Trelawnyd Wool & A Gift From The Gods

No, it's not whole meal spaghetti ...nor is it several plaits of odd looking French bread

What this village lady is holding out proudly is newly spun chocolate brown "Irene & Sylvia" Soay sheep wool!

Over the past weeks I have collected a bucket load of fleece from the fences and the hedges of the field and gave it to the nice lady from the Still House to do something with.

Ideally I should have had stripped the wool from the ewes themselves, but they remain remarkably skittish and difficult to catch , and so I have had to resort to scavenging to obtain even a handful of coat.

The " still house " lady turned up yesterday with a completed length of spun wool. True it was a bit rough. Admittedly it was not as silky soft as wool hand stripped from the beasts themselves, but it was my wool from my sheep! And I was absolutely thrilled with the result!

The still house lady seemed pleased at my obvious pleasure with the fact that she had worked so hard producing a bit of " Trelawnyd Craft" and promised to knit me my own woolly hat from the wool on the spot!

This little gesture of kindness really made my day yesterday.....as did the plate of homemade ( YES HOMEMADE) scotch eggs that turned up from fellow chicken geek Greta last night.

Now if I you thought I was excited at the prospect of owning my own sheep's wool hat, I must tell you that I was practically hysterically wetting myself over four homemade scotch eggs!!!!

Thank bleeding goodness I had enough weightwatchers' points to eat one!

It was divine!

Nectar of the Gods

The best thing I have tasted since I ate a bowl of cheesy chips at the Hillsborough Corner chippy  after 2 bottles of white wine eight years ago!

Heaven on a plate

Quality Of Life Issues

Mary, disabled, safe and happy?

It has always surprised me when lay people and professional nurses and doctors alike make a snap judgement about a patients' " quality of life". If years working with spinally injured individuals have taught me anything, it has taught me that life may not deal you the cards that you want and deserve, but it's a life that can be lived.
Yesterday a couple called around to collect a cockerel. He was one of the " refugees" and so was surplus to my requirements and was the second one to be re homed this week. The couple had a dozen of their own hens so were glad of a new leader.
On the way into the field, the couple stopped to look into the rabbit hutch by the gate, and both expressed surprise when they spied Mary sitting quietly behind the chicken wire eating a pile of dandelion leaves.
The husband asked about Mary and I told him her story, but he shook his head.
"Poor thing" he said " it's not much of a life!.." I would have pulled its neck"
I found myself starting to defend the fact that Mary had been saved but thought better of it, so I just shrugged ... He obviously thought I had done the wrong thing
The wife leaned over and cooed at Mary and she asked  " are you going to let it go?"
I told her that I couldn't because of her damaged leg and the husband tutted a little more
He was seriously getting on my tits
I went to collect the cockerel
When I returned the husband asked me how much I wanted in payment for the rooster.
I thought  about it and said I would take a fiver
He was unlucky
Before he started commenting about Mary
I had decided to give them the cockerel free of charge

Winifred Week One

Winnie watching Albert carefully from his hiding place 

Winnie doesn't give a stuff.
She has come to a new home, with a new pack, new owners, new routine and more greenery than you could shake a stick at, and she has settled down remarkably well.
Like I said, she doesn't give a flying stuff
She is a remarkably chilled out character.
She has met local dogs at the field gate, who have bayed right into her face, and apart from an expressionism of mild surprise, she has done nothing at all.  She has been " faced off" by the sheep who are well used to frightening the other dogs into running for the hills, and has flexed nothing more than a Roger Moore eyebrow and  when she has been asked to venture out in the old Berlingo , she has sat on the back seat with George with all of the gravity of Maggie Smith's Dowager from Downton Abbey.
The other dogs have accepted this strange character much easier than I expected, and despite her bulk, even Albert has coped with her great big fat face baring down on him for a thoughtful sniff several times a day. Like William's obsession with Mary, Winnie has a fascination for the wide eyed cat.
She is also housetrained, affectionate and is fit as a flea despite her size

It's not all been plain sailing though.
 Winnie is quite an active dog who seems always on the go. She doesn't sleep much during the day an odd trait which is rare for bulldogs, who by nature tend to be somewhat lazy characters, and she is a terrible follower.....being my " shadow" since she arrived.
This , I know will settle down given some time.
She is also not that good on the lead, having a tendency to weave when out with the others, but it's early days........and bulldogs are wonderfully bright dogs that learn very fast indeed.

