Influences - what were yours?

 Not InfluenCERS.  Books, people,  experiences.  You all know about my love of history and archaeology.  Folklore, myths and legends too.  The school library was helpful with this as I can remember getting out books on Greek Mythology, and our English teacher introduced me to Georgette Heyer.  We also read Rosemary Sutcliffe's The Eagle of the Ninth, which I adored.   Our history teacher was pretty useless - after learning about the Romans, history seemed to go downhill for me as it was all names and dates and absolutely nothing real about the people who had made that history or lived through it.  It wasn't until I left school and was able to read about the things which interested me that I could broaden my knowledge.  Not so much about archaeology as our local library only seemed to have books about Egyptian archaeology, and that soon palled.

I wasn't interested in sewing, but someone I shared a house with was making a hexagon patchwork quilt and thus began my interest in patchwork, helped by my visiting the American Museum at Bath.  Some amazing American quilts there.

I was an absolutely HOPELESS cook to start with - mum was too, so I could hardly learn from her - yet my gran had been an amazing cook, but it never got passed on to mum.  Yet I learned, and found an interest in baking, and learned to make my own bread in 1980, after going to an evening at Eling Tide Mill at Totton, where we were shown how to make bread by hand.  Since my dad's grandfather had been a Journeyman Baker, perhaps that came down in my genes.  My cheese bread was always very well received.

When I discovered John Seymour's book about Self Sufficiency, that was my way forward too - though the idea of ever owning five acres to be self sufficient on seemed unlikely!  I read all the books by Derek Tangye too, about their idyllic life on a Cornish cliff, growing daffodils and flowers for posies which went to London, and growing tomatoes too in the summer months.  Then I discovered Elizabeth West's Hovel in the Hills.  I read that so many times. She wrote a second one, Kitchen in the Hills.  I remember seeing that in a bookshop window in Rhayader, whilst on a coach trip to the Elan Valley (from Salisbury, when I lived there) and spent my lunch money buying it - think it was about 12/6d (that would be 65 pence now). Her third book was Garden in the Hills. They lived in North Wales, halfway up a mountain, in a cottage which really, had been for summer living when pasturing sheep up on the mynydd.  It certainly didn't lend itself to living in the winter as it was incredibly damp, leaked and was cold and miserable.  They lived on so little money that at the end of winter sometimes they were reduced to living off the garden weeds to have food inside them.  Things were extremely . . . basic.  All the same, they were inspiring, and her husband Alan was very practical.  

With the coming of the internet, in the early years of this century (gosh, that sounds rather Victorian doesn't it?), television programmes such Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's wonderful River Cottage and Dick Strawbridge's It's Not Easy Being Green set up their own forums, which I joined.  There were programmes called Victorian Kitchen, the Victorian Farm, Edwardian Farm etc.  Have those on DVD and watch regularly.  My favourite was probably Tales from the Green Valley.  All so very "me".

I also discovered and joined a private online forum with mostly ladies who gardened, made bread, made soap, made jams, chutneys, jellies, cooked from scratch, baked, embroidered, made patchwork . . .  you get the picture.  They were a lovely bunch and I learned so much.  Sadly, these things never last forever.

When I met Keith, we were both interested in antiques, which my dad loved too - still remember watching Going for a Song with him.  We would look in Antique Shop windows, but because we didn't have any money to purchase anything, didn't want to waste the shop-owners' time by going inside "just to look". Keith and I went to Dorchester on a day out when we were first together and saw a sign for an auction at Stinsford School, right beside the beautiful church where Thomas Hardy's heart and his family members are buried.  Of course, we went, and the rest is history!

We ended up in Wales because I had a penpal here back in the early 1970s and holidayed at Ferryside, Carmarthenshire.  When we were househunting and the prices in the West Country (Devon) were going up literally week on week, I said why don't we look in Carmarthenshire?  Well, we did and Wales is still my home.

My degree course was a huge influence on my interest in archaeology and my main passion for Prehistory developed into a deep interest in the Pictish symbol stones, the subject of my Dissertation.  From this has grown my interest in Early Christian Monuments, and we have plenty of those all over Wales.  This has led to bothering Churches as that is where most of them are found :)

So, I would love to know what turned you into the person you are today, and what your passions and interests are.

P.S.  I did a quick shop this morning as I needed food for when Tam, Jon & Rosie are here Sunday - Tuesday, and picked up the latest Today's Quilter magazine.  I was half-tempted but put my glasses on to read the price.  £8.99!  I don't think so!

