Silence is Easy, Prayer and Action Require Effort

Wings

Wings
Flared... searching,
whirring skywards .
Released
to the power of the wind.
Freedom
of open skies

Wings
Furled... seeking,
nestling close.
Comforted,
safe from the storm.
Undercover
of His wings

See more Sunday Scribblings here
...and congratulations on the book, Laini, it is beautiful.

I wrote the above in church this evening while waiting for the worship to start. Wings is such a varied prompt. I could not get a grip on it, but then I thought about angels wings and from there it was a short step to Jesus. I don't often write about Him, I do not have the words but here is a rare offering. The freedom that He gifted us with and the love he offers us. He is more than beautiful.


Another thought spark was the pair of buzzards that nest in the wood at the bottom of our mountain and on summer afternoons the thermals from the valley floor lift them effortlessly into the sky and they scream with joy. Wheeeee! Wheeeee!
Each time I hear it it reminds me of the joy in the Lord that is our strength and the promise that we will mount up on eagles wings and never be tired again. It is the feeling I get when I dance in worship. I am certain that I very often thud about... but while I'm dancing I can feel the air moving on my skin, hear my heart race (Very unfit see, but it doesn't stop me) And I feel so aware of movement and the texture of sensation. It is amazing. I know why the buzzard cries.

Project Spectrum - Mum's Mural

There's pretty isn't it?

Love is all around

Rose & Mum

Love

I wondered what I would write for this, my one hundredth post and surfing around this afternoon I found this site and liked the idea. Post an image of love on your site every Thursday. Spread a little true love around - we can all do with a just little more.

Project Spectrum

The idea of Project Spectrum is simply a celebration of the colors around us, and taking the time to notice them. Each month over a six month span will be devoted to a color group - participants can knit, dye, crochet, weave, spin, stitch, paint, scrapbook, sew, quilt, cook, grow, photograph, bake, or bead items in that color group (of course all arts and crafts not mentioned here also count!).

It is really about expressing yourself creatively - making something beautiful, and creating something unique with your hands. It is also about thinking outside of the box - perhaps taking up a new hobby, or a long neglected one, or finally dabbling in design.

Text above is lifted directly off the Project Spectrum Page.

So, there are three colour groups that you get to paddle in for two months. I am taking as my key words: Thinking outside the box.

April/May colours are:Green, Yellow, Pink. These are not colours that I customarily work with. I think pink is a difficult colour as so often it looks twee or saccharinely cute. Yellow I love, but I can't wear and neither can anyone else in the family. Green is one of my favourite colours but I like it best on trees. Having said that I like lime a lot, but lime doesn't mix easily with the other two. Like I said, if I were a designer then I'm certain I would see a way through this, but I'm not.

Oh dear, just realised. This is the point of the excercise. Break out of the box, girl!

I get very bogged down sometimes and I end up restricting myself. I like to have a project in mind and produce yarn or what ever with that objective. Outrageous creativity doesn't often happen to me.

So I reckon that I must relax, card up fibre and see what happens...I think beads will come into it somewhere down the line too.
Craft on!

I Can Spin a Rainbow

What a fantastic site this is, so inspirational. Exploring the use of colour. It is massively open and diverse with a huge collection of contributors. A whole library of adventurous blogs to be getting on with.

The thing is that I am not a fibre artist, I reckon I can stretch to crafter but that extra edge of innovation is something that I can only admire and enjoy in others. I do not possess that well... edginess myself, I don't see in design terms.
This is possibly why I enjoy writing so much because I can see the shape of a piece of writing quite clearly. If only I could do so with colour and materials, but instead I tag along cwt bwych*, in my ususal derivative manner.
So it is with a sense of a bravery that I tackle project spectrum. Not caring if the end product is a success or not but rather enjoying the journey. I allow myself the freedom to potch about and blur my boundaries.


* Welsh: direct translation - cow's tail,
colloquial meaning - someone that is always behind

A dash of poetry must do you good...

But for the next few days it's back to fibre fun or else I'll get this blog all clogged up and fuzzy.

Haiku - Earth Day

We spin here in space,
Are we creating? Or are
we unravelling?

Another new find!

