Tales of Lockdown Part Four or 9 Dresses.

Hello, I didn’t think it would be quite this long until I’d blog again but there you go. I’ve certainly been kept busy juggling various commitments, and to be honest those combined with spending so much time in front of a laptop for work, my brain is too fried to do anything other than veg. I’ve also been struggling with tired eyes and my current glasses, but that’s a tale for another day.

 Dress One - Hell Bunny Apple Print (Bought in their sale)

To head back to the scorching days of mid-August we finally heard from the coroner and were able to go ahead with the funeral as planned. Himself headed down on the Friday night, his sister arrived on the Sunday and I set off on the Monday afternoon. Travelling through London wasn’t too bad, the circle line was temporarily closed when I got there, but thankfully all my pre-lockdown work trips meant I now have a fairly good idea of that central chunk of the underground and I was able to find another route and still caught the train to Ramsgate with about 5 minutes to spare.

Himself’s friend Paul has been an absolute diamond and kindly agreed we could all base ourselves at his house for the week. Of course it had to be that insanely hot week which makes sleeping impossible and everything an effort.

We spent the Tuesday doing official stuff in the morning and started to clear the house in the afternoon. Our plan was to get as much done as we possible could that week as that was the only time Himself’s sister was able to get there. I decided the best focus of my efforts was to clear the kitchen which is huge with many cupboards, all of which were full. By the end of the week we completely filled a van with the charity donations of household goods, another was furniture, as well as separate piles for stuff to be collected by the council and finally the rest for a skip. What had seemed like an insurmountable task to Himself on Monday was done by Friday, yup we managed to sort the whole house. By Friday I was knackered and my back declared enough was enough. It was a good job we were going home on Saturday because my back had completely seized by then so I couldn’t have done anything more anyway.

 Dress Two - from Heyday (bought in their sale)

It was a strange thing doing a funeral in lockdown. Only 30 guests maximum at the church and 15 at the crematorium, with masks mandatory at all times. Ironically Himself had ordered 3 plain black ones for his Dad which arrived too late for him to use, so we wore one each. In an era when so few of us seem to have the time or inclination to get to know our neighbours it was heart warming to see just how many of Dave’s came to the church. The landlord, his son and the barmaid from his local came too, it really was lovely to hear how well thought of he was.

None of us was too keen to sit in a pub and Dave’s local is not exactly spacious, but on the plus side it is on the seafront in Margate and the weather was firmly on our side so we were able to sit outside and raise a toast.  

Paul kindly borrowed a small van from his work and drove us home on the Saturday with it completely full of everything Himself wanted to keep. Thankfully it all just squeezed in and saved us having to think about doing that at a later date. 

Most weekends since have been taken up with either trips down to Kent for Himself or stuff to do with the house there. Culminating with us both going down a coupe of weeks back to clean as much as possible now the house was empty, meet the estate agent and a couple of other appointments. Now that restrictions are ramping up again we took the decision to just go down over night, staying at the local Premier Inn do as much as possible in one day and catch a late train home. Travelling across London was not pleasant, the underground was full to standing which surprised me, obviously not to pre-covid levels but still… thankfully most were in masks.

We had an earlier start than anticipated when the stair lift removal company called at 7.15am to say they were en-route! Thankfully we were already up, so we packed up our overnight bags quick and dashed across town to be at the house when they arrived at 7.40am. It was a long hard day but we did manage to do all we needed too. The weather that weekend was insane, heavy rain and gale force winds. We literally had to battle along the seafront to the station being painfully sandblasted by the wind whipping off the sea and up the beach, it really hurt and you had to walk with your eyes shut as much as you dared. I have never seen waves like it in all my time visiting Margate. The trains were delayed because of the weather but thankfully running so we finally got home about 11.30pm. Straight into the shower and then bed. The next day when I emptied our bags there was sand all over the kitchen floor! 

Dress 3 - Collectif Leopard Dress (bought in their sale.)

In between we had our annual long weekend in Bournemouth. We thought about cancelling but Himself really wanted to have a break. We toyed about going to Cornwall because of the mad news stories with all those idiots cramming on the beach at Bournemouth but in the end decided to stick with it. We figured as technically kids were now back in school it shouldn’t be too bad, and also as it’s somewhere we know really well we would know places to go to avoid the crowds. As it goes whilst it was lovely to get away, there were a lot of people about and I did find it did make me nervous. It weird how much I feel that these days, when there are crowds of people.

