After nearly a year of not posting anything on my blog I have decided, at last, that I ought to do something about it. It has been a difficult year in many ways but especially because my siblings, my husband, daughters and I have been dealing with my mother’s death and the associated tasks of sorting out all her belongings and trying to sell her house. I may go into that in more detail in another post. As going out and taking photos has not been a priority recently I haven’t many adventures to relate so I have decided to carry on with my record of our holiday in Brittany when our daughters were very much younger than they are now. Please see here https://asuffolklane.com/2024/03/12/holiday-in-brittany-august-1999/ and here https://asuffolklane.com/2024/03/24/holiday-in-brittany-august-1999-part-2/ to remind yourselves of the holiday so far.
ooOOoo
Tuesday 24th August
When we woke the rain had stopped but everything was very wet. Richard drove to Lanvénégen and bought croissants, pains aux chocolat and two long, thin pains aux campagne for our breakfast.
We had an early lunch at Le Grand Pont on the R. Ellé outside Le Faouët. The inn is next to the chapel of Ste Barbe and became quite busy just after we arrived. Alice had wanted to visit the Witchcraft Museum (I don’t believe this exists any more) but as the key had to be obtained from the staff in the inn and they were so busy we didn’t go in, to Alice’s disappointment.
We then drove to Pont Scorff Zoo which Elinor really enjoyed. We all got very hot and tired as we were not expecting the zoo to be so large or for the weather to get so warm.
We returned to the gîte via Les Roche du Diable so that Alice could take photos for her school art-work. Elinor fell off the low garden wall when we got back. We then ate our evening meal of ham and cheese and finished the bread.
We all admired the beautiful full moon Richard pointed out to us before going to bed.
Wednesday 25th August
Richard went out to get croissants and bread for us again this morning. It really is so pleasant eating breakfast all together – and such a nice breakfast too! We didn’t want to do much today as we had been in the car such a lot over the past few days. We sat in the sun and read and then Richard took Elinor for a walk to see the geese and the horses. We ate bread and paté for lunch and Breton Cake for pudding.
At about 3.30pm we went into Le Faouët to do a supermarket shop and to get more postcards. Richard cooked us risotto for tea. The owls were very noisy after dark. Alice drank a couple of small glasses of red wine tonight and got a bit merry. She swung on the swing and lay on the grass outside for a while. She then came back into the house, did some wiping up while I washed the dishes and then went off to listen to her music in her room. When Richard and I decided to go to bed about 11.30pm we realised we hadn’t seen or heard Alice for some time. She had fallen asleep in her clothes and needed a bit of help in finding her pyjamas and getting comfortable. No more wine for Alice for a while !
Thursday 26th August
We all woke later than usual this morning so we decided to bath Elinor and wash her hair after breakfast. Unfortunately, the bathroom stool broke decanting Richard onto the floor – more bruises added to the earlier ones! Wood glue added to shopping list.
We set off for Quimperlé just after midday and drove along a winding hilly road through little villages. We parked the car near the river in the centre of the town and went to the tourist office to get a town plan. As we were all hungry (when weren’t we hungry on this holiday?!) and as restaurants and cafés in Brittany only serve food between 12.00 midday and 2.00pm we went off in search of somewhere to eat. We decided on a pizzeria; its entrance was a covered bridge over the river. The food was very good but Elinor didn’t eat much.
Elinor with her drink and Pingu comic.
Alice and me on the bridge to the pizzeria.
After lunch we walked round the town going first to the Haute-Ville. On the way, Alice went into a shop to buy post cards and a diary. The shop keeper gave her two chewy sweets! We found a large, well laid-out square, Place St Michel, where Richard posted my postcards for me. We visited L’Église Notre-Dame-de-L’Assomption which had a charcuterie stuck onto the east wall!
The road up to the upper town.
Church with charcuterie.
We then walked down the hill to the river again and the Bas-Ville. We crossed the river by the Pont Fleurie, a very pretty ancient bridge. We saw a tiled fish hall and then went to a park on the banks of the Ellé for a rest. Alice’s feet were suffering as she was wearing high heels. We walked back to the car via the Rue Dom-Maurice which has beautiful 16th century half-timbered houses.
Elinor in push-chair, Alice and me next to the river. The old bridge in the distance.
Alice and me on the bridge.
Timberframed houses.
We drove back to the gite via Querrien, a pretty village we had driven through on Tuesday. We parked in the square by the church and Richard and I got out to look around. This was a very well-kept village with a mayor’s office, a small supermarket and a number of other little shops – two boulangeries! – and a library. We looked at a restaurant but they hadn’t put up their menu or price-list yet and then went to buy bread and pastries. We decided that if we lived in France this is where we’d live.
We had another bread and cheese tea which we all enjoy and Elinor went happily to bed at about 9.00pm. Richard told me what a lovely, still evening it was so we went out for ten minutes or so listening to the owls, the crickets and the horses. When the farm dog barked we noticed what a wonderful echo there was.
Dear All; and you are all very dear to me and I have been thinking of you a lot over the past many months. Some of you may have forgotten all about me, some may have been wondering where I had got to, others may already know what I have been doing.
If you have been reading my blog for some time you will know that I am married to Richard, I have two daughters – one married and living in Sheffield and the other still at home with us. I have also been caring for my mother for fourteen years since my father died in 2010. My news is that after a short illness my mother died on the 24th of October this year and I was by her side as she passed away.