I have found One Deep Breath, a site for Haiku poetry. (See Sites I like)
I love haiku, they are so clean and spare. Writing them really focuses the mind and encourages a writer's discipline, cuts out wordiness, which usually means adjectives. It's a useful habit when writing anything. Keep it simple, it stands out amongst all the outrageous fuss. So I'm giving this week's challenge a go. Might as well now that I've got the poetry juices on the go, shame to waste it isn't it?

Happiness

I think I'm mostly a happy person. I laugh easily, I'm pleased with small things such as the flowers that V almost buys me on our anniversary. (They last so much longer than real roses). But today I was surfing around the web and saw so many black and white banners for the day of blog silence for Virginia Tech on the 30th April.

My day of sorrowful remembrance also falls in April on the 28th. I remember the first baby, miscarried at 13 weeks on that day. I also remember that it is the wedding anniversary of good friends of ours whose marriage I thought would be as strong as mine own was destroyed through conflict and eventual adultery. This time last year they were fighting for their marriage, now they have surrendered and are heading, inexorably it seems, for divorce.

And today another friend has terrified their spouse by leaving home unexpectedly with no word of where they have gone. I do not fear for them, although they are in great sorrow for a departed loved one, for I know that God has this covered, but I am concerned. Have you ever tugged on a spider's web? There is real resistance there but inevitably it tears. We are so strong sometimes but at other times we can be such fragile creatures.

Is there a fierceness of joy in our lifetime to balance the massive tragedies, or a softer happiness that will cushion us when we experience the desperate, gnawing sorrows of loss?

I have no TV and rarely read a newspaper so Virginia has been removed, or rather I have been removed from it all. But I remember Hungerford, Dunblane, 7/7 and Aberfan is a racial memory for the Welsh.

If you are reading this, send a prayer for those in sorrow. It's a daily thing.

This Week I am Mostly Reading...

The Celtic Devotional by Caitlin Matthews

This is a non Christian devotional, this means that all faiths can use it. Some reviewers on Amazon think it is a little new age for Christian tastes, but I am a pentecostal nutter and I don't see anything wrong with it. You just have to substitute the terms for the Divine for one that suits your particular faith. This lack of boundaries often unnerves your avarage churchgoer, but why lose out on beauty (and this book is very beautiful) for lack of nerve? As long as you know what or who has your worship.

Sunday scribblings

So much for haikus!

Ember
Roots go deep in this my country.
Scars run too, fel dwr mewn mine.
These things run through us,
run deep, run long,
Forming our souls as a mountain's spine.

This earth was robbed by a stronger hand
Riches stripped for an Empire's maw
My people's song
ran deep, ran long
But wrecked upon the hardest shore

My land wears her scars like a lioness
with grace and strength and hard won pride.
Grasslands veil the wounded hills,
run deep, run long.
Curlews weep on the mountain's side.

Mae hen wlad fy nhadau yn annwyl in mi
It's the place I long to be

[It's very derivative I know and rather idealised too, but considering I have done little else these last few months than adapt Cordell, what can else can be expected?]

New Find!

Sunday Scribblings
I love writing but I don't often do so without some kind of cause, which is why I love blogging too. But this site well, it's one great bundle of writing prompts. Like assignments but of course utterly voluntary.

What fun!
This week's prompt is rooted and I think that I will give it a whirl. Haikus are a favourite. I might be posting something later on.

Inspiration

Found this on a site called The Yarn Museum.

It was spun by a lady called knittydirtygirl and it a wonderful mix of merino, cotswold, sari silk, camel and other bits and bobs. Isn't it beautiful? (I am supposed to ask the artist's permission to use her image and I confess I have not, but all the links are there and it's not as if this blog sees a lot of traffic anyway so live and let live eh? She sounds a true fibre artist and a very busy one at that - I can only think that she'd go duh at me. Do I sound intimidated or wot?) Anyhoo, I love this yarn pic and would like to give the style a whirl, when I get all my other projects under control.

Talking of other projects, I believe my Icarus yarn arrived today but I was out and the postie couldn't get the package through the post-box. Instead of dropping it at my neighbour's the daft bat took it back to the depot and I won't be able to get at it until Monday! Arrrgh!