Interestingly there were quite a few big groups of blokes out doing pub crawls. Bournemouth is a big stag and hen destination and I think the girls haven’t come back because they tend to go clubbing and the clubs are still shut, but blokes are more about pub crawls so surprisingly they were still out in force, at least we knew where to avoid!

Our usual B&B of choice was closed so I managed to find another that came recommended. It was in the stag do end of town and the room was tiny but very clean, they prepared your breakfast in a little brown paper bag which you went down and collected and had put a larger kettle and more tea/coffee stuff in the rooms so it worked well.

 The big sad thing was our favourite Restaurant has closed. It’s in a part of the town earmarked for redevelopment so would have had to close anyway, but with covid they just decided to shut now. Gutted. We arrived on the Thursday and it rained bah so we found a pub with table service until it stopped then bought a bag of chips and sat by the beach by the pier to eat them and watch the sea until it was dark.

Dress 4 - Collectif  (bought in their sale.)

For the Friday I booked us tickets for Brownsea Island. I stalked the National Trust website for weeks waiting for the tickets to come up! The weather was just perfect and to be deep in a pine forest with gorgeous fresh and fragrant air sitting looking at the sea, well there’s not a lot to beat it. 

Tickets included the boat trip to the island and you were limited to a 4 hour visit which was my only disappointment  otherwise everything was really well managed. Brownsea Island has a colony of rare Red Squirrels and this time round we got to see a few of them which made my whole visit, it was amazing.

You catch the boat from Poole so we booked a table in a little Italian restaurant on the quayside there for that evening. We killed the time in between visiting a few shops, which was weird but comforting too, I have missed shopping. We also found a quiet pub and had a drink. After a delicious dinner we caught the bus back to Bournemouth and retired to our room with a bottle of wine.

On the Saturday I caught up with my friend Alison for a couple of hours which was lovely. The weather was gorgeous again so the beach was busy. Instead we walked up and down a couple of the chines and went to a little café at the bowling club that she knew about. Definitely one to remember as the food was great and super cheap. In the evening Himself and I had an early dinner then walked away from the crowds to Westbourne where we had a table for two in one of the pubs there and shared a bottle of wine. 

On Sunday we checked out and wandered along the cliff top, they have been holding all the big cruise ships empty just off the Dorset coast and it so happened they were by Bournemouth when we were there. According to Alison some of the local boat owners have been doing good business taking people out to sail around them and stare up at them they are so huge. 

 We headed to the central park where we sat in the park reading and eating one last ice cream before heading to the station. The train home was surprisingly busy but everyone was masked up so all good. It really was great to have a break it was sort of long enough and not long enough at the same time.

 Dress 5 - Bought from a facebook sale page back in March (Trapped at my work due to lockdown and only picked up months later.)

I have been into Oxford a couple of times in the last 6 months. I had to go into work and empty my desk so they could clear our office to be used for a teaching space. That was kind of weird and I just had to grab anything I thought I might find useful at home and could physically carry on the train! 

Dress 6 - Seasalt (Bought in their sale.) 

We have also had a couple of days were many of my team met in this big café come restaurant come deli in Jericho with our laptops and kind of worked together, though to be honest we mostly gossiped. We also had a socially distanced picnic in University Parks before the rule of 6 came in as a farewell to one of our team who was going home to Australia. That was fun, we all brought our own drinks and snacks and sat in a huge circle. 

One of the girls from our office is 24 and had just moved to a shared house in Oxford in February right before lockdown. I hadn’t seen her since so asked how she was finding it, that it must have been hard and she was like “ Oh no, I have had exactly the same summer as usual, socializing, partying etc. It’s like covid doesn’t exist” and they wonder why our numbers are going up. SIGH. I was only half joking when I told her to stay sitting well away from me because her demographic was the reason mine were getting sick!

Dress 7 - Collectif  (bought full price rerelease that I missed first time round and wasn't going to miss again.)

When I have had any free time I have been pottering in the garden, I really find myself switching off and unwinding when I'm outside. I ordered more compost and re-potted more of my plants inside and out.