Since about this time last year I had become more and more concerned about Mum and had been spending more time with her and, when not with her, anxiously trying to find ways of helping her which wouldn’t appear to interfere with her fierce (and I use that word advisedly) independence. Mum was ninety-four when she died and was proud of the fact that she had been able to look after herself in her own home with no carers or home-help until just a very few weeks before her death. She wanted no interference from anybody! (My help was not considered home-help because she wouldn’t let me do any of her housework or cooking and she knew I would normally do as I was told. Her sight was very poor and if I was quick and quiet I often managed to do a couple of things before I was called to order!) I am also proud of her but because of her pride she didn’t ask for help when she needed it and she probably had more discomfort at the end than she should have had.
As soon as I realised how ill she had become I tried to get help for her. This proved difficult at first because Mum denied she was ill when she spoke to the nurse and doctor I had telephoned! I spent a week nursing her alone and trying to get help for her. Eventually, nurses and doctors turned up at her house and then a hospital bed was delivered. Carers then came in twice a day to get her out of bed in the morning and then put her back in the evening. After a week of this increased help it was decided she was too ill to be at home and was taken to hospital. There they discovered she had numerous things the matter with her on top of the rare bacterial infection that had been diagnosed at home. She had pressure sores. Her heart was not working properly and because of this she had been taken off her high-blood-pressure tablets before going into hospital. She had two oesophageal ulcers (which were treated in hospital), she was emaciated because she hadn’t been eating properly for months, though I had tried to encourage her to eat (I knew nothing of the ulcers!), she had bronchial trouble and no strength to cough, her hands and legs were swollen and she had to have her wedding ring cut off, which upset her.
During the first two weeks in hospital we were hopeful that she would recover enough to leave and go into a nursing home. But, it was not to be. She might have had a stroke because her speech became slurred and she lost the strength to move herself unaided. She died in hospital a week later in a side room of the busy, overcrowded medical ward where she had been treated; too sick to be moved to a hospice and with no proper palliative care. My sister and I did what we could to help but it wasn’t enough to make her comfortable.
The funeral took place the week before last and my sister and brother and Richard and I are now sorting out her house and belongings in readiness for the house sale, once probate has been granted. It is sad and weary work.
On the plus side, we have found some fabulous photos of many family members past and present. Mum wrote, but never shared with us at the time or since, two accounts of camping holidays we took in Scotland and the Welsh borders sometime in the late 60’s and early 70’s. This has proved to be a treasure!
We have met up with most of our cousins and we are trying to organise some kind of regular meet-up that isn’t a funeral.
Mum’s best friend’s daughter came to the funeral and we will definitely see more of her in future. When I told my sister on our sibling WhatsApp chat group that Fiona was coming to the funeral her response was “OMG – Moriarty!!” As children we went to Fiona’s birthday parties each year until we were old enough to get out of going to them. Because Fiona is an only child her Mum, who was a teacher, used to invite some of the children from the class she taught to the party as well as Fiona’s special friends, and us. One of the party games I dreaded was called Moriarty. One child (usually the largest and strongest boy) was chosen, was blindfolded and given a cosh made of a roll of newspapers. We all had to lie on our stomachs on one side of the living room. Those of us without the cosh and blindfold had to crawl on our stomachs to the other side of the room without being caught. The one with the cosh bellowed “Are you there, Moriarty?” and then lay about him with the newspapers thumping anyone who got within his reach. This terrified me and I did my best to get up against any wall or underneath the furniture until the danger was over.
One of my nieces started a couple of JustGiving sites for two of Mum’s favourite charities, Marie Curie and The Sailors Society and we have been very touched by the amount of money people have donated and by the lovely comments people have made on the sites.
I hope to get back to blogging properly again some time in the near future, probably in the new year. In the mean time, thank you all for sticking with me and following my blog despite the silence from me. I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
It was Richard’s birthday in the middle of August and to celebrate, he decided he would like to visit Castle Acre Priory in Norfolk. The Priory is a ruin which is cared for by English Heritage.
Because of Covid-19 restrictions we had to book a ‘slot’ and pre-pay for our visit. We were so happy to have Alice staying with us for a week; she had arrived the day before and accompanied us on our trip. We made a picnic lunch to take with us and set out at 11.00 am as our ‘slot’ was at 1.00 pm. I drove us there and because the traffic was light we arrived in very good time. We ate our picnic sitting in the car in the car-park; it was a dull, cool day and the only benches and tables were beyond the reception building. We had liked the look of Castle Acre village as we drove through it, (it also has a castle and an interesting-looking church) but it was very crowded with visitors wandering about the narrow lanes. We will return in happier times, I think.
We donned our masks and presented ourselves at the reception desk where we were given a map of the priory and I bought a guide book. Just outside the reception building was a charming herb garden.
Castle Acre Priory herb garden
There were a couple of stands of plants for sale. I resisted buying from them with difficulty!
This was our first view of the priory ruins on leaving the herb garden
Castle Acre was chosen by William de Warenne, a Norman knight who had fought at the Battle of Hastings, to be the headquarters of all his newly acquired Norfolk properties. The castle, the priory and the massive 12th century town defences were all built by successive generations of the de Warenne family. The building of the priory was begun in 1090 by de Warenne’s son.
