Which Narnia Character are You?

I am Jewel, the unicorn in The Last Battle.


As Jewel, you are slightly stubborn and a tad head-strong, but you are valiant brave and daring. Admired for your free spirit and adventurism, you are the subject of much respect.

Click here to take the Narnia character quiz

This week I am mostly listening to...

Ancient Paths of Peace by Craig Smith

I love this CD, got it last week and have listened to not much else and I am not fed up which is rare for me.

Lovly lilting tunes, a touch of country folk. The chap is a worship leader in a church in Arkansas and his voice is reminisent of John Denver, very pure but stronger in the higher registers. Anyway, it lifts me up and I'm away. Not much good to spin to this really for that very reason but oh it does cheer when you are feeling far away.

Here's what I did yesterday. It spun up really quickly censidering how fine the yarn is. I don't know why that shetland is taking me so long! I'm going to do some slubby turquoise merino and do a really funky wide scarf with really long tassels and I'm keeping it for me.

Retail Therapy?

I wonder sometimes if my addiction to fibre and spinning it is just a front for the enjoyment of spending money, just a thought.
I have just put an order in to Winghams and normally this is an event, something to be pondered over, making wish lists, discarding because the amount I'm ordering is laughably expensive. Today I knew exactly what I wanted, I had a definate project in mind and I bought only the fibre I needed for that, no little extras tucked on at the end, no angelina fibre, which is my guilty pleasure (so glittery and tasteless) and there was very little pleasure in the shopping experience as it were. Is this what responsible consumerism feels like? Or is it just the way I am feeling today? Who knows.
I think I am going to do a little spinning now, just for fun. That shetland is turning into a chore, I still have about 150gms left and I think that translates into about three or four dedicated spinning evenings ( about 6 or 7 hours) and right now I fancy something rather more frivoulous than plain white. I have some gaudy parrot synthetic in my stash which I need to ply with the turquoise that I have just now ordered, so I could get ahead on the project and start the plying thread now. And it really is a lovely day so probably the first outside spin of the year while Lily and Eden toddle round me after I get them from nursery.

parrot acrylic

So that means I really must crack on with the work if I am going to spin in daylight rather than evening time.
So long lovlies, have a sweet day.


ps. Iwasn't feeling so good when I sat down to write this but seem to have talked myself round, that or the homeopathy tabs have kicked in. Hurrah for pulsatilla!

My Basket

Sliced fingers and aching wrists bought me this pretty little basket and the knowledge that I will never make the log basket that I have been wanting since we moved to our house!

Willow weaving

This is not my basket but mine looks very similar

The day went well, but golly it was hard work and it turned out that my brain died at about lunchtime and from there on very little made much sense, so I failed to finish the basket myself as I just could not understand the instructions. It was like Lois was speaking Greek. Poor thing, she was lovely and recognised my defeat and just took over - so I do have a basket to show for the day and most of it was my own work. I gave it to my mum who was delighted. Pics? In a few days when I can find the memory card.

And now for something completely different

Basket weaving workshop tomorrow. Never tried it before and never thought that I would ever have the opportunity to have a go so I am intruiged.
I love going to guild workshops. There is always the air of a picnic treat about them. Something brand new and absorbing for the day.
Must remember to take the camera. Last time I went I remembered the camera but forgot to bring the memory card and I was so annoyed with myself.
Anyway hopefully pics here tomorrow.

The charm of the boy

Went to see Becoming Jane last night with my sister. It wasn't fantastic or wonderful or marvellous, the usual words for a film that I really enjoy. It was however, just right. Quietly agonising with that peculiar pathos of the British broken heart. I know a little of the history of Jane Austin and I know she never married so I knew how that little romance was going to end but crazily I hoped for a diffent ending! And by golly that James McAvoy can act and although young is not my thing usually, he was particularly beautiful and intense.

There was one particular scene where LeFroy and Henry Austin were pelting down a hill, running hell for leather and they looked so...young thatI felt really quite old. What I mean is that these young men had such energy and hope and strength and ...well, I don't. I felt the cold breath of my own maturity on the back of my neck. Which is why I think there is such a fond sorrow for films like this.

Just read this over and I sound particularly pathetic but really this is the mood of the passing moment. Like mist to be burnt off by sunshine of the full day. I have plenty of hope, there is lots to look forward to, but twenty seems such a long time ago.

Did I say Spring?

Snow on the mountain behind us this morning and the wind so keen I can feel it sucking the moisture from my hands by the second. Ewww - and I've not found a moisturiser up to the job.

Anyhooo, quiet day today, just Todd and Miriam to lunch with Eli. Roasted butternut squash and red pepper soup and lovely fresh rolls, pate and fruit. I'm feeling quite virtuous.

Off to a Cordell practise tonight, I wonder if anyone has learnt their lines? Still it's a night out.

Got to make a felt scarf for Trevor soon. Something snazzy and eccentric one side and very dowdy the other to suit his undercover nutcase persona. I feel a winghams order coming on woooohoooo!

Eighteen years

This time eighteen years ago I was at Madge's eighteenth birthday party in Sloanes nightclub, Swansea Marina. There I was, nicely fuzzy on extra strength cider, and I saw a beautiful but bored looking man on the edge of a dance floor and with the confidence that only a tiddly seventeen year old possesses, asked him to dance. The rest as they say is history.

