A Greenhouse?

Yup! A greenhouse!

The Hub has agreed to build me a lean-to greenhouse against his beloved shed:

Site of future greenhouse!

Materials (you may need a magnifying glass!) timber, plastic from skip, perspex.

Tidied up compost heap, courtesy of the Hub- he can't bear a mess not of his creating, and the compost heap is MY mess...

A jungle tamed!!

A nicely weeded and mulched bed- with SUCH a straight edge!

I've started off so many vegetable seeds and they have begun sprouting now so I hope he really does built the greenhouse as promised. I'm going to be the most organised vegetable grower in Ireland come Spring!!

Funny thing a friend said last week about when I told him about the proposed greenhouse: 'The Irish do love their lean-to's, they even build lean-to's onto lean-to's!' And when I thought about it, its true!!


On another note, back to work/school yesterday, although the children don't return until next Monday. I thought it would be a nice gentle ease-in but no such luck- parents wanting second-hand uniforms, phone hopping, returning messages, booking services for office machines, staff trying to get organised, builders problems, Principal catching up on paperwork...and just what does all this have to do with me I ask?

Dunno, but it sure keeps Muggins busy!

Gardening-Oh My!!

What IS it with gardening?

What person in their right mind voluntarily goes out for hours on end in order to get dirty, hot, sweaty, burned (wind, me dears, NOT sun), scratched, bitten, stung, blistered (fingers) and end up aching all over?

And yet here we are in love with and possibly addicted to our gardens...out of all proportion to their beauty or usefulness!

Is there any other sport, hobby or activity which causes such bodily discomfort and damage for so little material gain????

Flowering montbretia on the driveway.

Boring old day lily, but so beautiful while they last.

This has a lovely yellow flower, but I can't remember what it is called, apparently I've been calling it the wrong name for years so of course I cannot get the correct name into my head now!

I've just spent hours on a stint of very satisfying destructive gardening, and the cherry on the cake was discovering a rose I thought was well deaded alive and flowering merrily under all the weeds!

I WorkWorkWorkWork...

....work the whole day long...

Isn't that the dwarfs song from Sleeping Beauty?

Well believe it or not, there have actually been enough dry spells in the last ten days for me to get some work done in the garden! A few drenchings too when I had my head down amongst the weeds and didn't notice the growing blackness of the sky, but maybe if I stand in the rain often enough I'll grow.....? Faint chance at this stage!

Firstly I weeded all along the montbretias, front and back, and was a bit disappointed when I realised how much of the growth was weed, not flower! Oooops! However in the last five days they have come along beautifully and are now just about flowering.

The grass and weeds along our verge were almost waist height as the strimmer is banjaxed. I took out the good old 'slasher' and hacked them down to a reasonable size. Its still all weeds, but its tidy weeds- a step in the right direction!!

 The blackberries are flowering ever so late; if we don't have an Indian summer nothing will ripen, but if we do we'll be inundated. Last year's crop was very patchy so we could do with plenty for jam!

 And I detest pulling up thistles even worse than nettles as they always seem to get me. Mind you, I was plenty stung too- anyone would think I was growing a nettle farm here. I lined the thistles up to put on the fire in the hopes of killing off any potential seeds, so alas alack but this fella is no more!

It doesn't look much does it, but the growth this summer has been something else with the wet and warm temperatures. I've done a fair bit of work around the patio and the beds along the walls but you can't really tell.

Oh well, I know everything is a bit tidier!!

Blue'n'Yalla Quilt

Finally, after much grumbling and grouching, the Blue'n'Yellow Baby Quilt is done!

The piecing went fine, and the stripes were an experiment with which I was reasonably satisfied, but I think next time I'll have them fanning out in all four directions. But the machine quilting was no joke- it took forever and I kept getting boggles. I just never seem to get the quilting quite the way I want it to look. I know my machine is nigh on twenty five years old, but that shouldn't be a problem...in fact I'm pretty darn sure the problem is Oul' Heckety here! grumble grumble...

I used a kanga cloth for the backing, pure cotton and attractive in itself. The yellows are mostly tie-dyed fabric from awhile back and quicte a lot brighter but I haven't got the knack of my Dad's new camera yet either...basically this post is a compilation of bishes!!

Ah well, c'est la vie en pays, as they do say!

A Puckish Puzzlement

Last week I took a notion to make a Puck doll. I was thinking of imps, sprites, woods and people of the land, but I didn't want a pretty pink thing with wings. I was trying for something more androgynous and foresty, Midsummer Night's Dream maybe...it wasn't very successful though, sigh...

First of all the fabric looked too pale for an outdoor person so I blobbed more tea on it and made it so wet it spent the rest of the day propped on the kettle to dry:

While the dismembered limbs were drying I embroidered the face, but it was really difficult trying to get it looking neither male nor female- I failed utterly:

For the clothes I tried to go for 'motley' in the Elizabethan sense,  but eldest said 'she' now looked more like a 'crazy geisha'...Great!

Off came the coat and I made a tunic. I tied the middle with string with an idea of attaching little felt leaves and flowers to it, like a garland you know?

So there you have it/ him/ her.

Not very Puck-like.