It's a case of
So far
So good

Bake off Week 5

It was biscuits and tray bakes

On The Great British Bake Off this week

Know all smiling Kimberly failed with her tweels

( how the mighty have fallen)

And my favourites Howard and Glenn managed to

Up their game with their biscuit towers

So they could fight another day

Howard cracked me up my describing his tweels as looking like " fagbutts"

 

Glenn , smiles his way through the  bake off

It's still all great fun

I was so excited by it all

I had to ring best friend Nu

For a post programme discussion .

Albert rubbing my hair with his paw during the bake off!

Part Of The Furniture

Above the door in our bedroom is a useless little shelf.
The day we moved in, I placed several odd little items on it
A few old poision bottles, two tiny  burleigh ware jugs, a couple of Carlton ware dishes.
Nothing much, but for years they have sat there, unmoving and practically unseen as if they have morphed not the very fabric of the cottage.
Before I got up this morning, I lay there and looked at the shelf as if I had seen it for the very first time.
The Art Deco jugs looked cute as a button. The dishes beautifully painted and the bottles, delicate and tiny enough to feature in a child's dolls house.
I enjoyed each piece as if I had just bought them

 

Things we see every day, can almost become invisible to us can they not?

The same thing can be said of almost everything in our lives

An Art Deco jug on a shelf, a painting above the fireplace, a plant in the garden, the view from a window..... a friend from down the lane.....a close relative.....

It's easy to accept all these things are just " there" without

really " seeing" them again with fresh eyes

and a fresh appreciation

I am not a lover of the phrase

Familiarity breeds contempt

I think I prefer the more clumsy 

Familiarity breeds invisibility 

Season 4

Only a month to go

Apparently outside Liverpool there is a Zombie based

Theme park thing called " farmageddon"

I have just been asked by a work colleague to go

And the answer is 

Oh

So

Yes

Three Decades

The Class of September 1983 with our beloved tutor Leslie Brint

Exactly 30 years ago, I was a gauche, slightly immature twenty one year old Welshman. Who had just left a ' secure' yet mind numbingly boring career at the Nat West Bank for pastures new.
 I was also one of just seven brand new student nurses who entered their Mental Health Nurse Training at The Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester. We were nervous  little souls all told, and were an eclectic bunch that found themselves entering a vocation just as the demise of the old asylum system had been implemented .
It was all a long time ago
My nursing career has meandered from my training in Chester to staffing on a "Mother & Baby" Unit  at Bootham Park Hospital in York ( mums with Post puerperal depression and psychosis). From there I leapfrogged into general nursing in Sheffield, where I ended up at the flagship Spinal Injury Unit for over fifteen happy years.
Since our move to Wales, I have worked part time on Intensive Care
30 years all told........It's a sobering thought

And what has a career in nursing taught me?
Well
It's taught me the ability to read people, I think.
It's taught me a certain degree of sympathy and warmth for people
And it has homed a slightly irreverent sense of humour
But, I know that after three decades, I can now appreciate the fact that  its not that long before I can retire
 ......it's almost time to go, me thinks.

Hey ho
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Changing the subject... I thought you may appreciate a Winifred update.
Well Chris survived a day alone with her yesterday when I was at work and this morning, he gave her a quick early walk before he went to work, which was sweet of him.
The old bear continues to settle in quite nicely.

Cottage Night

a Welsh love spoon hanging by the fire

Autumn is definitely here. The Atlantic storm, which was promised,has hit North Wales though the rain held off a little so when I got home after a full day on Intensive care , I had enough time to lock the hens up.

The cottage has started again, to look cozy in an evening.

Low lighting and the glow from the coal fire

That's how cottages look their best