More intricate carving, with a couple of grotesques
We always seem to visit a place which is currently having work done to it! Last year we visited Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire because I wished to see its stunning facade. ‘Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall’. When we got there (in the pouring rain, I might add) the whole of the front was covered in scaffolding because of on-going restoration work.
This time, a number of projects were being worked on at the priory which restricted where we were able to go.
The Prior’s chapel is to the left as you look at the photo and the Prior’s great chamber/study is on the right with its fabulous bay window, added in the early 16th century. Further round the corner on the right side of the building you can see the side view of an early 16th century oriel window.
The Prior’s study with the oriel window is on the left and a late 15th century two-storey porch is on the right. The taller building behind the porch is the Prior’s lodging. You can also see the connecting passages and galleries of the west range joining the lodging to the Prior’s chapel behind the great chamber. The Prior’s chapel was also connected to the Priory church so the Prior had no need to go outside at all, unless he wished to.
Another view of the Prior’s buildings
This is part of the decoration on the oriel window. It must be a portrait of someone, don’t you think? Such a wonderful face! Apologies for the poor photo.
From left to right; entrance to the west range of the priory, then a kitchen and behind it the refectory and then the building on the far right is the reredorter or latrine block.
Restoration work is being done to the bridge (in the foreground) over the leat and also to the south boundary wall. The leat is a diversion of the River Nar; this leat was used by the monks to take the waste away from the reredorter. They dug the channel close to the priory and then built the latrine block over the top of it. The leat is dry at present.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Castle Acre Priory was a Cluniac priory, a daughter-house of the great monastery at Cluny in Burgundy. With the support of kings and nobility many Cluniac priories were created in England between 1076 and 1154. During the wars with France the Cluniac priories had restrictions placed on them because they were ‘alien’ even though most of the monks were, in fact, English. Gifts to the priory were reduced and the French monks were repatriated. Only after obtaining English or ‘denizen’ status did their situation improve again and their numbers increase. Castle Acre was suppressed by Thomas Cromwell during the reign of Henry VIII and the deed of surrender was signed on 22 November 1537. Thomas Howard, third Duke of Norfolk acquired the lease of the priory’s site, lands and rights. By the following summer the priory buildings were being demolished, though the Prior’s lodging was retained as a house.
Richard and Alice at the Priory
My girls!
Elinor with the reredorter in the background. You can see clearly here how the building straddles the leat.
Richard, Alice and Elinor
It started to rain, and we decided it was time to go home.
Alice and Richard approaching the bay of the south aisle of the priory church under the south-west tower
The ceiling of the bay under the tower
Arched exit from the south-west tower
View from under the south-west tower looking towards the inside of the west door and onwards to what would have been the north-west tower
As usual, I also took photos of the plants living on and near the ruins.
A Willowherb. It could be Hoary Willowherb ( Epilobium parviflorum) because of its very hairy stem and leaves. Growing on a wall would account for its small size. (There are other willowherbs which are hairy which accounts for my doubtful ID).
Many plants growing on one of the walls
White Stonecrop (Sedum album) I find its red leaves most attractive
White Stonecrop
White Stonecrop
Horse Chestnut ( Aesculus hippocastanum) These leaves are badly affected by leaf blotch caused by a fungus. Horse chestnut trees are also often badly attacked by Horse chestnut leaf-mining moth larvae
Wild Teasel ( Dipsacus fullonum)
Wild teasel
Maidenhair spleenwort ( Asplenium trichomanes) Recognizable by its black midrib
I think this might be Roseroot (Sedum rosea). Not a plant one would expect to find in this part of the country
Harebells ( Campanula rotundifolia) and Black Medick ( Medicago lupulina)
Harebells
Common liverwort/Umbrella liverwort (Marchantia polymorpha ) Common liverwort is a thallose liverwort; it has flattened leaf-like structures (thalli) with forked branches. Common liverwort is also dioicous – it has separate male and female plants. This photo is of a female plant as it has star-like umbrella structures some of which are showing yellow mature sporangia or spores. Common liverworts can also reproduce asexually by ‘gemmae’ produced in gammae cups which can be seen centre bottom of the photo on the thalli. The gemmae are knocked out of the cups by splashes of water/raindrops.
Lady’s bedstraw (Galium verum )
Wallflower ( Erysimum cheiri)
I think this is Common calamint (Clinopodium ascendens )
Common calamint
We had a very enjoyable few hours at the priory and I hope to return to Castle Acre one day to look around the village and revisit the priory.
To end this post, I have added the following English Heritage guide to Medieval Monastic life….
and, here is the Salve Regina, a chant that would have been sung (probably not to this tune) when Castle Acre Priory was in its glory.
I have been considering how much and how quickly our lives have changed recently; as no doubt most of you have, too. I am hoping that some of the positive changes we have witnessed in our communities will continue and flourish ‘post-corona’. I am not going to discuss the pandemic here as I have nothing new to add and frankly, it just gets me worked-up and anxious just thinking about it. I will be mentioning it, no doubt, in passing in other posts, as it affects my day-to-day life.
After thinking about current changes, I then began recalling some of the big changes and events in my life. Moving house is a major upheaval whenever one does it and at whatever age. Big events for a child are going to school or changing schools. I was fortunate in that I lived in Bromley in Kent all the time I was growing up and attended just two schools in that time. My Primary School was called Burnt Ash and had an Infants School and a Junior School in the same building.
