North of the Border

We headed north last Thursday.  Throughout the last couple of years, I’ve been enjoying the privilege of working with Voluntary Arts in Wales, teaching workshops enabling people to share their creative skills.  An opportunity arose to do something similar in Scotland, so I packed up my flip chart and workshop toolkit, my hero grabbed his car keys and off we went.

A slight crisis just north of Stafford, when a sharp stone hit the windscreen and gave us a bit of a surprise, but we – and the windscreen – were able to soldier on, battlescarred but undefeated.

Of course I took a picture as we crossed the border!

It seemed to take no time at all to get to our first destination – Edinburgh.

Though actually, we were staying in Leith, at the rather windswept but perfectly comfortable Premier Inn!

Thanks to the recommendation of one of my Scottish colleagues, we ate very well indeed, too, at the excellent Sasso just across the road.

Why Leith, you’re probably wondering?  Well, my workshop on Saturday was to take place at the Botanic Garden Cottage, not 500 miles from here, (and if you haven’t already seen it, it’s as good a time as ever to encourage you to watch Sunshine on Leith!)

Anyway, the Botanic Garden Cottage turned out to be in the loveliest of settings and on this bright, late October day it’s hard to think of a better place to be – except for being outside in the garden, of course.

The story of this remarkable venue was told in an attractive set of panels on the wall of the room we were using.

Recently completed and finished to the highest of standards, I couldn’t wait to take a look around the cottage – once I’d had a closer look at how those panels had been cut from hardboard, that is!

Neat!  Laser cut I assume.

Anyway, we were working in the room through the doorway there, and this room was set up as a kind of breakout space or for small cooking groups.   We were told how community groups are encouraged to come here, to use the kitchen garden and to cook what they grow.

Just as I’m thinking what a fantastic resource this is, I step into the next room – the perfect gardening workshop!  This was set up for a potting workshop later in the day.

Upstairs was ”The Professor’s Room” , formerly a classroom but now a bright and airy lecture room, open for meetings and gatherings of all kinds.  I took a quick look but hey, wasn’t I here to teach a workshop?!

Well, yes, and a few closely covered flip chart sheets later into the afternoon, there was just time to admire this community quilt before it was time to leave.  Sadly, I’d had no time to explore the Botanic Gardens “proper” but next time….definitely next time!

We had a bit of a journey to drive, because on Saturday, I was teaching the same workshop in Glasgow…

This time, it was in more conventional surroundings.  None the worse for that, in fact, in many ways, it was easier.  Fewer distractions!  More space!  Tables to sit at!

Another bright piece of lively community art, too!

When all was done and my responsibilities fulfilled, we seized the chance to go out on the razz with our friend Nigel on Saturday night (!)  Well, not only is he working up there for a few weeks and has had time to suss out somewhere decent, it was his birthday too.  Any excuse, eh?

The Schottische Restaurant at Babbity Bowster fitted the bill perfectly.  When we stepped inside, we thought we were in Dublin, because in the corner, a bunch of pals were playing fiddle.  The atmosphere was great and though the restaurant upstairs was a bit quieter, it did mean we could hear well enough to have a sensible conversation!

On Sunday morning, the geese were flying south and we were heading that way too.

It had been a short but sweet stay and at least we’d had the benefit of an extra hour in bed!

The next socks are underway, too.  To answer a couple of questions from the comments of my last post, my hero agrees that wearing hand knitted socks is like flying business class: once you’ve experienced the comfort, it’s hard to go back!  I find knitting in circles simple and rather therapeutic, plus the needles are short and bendy enough to fit in my handbag, so although the knitting mojo leaves me for a while now and again, I usually have a pair on the go.  As for the Froelich wool, Marianne, I’ve bought it in the Co-op in Zürich amongst other places.  Yes, it still has a card of matching reinforcement or darning yarn tucked in the band, too.  I googled it and found a couple of online sources for it.  Next time we’re heading for Switzerland (in the Spring, I think) I’ll give you a nudge!

Anyway, after another day on the M6/M5 we were pleased when the signposts began to show the South West.

Happier still to drive through Cranham Woods after such a long drive.

Happiest of all though, to be home!

For the record

Pair #24 of Hero Socks are complete.

Pair #25 will be cast on in the morning.

Not me

It happens almost every time I go to take a look at what’s happening on Pinterest.

As my eyes scan the page they fall on that name.

Gillian Boyd.

As soon as I came across her, I simply had to click “follow”.  Fortunately, she pins some rather interesting pages and it’s clear that we share some common interests.

Recently, though, she’s been pinning country cottages just like those down our lane.  I can’t get excited about those!