Quite a few years, a near break up and three children later we are still here and it has by and large been great fun. Still mates, still my favourite person, the one I love to spend time with, the one who drives me nuts, makes me laugh, makes my day.
Here's to you V.

Small Hymn of Praise

Thanks for warm doorsteps at sundown,
merlot wine,
hot buttered corn on the cob,
the flight of crows,
starlings pops and whistles,
ice cream and seafoam.
For these and all other blessings,
we thank you Lord.

That was my day today and I'm feeling good and fuzzy about it

Spring Pots vs Marauding Sheep

I'm always the same. Something works and I go nuts with it. I've done a few window boxes and tubs of primroses and now I can't stop. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't know that as soon as word gets round the neighbouring sheep they will all be up here sampling the new pretty delicacies the crazy bird in number five (me) always puts out for them at this time of year.

I've seen the sheep climbing up on the coal to get up to my windowsill (and my beautiful potted pansies) before now. They haven't managed the hanging baskets yet, ordinary neglect sees them off by July usually, but other sheep fatailities include lillies, geraniums, more pansies than I can count, my entire vegetable patch - they broke down the back fence to get to that and when I was eventually capable of rational thought, I seriously considered animal cruelty. But I never learn. The pain of losing plants is always outweighed by the beauty of the brief time that I have with them. So I suppose a few primroses won't make a big deal when they too are consumed.

I will be retuning the compliment at Easter anyway with mint sauce on top.

It's Spring (I think)

Sunny mornings, cool but not cold wind strolling not howling up the valley, primroses, daffs, grape hyacinth - which smells of heaven - and that indefinable feeling in the air. Lambing soon and time to start the annual fight with the garden.

No church today 'cos of the tonsillitis but I think we might manage a stroll up the hill after lunch. And then I think I just might get the peg loom out. I haven't wanted to do anything crafty for a while, the Cordell thing just wiped me out, but now that has been brought under control I can get moving once more. It's good to be crafting again.

5.50pm
It has indeed been a beautiful spring day, but we couldn't go out as Rose is still unwell. So I pootled about a bit with peggy and Rose rose up from her bed of pain to have a bash at her loom which she hasn't bothered with since January cos her sisters kept on wrecking her work, disheartening for anyone let alone let alone a six year old. She seems to be improving a little, her throat is a little less swollen, but still nasty. Poor sweetheart, she is so angelic when she is sick, it will be a relief to have her back to her impish self.

V has done another website for a friend, rather good this one, very dramatic. He let me have a go with the colours, but he didn't like what I did as it was rather mild, so he went overboard with the contrasting colours and ended up with orange and black. It sounds harsh, it's certainly not restful but it is very eye catching which is a good thing. Anyway, it got me going again and so I've done a little rejigging of my own on here in honour of Spring, turned out a bit pink but that's okay for now I think. Easter ain't far away and one cannot go wrong with pastels at this time of year, even though I'm more of a brights myself, they just don't work well on a screen.

Enough pootling Sian, time to re-thread Rose's new project.
See ya later Dudes!

This week I am mostly reading

Silverthorn by Raymond E Feist.

Yes I'm back into the sword and sorcery for the mo, I got Eddinged out a few years ago and haven't really been back since LOTR film made it all so much easier if I needed a fix rather than having to put up with clumpy writing.
I haven't read much of Feist and this one was written in 1982 so I think he was fairly new to the game and it shows, but the story is good if well worn. Ii think I will probably read the Riftwar books but no more and I will stick to Guy Gavriel Kay for the fantasy stuff because he really is a Tolkien clone but with rather a softer touch for female characters. His Summer Tree stuff is some of the finest I have read in the genre. But for now, Riftwar and scary elves.

Hi Again

Wow, a whole month away. Been so busy that I haven't had time to write about how busy I have been. Haven't read any of my fave blogs either so it was nice to find out what others have been doing the last month. all these people the world over having their little lives domestic crises and triumphs while the world just keeps turning. Blogging puts it in perspective well sort of - the micro and macro alongside each other. Like a snowflake in a drift.

I've been to Ashburnham for a week, great fun - see COTM blog if interested
Papered my bedroom which didn't turn out so badly considering I did not have a clue about what I was doing.
Finished the Cordell adaptation and by Golly it's good, even if I do say so myself (and it took ages).
Sorted out the box room which was a concentration of mess in proportion to how small it was but now it is quite pretty if one can ignore the ripped wall paper, evidence of Eden and Lily's attempts at interior design.
Rose has tonsillitis and nothing is shifting it but fortunately she is not passing it on and today we are all going to Mum's to celebrate my birthday.

Haven't done any more felting, only a little spinning and that was the shetland that I have been working on for the last two months. Lace weight shetland takes a bit of spinning doesn't it? Crocheted a scarf for V's birthday, purple merino chunky, hand spun hand made and I don't think he's worn it yet! I wouldn't mind but he asked me to make one for him. Nuts.

Off now this instant to spruce up for the birthday lunch and with one sick(ish) kid and two toddlers with the attention span of rabbits this is more challenging than this caffine starved mum can reasonably be asked to cope with.
I reckon V can be in charge of bath time I want another cup o' tea.