Lily

Not sure how to start this post. Had planned to show some w.i.p.s. Chat randomly about this and that.

But all that seems a bit frivolous.

Lily - wonderful, beautiful precious Lily is no longer. And we don't know where or why. We hear rumours in the village about cats going missing.   The more posters we have put up and the more people we have spoken to, the more we hear about other cats disappearing.

Most stories have the same alleged ending.
The same name keeps coming up.

The same man .... and his gun.

I am running out of ways to comfort my boys and to shelter them from the possible way their precious cat was taken from them.

Lily

aka Lily Purkins, the pompom of doom, bogbrush tail, Tiger Lily

01.10.11 - 15.10.12

You are missed and were dearly loved.

Tears

I want to thank you all so much for you kind comments - I hadn't realised that my ramblings about our little catlings touched so many of you - thank you.

All we can surmise is that Holly slipped out through the back of our garden into the neighbours. From there she would have been able to get to the road and as she didn't know that area then got lost. She could have tried to return or was frightened by something and ran off in the wrong direction.

We had searched from about 2 hours when I received a phone call - her body had been found and carefully lifted off the road while her rescuers tried to trace us. We, Himself and I, left our sobbing boys at home and we collected her body.

At home we all cuddled her, Eldest - who was her human held her the longest and cried so hard while Himself dug her a grave in her favourite part of the garden. Youngest collected Lily as we all agreed that she should know her sister had died. He held his cat as I held Holly (Eldest too distraught to watch stood behind and sobbed) and Lily very very gently washed the small speck of blood off Holly's face. She looked as if she was just asleep.

I am crying as I type - sorry - who'd have thought that a small creature who we'd only had for 6 months would reduce us all to such floods tears. The rest of the evening was of self-recriminations of should we have let them play in the garden, should we have searched quicker, sooner, longer but what ever we could have done, we didn't and so the boys and I cuddled up on the settee and took turns to talk and cry while Himself seemed stunned.

Later, much later, once the boys had gone to bed, we talked about her and Himself summed it up in one sentence -
How could something so small and furry leave such a terribly big hole?

Lily seems to know she has gone, she doesn't look for her, but needs more loving and lap time. Yesterday she sat on me every time I had a lap or followed me and sat on my feet. She is sitting next to me now.

I promise my next posting will be a little more cheerful, but for the time being we all feel a little sad and a lot empty.

Holly

RIP

Holly

01.10.11 - 15.04.12

We are heartbroken.

Japan

I feel that I can not waffle on today about my life when so so many people are destitute, traumatised, missing or trying to survive the awful conditions over in Japan. 

I sit in silence with my hands on my mouth trying not to cry every time I see the footage of their bewildered faces as they try to pick through their damaged environment.

I dearly want to help and am in the throws of trying to sort something out. I will let you know as soon as it is all in place - you might even want to get involved too.

That is all for now.

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One of those mind-numbing moments

This morning a stoat got into our hen-pen and killed two of our girls.

What a waste, what a waste. The girls were up and ready for their breakfast when it struck. I found them and my first instinct was the mess had been caused by a fox, but our neighbour recognised it as the style of a stoat. Apart from the obvious visual evidence - what I was struck by was the smell - a strange sweet and cloying stink that hung over the air and clung to my clothing.

It was awful having to collect up the bodies and clear away the feathers. The other hens were very distressed and refused to eat preferring to hunch up at the far corner. I let them out into the garden and they very quickly disappeared into the meagre winter undergrowth of the garden. They stayed out all morning and I only managed to get them back in by the devious means of a slice of stale bread - how quickly feather-heads forget.


So, poor dear Rosie the Tea-Cosy and Tatty-bird are now no longer.

Rosie

Tatty-bird

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Lovers, tears and cascading leaves

Entwined and twisted into each other, long limbs clasping tight, 

wrapping the other closely. 

 Never to be separated until death.

 Linked. 

Timeless. 

Lovers in an ancient track watching as the world passes them by.