To concentrate the faculties here is a short list of my other projects that I need to get under control/address

1. Spin up at least 100g of the soya silk from the stash, ready for the guild dying workshop.
2. Felt up more merino/possum blend for Arran's splint
3. Finish the last sleeve, and join up V's jumper, I've been meaning to do this for months!
4. Spin up the remaining rosebasket tussah silk for general plying.
5. Finish off the jacob top for Carol's scarf.
6. The fawn merino to felt into a shawl a la Elianor Mortymer.
7. The ashes of roses merino lace weight to ply for a fringe for item 6.

There's probably more but I cant think of them right now.

See ya later

Icarus update

This is not mine alas, but it's a beautiful photo isn't it?

On a happier note I've been accepted onto the Icarus KAL. Even though I have nothing as yet to KAL with - the ol' Hip Knits is taking rather longer than I'd hoped it would to get my yarn to me. Though it has been Easter hols and I believe Kelly, the owner, is sprogging at the moment so it is to be expected that she has been sucked into the maternal undertow and hasn't surfaced yet.

Having said that, I suppose the yarn will turn up on my doorstep tomorrow in order that I feel like an utter rat and have to re write this asap. And it is nice to have something to look forward to...

Jeepers creepers!!!!

Four days back in school, count them 1, 2, 3, 4, and Rose brings home passengers. Uch a fi! *

Get out the big guns olive oil: gallons, well about 3 tablespoons. Lavender, rosemary and tea tree essential oil: 5 drops each. Sluice through the hair and wait 24 hours. It works but it is annoying that some lousy kid is in her school and the cooties are just waiting to be spread around :(


* Welsh - denotes disgust, the f is pronounced as a V sound

This Week I am Mostly Reading...

Such an easy book to read. Rather more than gardening, more like a horticultural chicken soup for the soul. Dip into or read all the way through and what a lovely bloke he must be - well read, intelligent, sensitive, muscular, hard working and self aware. Rather like my own V, no wonder I like him.

My echinacea don't work!

Let me see, what have I done today?
Sneezed, slept, wheezed, made a castle with Rose, sneezed a bit more, coughed

and now it's bedtime.

A Life full of Life

Lily and my Daddy in my parent's pretty garden. Taken about two years ago.

I have been so wonderfully busy this last week, so busy that I have not had time towrite about it all so I think I will back date the last few days and write about them restrospectively but as if I had just done the day rather than try to catch up.

Today however, I went to Mum's and spun in the sunshine. It was as warm as summer out in her garden today. I have started a cold though and so I am feeling a little de ddim. But it has been a gift of a day.

The Easter resolutions are going well. I surfed round some particularly pretty blogs today and on one hand they were encouraging about daily life as a stay at home mum, however, they also managed to make me feel very under-achieving in what I do. They are so full of pretty things like bathed children and pot pies, jam covers and kitchen gardens. I feel after reading them that I am a big fat failure.
For instance: I am writing this at the end of busy day. Eden and Lily are upstair running around like mice in hobnails and I just know that they is going to be mayhem up there by the time I get there and I am certain that I should go up there right now and sort it out.
On the other hand, they are safe, they are having fun and I have peace for the moment downstairs. I have never really got on with the philosophy that every moment of pleasure is paid for with a moment of pain, but it does seem bourne out in my daily living that every moment of peace is paid for by 10 minutes of chaos. There it is - Sian's chaos theory.

Right I'm off for a bit of practical chaos. Nos da my lovlies

Seventies Night at Church on the Move

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Well how would you dress up for a 70's night?

We had fun, lots and lots. There was every spectrum of the seventies from Farrah Fawcett, to Huggy Bear, Leo Sayer and Jonny Rotten. Eclectic? I'll say. Give a man in our church a chance to wear a medallion, an afro and a chest wig and they leap at it like a rooster at a blackberry.

The photos and vids are yet to be put up on the COTM website but here am I dressed as a punkette, even though I was mostly in cord flared dungarees in my experience of the seventies, normally with my spacehopper in tow and though I had no idea of the punk movement at all, I just couldn't do disco.

The Wives of Bath

Oh, what a lovely day. Steph, Sara and I went to Bath. We'd planned it ages ago and then mostly forgot about it until we turned the April page in our calendars over and there it was - Bath. And what was most amazing was that though several things cropped up to impede, nothing was allowed to force us to cancel.

So rather to my surprise we were on the M4 east at a fair time. The journey was easy peasy and there was loads of space in the park and ride. Stress free, fab!