My tomatoes FINALLY started to turn but then so did the weather so I ended up picking them all and ripening them inside. I always collect my own seeds and have been really thrown by the huge yellow plum tomatoes as I only ever bought baby plum sized ones, no idea why they suddenly grew huge!

Dress 8 - Seasalt (bought on Ebay.)

 So that brings you up to October and the frocks I have bought up until now. Dress 9 was bought from M&S. I needed some undies and a new green cardigan and was idly browsing the website and fell in love so I just went with it.

  

Tales of Lockdown Part Three.

So I did have a couple of blog posts lined up, genuinely, but then we had some sad news. Somehow it no longer felt right to blog about handbag purchases and the like, nor did I feel inclined if I'm honest. 

Two weeks ago Himself's Father died suddenly and unexpectedly at home, it would seem he had a heart attack after getting up that morning, but we are still waiting to hear the final conclusion of the coroner's office. Due to the current covid times it takes a lot longer than before to get these things done. 

Himself rushed straight down to Kent but I was unable to take time away from work until the Wednesday. He quickly realised there wasn't much that could be done other than securing the house and gathering up a big bag of any paperwork that looked like it might be important so I didn't travel after all (no bad thing considering we don't have a car and have to travel by train in and out of London!) 

We spent the rest of the week sorting through the paperwork and making lists of what needs to be done and who needs to be contacted. We hope the funeral will be on the 12th but we have already had to cancel and rearrange it once, so things are in limbo. we have done all we can for now, and well, once the initial shock has passed, you just take a breath and get on with things. 

It had been my birthday the Friday before and I had had a lovely day. I have made it my policy not to work on my birthday since I turned 40 ans this year was no exception. So after Himself went to work I had a lovely lie in then made myself some tea and took it back to bed to open my cards and read for a while. Usually I would have met friends or my Mum and had a day out, instead I beasted in the garden for about 5 hours. I did more garden archaeology. I did take a before picture this time as you can see it was a bit overgrown.

Not only did I discover there had been some manner of edged flower bed

I also found two old hanging basket brackets on the fence and an old nesting box, which feel straight off the fence when the ivy was gone so I wedged it behind the tree trunk. 

I uncovered this pottery planter with a dead tree in it. I quickly cleaned it, and planted it up!

I had cleared two thirds of the area by the time I stopped, partly because Himself came home and insisted I stop working and chill for the rest of my birthday, but partly because I knew there were birds nesting in the ivy which I didn't want to disturb.

I had a shower and chilled with a book on a lounger in the garden with Himself keeping me well supplied with spiced rum and coke!

Decisions decisions... I also got another 3 bottles for my birthday. Nephew Number One is a huge spiced rum fan too and we often discuss different/new varieties, he bought me a bottle I haven't tried before (not pictured). My favourite is Dead Man's Fingers and they have started doing many different flavours so I spent some birthday money on a bottle of Lime and a bottle of Raspberry. They came with a free tiny bottle of hand sanitizer and a branded face mask, what a sign of the times.

I managed to get another compost delivery, so on the Saturday I re-potted some of my plants (when you rent, your garden lives in pots so you can take it with you!) I also decided to tackle the covered side passage which has had a few boxes in it since we moved here. Of course they were there because we were going to sort out the contents and of course we never did! 

However we have discovered to our horror we seem to have a colony of false widow spiders in the passageway so we decided the time had come to clear it completely so they have nowhere left to nest.

Yes, yes I know spiders are wonderful things and do great things, but I hate them and ones that can give you a nasty bite have absolutely NO place in my home.

Anyway I come to agree with the train of thought that, space allowing, you should leave things for a while before sorting through them. After 3 years, apart from a few random tools and a big padlock everything else went straight in the bin! 

I did rescue my wellington boots which I had left in the passage since we last had snow. They got quarantined and thoroughly hoovered out before I stuck a foot in them again.

When we did our weekly shop I spotted a pretty petunia in Sainsburys. It only had one or two faded flowers on it but I kept thinking about it, so I nipped back and bought it for myself as an early birthday present. 

After a couple of weeks it has just gone mad and I have loved looking out of the kitchen window and watched more and more blooms appear.

The garden really has been a sanctuary throughout lockdown and certainly in the last couple of weeks.

My vegetable 'patch' is going great guns.

From this to this

We have had salad leaves and peas, as well as some ball shaped courgettes. 

