Family stuff

For Mr L's birthday, a few weeks ago, Son and Mrs Son gave him afternoon tea on a steam train, above. 

This is the afternoon tea. 

And this, for I think only the second time ever in my blog (which is now over 20 years old, good grief, why do I do this?) is me. I don't like having my photo taken, hence the rabbit-in-headlights smile, and it was both very hot and very windy, hence the Einstein-like hair and the baggy shirt. 

Minimalising Monday has got a bit behind, but last Wednesday we gave our garden umbrella to the daughter of friends. We bought it during Covid, at the point when you were only allowed to be visited in the garden - and this coincided with nice weather. But mainly it's lived under the bed. Neither of us sits in the garden very much, and if we do, we don't bother with the umbrella and just sit in the shade. As above. Whereas their daughter has just bought a house with a garden, and wanted one. Done!

This, randomly, is a photo of my lovely granny and grandpa, Ella (Isabella) and Tom Campbell. Well, to be frank, my granny was lovelier than my grandpa, who was good at heart but could be something of a curmudgeon at times. My granny was an absolute pet. She had a sad early life, but was so contented with everything in her adult life and never said a cross word. This photo had gone brown, but SIL 1 used the magic of electronics to restore the colour. 

The year has turned, but the days are still long. This was taken at ten at night. 

Minimalising Monday this week - slim pickings, but it's something. Two perfectly nice pots that somehow never get used. 

We took the Edinburgh Two to the Glasgow Science Centre today. Look at the size of Big Grandson! He'll be fifteen next month. He doesn't really need to be taken anywhere, but we do like having them around. 

 

Wester Ross 2

More photos from Wester Ross - oh, how lovely and cool it looks! At the moment, in Edinburgh, it's hot - 27C, evidently, which is over 80F - but not nearly as hot as London and the continent, which are over 90F or 30+C, argh. I do wish that Daughter 2 and her family didn't live down there - for many reasons, but at the moment I worry about them being in that heat.  

There are many deserted beaches up north.

We visited Inverewe Gardens twice, once in dazzling sunshine...

and once in very light drizzle. It's beautiful in all weathers. 

 Dogwood. 

I don't think I realised that dogwoods were so lovely till I saw them recently in the Botanics.

There are lots of roads like this - single track, with passing places. This is fine when you can see ahead. 

Lots of people come up here with unsuitably huge camper vans  - they're not at all popular! But actually we saw very few of them on this trip. 

The single track road to this beach had a lot of blind summits and corners, which was a bit stressful. One just has to hope that everyone's driving as slowly as one is oneself! However, we hardly met anyone on the way. 

The beach is called Red Point. We went there on recommendations from other people who'd stayed in the cottage and filled in the visitors' book. When you park, you walk across a field and find yourself at the top of high, steep dunes - the sort you gallop joyfully down when you're young. But when you're not so young, you imagine broken ankles. But we got down more easily than we expected, and even better, up again. 

Writing this is a displacement activity. We're having friends for the day tomorrow and I must go and cook - but it's hot! I am much more interested in flowers than I am in food. 

 

Away

We have been away in Wester Ross, in the north west of Scotland, staying in this little extended croft house for a week. 

We did lots of stuff, but also spent a lot of time on the sofa, reading books and looking at variations of this view. Sometimes the Torridon Mountains were only faintly visible, as above. 

Sometimes they were much clearer. Though it doesn't come out in the photos, we could see the sunshine picking out the varied slopes on the sides of them. Sometimes. 

The light was always different. 

This was 10.30 at night. Again, the photo doesn't do it justice, but I've never seen a rainbow after sunset before. 

Sometimes, in contrast...

I'm including all these photos of the same view so that I remember it. I really, really love Wester Ross and also Sutherland, which is a bit further north still. But it's a 5 and a half hour drive away and we're nearer 80 than 70 (well, I'm only 75 - just). Will we be back? Not sure. Poor old Mr L does all the driving because I'm frightened of big roads (though am fine with the tiny roads once you get up this far north). 

It's always seemed self-evident to me - without any logic whatsoever - that north is superior to south. I would much rather live in the country than a town (says she, who never has lived in the country). Ideally on an island. But this is a fantasy. I'd actually rather be able to see the family and indeed my friends, than live among rugged mountains and not see them. But if they were all there too... .

 

Flowers yet again

I met up with school friends on Wednesday and one of them brought along the obituary (from 2002) of the headmistress who took over at our school when we were in fifth (ie second last) year. To my amazement, this lady was only 38 when she became headmistress! While we didn't think she was ancient, especially compared with the previous head, who was clearly 150, we didn't think she was - well, what now seems to me - really quite young. She'd previously been head of another girls' school in England before that, too. When I was 38, I was just going back very part-time to work because our youngest, Son, was 4 and at nursery in the mornings. I certainly had no ambitions to be head of anything. Of course, I had 3 small children, while Miss Thow was unmarried. She was softly spoken but she must have been very driven. Then she only lasted 11 years at our school before leaving to do something completely different. 

Thirty-eight! A child! Younger than any of our children are now.