We got into town just before twelve and immediately decided on lunch in Cafe Rouge. What I had envisaged to be a quick snack before some serious shopping turned into almost two hours of hilarity as we enjoyed particularly good steak, which even impressed the Texan among us, and sublime deserts (apricot tart, something in chocolate and a crepe) which required twenty minutes all to themselves. Sara had her first taste of espresso and her shocked, shuddering reaction caused me to almost have an asthma attack laughing. Oh and the very young French waiter was very pretty too. Not for the first time that day we were reduced to the level of giggling adolesents. Such fun considering that between us we have three handsome husbands and eight gorgeous children.

Eschewing the liquers as rather heavy for an afternoon we headed off to Monsoon to get Stephanie's posh frock for an upcoming glittery wedding in London and for me it was one of the most fun parts of the day. Steph is beautiful, tall, size 10, long hair, just the right amount of tan, a fabulous figure and possessing a natural athletic grace probably from those excellent cowboy genetics. Combine this with the most genuine compassion for others and the sweetest heart I have ever encountered and it is impossible to feel anything but pleasure in her blessings. It was fantastic to pick out these outfits and she'd try them on so patiently. So with mine and Sara's help we got her the entire outfit, from hat to jewellrey and simply stunning coral shift dress.

From there to the spa. Oh my gosh. I felt very provincial - which let's face it is what I am - when we went in. I've never been to a spa before. Words almost fail me. A rooftop pool that was as warm as a bath so that the soft breeze from the hill around the city felt tinglingly fresh. Steam rooms scented with lavender and sensuously moving heat - that was gorgeous. A bright welcoming restaurant where I sat in stoned silence, drugged on warmth and lavender oil. A quick dip in the whirlpool bath to wake up and it was time to leave.

We'd missed the rush hour and driving back into the slowly setting sun was easy watching the sky turn lazily through rose to turquoise. A day to treasure, which is why I wrote so much.

This Week I am Mostly Reading...

Country Wines and Cordials by Carol Wilson

I can feel another hobby coming on...

Ginger Beer
1 oz root ginger
1lb sugar
0.5 oz tartaric acid
0.5 oz citric acid
0.5 oz baker's yeast

Boil the bruised root ginger with half a gallon of water for 20 mins then decant onto the sugar and both the acids. Add a further half gallon of cold water and the yeast.

Allow to ferment in a demijohn fitted with an airlock until there are no signs of gas escaping then place in bottles primed with half a teaspoon of sugar. Cap the bottles.

Stand in a warm place. It will be ready to drink after three or four days.

NB Use stong bottles for this or else you run the risk of them bursting. Very nasty.

A Hot Dark Knight

Sir Rodery of Caerphilly Castle

Today we went to see a demonstration of siege engines and medieval warfare in Caerphilly. It was a warm day and poor Sir Rodery was sweltering in his plate armour that weighed about 100lbs. We managed to get quite close up and the chain mail looked so intricate, so delicate but it could take quite a bit of punishment. It looked crocheted if I'm honest but it was, in reality, the result of hours of painstaking linking, that amounted to some serious money being spent on a weekend hobby.

The kids loved it, running around with bows and arrow. There was a fletching demonstration, falconry, the siege engines of course and finished up with a grand melee between Welsh and English, but despite huge and obviously biased support, the Welsh lost! This year's rugby all over again really.

I wish I had another day in the week as it looked such fun, I would love to join a re-enactment society. I think V would look rather spiffy in plate armour and I could have all that extra time sitting in a long pretty lace up dress, spinning away looking picturesque. I mentioned this to V and he stated that plate armour aside, that pretty much was life as usual in our house.

The Lobster Quadrille

Do you know that one by Lewis Carrol?

Will you, won't you, will you, won't you,
will you join the dance?

Will I won't I
Will I wont' I
Will I go to Woolfest?

Pro's
Long way to drive, I'll be on my own, more stuff in my stash

Con's
Long way to drive, I'll be on my own, more stuff in my stash

Someone tell me what to do!