I’d like to know more about her, so I find myself looking at her other boards, wondering about her interest in fashion, her age and lifestyle.  I’m a bit spooked by her, to be honest.  Because for the first 27 years of my life, I was Gillian Boyd.

It’s a fairly unusual name, I thought; well, at least, I’d never come across another until now.  Growing up in Hull in the late 1950s/early60s,  I don’t think I even met another Gillian, let alone a Boyd I wasn’t related to.  I think the first clue that I wasn’t unique was when I received my first driving licence and noticed I wasn’t xxxx-01 but xxxx-09 or something. 

We get attached to our names though, don’t we?  Gillian Boyd still trips off my tongue easily, even though I have not been generally known by either name since we’ve been married.  But my attention is immediately caught by the sound of “Gillian!”, spoken in that same tone as my Mum would use all those years ago.  Because somewhere, underneath the layers of identity I’ve acquired along the way, beneath Gill and Gillie, Mrs Thomas and Miss Boyd, the original Gillian Boyd is still there, just the same as she always was.

But it’s not me.

I realise I could google her.  I think I have identified which Gillian Boyd has created the pinterest board I follow, because needless to say, there are at least half a dozen others out there.  But somehow, it’s sufficient to settle into an easy peace, secure in the knowledge that she’s fine; that she has no more of a monopoly on the name than I ever had and that she’s using the name well.  Because it’s a fine name, after all.  I don’t think I shall want to use it again regularly, so I don’t mind that she does.  It’d be a shame to waste it.

I’ll still do a little double take when I come across it, though.

When we were last in Valparaiso

(one way to begin a story!) we came across something fascinating in the Vina del Mar museum

I listened to our guide tell us a little about this polynesian seafarers’ chart as we passed swiftly through the museum, returning to take a closer look and to think about it.  I commented on my blog that day how such non-verbal interpretations really do pique my interest and added a few notes to my journal together with my intention to find out more.  As is the way of things, however, over a period of weeks travelling, the list of subjects to investigate further gets increasingly longer and some things just get overlooked.

Until…

My hero was sitting reading last evening. 

I know.

But turning the page, look what he came across:

An article about those stick charts!

Now one of the challenges in finding out more about them was my inability to read the caption in the museum and the scant information I had at the time.  Now, I could google “Marshall Island Stick Charts” and find out all I wish to know.

There’s a whole new language for me to learn: rilib, kaelib and bungdockerik swells and there are mattang, meddo and rebbelib charts.  I look forward to sitting and reading more, to following up one or two links and extending my knowledge of such things.  I may be inspired to create something along these lines for myself, just to see how it could work.

What gently intrigues me is the description of the concept in one of the many online articles as “lost knowledge”.  Just how much knowledge have we lost along the way?  

Rabbit holes

On an overcast Autumn morning with an hour or so to spare, it’s tempting to begin the day by reading email and allowing myself to get distracted.  I’ve done my Spanish practice (level 10, no less!) and the washing machine is humming.  As my Mum would say, “nothing spoiling”.

I opened up my Feedly blog reader and began at the top.  Books and Journals.

 

The entrance to the rabbit hole is staring me in the face.  As I read about the book art course in Amsterdam, I click on all the links and a succession of Windows tabs opens up on my desktop.  I’ve read about Rachel’s courses before and they always sound so tempting, especially this one in Amsterdam.

Having read the article, I settle back to follow through the links I’ve opened, then.  As I do, I decide how best to store these interesting websites for future reference – after all, we might find ourselves in Amsterdam one of these days and it would be fun to drop into one or two of them.  Normally, I will look on my Pinterest “Places” page these days, but links to sites like this cute set of Amsterdam-related rubber stamps don’t seem to fit there.  I resist the temptation to reorganise my Pinterest catalogue right now and simply bookmark the whole article with a tag “Amsterdam” in the hope that I’ll find it when I go looking for it.

Working my way through a variety of websites, I hit upon a new and rather interesting blog and decide to add it to my Feedly list.  As I click +, the last couple of posts appear and one of them in particular looks fascinating.

The Story Behind the Art – Robin Pickens tempts me to click through straight away and reveals a great story of career development.  I enjoy reading about how people end up doing what they do, especially when the story involves skill, energy, tenacity and sheer hard work. 

You’ve already guessed where I went next and yes, Robin’s blog is immediately added to my Feedly list as well.

In particular, I’m interested in her post about designing fabric on the theme of pie! 

I mean, who couldn’t be tempted by this?  What an interesting recipe…

especially as, out in the garden right now, the ingredients are hanging from the tree.  I think I need to spend the morning baking, don’t you?

What’s not to like about a rabbit hole with an apple pie at the bottom?