Light and colour

Life is busy but uneventful at the moment - which isn't a bad thing, but isn't exciting. This week has mainly featured the writing of Christmas cards, of which we still send quite a lot. Our offspring send far fewer, I suppose because of Facebook and so on. It's quite time-consuming because I tend to write little bits of news in cards for people I haven't seen for a while, because otherwise, what's the point?

Big Grandson, now 13 and towering over me, sends us lots of photos of buses (he's very very into transport of any kind) but also photos of beautiful skies on his way to school, which is nice. As above. 

We went to the Botanics - not newsworthy but always lovely - on a sunny day. It's the "very dead of winter", as TS Eliot says in "The Journey of the Magi", which I always think about in December, when the garden is mainly a heap of brown sticks. But this cotoneaster was a wonderful splash of colour. 

And the gardens are set out for their walk of lights, which we always enjoy. Daughter 1 and I are going with the Edinburgh Two on Saturday night. Those candles are a bit surreal but do cheer the place up, even during the day. 

A sparkly robin, or something of the sort. 

And a stained-glass "greenhouse" - not sure that would work. 

And here's my favourite tree, lit up by the sunshine like a candle. I can never remember what it is - a cedar? - but in summer it's covered with frothy pale green coniferish leaves. I'm sure I have photos of it at different times of year but can't find one at the moment. 

And now I'm off to Dunfermline Abbey to take part in a carol marathon. Better get myself going.

 

Ding dong merrily on high

I've been very busy, but in a mainly choir-related way. I'm a member of two choirs, and both had carol concerts last week. I have had quite a lot of organising to do for one of them, and as well as that I had rehearsals on Thursday evening, Friday afternoon and Saturday afternoon, and concerts on Friday and Saturday evenings. This was quite hard on a) the brain, b) the back and legs and c) the voice. But it was all quite fun. As a result, I have nothing interesting to report, but - this isn't very interesting, but it's all I've got - Jubilo, the choir of which I am now the chair, used to have a banner which became obsolete, so I commissioned a new one (designed by a committee, hmm, but it turned out ok) to advertise our concert. It's reusable - we just stick another (plasticated) poster on the top for next time. This was much more faff than it sounds, but there it is on the fence outside St Cuthbert's Church, our venue. Can you see Edinburgh Castle in the background? 

Did it bring in any extra audience members? Well, at least two, which I know because they were very nice South African tourists who saw the banner and came to the concert. They came very early, which is how I became aware of them. Their presence may have had something to do with the fact that it was pouring rain at the time; who knows? 

Mr L kindly put the banner up with cable ties earlier this week, and after the concert, when it was still Biblically pounding down, he even more kindly took it down, in the dark and (very) wet, slicing his finger while cutting the ties. He's a very good chap. 

The other choir, at which I am just an ordinary member, had four of the same carols as Jubilo in its programme, which made it easier for me, though also slightly confusing, since we performed them slightly differently at each choir. For example, sometimes the men sang verse two alone (or we all sang it) or we had to get louder in one bit (or not), or we had to sing things legato (or staccato). And so on.

The other choir is The Seven Hills Chorus (Edinburgh is reputedly built on seven hills like Rome, though there are really more). This is their banner and it's an indoor one, displayed in the hall where we give our audience drinks and mince pies. It's there for the purposes of recruitment. 

And that's been my life this week. Next week - Christmas preparations. 

PS I was surprised that Margaret doesn't know what "faff" means. I hadn't realised that it was a British English word. It just means "bother", in the sense of having various minor but time-consuming things to do, though as a verb - when you're faffing around - you're doing these things inefficiently. The Scottish equivalent, or at least near equivalent, is "footer". Eg, "I haven't got time to footer around with that", or "I'm going to string fairy lights round the doors but it's a bit of a footer."

 

Gathering rosebuds

Strange how one can be very busy and yet have nothing terribly worth recording. We had snow a week ago, which came as a bit of a shock and caused the buses to stop running completely for most of the day, which I can't remember ever having happened before, or at least not for more than an hour or two. It was most strange, since the main roads were gritted and fairly clear. We'd intended to go to the supermarket, but decided just to stay at home. The snow was completely gone by the next morning, by which time it was 13 degrees C, 55.4 F. 

I've had various social events with friends - coffee on Monday, lunch on Tuesday, family here yesterday and lunch today. All very pleasant. And Daughter 2 came for a work-related flying visit from Wednesday to Friday. And we've been for walks, such as this one, on some beautiful days. 

I meet up most Mondays with friends I used to teach with in the 80s. There are eight of us, one widowed about ten years ago and another about two years ago. Then a third lost her husband a few months ago and a fourth last Tuesday. It's all very sad and sobering. Obviously one knows one's going to die, but when death comes for contemporaries, it's a shock. I'm more and more conscious that's it's important to not to let time drift on with the intention of arranging a meet-up. Hence my trip to Glasgow today with an old friend to meet up with another - we taught together in the 1970s.

So I shall right now write a couple of emails to make some arrangements for the new year with lovely women I haven't seen for a while. Tempus fugit. But we're all fine at the moment!
 