Click on the photo to enlarge it.
Burnt Ash Junior School
Above is a school photograph of mine taken during the summer term of my first year in junior school. (I am of an age where class photos were all done in black and white!) This must have been in May or June 1967 and I was eight years old. I am in the front row, third from the right. I had my hair in plaits with red bows and the two girls either side of me were both called Julie. The school I went to was built on the edge of an enormous housing estate. Some of the pupils were extremely poor and Rosemary (second from the left, front row), Shanie Edwards (forth from the left, front row) and Michael Collins (furthest right, back row) in my class didn’t own proper shoes and didn’t have coats, either. I liked Rosemary (Porter, I think her surname was)because she was quiet and Michael too. His hands were very hard and rough, I remember. Many fairly affluent families lived in houses close to the estate and the school, being the nearest one to where they lived, was the one their children attended as well, so we had some girls and boys in the class who were quite comfortably-off. Bullying went on, as it did in all schools and still does despite all the ‘we don’t tolerate bullying’ hype, but I don’t think anyone was picked on especially for being poor or wearing ragged clothes. We all played together and learnt together and we all liked our lovely teacher, Miss Gloria Hitchcock, very much. Isn’t she gorgeous!
Below is another school photo taken about eight or nine years previously.
Burnt Ash Junior School
The boy who has been highlighted is, of course, David Bowie or David Jones as he was known then. As you can see from the photo, all school pictures were taken in the exact same place; just in front of the veranda. Click on the link below and you will see what my old school looks like now. They have enclosed the verandas and have made the classrooms bigger. At present the school is closed temporarily because of ‘you-know-what’.
Going back to my school photo; look at the blonde girl, third from the left on the front row. Her name was Vanessa Jaye and her father was Bobby Jaye, a radio producer who became Head of Radio Light Entertainment at the BBC. Vanessa was a friend of mine and I went to tea at her house. I remember she had a crazy cat that sat on the stairs and leapt on people as they passed by. Absolutely terrifying for me! I had no idea at first that her father was well-known but eventually she spoke of her family knowing Peter Glaze who presented Crackerjack! with Leslie Crowther. I was never keen on Peter Glaze – he annoyed me.
The girl standing second from the right in the middle row was Samantha Parry. She was another friend and I and my brother and sister went to parties at her house. Her brother Andrew was in the same class as my brother Andrew and her brother Benjamin was in the same class as my sister Francesca. We all trooped off to their house and played party games, had tea and then listened to their dad, Gron (short for Goronwy) play guitar and sing songs. He always sang ‘Little Boxes’ as far as I can remember. Sam’s mum was Alison Prince who, until she died last October wrote lots and lots of books for children. She also wrote the animated series’ Trumpton and ‘Joe’.
I was aware of all this at the time but I didn’t think about it much; most children take life as it comes and accept it (though don’t always like it) good or bad, interesting or boring, calm or frightening. The fact that some of my friends were very poor and some well off didn’t occur to me at the time. That some of my friends’ parents were well known or had written books was no more interesting to me than the knowledge that my mother had been a Woman Police Officer in the Metropolitan Police Force in the early 1950’s and that my father had joined the Friary near Cerne Abbas in Dorset after he came out of the Air Force where he had done his National Service. I just though of all these children as class-mates, some of whom I liked and the reason I didn’t like some others was mainly because they enjoyed calling me names and making me cry.
My mother when she was in the Metropolitan Police Force – and no, she didn’t drive motorbikes!
Click on the link below and you will see the house I was born in. It has rose bushes in the front garden. Mum and Dad bought a newly-built house in Barton le Clay in Bedfordshire shortly after they got married in 1956 and lived there for just under three years. Despite me being Mum’s first baby she gave birth at home because the house had a bathroom and a water supply. I remember absolutely nothing of this house. Mum and Dad decided to move back to Bromley as Dad had another job there. They would also then be nearer to their parents. Mum was eight months pregnant with my brother Andrew when we moved and I was approaching my first birthday.
Click on the link below and you can see where I lived from 1959 for eight years until just after that school photo was taken in 1967. Our house was the one with the pale silver-blue-grey car in the front garden. When we lived there we had a front fence with a gate, a front path with a flowerbed alongside and a little bit of grass where that car is now parked. The house had black paint on the door and window -frames and there were steps up to the front door. It was a very small house with a small back garden which was made smaller when Dad built a garage and an extension to the house. There was a back lane behind the houses that we children loved to play in when we could and an area of waste ground called ‘the dump’ – I don’t know why it was called that – and at the top of the road a fenced off hill, or what I thought was a hill but was in fact a reservoir with grass over the top. The house next door to us on the right, as you look at it – number 137 – used to be the last house in the road on that side and had a large garden. This has now been built on, I see, and another house added to the road.
We moved in September 1967 on the day before my ninth birthday to a much bigger, detached house with a much larger garden. My sister decided to take her beloved collection of garden snails with her in a bucket. Dad found this in the boot of the car when we arrived at the new house. We over-looked the churchyard at the back of the house which had an enormous copper beech tree in it and crows nested in it every year. We used to get lots of different birds in the garden and Mum was able to enjoy gardening, though she never liked the house and Dad built a workshop. The house was haunted, though I never saw or heard anything. Dad saw the woman a couple of times; dressed in a crossover apron, she stood by the kitchen window and stared at him. She seemed sad, or so my father thought. My sister heard someone clearing the grate in her bedroom; she heard it a couple of times, I think. Click on the link below and you will see our second house in Bromley. It was nearer to the town centre which as a teenager, I really appreciated.
