TARRAGON & THYME

Its been a busy weekend and I have managed to get all the washing done and air dried this weekend which is quite an achievement as there was a lot.  Now I have a large ironing mountain to deal with.  Guess what I will be doing tomorrow evening. Its been a lovely day here today and even now it is still well warm and very muggy.  I have been busy as usual in the kitchen today.  I cooked tea tonight after a few weeks off.  We have had roast pork with home made sausagemeat stuffing roasted courgettes, roast potatoes, fresh baby carrots,cabbage and cauliflower with gravy.  Very tasty  it was too. I don't use salt to get the crackling.  I have a gas cooker and for the first hour I blast the joint at Gas Mark 8 to give it a real nice crispy crackling.  OH has high blood pressure so I tend to avoid it if I can.  Here you see the joint and the stuffing after only ten minutes or so.  I also add a pack of lard to the bottom of the tin so tha...

Well I think we are in for an early autumn this year.  There is not much way by hips and haws in the hedgerows round here at the moment - not as good as last year so far in any event.     I have not managed to get any yellow bullace from the hedgerows - there was a prime spot that we went to last yearconsisting of several bushes, but there is also a large community of Polish and the like in this area and they had stripped the tree bare before the fruit was even ripe so I am assuming that they have turned it into alcohol of some sort or another. One of the rules I have always followed when foraging is that you are not greedy and harvest from various spots rather than just the one and then stripping it bare.  I am always mindful that the wildlife eat these fruits too and that it does not have any exclusivity just to us mere humans, but there should always be some left for others too.  Anyway that is by the by - I will keep looking out for different spots...

I posted recently that there were a lot of things that I would like to do before I die list.  Some of the items are more practical things on a lifestyle basis others are things I would like to experience to exhiliarate the soul  This is by no means comprehensive but is a start is in no particular order just as my rambling mind thinks of things and "spills"  Set my intent and focus and share the love there is too much discord in this world. Learn to tread lightly and live simply. Learn to drive so that I can regain my independence - I hate having to rely on people to transport me here and there and there are things I am interested in that I cannot get to because of lack of transport or the good grace of others.  I like going to car boots, antiques fairs, needlecraft shows, etc. etc.  I also love doing the charity shops and not all are easy for me to get to. Progress my Mediumship training in whatever way I can WIP Take my Masters in Reiki so that I can t...

From a very young age I have had a love of words; I have always read and written pieces of poetry but words they have always fascinated me.  And a group of words formed into a sentence or into a book or a small poem, prose - needn't even rhyme but it conveys so much meaning, and so much hidden passion it surely is a truly beautiful thing.   On a spoken word basis I don't always manage to convey how I am feeling or am able to communicate that fact, but give me a piece of paper and an opportunity to form my thoughts and write them down - then that is a slightly different scenario.  However, for one reason or another  - whetther I am too highly critical of myself or not - I always come to the conclusion that things can always be a lot better. As a child I always had a bedtime story I was very lucky it was a regular event in our household - I like to hear people speak; I loved the folk tales and local legends; my dad made up stories and so did my grandfather....

It was cold here last night and I woke about 5.00 a.m. this morning perished I quickly flung the quilt back on and snuggled down.  Today or should I say this morning was dull grey and cold - I ended up putting a jumper and trousers on and by the middle of the afternoon was far too warm - just cannot win with the weather round here.  I understand other parts of the country have had a nice warm sunny day.  Lucky them.  I am hoping the weather is going to improve over the next few days or so All went well at the Doctors apart from the Nurse I managed to draw wasn't very good at getting my blood  my vein collapsed and wasn't giving any blood up and I had two tests being carried out; she was a bit rough with one of the other procedures I had to have which was uncomfortable.  But at least its over with now just have to wait for the results. Then I was wheeled in to see the Doctor I  updated him as to what had been happening - got my medication sorted have ...

Its been a busy day at work I have been billing all day and it is ardous time consuming work and as a result my eyes are feeling strained this evening and I am very tired again and so I am not indulging in any craft tonight.  Its cold again or at least I am feeling the change in the temperature. My toes have gone cold! I didn't fancy much for tea and in the end just had some hot crumpets with some butter on - seemed appropriate in view of the change in the weather which according to this evening's weather forecast is liable to be variable for the next few days. I have for once managed to catch up with the National News - usually I manage to pass it by, but did you see the article about the lady who went over the cliff at St Agnes down in Cornwall.  Someone was watching out for her today, (surely a miracle). Oh and I had a surprise present from my friend yesterday.  Normally year in year out I have an Angelica plant or plants that self seed themselves, but last winter ...

Just a quick flit in and out before I wend my way upstairs to Bedfordshire.  Its been a long day today and I feel a little out of sorts; am very sleepy today and is it me but its been colder today - I feel the cold or change in temperature quite badly and I have had to sling a jumper on it seems to have got very dark - pitch black very early tonight too. It smacks of autumn yet its summer. OH on his computer in the back room so will probably see him tomorrow morning sometime with Missy - Squeak is camping out with me. I have the Doctors first thing on Wednesday morning, not only with the Nurse who apparently needs to take some more of my precious blood out of  me (the hospital have had it as welland according to them the medication I am taking for the scleroderma is working) but with the GP.  Have to get this medication sorted out for the hiatus hernia and what with me being backwards and forwards to the hospital quite a bit .  I have a follow up appointment at t...

Yesterday    I have few vices in life, but one of them is Food.  I love trying new things, I love being able to go and buy good quality produce or in the event of a limitation on my purse the best | can buy for the money I have available, but one thing I will not do is compromise on flavour as flavour is everything to me and a well cooked full of flavour meal is far memorable than one not so well cooked and lacking in flavour.  Unusually for me yesterday I did not go to the veg shop but I did got to the Butchers instead.  I have fresh veg I have frozen myself in the freezer that needs using up and as we needed to top up on some meat for simple meals during the week it was more cost effective to deal with matters in this way.  I do prefer fresh veg over frozen but have found that if I freeze veg myself it has more flavour and at least I have the provenance of where it has come from.  That is apart from peas!  I love fresh peas but I am also very...

This is the book I was referring to last night in my post of Crotchet. It has some lovely ideas in it for decorating your home and it is a book I have had from new and for quite a few years.  Its one to look out for at the car boots or charity shops as it has lots of useful instructions. I taught myself how to do ribbon weaving from this book never having done it before and have gone on to make several pieces which have yet to be turned into little creations. The next two photographs show the heirloom style bedspread that I want to make for myself together with lots of other little projects.  The second photo of the bedspread shows the detail in the stitches.     The rug below is worked in cross stitch The photos above of the cushions on the bed shows the cushion I am crotcheting or at least have started to crotchet.  I also have the fabrics for doing the other cushion covers.  I like the traditional old style charm of pretty things brought toget...

A couple of weeks ago I was given a copy of a crotchet pattern for a scarf to crotchet, a little bit of whimsy a neck warmer.  Since then I haven't been able to stop crotcheting and have made three so far - these are for myself for wearing at work during the winter months.  See separate post for further detailst  They are simple and quick to make and an ideal small Christmas present, so I am getting stuck in and making one or two., three or four, five or six etc... The pattern is a free one on the Artesano Website - it is the Corkscrew Scarf by Birgit Chaplin which can be downloaded as a pdf. http://www.artesanoyarns.co.uk/Free%20Knitting%20Patterns/free%20knitting%20patterns.html It is quite a way down the list.  So even if you don't intend to use the pattern now it might be worth dowloading it so that you have it in readiness for when you do want to use it. Trouble is that this has spurred my latent hibernating wool addiction and I don't seem to be able to sto...