P.P.S.  Have Beef Goulash in the oven (very 70s), and am sat down with my embroidery watching, wait for it, Tales of the Green Valley, on Youtube.  Sat watching the rain outside and trees blowing around a bit.

Less is more - what could you live without?

 I was pondering this whilst reading posts on an American site (Grandma Donna, have you come across her?)  She and her husband are quite elderly but getting more fed up with the modern way of living and have been researching and experimenting with life as it was lived in the 1940s.  It's certainly food for thought.

Firstly, and how could I ever forget them - I couldn't be without my cats.

Folk in the comments on her site were talking about people having new kitchens put in and all-new appliances too, but some people weren't bothering with dishwashers any more, as they didn't last very long - built in obsolescence I suppose.  I have never had one, but Tam has.  Not sure if it really helps with their "I hate washing up" as the really dirty things, greasy pans etc, and certain items still have to be washed by hand.  Keith was my washer upper, now I have to do it all myself!

We made our washing machine last 17 years by Keith changing the brushes on it regularly.  My latest one has a 10 year parts guarantee so hopefully it will last 10 years!  A washing machine is an essential of course.  My poor mum had to make do with the "copper" in the corner of the kitchen.  She was thrilled to bits when she finally got a twin-tub!  When I was first married, the first time (married twice, divorced once) I didn't have a washing machine and having a husband in the motor trade, can still remember having to take a stout nail brush and washing soap to try and scrub out the worst of the oil on his jeans.  Drying was a pull-out stretchy drying rack over the bath . . .

Which brings me to tumble driers.  Had one once, wouldn't bother again. 

Fabric conditioner - don't bother.  I haven't used it for nearly 50 years and have never missed it.  Total waste of money, and it pongs something awful.  NOT a natural just-washed-line-dried smell at all!  Yuk.  Febreeze comes under the same heading, along with plug-in air conditioners.

An electric blanket - only just started using mine again to take the chill off the bed, but I have returned to hot water bottles - my feet get cold and in winter, that's no fun.  I have a daytime electric blanket to drape over me which costs very little to run but can just heat me rather than turning the central heating on to heat the whole house when it's cool rather than chilly.  

Central heating - yes please!  In a house with no fireplace, it's non-negotiable.  I use it sparingly and have it on just 17 deg when I do have it on.  It would be upped if snow/frost outside.

A kettle.  Can manage without that.  Until recently I heated just a mug full of water up in a pan on the hot ring of my stove, but then noticed that even the little bit of steam from heating that (and not turning the extractor fan on) had lifted the covering on the end of the wall cupboard beside it.)

A vacuum cleaner.  Yes that's a must-have.  When Keith and I first at Ynyswen, mine broke and our financial state was so parlous we couldn't afford to buy another.  I remember having to go round the carpets with a stiff brush and dustpan.  I do not recommend that for one room, let alone the entire house, especially when we had inherited awful nylon carpets with the house.  The one in the living room had to go straight away because years of muddy farm boots from the cow-hand living there had "embellished" it!  

A breadmaker.  Useful as I can just bung the ingredients in, go out and 3 hours later I will have a loaf.  I can of course still make bread by hand if I want to, but it's nice to be able to raise the dough reliably to ready to cook in the oven, to get a good crust.  In a cold kitchen, you have to wait longer for it to rise.

A microwave - not essential.  Handy for re-heating small portions (I recall putting leftover meals on plates, covering with a dish and steaming over a pan of boiling water to reheat them.)

A shower.  I grew up with shallow wartime baths (still do that - WHAT a waste of water having a deep one and wallowing in it for ages).  I get in, wash, and out again.  It's good to have the shower hose/nozzle for washing hair, but I grew up washing mine in the kitchen sink, so it could be done again if no shower available.  

A radio.  I used to have it on all the time in the kitchen, listening to Radio 4, but since moving here I have gotten out of the habit.  I prefer to listen to podcasts when I am working in the kitchen, or upstairs sewing.

TV is non-negotiable to me as it stops me being quite so lonely, and I watch all sorts of documentaries which keep my brain active.  The first winter here on my own was so lonely, but I used to have Kate at The Last Homely House on regularly and she was like having a friend in the room, one who quilted!  The subscription to Sky was the first thing I stopped, and then the subscriptions to Ancestry/Find my Past.  I may just get a month's subscription in January which is a long house-bound month.

Books - another non-negotiable.  I use our local library, and also look for good books on the charity bookcases in supermarkets.  Rarely do I buy a new book from a shop/on line.

Computer and Internet - don't be daft! Another way of keeping touch, learning things, shopping etc.  Saves me on the shopping as my nearest big towns aren't near at all!!

A car - an essential, on many levels.  