Beautiful.

We've been walking today - Sunday. A quiet valley nestling against a wild moor land. A cutting breeze seemed to slice through our fleeces and gloves, giving a sharp reminder that summer had gone and autumn reigns supreme. Colours of orange and reds were splashed across the hill sides and thick swathes of fallen leaves banked up again the lane edge.

When we had almost completed the walk, we meet two tearful women, a mother and daughter, each clinging to piebald cob. The older woman asked if we had seen another piebald and his mate - a dark bay horse as they had been fruitlessly searching for the missing pair.

We told them that had seen their horses at the far side of the huge field we had just walked through. Their relief was palpable. They began to babble an explanation to us as well as reassuring themselves about their worry that the bay had been shot before they could say their last goodbyes.

There were tearfully bitter comments about man who was to shoot their beloved animal, angry and hurt words.
He is not fit to keep the horse, he did not understand their  pain and love for this horse. He did not have a right to shoot this animal as it was not his......


'He' was the younger woman's father and the older woman's ex-husband. Oh what misery this divorce had created.

We left and they turned back to where we had pointed out the horses, determined to see the animal one last time before it's destruction and to find and comfort it's mate. Our happy walk seemed sullied by their sadness.

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Autumnal Recipe - cascading leaves

• Take one 'almost teenager' (but in self denial)
• Collect various autumnal leaves - making sure they are brightly coloured and differing sizes
• Have in your stash of sticks a particularly knobbly and interesting one
• Find a reel of white cotton

Tie leaves on to the cotton
Arrange the lengths of cotton then tie to the interesting and knobbly stick
Hang the stick above the glass doors so as the sun streams through, the leaves catch the light.

Stick the few remaining leaves with tape to the glass and down the wall to continue the cascade downwards.

Voilà - autumnal cascading leaves

And if you enjoyed this 'recipe' - you might like to check this one out too!

04.04.10 - chocolate eggs and saddle sores

Hooray!
The easter bunny visited over night, and being the clever bunny that he is, he put out the chocolate treats just before he went off to bed (because he very nearly forgot) and even more clever, he hid them inside the house (coz due to the lateness of the hour - it was very very dark - besides the weatherman had promised yet more rain.....) Clever easter bun!

So, yes you guessed, it was chocolate for breakfast - yumm.....

Inspired by our ride out yesterday, and not completely put off by what the weatherman did say, we decided to go out again. Only this time not on the coast as heavy showers had been forecast but inland, in the Dales for a change.

The day has the same format as yesterday. We set off when it was fine, and when we arrived at our start point - the rain lashed down with vengeance.

Only this time we did sit in the car and eat our lunch....and our mid afternoon snacks....and drank tea.....and the orange meusli muffins....and the chocolates that survived the breakfast nibbling.....but we chose to leave the apples for later......!

We had parked outside a little rural church, quiet and sleepy, thinking that there would be no service in the afternoon and we would be not interferring with any congregational parking - alas we were wrong.

Shortly after we had consumed the last crumbs of our lunch (except the apples which were just too darned healthy) various warmly wrapped up good souls appeared from nowhere to this apparently isolated church - for an afternoon's service.

A very polite vicar confirmed that we had indeed taken church parking and equally politely suggested we parked.....Over there, by the telegraph pole

Which we did, and promptly sunk into boggy mud and almost lost our boots. Hmmmm.

We wrapped up warmly with Himself grinding his back teeth at the weather and set off. 

After a while, the icy wind eased off, the rain became less stinging and then stopped and the views began to delight.

I must admit, I am used to riding a mountain bike and being able to power up hills and whizzzzzz down them again, landing in pot holes, splashing through puddles and surviving, however, Evelyn doesn't do things like that, so we genteely navigated along the lanes at an elegant pace, occasionally having to be pushed up the hills, as despite me changing gears down to the lowest, and despite me puffing and panting, Evelyn DOES NOT DO HILLS..... She also doesn't race downhills either, no we have to gracefully glide down, avoiding potholes and gravel that her road-thin-wheels tremble at. Despite all her fuss - we had a lovely ride - just a little slower and a lot more girly than I am used to!

