where stuff happens

This little mouse came to me from Steph during the DBM episode. She said I needed to get in touch with my inner mouse! It has now found its true role in life, as indicator of my having decamped to "The Workshop" - the idea being that I place it on the dining table where the Good Man cannot miss it.

"The Workshop" is our garage, never used for cars, with the addition of a very fine sink, a water heater, some random furniture, a print bench, and two skylights for natural light

The rug in front of the sink was hooked by Mum back in the early 1960s to her own design which sat in front of her gas fire all of my life. It is now sadly on it's last legs, but gives me a soft spot to stand when working there and is a link to her. Our coastline hangs on the wall, four pathfinder maps laminated to a large board, so I know where I am in case I get lost - a project from many years ago. Some ancient mirrors and one of Jen's GCSE artworks, also from long ago give the end where the garage doors are some interest.

Looking the other way, there is a door to the back garden, which means I can go in and out from the back of the house. There are shelves and cupboards for storage, and I am beginning to get things organised

In the corner by the garage door is my ponder spot, two chairs of Cecil's, one an upright beautifully caned chair, the other a little low legged upholstered chair which used to sit by her bed and hold her clothes ready for the morning. Again, I have known it all my life and it is another link to deeply loved people. Here it is, still holding clothes, but this time my workshop apron and clothkits smock

On the bench in the foreground is one of my Coronavirus project pieces, the textures I was collecting from the garden to reflect activities that have been part of our isolation experience. I did further rubbings yesterday and have now added a new layer of dye.

The other place that "stuff" happens is here. In theory it is the spare bedroom. In reality it is my sewing and "whateverothercraftactivityI'mdoing" room. Yes it is a bit of a muddle, but I know where everything is (honest)! One of Nanya's oil paintings hangs above the fireplace.

I can sit and plot and design and cut out stuff, and baste things together at the table (another piece of Cecil furniture). I can clamp my little tapestry loom to it's edge (yes, I'm tapestry weaving again) to do a bit of weaving, and on the table behind me is my sewing machine to stitch things together. The room is south facing, so again plenty of natural light to see by.

I am thankful every day that I have these places to retire to and explore the various creative activities that bring me joy - I know that many have much less. I am thankful too for the network of folk who share these interest with me. In particular Christine's wonderful transferral of Studio 11 to an online space has encouraged me to really make use of my garage-workshop. It has been a long time coming, but walking in there every day, turning some music on and using the things I have gathered together over the years to explore the current Studio11 projects is a huge pleasure.

I hope you too are finding time for creativity in the these strange lockdown days

Corona creativity

Because we are unable to gather at Studio 11 for our monthly creative delights with Christine, she has, in her usual undefeatable resilience, put together an online course for those of us who want to continue exploring cloth and stitch. Her suggestion was that we work on the theme uppermost in our minds at the moment which is, of course Covid-19.

What an unprecedented experience for all of us, both close and far - something which will probably redefine "normal" for most of us once we have got beyond this stage of lockdown For us, me and my dear man, life is in many ways unchanged, we are both retired, but the loss of weekly markers, Bridge for him, various things for me, lends a sense of timelessness to days, a stasis which is quite hard to rise above.

The garden has provided a retreat and sanctuary space for both of us, and as I have sat out there I have been much more mindful of my surroundings. The extra level of hush brings birdsong to the fore; an aircraft passing above is something to remark on, rather than ignore; the textures of things around me, visual textures and sounds, are things to focus on and enjoy. So, I spent some time taking rubbings of things, first on paper with a simple wax crayon - some came I was very happy with,

So focusing on those I liked, I took some cotton out into the garden to collect again, this time with candle wax. The marks are there, but could be more definite, what you can't see here are the lovely contact marks the dye made on the back of the cloth. I will add more marks, and more colour, and see where we get. Had I thought, I could have left the first layer of wax on, taken a second layer of marks and then added colour, but I was too hasty with wanting to see what it looked like so it has all been washed away. I will do my best to overlap the rubbings so I retain some of those white marks

The other thing we did was to look at the imagery attached to the virus, drawing it in various different ways. I played with stitching and clamping, linen and ramie, to see what shibori methods could do to evoke that spiky ball - lots to think about here, and to play with some more

The gender fluid cow

As our isolation and social distancing settles in we are keeping ourselves occupied in a variety of ways. I am taking great delight in returning to my Mum's diaries, transcribing them little by little each day and wishing she could know how much they are contributing to my touch typing skills. As I follow her adventures I occasionally come across mention of letters written to her beloved "Mummy". You can imagine my delight when I investigate one of the many old suitcases that I have kept,

and find each of those letters carefully tucked away. Little did her 14 year old self think that her daughter would be reading them all these years later.

