My Pocket

to do - doing it - done

Happy July to you!

I am happy with the way the weekend turned out. Minus the hot soup and the studying which didn't happen we managed to...

watch a film (Pride and Prejudice: I plucked the courage to suggest a girly film and I loved watching the costumes)

put up the kitchen shelves (they have been a project in waiting for ages now),

get a dining table (I love it! It used to be D's desk and I just painted the legs white while he polished the top leaving the dark stain and the worn look of it),

buy an oven (oh, the things we can cook now!),

and paint the chimney breast in the living room (green! Yes, the red was lovely too, but I have shared a room with it for two years now and it was time for it to go).

On a completely different note, I have added another Long Story page, about my family if you're interested.

I hope you enjoyed your weekend and I wish that July will bring joy and summery adventures for you!

no, let's not

The forecast for this weekend and until Wednesday is showers, showers, showers and more showers, so we decided not to go on our planned Cornwall holiday. Yesterday the cheeky weather showed it's sunniest, warmest and most pleasant face in a long time however, just to tease I think. I've never been so relieved to find a misty morning view from the window and take such delight in steady drizzle.

It will be a weekend of pottering around indoors and getting some things ticked off our to-do list. Apart from putting up shelves, clearing out and putting together I intend to watch films, have hot soup, do some sewing and some studying. For me that beats getting soaked in a tent down in St Ives, though I would have loved to see the place.

I'm still touched by the performance of the students last night at the last Informal Evening. Informal Evenings are events the school has every so often when anyone who wants to perform can get on stage and play their instrument, sing, do a skit, perform an act or read poetry etc, mostly people sing and play and often together. Saskia, a 16-year-old girl, sang the Jeff Buckley version of Hallelujah to acoustic guitar and it was amazing, can't do it justice by describing it really, it was just spot on and so touching.

OK, enough of the rambling, I don't have much to say today. Have a great weekend!

farewell

Last night was the night of the Farewell Dinner. All the leaving students, mature students and staff make leaving speeches at this formal dinner held for the whole school. This year there were 37 people leaving, which is a lot for any given year, and it took more than three hours to get through all the people saying something. Each year it humbles me, hearing all these wonderful people speak about their year or years here. I always feel like I haven't got involved enough, never get to know enough of them, don't spend enough time at the school. The students live such an intense and unique life here, close together and learning about themselves at a terrific speed.

There's no comparing to that really, but I still set myself the challenge each year to push myself a bit more out of my comfort zone. I run and hide as often as I can, feeling awkward and out of place with all these people around. There is always something going on and opportunitites present themselves to learn something new and I am mostly too scared to take advantage of it. I learn lots on my own, but I would like to learn about sharing time and experiences with others more. In any case, there are several students I did get to know somewhat and this is their last day, so I am off now to hand out hugs. Take care.

rain, holiday and art

It's been raining heavily again here and you wouldn't believe it's the end of June - I've been filling my hot water bottle regularly. Well, you know, I get cold easily...

We're going on our summer holiday to Cornwall on Saturday and I'm so hoping the weather will shape up by then. I want to lap up the sun on the beach, wear my summer dresses and go for walks along the coastal path. Like in this painting. It's one of my favourites and I love most everything this painter does - he's called Nicholas Hely Hutchinson. You can find him here, but I put some of his paintings up too if you want to see. Along with some other art I like, I plan to put stuff up whenever I remember or find something new.

Hoping you have sun where you are! Take care.

quiet life

Things are quiet here. The students have been away on the yearly camp in Devon this week so the school has been empty. Tomorrow back to normal though. We've been rearranging the two rooms in our little flat to suit us better and had a lot of laughs in the process. I'll show you pictures of the new arrangement once we've cleared away all the bits and pieces that always remain spread across the floor after these kind of endeavours. We've been going for walks in the evenings after work these days instead of our usual lunch-time one. It's wonderful - I love summer evenings! Bright, lush green and sultry.

I wish you all peaceful summer days ahead - be well.

clouds

It's been raining today but the sky has cleared now. The clouds are moving quickly in their bright white and the sky is a clear blue.

We're going to London this weekend to visit friends and babysit their three boys so I'll be back on Sunday afternoon. Happy Friday to you and wishing you a lovely couple of days!

lapping it up

Sunday had to be spent over my studies so I thought I might as well make myself comfortable. I did manage to get quite a bit of work done, but it was so marvellously warm and lying out on the grass in the sun without truly lapping it up is a shame.