Well, enough of me wittering on.  I fear we have all gotten far too used to "having everything".  Sometimes less is more.

Waiting for Storm Austen

 The National Grid has emailed households with the phone numbers to contact so I have these to hand, and good torches/lights in power does go out.  My head torch arrived today too.  

I am just charging my phone as I've got it low from listening to brilliant pod casts today - The Rest is History of course.  Two on Elizabeth 1 and sadly, the last excellent one of 4 about King Arthur.  Did he really exist?  I would like to think so, but possibly not centred on Tintagel as in . . . legend . . . and the time frame may be a little different, perhaps earlier.  Perhaps there were several chaps called Arthur, whose feats have ended up amalgamated.  As in the 16th and 17th centuries, when he was considered made up (Le Morte D'Arthur and Thomas Malory had a lot to answer for, as much of that definitely embroidered and fictional).  What think you?

Today's walk was a bit short and sweet (40 mins) as my back was complaining when I was going uphill, so I think I have tweaked it sleeping awkwardly.  I was nice and warm last night as when I changed the bed, I put the thicker patchwork quilt on.  I have a really warm (hot!) duck down duvet for snow/frost but don't need that yet.  I need to pension off the (old) duvet which is a sort of autumn weight - is part of two that fasten together, summer and autumn, to make a winter weight duvet.  I will buy one next week I think.

I have had a sale of some carved wooden pieces - Keith bought them 10 years or so ago, intending to make a coffer-type box with them, but never did. (They almost certainly came from an old coffer).  I sold them through Marketplace, so I was expecting someone to pick them up.  Imagine my surprise when it was a sale to Dover in Kent - t'other end of the country.  So they are being carefully wrapped to go via Courier.

When I was out earlier I got some AA batteries as I was not sure of the age of  the ones I had.  Now I am going to sit down and embroider some more on the cushion cover.  I've just been upstairs and fastened the shutters closed across my bedroom window.  Should keep some of the storm noise out.  I think that the West Country will have it worse than us though.  We'll find out in the morning . . .

Following on from yesterday

 I am sat here watching my wind-up radio, solar light, torch, charger etc charging, as I have taken myself to task to finally get around to doing that, and working out how it works, and realizing I need AA batteries as well.  I have sensibly tuned it to Radio 4 . . .

I was awake early - slept right through until 4.20 a.m. when I answered a call of nature.  Then Alfie heard me and yelled for food.  15 mins later he was yelling to Go Out Now . . .  I didn't sleep after that but stayed in my nice warm bed till 6.30 or so.

My latest project, which will be a gift for a friend.  I am enjoying working on this.

Yesterday, Tam and I discussed getting butane gas cooking stoves to replace the ancient (as in only use in an emergency) camping stoves in the stables.  She couldn't afford one till next payday, so I ordered two from Halfords and we will share the butane cans, and I'll get more as I shouldn't think they will last long.

I have also found Keith's big Ever Ready torch and got a new heavy duty 6V battery for that.  I also found my ancient head torch, which was beyond use now, having been stuffed in the back of the drawer ever since we've been here, and about 5 years at Ynyswen.  I ordered another one.  Have a shopping list of Charcoal, more Matches, Butane gas and Cup-a-Soup.

I had a little idea this morning - could you cook rice in a thermos flask if you put in a portion with boiling water?  The answer is yes.  Takes about 5 hrs - one measure of rice to two of boiling water. Heat the thermos first with boiling water. Pasta is a lot quicker.  Spaghetti, angel hair or couscous work best - place a portion in a warmed flask and fill to within an inch of the top with boiling water and add a pinch of salt.  Shake.  Ready in 5 - 10 mins.  A proper food flask is best for this, as it has a wide mouth.  On my shopping list . . .

I have enjoyed reading all the comments, and had a lovely long off-piste chat/video  from my friend D, who showed me her Bug Out Box, which has all the useful things you would need.  There are four in her family so best to have everything in one place. Hot water bottles, batteries (lots), candles (lots), 2 lighters & 2 packs lotsa matches, tissues, first aid kit, notebook with useful and family phone numbers in, food you can eat cold incl. crackers and biscuits, peanut butter etc.  Empty glass jam jars for safe candle holders.  Fully charged battery chargers.  Brilliant 24v solar panel for charging phones etc.  (you have to charge them whilst it is being solar charged, I understand, as it doesn't have a battery to store energy.)  Hope you didn't mind me sharing that D.