Ingleborough in the background

Evelyn in the foreground

Just in case you didn't notice...........

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A stone stack - For S, who's sister Di died this morning at 7.30am

S - we are very sorry xx

18.01.10

Sad
sad
sad

Today I say goodbye
 to a good friend
My elderly cat
has finally reached the end
of her furry life.

At 20, she has outlived many others.

She has seen us go from living together, to getting married,
to moving to Africa,
to moving back to the UK.



She had first run away from, then learned to love the boys.
She even discovered that they were very useful - they could be trained to open doors, open tins of cat food, to tickle on demand and to cuddle at the drop of a hat.

I will not be the only one to miss her.

01.12.09

December.
We don't rush to put up the tree in our house, we used to, but not any more.
We tend to wait for the weekend that the boys breakup from school,
then the three of us,
each taking turn to supervise,
put the kettle on and make tea,
change the music
and decorate the tree.
But- something we always have - advent calendars.

Granny and Bumpa painstakingly collect and assemble a delightful choice for my boys each year.
A few years ago, my Mom made the calendars
and they are brought out every festive season and hung up
for the boys to find.



This will be the first Christmas of my life that my Gran has not bought me one
 - She died New Year's day 2009.
 I am sure my Mom will feel pangs of loss too, we all do.

A moment, a thought, a memory slips in to my head and it jolts it as fresh as the day it happened.

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I took my camera outside into the garden today, caught some frost.

Then came inside and decided to make an advent calender for work

- yes I know,

but better late than never.

I opened  Jonathan Jo

and found all sorts of interesting things.

And made these.........

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In our garden we have a collection of 'findings'

When we walk,

we find 'treasure'

other people's cast asides becomes ours.

And, when frosty, the rusting farm tools

have a beauty of their own.

Time for work.

A Friend

02.11.09

I met her in the autumn of 2004.

I misheard her name in my nervousness and for the first hour kept referring to her wrongly.

But from that Thursday, we became friends.

At first just a weekly meeting whilst at college,

but then we met for children's birthday parties and weekend get togethers, then she moved into our village.

Although we are so different, we are so alike.

We can both say things like - Ophiopogon planiscapus 'Nigrescens' and know what we are talking about.

We can both lose ourselves in a plant nursery and love it.

We can both plan next season's colour or vegetables this season and have them sown and ready in our greenhouses

We both love the allure of yarn and beads and threads and material

We have been on holiday together

We look after each other's fur-babies when the other is away

I have dragged her hill and dale, through thick and thin, through mud and water

She drags me shopping................

I get her to join in our madcap themed parties where she has to make costumes and get dressed up,

she has taught me that matching china looks good, colour co-ordinated cushions actually do make the room and that our friendship is strong............

She looks fantastic in pink - I don't

She wears jeans and looks slim - I don't

She wears heels - I fall out of them......

She has long elegant nails - I have gardener's hands

She will leave a hole in my heart and in my life when she leaves - but I understand and agree why she is returning to her beloved island.

Happy birthday my dear dear friend - I love you.

22.10.09

A celebration of life

A marking of a death

A meeting of the families from far and wide

A chance to catch up

A Quaker funeral - with quiet words of love and memories and stories

A few discreet tears

A sharing of tissues

A mutual handshake to commune accordance to life, to love and family.

A wake that remembered her gentle look on life,

 her love of the countryside, her family, her cooking,

her enjoyment of music, her love of the arts, her open door.

Then a drive along her favourite lane,

to take pictures of places that will always hold her memory and whisper her name.

12.09.09

For breakfast we ate blackberry and apple jam on pancakes.

The boys jokingly called it ratberry jam.

Last weekend we'd spent a happy afternoon collecting the berries.

Autumn – it gives me mixed feelings. Sad yet hopeful. It is the end of the year it is the beginning of the year.