More Rape of the Fair Country Shots

The Mortymer family at dinner

From left to right
Edwina, Dada, Mam, Morfydd and Iestyn, also known as Zoe, V, Me, Catherine and Jonathan

This is my gorgeous man

We took these on Good Friday in Blaenavon Iron-works and The Big Pit. What a day this was, a real family day. I love being part of the Cordell Players. We are mostly made up of married or betrothed couples, brother & sisters and long time friends. So comfortable and such fun. All this and dressing up too. We were taken for Quakers/Amish at the Big Pit. We laughed but it was sweet too.

I think I might wear a long skirt and calico pinny more often, they certainly made me feel old fashioned in all the good ways. By that I suppose I mean the good old ways, before cynicism became common currency and people still believed in their beliefs and would go so far as to die for them rather than being ashamed of having any.
Elianor Mortymer (Mam) is a complete woman, fiercely loving, proud, strong, a good wife, confident in her husband and able to lift her weight as the saying goes. I love her and she has been an inspiration to me.

Easter Resolutions

We had a church meet in the Castle Hotel today because we could not get the town hall because it is Easter. This will be my third Sunday without a meeting and it is starting to blunt my month. Sundays give a shape to the week, something to hang the daily thoughts and meditations on or at the very least it is a starting point.

Anyway, I have been rather low these past few weeks and as is usual I haven't noticed it much until I start boring myself and it turns into a frenzy of organising and cleaning. I am deeply, deeply tired of trying quite hard at keeping this house in order only for it to turn into mayhem the same day, sometimes in the same hour!
Something must be done, I must be doing something amiss - whatever it is I am going to remedy the situation.
I don't do New Years resolutions partly because I never feel as though January is anything other than an arbitrary calender moment, there is no real significance. But spring, Easter, the equinox, there is a spiritual and physical response to the change of season, the flood of new life and I am swept up.

I don't know what form these changes will take but change is coming to me and mine and the home that I run. Possibly I will run it rather than drag it limping behind me!

Rape of the Fair Country - day out

Went to Blaenavon today to take promotional pics for the Arts Festival and the Cordell evening.

Had a good poke round in the iron works and then on to the Big Pit. It was a lovely day, the weather was warm and sunny. Thd children behaved like angels and we all had a great time. I took some particularly good photos of Morfydd and Iolo Milk (aka Catherine and husband Matthew) kissing in the heather and there was quite a good shot of V and myself at the pit wheel looking very romantic.
However, my favourite was one of Zoe (as Edwina) reading outside an Irish cottage.

Went to the Dyffyn Arms for a drink after and let the children run off steam as they had contained themselves so well all day. I did a little crocheting to use up my stash, the Welsh black and silk left over from my mum's Christmas present. I think I might try a little felting after the children have gone to bed.

I (as Elianor) get to wear a particularly good felt shawl as part of her costume and I found it rather inspiring. It was certainly very warm.

This Week I am Mostly Reading...

This Proud and Savage Land by Alexander Cordell

The prequel to Rape of the Fair Country. The story of Hywel Mortymer as a young man. It's a weepie, as usual for Cordell, with a clarion call to hope at the end.
It's not an easy book to read if you're Welsh, indeed some parts of the trilogy borders on incitement to racial hatred (of the English for a change) but I got so wrapped up in the adaptation for the Blaenafan Festival that I just wanted to keep going when Rape had finished. That last was a nasty sentence but you know what I mean.

Finished the Mural

Took about six hours of solid painting and I was not aware of time passing at all. Magical. There are still some fine details that need to be tinkered with, but they can go on for months. However, for all intents and purposes, its all done and everyone is happy with it. I haven't taken a photo of it yet but will do soon and then up it will go. I am chuffed.

Count Your Sheep by Adis

Mum: Ship, I'd like her to be everything whe wants to be.

Ship: President, doctor, philosopher,actress, gardener, veterinarian, activist, sports agent, yo yo artist, centerforward, perfume inventor, test pilot, candy maker, comedy writer, team mascot

Mum: Oh my! She can't be all that she wants to be

Ship: And those are just her hobbies

This is Me and Rose

300

What a strange film to want to go and see. But I did and I cannot figure out why. I think I was curious to see what it would be like. And I really enjoyed it too. There was not a single second that did not provoke an emotional response, whatever that response might be. It was exciting, vivid, emotive, heroic, glorious and in parts revolting, but it was not dull or worthy or preachy which I suppose I have run thin on lately. But I love heroes and I appreciate men and masculinity, strength and faith and courage.