So, bearing in mind we could have power cuts, I am at least getting towards being winter-proofed.  I have found the heated gilet Tam bought for Keith.  I am far too big for it (he was very slender) but it would be fine across my front or tummy.  Tam said that the battery charger can charge phones too.  D and I both realized that we would be slightly panicky without being able to make contact with family members if phones went down, but as she said, think what it was like in WWII, when husbands, sons (even daughters and wives) went to help the war effort in whatever way and for some of them, you didn't know where they were going (for the chaps, even they were in the dark at times) and when you might hear from them again.  Hand written letters were pretty well the only form of communication.  

Here is my new book (SO glad I treated myself).  A few illustrations for those who like quilting/sewing.  I take them the right way up but for some reason they all come out sideways!, even though I try and turn them up the right way.

FInally, my sideways puffin without legs and feet.  Having worked flat out all morning I am going to give myself the afternoon off and do some sewing.

Central heating was on for an hour first thing and I shut all the doors to keep the warm air in rooms as long as possible.  This of course had a queue of cats wanting to get the other side of the shut doors!!

Spag. Bol. again tonight and enough to freeze two portions too.  I cooked extra pasta and am using up broccoli I had pre-cooked too.

You'd soon run out of clean knickers . . .

What we take for granted - above all, power.  Power to heat, light, cook, preserve.

I've been thinking about this recently, and wondering whether the Government Nanny-State guidance to us to build up 3 days' store of foodstuffs, especially things which don't need to be heated/cooked, and water, have anything to do with threats from Putin to cut off power supplies.  

I used to work for the Marine division of the Post Office, back in the day, and know only too well how many (now fibre-optic) telecommunications cables run beneath the sea.  In the past they would sometimes be dredged up accidentally but now there is a much more targeted approach from our enemies.  Think how easily supply lines for food could be attacked and how instantaneous the result.  In the past, supermarkets used to keep stocks of supplies on site - they no longer do.  When they have run out in store - that's it until the next delivery.  With no communication system, that's it for a while.   That's it on the most basic level - no food, no power.  How to hit a country hard.

Halloween on Llandrindod lake.

An attack on the under-sea gas pipeline from Norway to the UK would be catastrophic too.  In rural areas in Wales, we don't have access to gas anyway, unless we buy it in cylinders to heat a cooker or stove.  I am very vulnerable here as I am all electric - we did consider having a wood-burning stove put in, but there is no functioning fireplace - the old one in the kitchen does have a non-functioning cast iron gas heater, but it was condemned before we got here.  It was connected to an outside supply (gas cylinder).  Gas fumes and asthmatics don't go well together though.  The original chimney above it was covered and I have a storecupboard, with a little window in it, so no longer any good as a chimney!!  Keeping warm and fed would be reliant on blankets, quilts and a primus stove . . . .

It may never happen, but in the middle of the night, when I can't sleep, such thoughts go through my head and cause much pondering! I am perhaps fortunate that less than half a mile away is a shop called The Bug Out, which is about survival equipment and prepping . . .  Perhaps I should check it out!!!  My little recently-bought wind-up radio and phone charger seems a bit inadequate!!

On that happy note I shall leave you and go and see how much it is going to cost to sort out my malfunctioning handbrake (which did NOT want to co-operate when I had to pull off a single track lane last evening coming back from Tam's - 10 sacks of rubbish stopped me pulling into the top of the STEEP driveway and I had to drive down it. Think Porlock hill in miniature (about a 1 in 4 steepness). Handbrake didn't hold and I thought I was going to go through their gate before I could hold it on the footbrake to start reversing out . . .  Oh, and my phone has Malware on it (came in on a QR scanner), so more expense.  Tam tried to fix it yesterday, but it's a sort of self-replenishing one.  Barsteward thing.  (Update: the lad at the phone shop fixed it in about one minute flat . . .)  Phew.  Garage closed (as it was when I passed it last week, so the handbrake will have to wait).

Whilst I was out, I was thinking about how it was when I was growing up.  No central heating of course, just a coal fire in one room.  Mum kept warm-ish in the kitchen (which she called the scullery) with a paraffin heater.  This same beast heated the icy bathroom on bath night.  In winter there was often frost inside the windows where condensation had formed.  Clothes often felt damp.  You put the clothes you were going to wear next day (often the ones worn the previous day, plus clean knickers) on the bottom of the bed so you had extra heat and they weren't icy cold to put on.   When small I wore Liberty Bodices, which were like a fleecy lined vest.  If there had been a storm and a power outage, mum would light the living room, which had the coal fire, with a Hurricane Lamp on the table.  We would play cards or board games until the power came back on again.  Our old house had a gas supply and mum had a gas stove, so we could always boil up a kettle for a hot drink, or cook on it.

