Using one's arms

We visited Mansfield Traquair Church the other day - or, it used to be a church. Now it's a venue, rented out to make money so that Phoebe Anna Traquair's murals can be preserved. It was once a Catholic Apostolic church, built in the late 1800s, so it's not old, but this artist was hired to paint the walls and some parts of the ceiling. So of course it's known as Edinburgh's Sistine Chapel, which is a bit of an exaggeration, but it's an amazing feat for a lady, then, climbing around on scaffolding. 

It's really quite high!

Here she is. She did various forms of art, including embroidery, watercolours, book cover tooling, illuminated manuscripts and enamelling. I think she must have had staff to do the childminding and housework. 

So that's about it apart from the normal gardening, socialising and sewing. I've got a trapped nerve (or something) in my shoulder, which is rather painful and, I suspect, not helped by being hunched over a sewing machine (or indeed ripping out stitches, another too-frequent occupation...). I imagine typing doesn't help either. Ah, woe is me. I'm sure it'll get better, but it's taking its time. 

Son and family are on holiday and having fun. This is Scotland, not the Riviera, so they have wetsuits on. 

 

Colours and scents

 Ah, Blogger has uploaded my photos backwards again. Still, never mind. 

 

Today we took the Edinburgh Two to Lauriston Castle, a big house (with a medieval tower house incorporated) in lovely gardens, given to the city by its last inhabitants. Look at the length of Big Grandson's hair! It's very nice hair, but I'm not too keen on its length. However, it will eventually get cut. I hope. 

It was a beautiful day and they're such good company. A croquet club meets in the grounds. 

You can see over the water to Fife. 

I've finished my rainbow quilt top. I didn't design it, but copied it from a photo that I saw somewhere or other on the internet. Well done to the designer. My brain could never have thought that up. It was fun to do, but I still don't like orange. I've still to put a border on it, piece together the back (much less elaborately than the front) and quilt it, so there's a long way to go. 

It's been warm, and the doors and windows have been open a lot, and the garden smells divine, especially at night. I've planted night scented stocks and nicotiana - what a lovely scent. 

This astilbe hasn't got any scent but I love the colour - however, the thalictrum has, after many years, suddenly taken off and entangled itself among several other plants. My day lilies have also gone rogue. I shall have to Take Steps. 

This clematis is doing well. 

And, back to scent, this trachelospermum jasminoides, just outside the patio doors, fills the house with perfume. Son gave me it, years ago. 

And here again are the night scented stock, nicotiana and (unscented) cornflowers, all annuals. The others have somewhat overwhelmed the cornflowers, but hey ho. 

In a few months, I'll have to cut it all down. I'm getting a bit old for this... 75 last birthday, which was July 4. Hope you celebrated it in style, Americans. 

Out and aboutery

Life continues - thankfully - and the garden blooms. 

We went for a walk through The Meadows the other day. The Meadows is a big park in central Edinburgh, but it was once, yes, a meadow, where sheep grazed. My grandfather grew up nearby, in a tenement flat, and used to play football here. Nowadays it's often full of students, since this is the student area. We'd never actually walked along this particular path before, and it was quite interesting seeing The Meadows from this angle. 

It's obvious that the tenement-dwellers who live around here still see it as their garden. 

There are some new student flats overlooking this path, and we liked Professor Polar Bear, keeping an eye on his territory. His mortar board has slipped somewhat. 

There's a little community garden. It's all rather nice.

Yesterday, we went up to visit Son and family. The journey was fairly horrible: it was raining, and there were quite a few lorries throwing up spray. I'm very phobic on motorways and never expect us to get to our destination alive. However, we did. On this occasion. 

Because of the weather, we went to a play place. Spectators have to sign a waiver, I suppose in case they decide to have a go on the equipment, injure themselves and sue. The girl in charge told Mr Life and me that we needed to sign the waiver, and then she hesitated, looked at us and said, "Oh, don't bother. I'll trust you not to go on the equipment. " What could she have been implying??? 

Mind you, Son did have a go...

 

Ho hum

Life has been a bit trying lately, mainly because of one of my choirs, the one of which I'm chair. Basically, our treasurer has taken offence at our musical director, for reasons which seem totally bewildering to me, and has resigned. Treasurers are valuable people, so we've all been falling over backwards to please him. However, he's thrown his toys out of the pram, and gone. This isn't as bad as it might be, because his 3-year term of office was to be up in October anyway, and we have - or at least I hope we still have - a new treasurer lined up. But it's been very stressful and unpleasant and surprising. In my peaceful retired life, I'd kind of forgotten about difficult people who throw strops. 