I don't know whether to remove clothing and just turn him/ her/ it into a fairy or try to rescue it further. I have to say its frustrating having what I think is a great idea and then the reality coming nowhere near the image.

Any Bailout Recommendations?

Movements v. Morals?

At the risk of sounding like Aesop of the Fables, or worse still, my Great Granny (very VERY opinionated, clever woman and not backward about coming forward either!) I just have to respond to Ann's comment last weekend because a) it triggered such a 'yesssss totally!' response in yours truly and b) she made a pertinent comment on the subject of movements...or Movements?!

Anyone with a 'war baby' for a parent has likely been brought up with a very strong thrify habit. Add to that living through the austerity of '40s and '50s Ireland, and you could add 'stingy' to the general lifestyle as well!! At the time it was born of necessity since there was nothing to spare and every single item had to be used, reused and then, if possible, remade for further use. I'm not knocking it at all, even with such ingrained habits we have had it so much easier that it is difficult for my generation to imagine how difficult it truly was.

It stood me in good stead when I moved to East Africa at 21 and had to get to grips with another lifestyle wherein there was little to spare and nothing could go to waste. In 15 years there I went from a reasonably affluent life to one on the brink of white poverty, and then to drought and flood on a fairly remote coffee farm where the chasm between 'haves' and 'have nots' was vast. One stored, hoarded, eked out, grew and shared everything with whoever needed what you had, and learned to gracefully accept gifts in every guise. There, a neighbour was such in the Biblical sense, ANYone in need.

Thrift? Common sense? Recycle? Necessity, me dears, not a lifestyle choice! And even now, after the Celtic Tiger and the years of prosperity which many MANY of us have experienced should thriftiness not still be a way of life? Waste not want not, frugal and considerate use of resources, conservation of our non-renewable planet, thoughtful preparation againt the future.

Despite my favourite sci-fi adventures, in reality, NASA doen't seem to have a bunch of inter-stellar Space Ships ready to beam us all off to a brand new planet so I guess we'd better seriously look at reversing some of the thoughtless damage we have perpetrated on this planet, as well as preventing future damage.

And so to the comment Ann made about Movements...These days it seems as though unless it is a 'movement' its not worth doing and unless it is a Propaganda Bandwagon there is no intrinsic merit in adopting the attitude. In my (loud!) opinion, if it is ethically and morally right then we ought to be doing it (whatever 'it' is at the time) regardless of mainstream or indie culture...or Bandwagon...or Movement..or anything else with a funny name.

One last (I think!) thought: I have a serious problem with the 'look at me' attitude which somehow seems to have become the norm, when people want to be congratulated for doing what in previous generations would have been called duty or community spirit. Whether or not anyone is looking, or anyone notices, and even if NO ONE notices, doing what is right should be our priority at all times. Easier said than done, for sure, but so be it: nothing worthwhile was ever easy.

Sure culture plays a part in our ethics, morals, choices and actions but a bit of good ould fashioned common sense never went amiss! Long live the silent, unobtrusive people who quietly, thoughtfully live right by their own lights.


PS just think, modren young 'uns don't know the joy of skip hunting and foraging and junk trawling just for the pure something-for-nothing un-political non-movement fun of it!!! what are they MISSING babe????


In the immortal words of Winnie-the-Pooh, 'That's what I think. But I don't suppose I'm right.'
(The House at Pooh Corner)

Slow Clothing....Huh?

I've heard of Ethical Fashion and Up-cycled garments, customising and altering, donating unwanted clothes to charities or what's that swapping clothes movement called...you know what I mean...but Slow Clothing??? Really??Makes it sound like if I move too fast for my clothes I'll leave them behind...d'you think I should start keeping on my pyjamas underneath my clothes in future? For the sake of the unsuspecting public, you know?

But wait! You haven't heard the exact definition of Slow Clothing yet, as per the dubious Wikipedia (I like Wikipedia, just heard others slagging it):

The term "Slow Fashion" was coined by Kate Fletcher in 2007...based on the same principals of the Slow Food Movement, as the alternative to mass produced clothing.

Some examples of slow fashion practices include:

• Opposing and boycotting mass produced fashion.
• Choosing artisan products to support smaller businesses, fair trade and locally-made clothes.
• Buying secondhand or vintage clothing and donating unwanted garments.
• Choosing clothing made with sustainable, ethically-made or recycled fabrics.
• Choosing quality garments that will last longer, transcend trends (a "classic" style), and be repairable.
• Doing it yourself - making, mending, customising, altering, and up-cycling your own clothing.
• Slowing the rate of fashion consumption: buying fewer clothes less often.

The Slow Fashion movement is a unified representation of all the "sustainable", "eco", "green", and "ethical" fashion movements...A key phrase repeatedly heard in reference to Slow Fashion is "quality over quantity"...slowing down the rate of clothing consumption by choosing garments that last longer.

Bet ya didn't know that then?!! Or, like me, yous all did, but thought it was called 'thrift' or (shock! horror!) COMMON SENSE!!!!

So now, all of us stingy dressers who buy our clothes in Boutique de Charity and re-wear our garments until we are simply stitching the mended parts together, can refer to ourselves as being part of the ultra-trendy ethical Slow Fashion Movement!

Oh my family are soooo gonna expire laughing over this notion!!!