Click on the link below to see the building that once housed the school I attended from 1970 until 1977. It had been called Bromley Grammar School for Girls until just before I joined it when it changed its name to Ravensbourne School for Girls. I think the only well-known woman to have belonged to the school when it was known as Bromley County School,was Dora Saint, or as she is better known, ‘Miss Read’ who wrote the Fairacre and Thrush Green series of books. The two Ravensbourne Schools (the girl’s school and the boy’s school) amalgamated many years ago and now occupy the building that was once the boy’s school. My old school building has been used for many different purposes since then and by different groups of people.
Fifth Form, May 1975 Ravensbourne School for Girls
Here is my form at Ravensbourne in 1975. Two girls were off sick that day. I am in the middle row, fourth from the right. My dear friend Wendy, is in the same row on the far left and our form mistress, Mrs Shoubridge is on the far right. She was a lovely lady and taught mathematics and rode to and from school on a motor scooter. We were all just about to take our O’ Level exams and eight of the girls, including one of the absentees were to leave school in a couple of months time. I and the rest of the form were to carry on into the sixth form and the pleasures of A’ Levels.
Mum and Dad moved from Bromley in 1987 to the house Mum still lives in, in Suffolk. By that time all three of us children had married and moved out; click the link below to see my first home with my first husband. The large Victorian house in Forest Hill in south-east London with the black iron gate and the holly trees in the front garden had been converted into four flats; a basement flat, the ground floor flat, the first floor flat (where we lived from 1982 until Christmas 1984) and a top floor flat.
My marriage fell apart in 1985, just after Alice was born. I lived in New Eltham, where her father and I moved to from Forest Hill until the summer of 1988 when Alice and I moved to Suffolk a year after my parents had moved there. Click on the link below and you will see my house in New Eltham; number 54.
A very long post, I’m afraid but I thought I would put all the house moves, pre-Suffolk, together. Sometime, I may go on to talk about what I had wanted to do with my life and what I ended up doing instead. I may show you the houses I’ve lived in in Suffolk and the short 18 month move to Somerset between 2004 and 2006. We will see.
This will be a strange post with links and no photographs. I have accumulated a collection of links and titbits of news and thought I would share a few of them with you.
Well over a year ago I wrote a post that included, among many other things, some news about my niece, Natalie. Natalie works for a firm of specialist silk weavers in Sudbury, Suffolk and she does some extremely interesting work and has a few very important clients indeed. My brother shared a link on Facebook yesterday and I thought you might be interested in some more details of Natalie’s work.
In January this year Richard and I took a walk and I posted about it. In the post I mentioned a book called ‘The Easternmost House’ written by Juliet Blaxland. The book tells of the trials and tribulations of living in a house on the edge of a cliff; among many other things.
My sister, Francesca is the Operations Manager for the Kent Ambulance Service and works very hard caring for her team of skilled paramedics and for the patients in their charge. At present, testing for Covid-19 Corona Virus is an added pressure on an already over-stretched and under-paid profession. Here is a short film about one of the call-outs her team had to deal with recently where a man went into cardiac arrest and was given 21 shocks and then clot-busting medication.
There you are! A couple of good news items with a bad one sandwiched in the middle.
Both our cars are covered in mud all the time; they are in a worse state now than in the photo! Most of our lane is inches deep in sloppy mud and it is hardly worth our while to wash the cars.
This year has been crazily busy so far and there has been no time for even a short walk since the new year. At last, I have managed to catch-up with all my blog reading, I’ve sorted out all my bank statements and receipts and have got rid of large amounts of paper. I have even spent a little time in the garden weeding and tidying-up the flowerbeds; there has been very little cold weather and the weeds have grown and grown!
Rosemary ( Rosmarinus ‘Miss Jessup’s Upright’) in flower in January
Witch Hazel; the stems covered in lichen.
Crocus
Crocus
Snowdrops. These and the crocus above grow under the crabapple tree. It has got somewhat weedy there in recent years!
Iris reticulata
Iris reticulata
Pulmonaria
I have taken a Morning Prayer service at church and attended a meeting with others in our Benefice who take church services.
Plough Sunday Service 12th January. Richard took this service very nicely. Much of the congregation is made up of members of ‘Old Glory’ the Molly Men and their friends and supporters
The decorated plough; the star of the Plough Sunday service.
Most of my time has been spent in the car, taking Elinor to the station on her university days, taking Mum to her many hospital appointments, taking myself to hospital and doctor’s appointments, dental appointments, eye clinic appointments and grocery shopping trips. Mum has had both her cataracts removed and such a load has been lifted from her and my shoulders! She has so much more sight than we thought and the fear that she may not be able to look after herself and live alone as she wishes has receded for a while. She is approaching her 90th birthday and though she tires easily and is somewhat twisted and stooping because of arthritis, she is still able to cook and look after herself. Richard and I had to visit her the week before last to repair her hedge and fence, damaged by the first of our storms. Mum hadn’t been able to do any gardening for some months because she couldn’t see, and the garden has become overgrown with brambles and nettles, thistles and other unwelcome weeds. I had done a few jobs for her and so had Richard but the weeds had taken over and the fence that broke in the storm was covered in enormous brambles.