I had completely forgotten that I had bought these unusual courgette seeds until my Mum rang me up and was asking why her courgettes were growing ball shaped! They were some of my left over seeds from the old house.

I also found some anemone corms when I was sorting through the seeds. I have no idea how old they were but planted them anyway and to my delight they they have been just gorgeous. 

When I ordered compost during lockdown there was the option to have 5 trays of assorted annuals for £17 and as I had gaps I took a punt. 

I'm not a huge fan of  your average bedding plants but I have to say these tagetes have put on quite a show, the blooms are just ridiculously enormous.

There is a little cat who likes to prowl the garden and generally be a nuisance. I also have a pair of very stupid pigeons who do keep nesting in wide open places and having their nests robbed by the local magpie. Well they had built another such a nest and I noticed it when I was clearing the garden. Whilst I was out pottering about I glanced up to see if it was still there, did a double take and then went and grabbed my camera.

Not a pigeon but a cat in a nest.

Talking of cats. I went to visit my Mum with my brother and sister in law a few weeks back once the 1 metre distancing came in. I sat in the back of the car with a mask on. We had a lovely day sitting out in her garden, but best of all I got to have a play and make a big fuss of Bobby the cat who I haven't seen for months.

 Mum sent this picture afterwards clearly I wore him out.

It was Mum's 80th last Saturday. We had to change our plans due to lockdown and instead of a family trip to Cornwall we bought her a new i-pad and had afternoon tea at my brother's house. Of course it poured with rain so we ended up having to distance in the kitchen, thankfully it's a big room. We did manage to arrange a visit with Dad first and I nipped down the day before to leave a present and card for him to give her. We all had to be gowned and masked but at least they agreed to let us see him. 

I'll end with some handbags. First when I was rearranging my bags I discovered one had been chewed by a woolly bear. 

Once I got over being annoyed I decided to cover the holes. I cut out a scottie dog and stitched it on.

So you know I said I wasn't going to buy any more handbags? Well that lasted as long as it took me to bid on and win this job lot...

The bottom right was a separate purchase

As were these two. 

Oh dear so much for no more bags. 

I also bought a new bedding set

I could not resist the monkeys.

Not sure when I'll be back. We have some busy and difficult weeks to come

Tales of Lockdown Part Two.

After the guttering drama I had a busy week with work and suddenly it was Saturday again and I couldn't face being in the house any longer so I decided to do some gardening. I was in the mood for some heavy duty work rather than pottering about so I decided to do a bit of clearing at the bottom of the garden.  

You may recall we have that huge conifer tree there which means nothing grows under it apart from the endless ivy, and the derelict ivy covered shed. I had noticed that the neighbours had tried to clear the ivy from the fence on their side so I thought it would only be polite to do the same from our side too. 

I wish I had taken a before picture but I didn't think to. After about half an hour I hit concrete, I've started to refer to any work I do as garden archaeology as I keep discovering so many things! 

After a couple of hours of digging I had uncovered what I can only assume was once a cold frame and the paving slabs that lead to it. 

I also discovered an old rusted brazier, bits of rusted tool and some flower pots. More incredibly, not only did I dig this half circle planter up 

(now scrubbed and planted up with pineapple mint)

I also discovered this massive planter half buried too, I can't believe I never spotted it before. 

It also scrubbed up beautifully and is not full of strawberry plants. It took a whole bag of compost to fill it!

Himself got home and came to see what I was doing, so I showed him the pile of things I had found. He took one look at this huge spike I uncovered and said it looked like it should be hammered into the heart of the witch who is buried under us. 

I gave him a look.

He was a bit sheepishly and said it was the influence of a book he had been reading...

Over the 3 years we have been here I have discovered various roses in crazy places and have dug them out and potted them up. Two were tiny and really struggling but I absolutely refuse to give up hope on anything and this year one rewarded me with it's first flower.

The bottom rose I bought reduced to £2 in Wilko. It's called 'National Trust' and is a gorgeous old fashioned velvety bloom and as it gets older it goes so dark it's almost black.

So you know how I said I was going to dig over a bit of a veggie patch well in the end I decided to go down the container gardening route. As Himself pointed out, nothing ever really grew on that patch of ground anyway.