Letter from Sept 1939

So, it is 1940, she is staying with her beloved Aunt Connie and her companion Harry out at Nirvana, by Iden lock during a break from school

Connie and Harry at the gate of Nirvana

Harry and Connie pedalling across the fields

Her life is full of very simple pleasures; taking their dog Benjy for walks, picking bluebells, going to collect the milk from the nearby farm, wrapping 5 dozen eggs in paper to take back to Hastings for storage in "waterglass", and feeding one of the local cows "8 or 9 basins full of lovely grass". Having spent the day doing this, much to the cow's delight, she then goes for an evening walk across the fields. The cow, obviously anticipating more spoiling, comes ambling up for more grass. In her letter home she describes the scene

"… he stalked across about half the field to meet me. I showed him that my hands were empty and she put down her head as tho' to eat grass and butted me (don’t laugh). I was scared stiff and dashed nearly the length of the field back to Nirvana. She followed but saw I was too fast for her. I think it was a dirty trick after my feeding her all day with sweat upon the brow."

You will notice, however, that the "cow" changes sex in the extract, in fact, she changes sex several times during the recounting of the tale. Obviously my grandmother, in a reply that I don't have, commented. In the following letter, a few days later, Mum elaborates, noting that

"The “sack” of the cow was feminine but I think it must have had a bit of bull in it to want to butt me."

Obviously in Mum's world feminine was good, udders were best not mentioned and masculine was likely to misbehave!

Here she is the following year aged 15 in her garden in Cheam, with her much loved cat Patsy - who despite the name was male!!

Missed

It will be ten years this year that she has been gone, though she is in my heart every day. Today would have been her 94th birthday

On the beach with her Mum c. 1927

More happy summer beach days

Aged around 20 - sunshine and shadow

Mum and Dad in their courting days

a very happy grandmother

I am so glad she didn't have to fear this thing. I phoned my aunt this week on her birthday; she and Mum shared the same birth year. I felt her despondency; when life is burdensome enough the isolation and lack of "normal" feels just too much to bear. I hope my call gave her some small pleasure

Garden rescue

Just a little forget-me-not plant, one of many, accidentally dislodged during weeding. Great Great Aunt Harriet in the background, painted by her sister

We have a fierce and chilly wind blowing for a couple of days here, time to retreat indoors methinks

Rainbows

There’s a wonderful notion here in the UK, in response to the epidemic. Folk are creating rainbows and pinning them up in their windows so that passers by can be cheered. I love the thought, but at the moment people are, in theory, not going out except for essentials. So I though I’d share some of the rainbows that I live with.

They can be made by the sun, briefly captured by the wall

Or gently illuminating cloth stitched in India

They can be woven in Peru

They can have little birds flying across them

Or they can be made of cloth or glass and shine in the window by sunlight or lamplight

Because when the clouds are dark, if you can see a rainbow you know the sun is behind you. Sometimes we need rainbows to pull us through.

Strange times

In these curious times there are many things to be thankful for, and perhaps the sense of threat heightens that feeling. We are in the lucky position of having stopped work, so have the freedom to say, lets just stay at home and do "stuff" and just go out when we need some shopping. Admittedly that does mean one of us is in the "at risk" category because of his age, but that's just more good reason to stay at home.

We both take great delight in our garden, which has grown and changed quite significantly since we moved here in 2010. We have dug and planted, and had a number of very splendid folk in to help us with the proper business of landscaping. When we moved here we both felt that we wanted to give the garden time to tell us about itself; to reveal where the sun would lie in summer, to show us where previously planted bulbs are happy to see the light again and, most importantly, what wildlife we might be sharing it with. The consequence has been a slow transformation, one project at a time as strength and finances have allowed. The first priority for me was to transform the horrible shingle desert in front of the house into a garden that passers by could enjoy and which makes me smile every time I walk outside.

The back garden has acquired a productive area with greenhouse and raised beds - the badgers were particularly pleased the first year the Man provided ready to dig carrots!

The upper space has grown a pond, and much better walking areas. Despite being on top of a hill it gets extremely wet in rainy weather, and the water lies. We've had slate walkways carved into the grassy area over the past two years, that on the left the most recently completed.

the pond was added

and the garden has acquired the sense of something you can progress through; walkways lead to steps, or paved areas and flow round the top space in a very satisfactory manner. Most recently the latest stage of our garden transformation was completed.

I ponder and bask in this new seating area, a combination of fresh and reclaimed materials, with the flow and splash of the pond soothing me from across the grass,

As I listen to the birds in the many trees that surround me I feel deeply thankful to have such a treasured refuge in which to wait out this crisis.

What brings you pleasure at this time?