A rather beautiful female Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus ) who observed me taking her photo
This coming week I only have three appointments to keep and none for Mum except for taking her to church on Ash Wednesday. I’m at the hospital all day on Tuesday having eye pressure tests, I have a hygienist appointment at the dentist on Wednesday and a hair appointment in Norwich on Thursday. Housework has been a bit hit-and-miss lately and I hope to be able to catch-up with all my chores at home very soon.
This is just a short post to let you know what has been happening. My next post will probably be about one of our days out last year, or even the year before that! I have plenty of old photos but hardly any new ones!
I have been thinking for some time that I ought to let you know something of what we have been doing this year but I haven’t been sure where I should start! I will begin by telling you of our recent big family celebration, my brother Andrew’s wedding to Helen on the 12th of May.
Helen and Andrew – my brother and his lovely wife
This photo and the one below I ‘obtained’ from Facebook and they were taken by Andrew and Helen’s friends. I didn’t take any photographs that day and am very grateful to those who did. Don’t they look a happy couple?
Helen and Andrew
Richard and me – taken by Elinor
Alice and Elinor – taken by Richard
The day was a little chilly but fairly bright and it stayed dry until we were all at the reception, which was very lucky.
I had spent quite a bit of time during the preceding months helping Mum find a new outfit for the occasion. I visited many shops, on my own, in a number of towns looking for something she might be happy to wear. The shops had to have easy access and be near to a car park. The clothes had to be suitable in design and price. I eventually got together a plan of campaign and we had a shopping trip just ten days before the wedding. We were very fortunate in finding just what Mum wanted but I am disappointed in not having a photograph of her in her finery.
It was good to see Andrew’s children Natalie and Robert and Natalie’s partner Adam. My sister Francesca managed to take the day off work but her three children weren’t able to attend. Mum was very pleased to see them all.
oooOOOooo
My niece, Natalie specialised in weaving when studying for her degree in Art in London. I thought, as I hadn’t been able in an earlier post of mine to include any photos of the embroidery and textiles I saw at an exhibition, I would mention the work Natalie does and include a few links.
Natalie works for Humphries Weaving based in the town of Sudbury in Suffolk. Here is a short video produced by that company and in it you will be able to see Natalie and her colleague and listen to them talk about the work they do. Natalie is the woman with her hair up and she doesn’t have a Scottish accent!
One of the projects Natalie has been working on for the past few years is helping to conserve the Saloon in the Royal Pavilion in Brighton, that wonderful building commissioned by George IV.
Here is an article from the Guardian newspaper about the restoration work.
I also include another film made by Humphries Weaving which explains the work they have had to do and all the detailed research that has been carried out.
I am looking forward to visiting the Royal Pavilion and seeing this beautiful room!
Richard attended Holy Communion this morning at the church of St. Peter in the village of St. Peter South Elmham. He kindly took this photograph for me on his phone.
I attended Solemn Mass this morning at the church of St. Peter and St. Paul in the town of Eye. I was unable to take any photos as I was busy helping my mother so this link may give you an idea of where I was. One day I intend to write a post about the church at Eye.
During Holy Week we did manage to do a few things on top of all the church-going. We visited Norwich on Tuesday so that Elinor could revisit the exhibition of dolls’ houses currently on display at the Castle Museum. She decided that this was the exhibition she wanted to review for her college interview this coming Wednesday and she needed to check up on a few details and take some more photos. While we were in the city we did some Easter shopping and had an extremely pleasant lunch at the Iron House.
On the way home I stopped off in Bungay to get some more shopping and to order some flowers for the church to be collected on Holy Saturday.
On Wednesday I took my mother out shopping in Diss and she gave me a dozen Hot Cross Buns she had made which I put in the freezer when I got home. Richard and I went to Rumburgh church to tidy it a little before the service that evening. The building works have nearly finished but the dust is still settling on everything. The churchyard is full of cowslips!
Rumburgh churchyard
Rumburgh churchyard
We drove back home and then walked to the corner of the lane to admire all the Jacob sheep and their lambs.
Jacob sheep and lambs
Jacob sheep and lambs
Jacob sheep and lambs
Jacob sheep and lambs
Thursday was quite busy. After the early church service I went into Halesworth to pick up some things I needed and spent some time in town. We had organised a team cleaning session at Rumburgh church for 2 pm but only five people managed to attend – Richard the Rector, Pam and Ian (the other Churchwarden and his wife), Richard and I. We all worked hard for two and a half hours and the church is clean and tidy again with everything back where it should be. We got rid of a lot of rubbish and moved some furniture about too.
Before going out again that evening I managed to wash two altar cloths and a table cloth from the church. They dried quickly in the strong, cold breeze that has been blowing all the week.
Church washing
Friday was Hot Cross Bun Day!
One of my mother’s excellent Hot Cross Buns. They are split, toasted and then buttered.
Not only did we have buns at home but the Rector held a tea at his house after the last service of the day. It was very well attended, much food and drink was consumed and a lot of talking and gossiping was done!
We got a little much needed rain later but unfortunately, just as it started at 5.15 pm we got yet another power-cut which lasted until after 9.30 pm. A power cable was hit by a branch again! I had nothing suitable to cook on the gas hob for our evening meal so we went out to Bungay and had a pizza at the Stonehouse.
