holiday destination during my childhood. Photographs show that we spent time building sandcastles on the beach and I have memories of hotel rooms shared with my grandparents and Paul. It is some years since we were there; the last time being when I joined my parents with my small children and we went to the circus in the Tower. There was a discussion after my parents died about where to scatter their ashes and we had wondered about a family trip to Blackpool to complete the deed - discussion only and still something to be done. Strange how the mind works sometimes, meandering from Las Vegas to scattering of ashes via Blackpool. I think my Dad would have liked Las Vegas but, like Canada, it was a destination off limits as it would have involved a flight and that was never an option. The missed opportunity of a cruise across the Atlantic reminds me to grasp every opportunity as it is offered and live every day for that day - who knows what tomorrow will bring.

Seven years

Fascinating cutting from The Shrewsbury Chronicle of March 17th 1865 courtesy of Carole and Tim. I have a photograph of my great great grandmother, Elizabeth Mills who looks as if she had a hard life and this was her father - maybe an explanation for her expression.
The English Legal System is an interesting topic in its own right and it is made all the more intriguing when it enters the life of a family member, albeit one dead for over one hundred years. A crime of abject poverty yet a sentence of seven years imprisonment. In 1861 Elizabeth, at the age of 11, is identified living as a lodger, away from any family apart from an older sister, maybe, and working as a "nailer". Her father was not in the picture at that time and he certainly wouldn't have been after this court appearance. It is with wonder, sometimes, that I look at my family history and marvel at how I came to be. Oral tradition tells me of great grandparents meeting in the workhouse, survival through war and infection, hazardous occupations, a grandfather blown up in gas explosion at Etruria gasworks and further investigations produce evidence of crimes of poverty and removal under the Poor Laws. I can only feel gratitude for perseverance and endurance and the ability to survive and, in myself, a sense of humility when I complain that my high level problem today is the speed of my broadband connection

Post holiday tasks

One of the joys of a country cottage as opposed to a hotel is a washing machine. Two weeks away but only a small amount of washing to do on return. Sadly, this does not diminish the ironing pile but that can wait until the small gardening and food preparation tasks are completed. Just before we went away I picked all the coriander seeds and left them to dry. They have now been decanted into a Kilner jar ready to be planted out in the spring. The plan is to plant a complete raised bed and pick and freeze bunches as they are ready. I like plans but, unfortunately, they do not always work out. Tomatoes have ripened in the sun but only enough to eat. The apples will prove to be the largest job. I have made apple chutney in the past and that, again, is the plan but there are plenty of bramleys and apple crumbles and pies beckon. The last remaining courgettes have turned into marrows in our absence and are still outside. I think they may stay there until I have made a decision as to what to do with them. The delight of googling the word "marrow" awaits me. In the meantime I have decisions to make about my next knitting project. The baby blanket completed on holiday has now been edged and consigned to the "awaiting deliveries" pile and a smaller project seems attractive - perhaps a small blanket or another jacket, maybe in a larger size in readiness for a Christmas present. Amongst the post awaiting our return was my November copy of Good Housekeeping magazine and the inevitable early suggestions for Christmas gifts so that may be something I will be thinking about in the next few weeks. For now I will start the third Richard Russo novel of the fortnight; my current favoured author.

October 1st

My Dad was born on October 1st. My grandmother died on October 1st and today one of my young cousins became a grandfather for the first time. Another baby girl to welcome into the world on an auspicious day. Inevitably feeling contemplative today and, just having returned from a most enjoyable holiday, home does not seem to be the place I want to be in. A day to consider positives I think. The hens seem to be thriving and, to my chagrin, not to have missed me; the weather is glorious - far too warm to be outside: An American in Paris is the afternoon film on TV; there is a new baby in the family and doesn't celeriac look like something out of Doctor Who?