The film has been trashed by critics as variously racist, facist, homophobic, homoerotic, brutal, hammy, ridiculous, camp and downright weird.

It wasn't hammy or ridiculous, but I can see how they reached the other points of view. However, I thoroughly enjoyed it. And here's why. Because I do not look at films like this for their deeper meaning as I don't believe they have one and to go looking for one is pointless.

The film was not based on real life or history as we fondly believe actually occurred. A fact that seems to have bypassed otherwise intelligent reviewers.

Sparta was a horrible place to live. It was a military regime with an economy based on slave labour. The Greeks occasionally had a thing for young men and they did not like the Persians much.

The film however was well structured, beautifully filmed in sepia and grey which really made the scarlet of the Spartan's cloaks (and the blood) stand out. The fight choreography was clear and at points balletic. Really, for something that is based on a comic, I think that is about as much as anyone can expect. Plus the fact that it was the Spartan queen (above) that got to run a traitorous skunk of a politician through with convincing energy and panache. I believe I cheered at that point much to V's half horrified amusement.

I doubt that my mum would have enjoyed it at all, in fact I cannot think of a single person of my aquaintance who would. (V is now watchingthe BBC's Pride & Prejudice in an effort to take away the mental taste of blood.) I don't think my gentle husband is of the Spartan disposition. Thank goodness, there is no place for them in our house! But they did very well for two hours of heroic, gory escapism.

Seaweed

100% cashmere from Hip Knits for the Icarus.

It is arriving in about 10 - 14 days. I feel like a kid at the start of the summer hols.

Todays Project

Have plied the gaudy parrot acrylic with some thick'n'thin turquoise and it is all set for my scarf which was going to be the usual insane huge hook work that I normally crochet. But then, surfing around this morning, I found a Convertible and liked the sound of it. The pattern that I saw was a lovely lace pattern in a very fine yarn. Well that ain't gonna happen as I'm storing my patience for Icarus (ordered that yarn...more in a mo). Anyway I thought that I could fig out a wide rectangle for a scarf and jig together some buttons for the convertible.

Hopefully I can work it up today.

This is not yarn, it's pure temptation

An example of the skeins of silk mix available at Hip Knits. See what I mean? Combine that with the most exquisite shawl pattern that I have ever seen. How can anyone resist?

Iceberg Ahead Captain

Ah, I'm warning myself now so that when, in a month or two, I am weeping and tearing my hair out I will look back at this and know that I knew that it would turn out this way.

Knitting I cannot do,
I know I can't, I'm sure I can't.
I cannot knit.

So answer me this. Why on earth do I want to try lace knitting of all things and not a scarf, OH NO! I want to do a big son of a gun Icarus shawl!

It is gorgeous admittedly and I already have my eye on some cashmere yarn for the project. But Lord God (and I am not blaspheming here 'cos only He knows what is going on in my tiny mind right now and I think even He is scratching His head) what am I thinking?

And yet I know I will try and it is largely due to two yarn stores that are tantamount to yarn/fibre porn. One look at Posh Yarn and Hip Knits and I was a goner. Woe is me, I am the Lady of Shallot, doomed I tell ye...doomed.

Just found these

Catharsis
Mad dragon comic




Count Your Sheep - cute imaginary friend comic

Mountain Mural

Every once in a while I get crazy notions in my head. Wouldn't it be nice to paint a jungle in my bathroom, hang feathers in Rose's room etc.

And I get this propensity for temporary looniness from my mum. When she said to me that she would like a mural in her front room she promptly handed me the chalks and let me at this lovely blank wall. Not too big, about 9 or 10' long and the same high.
She wanted mountains. She has them, or at least the beginnings of them. It's not finished yet but it is coming along nicely. I'm working in watercolours (cheap ones!) and building it up in layers of colour to give it transluscence and depth. I'm pretty pleased with it even though the room is so small that you have to go outside the front and look through the window in order to get a good view.

I will be posting pics as I add layers. Good thing the hols are upon us, the kids can run on the mountain with Dad andI can get some painting done. I love big projects once in a while.

I think that this one will take me at least a fortnight to complete. My bathroom took a year, but I had newborn twins to cope with then and could only paint when they were asleep. I might post a few pics of our frog, which V hates as it stares at him when he is in the bath. I digress. As usual.
TTFN