I went back to Bungay on Saturday morning to collect the flowers I had ordered and to buy some wrapping paper for presents for my mother whose 87th birthday is tomorrow. I also had to take a large parcel to the post office.
Today we went to the Fox and Goose in Fressingfield for lunch to celebrate both Easter and Mum’s birthday. It was a lovely meal, enjoyed by all of us and then Mum came home with us for the afternoon. The rain that was forecast for today held off until the afternoon so we didn’t get wet.
We have eaten out much more than usual this week, and very nice it has been too!
I arranged to visit Alice in Sheffield on Thursday 23rd February, spend the night in a hotel and return home again the following day. What I hadn’t expected when I bought the train tickets and booked the hotel room was a visit from ‘Doris’ that day too. For those who don’t know who ‘Doris’ is (or who might have forgotten), ‘Doris’ was a storm that caused some disruption here. Fortunately, my journey went ahead with no problems other than a speed restriction. Alice met me at the station and we decided to have lunch together before I went to my hotel. We nearly got blown off our feet on the way to the café, the door of which kept blowing open while we ate, but we weren’t inconvenienced too much by this. I spent a lovely afternoon with Alice either chatting in my hotel room, drinking tea in another coffee shop or buying books.
While I was enjoying myself, Richard and Elinor were having quite an unpleasant time at home. The power went off at about 2 pm and in the garden a few of our belongings started flying through the air despite Richard having tried to make them safe before the storm began.
I wonder if any of you remember how pleased we were when we got our new summerhouse last year? Here is a photo of it.
Our summerhouse when it was new last February.
The summerhouse after the storm this February.
The wind ripped the roof off and the rest of the building just broke apart. A number of trees in the area were blown over and roads were blocked. When I got back to Norwich the following afternoon Richard was a little delayed when collecting me from the station by having to make detours to avoid blocked roads. The power was still off when I got home and the house was cold. Richard and Elinor had coped very well using the gas hob to cook meals and heat water for hot drinks and washing up. They had sat together the evening before in front of the gas fire listening to the battery-powered radio by candlelight. We often get power-cuts living where we do, though not as many as we used to do before the power company changed the cables and started regular cutting-back of tree branches that are too close to the cables. Having said that, we have had six power-cuts of at least an hour this year already. We keep a supply of candles and lamps ready and have torches in all the bedrooms and in the kitchen, utility room and garage. We have a portable gas heater as well as the gas fire and gas hob. We can also use the caravan which has a large battery and a gas supply.
Fortunately, the power came back on later that day. I was very grateful for it as we were expecting my cousin Beverley and her partner Jeremy to visit the following day for an evening meal. I didn’t have the time to prepare all the things I had hoped to, but at least the house was warm and the evening was great fun!
We have been able to claim for a new summerhouse on our insurance and our replacement arrived on Monday of this week. We got an identical summerhouse which had to be put where the old one was which is a little worrying, knowing how quickly it succumbed to the storm-force winds. Richard will bolt it to the concrete base and try to make it somewhat sturdier. We will see what we can do. We lost our old incinerator during the storm and wondered how far it had travelled, but once Richard had taken photos of the wreck and started to clear up the glass and the panels he found it squashed as flat as a pancake underneath one of the sections. I am grateful neither Richard nor Elinor got squashed under it!
Here is our new summerhouse. Spot the difference!
Our new internal doors were due to be fitted that week in February but the storm put paid to that, and, because of storm damage the carpenter had to deal with, we didn’t get the doors until nearly a fortnight later. We are very pleased with them. They look good, they are more sound-proof than the old ones and the doors downstairs are now glazed and let much needed light into the hall. The sliding door to the en-suite WC has been replaced with a better one and the sliding door to the downstairs shower-room has been replaced with an ordinary door which is so much nicer. We will now employ a painter and decorator to decorate the hall, stairs and landing and to paint all twelve doors (we replaced the airing cupboard door too).
ooOOoo
Richard and I have attended a Lay-led Worship Training Course at a church in Beccles. To enable us to keep our churches open, the way forward is for us, the members of the church to take the services ourselves if there is no priest to lead us. This will be very useful to us when our Rector retires in the summer. The four-part course was interesting and well-attended and it gave us the opportunity to meet people from other churches in the Deanery. Our Deanery is made up of a number of benefices from Halesworth, Bungay, Beccles, Southwold and the villages in-between.
ooOOoo
We have carried on with the usual round of duties and chores; hospital visits, blood tests, appointments with opticians, hairdressers, acupuncturists and chiropractors; housework, gardening, shopping. We have all had bad colds. I continue to take my mother to church once a fortnight and join Richard at church in our benefice when I can.
Richard went to visit his brother Chris in Manchester for a few days recently and had a very pleasant time. On his return we took part in two quizzes. Last year we had been in a team that had won the quiz held in the village of Walpole. Part of the ‘prize’ was the honour of composing and presenting the following year’s quiz and Richard offered to take it on. The time for the quiz duly arrived and he did a fantastic job as Quizmaster (I was his assistant) and he was presented with a bottle of wine as a thank-you gift. The following night we were at the village of St James taking part in the quiz to raise funds for the Harleston Choral Society. A meal was included in the fees – very good it was, too – and the questions appealed to me more than usual as there were more music ones and fewer sport! Our team managed to win again.
ooOOoo
We celebrated Mothering Sunday on the 26th of March and it was our church at Rumburgh’s turn to hold the service. I helped make a few posies to present to the mothers or for people to give to their mothers or take to graves. Though we have no flowers in church during Lent I was asked to provide some flowers to put in the porch.