The retired life

Life continues very busy with my choir-chairing responsibilities (which I think are slowing down now, famous last words) but we went up at the weekend to visit Son and family on a beautiful, if chilly, autumn day. We went for a walk in a wood. 

Medium Granddaughter swung. 

And the sun shone. 

Then another day we went along the coast a bit on a bus with the walking chums, and walked back into Musselburgh for 6 and a bit miles.

There was quite a sharp wind, but walking kept us warm. 

This stands in Port Seton, and is made up of  metal objects salvaged from the nearby Cockenzie Power Station when it was demolished. According to Google, "This consists of a set of large steel balls and a ring, which came from one of the coal milling machines used to grind coal to a fine powder for firing the boilers." 

Such a lovely day out with nice friends. 

Look at the size of Big Grandson! He's a lot taller than me, and every week seems to have shot up another six inches. He's still a lovely boy, though. Is he reading a good book here? No, alas, he's watching a YouTube about trains or something. Each to his own. 

 

Sewing

The other day we went with friends to see an exhibition of historical stitching in Scotland. For example, here's a chaise longue - it hasn't been sat on much, I shouldn't think, since it's very unworn. And one can understand why!

Look at the stitching! 

This one wasn't actually stitched in Scotland, but commissioned from India for a Scottish house in the early 1700s. It's a pair of curtains. Look at the background - how long would that take, never mind the flowers? 

Here's our friend admiring the curtains. 

And here's a bedcover stitched by William Henry Kennedy Erskine's mother - his initials are at the top, hers at the bottom, with "From Mother" sewn prominently. He was born in 1828 but sadly died at the age of forty-two. 

It must have taken months and months. It's thought his wife may not have liked it, because it's more or less as new... .

And a huge 18th century bedcover, with very detailed embroidery. 

And this table cover, more like a rug (but you wouldn't want to walk on it). Doesn't the black set the colours off? 

All sewn by hands long stilled. But it's good that they've left these lovely things and that we can still appreciate them. I do sometimes reflect that when I'm long gone, some of the quilts I've made will still be around somewhere. They're much less impressive than these things, though!

 

Voltaire

 Oh for goodness sake, America, not again! How very depressing and worrying. 

Well, Voltaire said that the only thing to do was to cultivate one's garden, and I feel he was largely right. 

I haven't had much time - hardly any - to cultivate my garden, but we did have a walk in the Botanics, which was, as ever, soothing and healing to the weary soul. This (yellow) red hot poker - not normally my favourite plant - caught the light nicely. 

And look! it's spring! Well, no it isn't, but this rhododendron is blooming in a very spring-like fashion.

 

The last of the Japanese anemones. 

And another day we went down to Dawyck Botanic Gardens, in the Borders.

The best of the autumn colours were lying on the ground but there were still enough bright leaves and berries on the trees to cheer us. 

The reason I've been so busy is that I've reluctantly become the chair of one of the choirs I sing in. The AGM was two weeks ago, and since then I've been frantically working out what the chair does, and then doing it. There's been a lot to read! Not that any one thing is terribly onerous, but there are a lot of these things, especially as it's a month till our carol concert. I don't know why the AGM is at the end of October, but it's not a good time. Basically you become chair and then people say, "Now it's very urgent that you organise this carol concert and here are the 97 things you need to do," and then when you've done them, you discover that there are another dozen or so of which you were unaware. 

Ah me. I'm glad I'm not running the United States. 

Essex

We've been away again - do these people never stay at home? - this time down to Daughter 2's in London. We visited Forty House, a Jacobean (early 1600s) house in Enfield. The grounds haven't been built on, so there's a 273 acre estate with a pond, parklands, a big walled garden and so on. Amazingly, it's now owned by Enfield Borough Council and is open free to the public. The house itself is large by most people's standards but not uncomfortably huge - a lovely family home. Its most recent owners were the Parker Bowles family - Queen Camilla's former husband, Andrew Parker Bowles, grew up here. Lucky chap!

It's partly furnished, not with the original furniture, and this room has clothes for dressing up.

A very realistic elephant. 

The queen surveys her policies. (I've just looked up "policies", meaning the managed estate round a house, and discovered that this is a Scottish rather than a standard English use of the word. So I suppose it's wrong here, since the house is in England. But I like the grandeur that the word implies.)

The gardens are stunning, even at this time of year. 

Later, I drew a picture of Smallest Granddaughter and she drew one of me drawing her. I look encouragingly young and much smarter than in reality - though somewhat naked. (I was not.)

The next day we visited the little medieval town of Waltham Abbey. You can easily imagine what it was like 500, 600 years ago or more.

Small Granddaughter helpfully holds up this somewhat crooked house. She was dressed as a rabbit only temporarily; she became rather hot.

The town has a very pretty setting on a river

and a beautiful church, the remains of the abbey which was (inevitably) demolished by Henry VIII. I wish he hadn't.

Then we went to a children's farm, with lovely views over the Essex countryside. (Why do we live in a town?)

There were rabbits, guinea pigs, goats, meerkats etc. 

And many many pumpkins, and really good playparks. 

It was a lovely weekend. But now we're home again.