At Ynyswen, in 2010, we had about 1 foot of snow on the ground when we woke up on Christmas morning.  That was the day the central heating boiler decided to give up the ghost, and as we were on the waiting list for a replacement one under the Warm Front scheme, it wasn't until April until THAT happened!  We thanked Heaven for the Spanish Hergom stove in the kitchen (which heated the room and you could heat things in pans on the top and it heated a couple of radiators too).  It was a multifuel stove, but once we had it changed to oil it lost its oomph and the oven was only good to warm plates in.  We had the woodburner in the living room and often said that was the only thing which saved us from hypothermia that winter. 

So let's hope and pray we keep our electricity supply . . .

So, did I buy anything?

 Yes, I had a shopping list.  I did buy proper quilting needles for my sewing machine.  I passed on the ultra expensive Best Pins for quilting.  RIDICULOUS prices esp. as made in China like everything else. I pondered whether to improve my rotary cutter by buying a new one with titanium blades.  As I had recently bought blades (non Titanium) for the one I have, I let that rest.  Fabrics it was then.  Some felts to take the place of the woollen fabrics suggested in the cushion I want to make from Kim Diehl's Simple Harvest (they are wool felt anyway).  

That's my dehumidifier they're on (currently drying my clothes and extracting moisture in the Utility Room, under the laundry poles in the corner.  The single ones were 80p each and I think it was just under £11 the lot.

A Christmas bundle.  I think this was £11, so not bad value.  I want to make a tree skirt this year.

These gorgeous different colourway variations on William Morris' s Strawberry Thief tempted me on Doughty's stand, as well as the half metre below I bought from them too.  £3 per fat quarter.  

This is from the Fine French Linen stand and it will go with these below which I bought at the Builth Quilt show back in the spring.  They had a kit/pack of pattern and fabric for a gorgeous triangles quilt but that was about £120!  I will make up my own.  Perhaps just a lap quilt.  This was 1/2m for £7.

Plus a metre of this gorgeous pink print which won't go to waste with grand-daughters in the family.  £7.

Here's the duvet cover I got at the Fleamarket, which is a lovely design and colour-way.  All washed and dried and ready to use.

I nearly forgot, this is the cushion cover for me to embroider for a friend for Christmas.  £8.  I shall start on that this evening.  There should be a new video from Rewilding Jude, and I'm looking forward to that.

I have lots of fabrics to make things with over the winter now, as it could either be very cold or very wet and windy or a combination of both.

Podcasts for the last two days were from Three Ravens (ghosty stories for Halloween) and two brilliant podcasts from The Rest is History about King Arthur and his Knights.

A Disappointing Quilt Fair

The saggy old roof on an old barn at the Farm shop.

 Pam and I met up on the edge of town this morning and made our way to Hereford, stopping first at Breinton Manor Farm shop as I needed apples and they do lovely Heritage varieties. I bought two bags of Russets and one of Ashmead Kernel, and some lovely onions and garlic.  Then on to Lyde Court for their last Fleamarket of the season.  I wasn't expecting much (and so wasn't too disappointed).  I got a history book for just £1 - The Forgotten Castles of Wales by Paul R Davis and a pretty double duvet cover set for Tam's bedroom here.   I may try and offload some of my oldest old stock there next year.

Old oast house for drying hops at Lyde Court.

I loved the little figures on this stand but resisted temptation.

Some lovely quilts formed the backdrop and skirting on this stand.

Isn't this lovely?

And these Goldfinches.  I think it was a preprinted panel which you then embroidered.

All hand-quilted.  Beautifully done.

There were several similar of these at the side of the hall.  Very colourful.

A nice view through a window.

Loved the 3-D fish that the Puffin had caught.

I love Swallows.

This was the 2nd day of the Fair and I didn't arrive until gone mid-day.  It seemed pretty quiet.  When I went a year ago I went on the first day and it was very busy.  There were perhaps 25% less stalls this year, and some stalls with very ordinary cheaper range fabrics which didn't interest me.  There really weren't many quilts on display either.  I was disappointed.  I did buy some fabrics, but had "good sharp pins" on my shopping list and they stayed put as I am NOT going to pay £15.85 for special quilting pins (and not that many of them).  There was a busy and very packed Quilt Fair on Builth showground this year - and again next I understand.  I will just go to that in future.  2 miles each way is cheaper than a 140 mile round trip!  I did bother a church on the way home, so will share that with you soon.

Oh, I nearly forgot.  I have cancelled the Autumny quilt book of Kim Diehl's that I ordered, as when I checked, I have it already!!!  It's Simple Harvest.