The flowers in the porch. Looking at this little work of art, you may be surprised to know I am not a flower-arranger 😉 The flowers are lovely in spite of my ministrations. As you can see, the porch is in urgent need of work. If nothing is done soon, the porch will collapse and we won’t be able to use the church.
The church was a little disorganised because we are having a tower screen fitted at the moment and there was dust everywhere. We have been saving for years for this improvement! We put everyone as near the front of the church as possible (well away from the building works) sitting in the choir stalls, which was very pleasant. Richard our Rector chose lots of good hymns and his sermon was amusing and instructive. I brought my mother to our church for a change and took her back home afterwards. I couldn’t ask her to lunch because I had no time to prepare a midday meal but she came for an evening meal instead.
This is the new tower screen. You can see the framework for the glass which has yet to be put in. There will be a glazed door at the bottom of the screen.
We will now be able to see and watch the bell-ringers as they ring before our services.
ooOOoo
I will end this rather wordy post with some photos of the flowers in our garden starting with my favourite iris reticulata that bloomed for too short a time in February.
Miniature iris
Miniature iris
Miniature iris
Miniature irises
Crocus
Crocus
Crocus
Mahonia
Mahonia with a bumblebee
Winter-flowering honeysuckle
Miniature daffodils
My music selection is ‘Handle With Care’ by the Traveling Wilburys.
Before I resume my Highlights posts from last year I thought I’d better write something about this new year.
Frosty path next to our big pond
There have been lots of frosts this month; probably more frosty mornings than non-frosty which makes a pleasant change. The last two winters have been quite mild with frost being a rarity. We have had some rain, even a day of snow (it didn’t hang around for long) and a fair amount of fog. The best days have been the sunny ones; a sparkly start to the day and then blue sky until sunset. Freezing nights with countless stars and a moon latticed by the bare branches of trees. Today the temperature stayed at -2 centigrade and a very cold wind and thick cloud made it unpleasant to be outside.
Full moon
Full moon
My life has carried on as usual – driving Elinor to college in Norwich, taking Mum shopping, to her hospital appointments and to church once a fortnight and when I am at home, basic household chores. I have been very tired this month so haven’t done more than necessary! I went to see my Rheumatoid Arthritis clinician at the hospital for a routine appointment and she seems to be pleased with how I am coping and doesn’t think I need any change in my drug regime. Richard is feeling much better, though still has some problems with his leg and back. He is driving again and we have resumed our sharing of the driving and shopping duties.
Birch tree in the breeze
I mentioned at the end of last year that Elinor had decided to try acupuncture to see if it helped to reduce her anxiety and its symptoms. She had three appointments before Christmas and has had three more this month. She would have gone this week but it was cancelled as the practitioner has ‘flu. Elinor is continuing with it, despite it being quite uncomfortable at times, because it has made a difference. The first session caused her to feel calm for the first time in her life and the effects lasted for nearly 24 hours! Not all her sessions have been as effective but since Christmas we have all noticed that she has been able to make decisions more easily and has had the courage to do a few things that for some time have been beyond her capabilities.
Dunston Hall
The venue for her treatment is Dunston Hall, just south of Norwich, which is a mock Elizabethan building constructed between 1859 and 1878 but is now a hotel with spa, beauty and therapy treatment rooms, a gym, a pool and outside, a golf course, driving range and football pitch. The acupuncture reception area and treatment rooms are ‘below stairs’ and I have become used to sitting on a sofa listening to ‘ambient’ music, attempting to read a book and trying to keep awake while waiting for Elinor.
Dunston Hall
She had her 20th birthday on Saturday and we went out for a meal together that evening. She felt a little unhappy to think that her whole teenage years were given up to anxiety and, because she has no friends, she had to celebrate her birthday with her Mum and Dad. Richard and I felt so sorry for her and wished there was something else we could do to help her.
The following day was quite eventful because she announced that she had decided that the college course she has been studying since September was not one she was happy with and was considering giving it up! We spent the day discussing this statement and even though it does sound like a negative step I am amazed that she has been able to come to this conclusion. She has been studying Graphic Art because she is interested in illustration work and had been told this course was the best one for her. She has struggled with it and has not been able to attend many of the classes. I have suspected for some time that she found it unsatisfactory but until this weekend she has said she thought it fine and was going to continue with it. She has been told of a one-year-long Art and Design course at the college for students who are 19 years old and older and this is what she intends to apply for. This week she has been talking to her tutors and support staff and has explained the situation to them. Her final day is tomorrow when she will try to apply for the new course and discover if there are any short courses she can attend in the meantime.
A bullfinch (Pyrrhula pyrrhula) in my winter-flowering honeysuckle. I opened the kitchen blinds this morning and saw two bullfinches in the honeysuckle. I found my camera and because I didn’t want to disturb the birds too much I crouched down by the window and took this poor photo while peeping over the window sill. I now know why I haven’t had many flowers on the shrub this winter!
We had a beautiful day here on Monday and wanted to go to the coast for a walk to enjoy the cold but still and clear day and also to recover from our surprise the day before. Because of other duties we had, we didn’t set out until 3.30 pm and it was nearly sunset when we got there.
A Suffolk Lane 