The people we bought this house from, 36 years ago, were not gardeners at all, but they - or possibly someone previously - planted this climbing rose. It's at its peak just now. It doesn't have a second flush of flowers and it's not very scented, but it's rather beautiful. Thanks, Mr and Mrs B. 

Look what happens when you weed judiciously. Foxgloves and candytuft, all self-sown. 

Also campanula, Canterbury bells. 

All things that I remember from our garden when I was a small child. So many of my memories are of that garden, which had lilac, lupins, pinks, irises, geums ... and I used to have my little garden plot, where I planted annuals - clarkia, candytuft, nasturtiums. 

Singing, cakes, family and flowers

I'm a bit exhausted, though have had a lazy few hours today and am mostly recovered. On Saturday, our choir (the one of which I'm chair) had its Come and Sing of the Mozart Requiem. This is when we invite the general public who want to ... well, come and sing... to pay £15, for which they get hire of a score and refreshments. We rehearse for two and a half hours, have coffee, tea and cake etc, and then perform it. All the profits go to our chosen charity, which this year was Edinburgh Direct Aid International, an all-volunteer charity which sends aid to victims of war and famine, sets up schools for children whose schools have been destroyed by war, and so on. 

We had... not sure, but I think probably 160-170 people come along. Maybe more? My main part was on the few days before and on the day, to provide paper cups, plates, milk, sugar, stirrers etc, plus enough cakes and other goodies (much of which was contributed by the choir members) for a somewhat unknown number of singers. We'd sold 150 tickets, but then more people turned up on the day. 

Mr L and I (well, largely he) set everything out in the hall - tables, chairs, tablecloths, jugs etc - not to say the food, in the morning. 

I had brought quite a lot more extra food than I thought would be necessary  - some baked by me, some bought, some gluten-free - but was slightly alarmed to see the first of the hungry hordes (I mean, not that hungry, surely - it was only 4.30) pile their plates with goodies. I had visions of there being nothing left for the last in the queue! However, in a loaves-and-fishes sort of way, it seemed to work out all right, and people were very enthusiastic about the catering. Once the hour's tea break was over there was literally nothing left on the tables except empty plates!

Anyway, it all went very well but we were quite tired by the end of it.

Daughter 2 was home (without her little one) for a flying visit , which was lovely. She had a school reunion at lunch on Saturday. Her main school friends arrived at our house at 9 am and had a nice chat before Mr L ran them up to the school. It seemed no time since they were all at our house for sleepovers, and there they were, all grown up (45-ish, impossibly) but all just the same. 

Later in the afternoon, she and Mr L were very helpful with the smooth running of the catering - filling up coffee pots and so on, and with the tidying up while we were performing. And then we had a lovely evening with her. 

On Sunday we had lunch at Swanston, with both daughters and Daughter 1's family, and then climbed the hill for a bit. 

It's not far from the city at all, but so peaceful. 

Here are Daughter 1 and her little ones. Not so little!

Today I had coffee with a friend in Saughton Park. 

It's approaching its full glory.

Which is pretty glorious. 

It's allium time. 

It's also allium time in my garden, 

and peony time. 

Different alliums. 

And lots of other flowers. 

And it's Minimalisation Monday. This week: a stoneware teapot stand which I used to use, but no longer do, and a vase that, many years ago, my mum liked at an antique fair and I bought for her birthday. I quite like it too and kept it for sentimental reasons, but... something has to go, and this week, these are on their way to a charity shop. 

 

Throwout Thursday

Minimalisation Monday didn't quite happen this week, but Throwout Thursday did, today. Two insulated cups, an iPad stand (I think it is), a blue star candle holder, which I like, but I'm not a fan of candles so I never use it, a candle in a little pot which someone gave me, but see above, and two little embroidered pictures in wool which I found out too late that Daughter 1 would have liked to have. I like them too, but they'd been in a drawer for years and I'm trying to be ruthless. Their mounts had got a bit discoloured and what are the chances that I would have replaced them? Sorry, Daughter 1. 

We didn't actually throw any of this out. We took it to a charity shop. Someone will love them, let's hope. 

 

Flowers, music and cakes

It's been a busy few weeks... well, months... well, years... but anyway, we carved out a day last week to visit Dawyck Botanic Gardens. We've been there in snowdrop season and in autumn colours season, but have never managed to go at rhododendron and azalea time before. It was sensational. 

They don't photograph well, but there were drifts of bluebells everywhere. 

The flowers were just perfect. 

This is the house whose garden it used to be. Rather nice!

And the mecanopsis!

So beautiful. 

It's otherwise been all about the music recently. I've had two concerts, with my two choirs, a fortnight apart, in the same church. One featured Benjamin Britten, not my favourite though he has his moments, but the second, last Saturday, was all Mozart - the Requiem plus some shorter pieces. Just sublime. 

Now - concentrate - the first choir - the one I'm chair of - is also doing Mozart's Requiem, this Saturday, but as a Come and Sing for charity. People buy tickets and are lent a score and are fed tea, coffee and cakes. This takes a lot of organising (about 150 tickets sold so far) and of course I'm doing a lot of it. I'm rather looking forward to its being over.

So my poor garden is somewhat neglected, and the quilt for Mr L hasn't been touched for quite a few weeks. I need to get my life back!