I was listening to Arcade Fire (Ocean of Noise, Intervention and Neon Bible), Mason Jennings (on recommendation from my brother and I love it - listen to East of Eden or Stars Shine Quietly, but they're all great), Nina Simone (never fails to get my reluctant study brain going - Love Me or Leave Me has the most amazing piano improvisation and I've Got Life is obviously just brilliant) and Phoenix (another recommendation by my brother - Long Distance Call is my favourite, it reminds me of the four years I spent with my boyfriend making 4hr+ phone calls between Sweden and Britain). Speaking of him - look what he took and emailed me:

My pencil case. :) Sent with the subject line: Heart Shaped Pens for You, My Love. :D I love him...

champagne tents and phone booths

I hope you had a pleasant Saturday. We needed to go off and do something other than what we usually do and so we went to a place called the Grange not too far from here. It's a grand old (17th century) building with Greek pillars and all but you won't get a good look at it because I generally find buildings boring and this one especially, so no photos. Besides, there were far more interesting things surrounding it. Tonight there is an opera performance so all over the grounds were party tents for groups of five to sip champagne in the interval.

Beyond the immaculate lawns a phone booth was standing in the barley - the British are funny like that.

After the Grange we went to Abbotstone Down, a wood with footpaths and open meadows, where we had lunch in the grass.

The best part of the day was getting here and there though - riding on the back of D's vespa. I love zipping along the lanes and watching the fields and woods fly by, feeling the warm breeze and the movement.

catching up

Happy June to you!

I feel lucky in that the warm sunny weather we had in April gave me a chance to have my summer holidays then, in those precious weeks inbetween my college years, and now that the May weather has been blustery and rather cold I've not had a chance to complain anyway with assignments to write. I always love this time of year though, remembering the last days of school as a kid before the summer break that began in the first week of June, lilacs flowering and the fresh green everywhere, whispering promises of free time adventures.

I feel like I've got some catching up to do, so here are the things I would have blogged about had there been the time:

Goodbye old friend...

Hello new sewing machine!

I've been so happy with my old Singer handcranked machine that for a long time I saw no need to have a modern one. It's handled making bags, mending clothes, hemming, sewing stage costumes for the school play, the curtains for the school concert (oh the mileage of black fabric!) and outfits for the dancers, but my imagination gradually started nagging me about the things my friend just can't do. So now I have two.

First thing to make I think will be something with the fabric with spots, perhaps with the green linen I bought a while ago. I've really got a thing for green lately, and always for linen. The fabrics above are from Superbuzzy by the way.

I found this linen skirt in the charity shop and I love wearing it as an apron. Digging my hands deep into the pockets.

I've been exploring taking self portraits of myself lately. For a long time I've just abhorred having my picture taken and the only progress I've made is to allow people to do it on the condition that I don't have to see it afterwards. A good friend that I trust inspired me to look into it though and I want to try it for a while to see what might happen. It is different if I'm the one taking my picture as the control is with me and I can be alone with it, so it's not quite the same as the real thing, but it's a good start for me. Also, deciding to put the photos on flickr makes it more of a challenge. My aims with this endeavour are:

- to feel more comfortable, if not relaxed, in front of the camera
- to get used to what I look like to other people, something I haven't wanted to face
- to let go somewhat of the importance my appearance has to me
- to challenge the image I have of myself in my head, something similar to what I'm doing with this blog
- to show who I am to other people, something I dread and again want to do with this blog

Last thing is - these bracelets:

I'm thoroughly enjoying exploring what it means to be a woman, something that takes a bit of courage for a tomboy like me. Bracelets is the latest thing and those colourful little beads have been the sunshine of my day since I got them on our Isle of Wight camping holiday. The bigger bead bracelet was a gift from a very good friend who visited from the States the last couple of weeks.

Well, that's quite enough for now... Enjoy your summer days!

Thursday

Good morning sleepy-head, time to get up!

Shower with a view...

Stretch them legs, wiggle them toes! (note sandal tan line, did I mention I live in them?)

Commute to work : round the corner, through the backyard, across the road, through the rose garden, past the greenhouses and vegetable beds and through the door of the school.

School library : backs of books to toe the line, some to be returned to their places, some just unruly generally, some books need TLC, some need to be given new homes, newcomers need welcoming and worlds come together - anywhere you want to go I can find you the shelf.

Daily-after-lunch-walk through canopy covered lanes.

Studies for this afternoon : Taking the Main Complaint, Questioning the Systems, Cancer and Pulse and Tongue diagnosis...

G'night...

...sleep well!