I'm meeting with the new (I hope) treasurer on Thursday. I just hope that the toy-thrower hasn't put him off joining us on the committee. 

Ah well, we can still walk along the river and watch this heron, 

and admire the meadowsweet and knapweed,

which grow happily despite everything. 

Daughter 2 has been home for a few days because her lovely friend, the owner of the very small architecture firm near Edinburgh for which she works in London, has died of a brain tumour, which is not only very sad but has also been very difficult for the rest of them in various ways. 

I shouldn't feel sorry for myself, because he was eight years younger than me and is no longer around, and I'm still quite well, as far as I know. But I always feel so sad when Daughter 2 goes away. (Yes, I know, she could be in Australia.) I'm worried about her and for them all. But one just has to buck up and be grateful for what one has. 

I've been doing Duolingo for French and German for a couple of years now. My French was always reasonable, though my German was pretty feeble, and I suppose they've both been polished up a bit. On a whim, the other day, I started learning Duolingo Scottish Gaelic. When I was at teacher training college - which I found somewhat boring compared to university - my dad and I went to Gaelic classes for a couple of terms, and bits are coming back to me. I haven't got very far yet, as you can imagine, but am enjoying the spelling. For example, I could ask for "ti" and "cofaidh" (tea and coffee, pronounced "tea" and "coffee") and say that "tha tidsear" (I'm a teacher - pronounced "ha teacher"). I haven't got to the past tense yet... I also like "tioraidh" (pronounced "cheery" and meaning "goodbye"), as in "cheerio".  Is that a British thing, or do Americans/Canadians/Australians/New Zealanders say "cheerio" for goodbye? 

It's not all as easy as that (mind you, the spelling isn't easy at all), but one takes one's pleasures where one can. 

 

Flowers

It's all about flowers at the moment. 

I can't bear to listen to the news in any detail. 

Why on earth are people (well, it's men, isn't it? - a few, horrible ones) still behaving in this uncivilised way, when we are so clever about so much?

Anyway, the garden blooms on, regardless. 

These poppies self-seed and I love them. 

Along the river, things are also in full bloom. This is cow parsley or something of the sort. 

Wild geraniums.

Elder flowers

and wild roses. 

And in Saughton Park, a shortish walk from where we live, the herbaceous beds are at their best.

 

We're lucky to live so near. 

More poppies. So delicious.

Heuchera in the foreground. 

And I can't remember what this white fluffy thing is in the foreground, but the pink flowers are peonies. The white-flowered plant is a member of the cabbage family, I think? It's very pretty, anyway. 

So that's life at the moment: doing the garden, making a quilt, going for walks in gardens and nature, socialising with friends - very peaceful. If only the whole world could enjoy the gentle things of life. 

 

Doings

So in brief: we went to the Tirzah Garwood exhibition at the Dulwich Picture Gallery - interesting, since we'd seen the Eric Ravilious (her husband) exhibition there some years ago and I've read her memoir.

Her art was very varied. 

and in various media.

I had a lovely visit to a school friend's house, and met her partner. M and I were never particularly close at school but we were friendly, and I always liked her. It's been so nice to reconnect. 

And then we came home and Littlest Granddaughter also came (to her) home and reconnected with her guinea pigs, which we had managed to keep fed and watered. 

Apart from that, it's been a flowery time. These mecanopsis were at Branklyn Gardens in Perth, which we always like to visit. 

And we met up with a very old friend, also M, and went to Little Sparta, about an hour's drive away, which is the garden of poet and artist Ian Hamilton Finlay. We've been meaning to go for ages, and when M - who lives in London - said that she would like to visit it, that was the spur for us to take her. M's mother and mine were friends in London during the war, specifically during the Blitz, and her mother was my mother's bridesmaid. 

It's a very pleasant garden

with various art installations and inscriptions, some rather mysterious. 

And then, at home, all is very floriferous.

A neighbour (whose front garden is mainly paved, with some neatly trimmed small bushes) said to me yesterday that she liked the wild effect of my garden. 

I know what she meant, but it takes a lot of work to achieve such a wild effect. 

And that's me just about caught up with our doings, though frankly I don't really know why I do this...