Since this picture I have added another crate two growbags and several other pots. I have collections of pots with tomato plants in three other places too. I have SO many tomato plants. I never thought all the old seeds would grow so I quickly dried and planted some more. Of course all of them grew and I can't bear to throw any in the composter. I have no idea what varity any of them are as I never made note when I dried the seeds. I also have peas, courgettes and FINALLY some french beans after buying and planting a third packet of seeds. the first two did nothing.  

The next weekend was another Saturday of me at home whilst Himself was at work. During the week I had had a brainwave, well I thought it was a brainwave anyway! 

I had been aware that the handbag collection was pilling up in the small spare bedroom and whilst walking up the stairs one day I looked at the bookcase at the top and thought this is the solution. I thought it might just fit in the space at the bottom of the bed and would of course hold the whole collection therefore clearing the floor. 

We plan to get rid of the knackered old single bed mattress from that room and take down the bed frame at some point and when we do my idea is the spare bookcase will hold all the books currently under the bed. 

Some careful measuring showed the bookcase would indeed fit in the space but investigation on their website showed Argos no longer sold this size of bookcase. Several fruitless hours of searching later it seemed neither did anywhere else, well not at a price I was prepared to pay anyway. So I went with a slightly smaller different design.

I was still confident the collection would fit and I would be able to get all the bags off the floor and get rid of the small unit I had been using too, freeing up much space. I had visions of a blissful day sorting and displaying my collection so piled the whole lot on our bed. I hoovered and dusted, put the bookcase in place and started to arrange. 

It quickly turned into a fraught day. 

It became very clear I had drastically underestimated the size of my collection and overestimated what the bookcase would hold. No matter what I did things didn't fit, they just didn't look right and I still had a sizable pile on our bed with nowhere to go. Argh.

I ended up with it looking like the above. I'm not at all happy and will probably use the redecoration when that ever happens as a reason to re-arrange again. 

As you can see I'm still using the small display unit too. My Corde bags our now on a unit in our bedroom.

I was slightly horrified at quite how many bags I had when I saw them all piled up and thought I really must stop just randomly buying, or just stop buying at all. 

I looked hard and long as to whether I could thin the collection and I'm slightly ashamed to say I could only bring myself to say goodbye to five.

I did actually keep to my word of not buying any more for about a month...no will power AT ALL. Joking aside I am being a lot more thoughtful in my purchases though, and long may that last.

I did finally put up my Snoopy mirrors. So that was something good to come out of it all.

On the Sunday the weather was gorgeous so I started to paint our garden furniture. We had to move it for the scaffolding to go up and I took the time to wash it. 

It had been at least 5 years, if not longer, since it had last been treated and it was looking flaky and rusty. 

This wasn't without drama though  when Himself managed to knock a brand new tin of Hammerite off the kitchen table and it hit the floor and burst open!?! 

Cue much swearing and frantic scooping and moping up of metal paint with kitchen roll. I took a chance on using white spirit on the laminate floor to get rid of the stain, thank god I found some under the sink. 

I was worried it would lift off the protective coating too, but it was either that or a huge black stain. Thankfully it didn't damage the floor and as the paint was so fresh it cleaned off completely. I can do without moments like that I can tell you. 

A new tin was purchased and of course I didn't buy one big enough, it was that kind of weekend. So I finished the last two chairs the next week.

Before

and after, so much better.

As I had half a tin left I painted various random metal plant stand and baskets as well. 

I finished not a moment too soon before the weather turned and we had an amazing storm. God how I love a good thunder storm. I was slightly concerned about the guttering but thankfully it held up and no more wet kitchen wall which is something at least.

I'll finish with a purchase. 

As you know I am a brooch fan and an Erstwilder brooch fan at that. I have long regretted not buying their cute crab brooch when it first came out  (I am a Cancerian after all.) Their ranges are limited runs and sell out very quickly. So by the time I did decide I just had to have it and hang the cost, you couldn't get one anywhere for love or money. 

Well this year they did some fan favourite re-releases and the crab was one of them. I did not hang about and snapped (excuse the pun) one up pronto, with a Benjamin Bunny because he is my favourite Beatrix Potter character and I had been dithering over him too, and thought learn your lesson woman! 

so here they are plus a pair fo earrings because why not?

There have definitely been some bag purchases but they will wait for another day.