As working parents of young children, there used to be signposts that guided our path through the year: start of the school year, birthdays, major festivals, etc. As the kids have grown up, these events changed: school summer fair – end of year exams – public exams and results etc. So how are things different with no children at home full time? What are the events that now guide us at this time of year? I list some below…

1. Village in Bloom... Neither of us are gardeners, as I have indicated already (see frittata post earlier!). However, keen to be involved in village life, we have attended a couple of meetings where the village’s entry to the above competition has been discussed in detail. Both the writer her indoors and I were struck by the fact that this is not just about growing flowers, but about many elements of community involvement, from developing footpaths to involving the village school. All around the village bird boxes, built and decorated by the children in the school, have started to appear and the children are taking part in citizen science observations about the wildlife they see. The weeks building up to the ‘doorstep challenge’, in late June will be busy…
2. The village May Fayre…. From conversations with our neighbours, it has become apparent that this is a major event. It is focused on the school, but I gather that many of the activities are definitely not for the young ones! However, the highlight is a local band playing music for the school children to dance around the Maypole. Whilst this is a tradition that has its roots in Europe, there is a strong history in the UK too and especially in the southwest. For some reason, this has really struck me as charming and I will continue to be charmed by it until someone asks me to join the Morris dancing group!
3. Dorset Knob throwing… I know…..I couldn’t believe it when I started seeing posters for this event – really, in this day and age? But yes, a big thing in the southwest! To assuage your concerns, the Dorset knob is a dry savoury biscuit, normally eaten with cheese. Shaped like very small, dry bread rolls they are very good with a soft blue cheese, like Dorset blue vinny. The annual event takes place in May and, apart from the throwing event – current record is 29.4m, set in 2012, there are others: knob darts, knob and spoon race, knob eating…… I step away….!

Eating: Pollock and blood orange en papillote…recipe courtesy of Thomasina Miers. I am not a natural fish eater and am always looking for recipes that will help me enjoy it more, so I was intrigued by the combination of some strong flavours – fennel,thyme and olives with the orange and the fish. Works really well together as a nice balance of tastes and textures. I just served it with some asparagus, as a Good Friday light evening meal.

Drinking: The above, one of my preferred grapes and part of a selection from Naked wines, refreshing with the pollock.

Listening to: The Magnificat by John Rutter. I sang in this a few years ago at child #3’s school and loved a. the nature of collective singing, which is really empowering and b. the harmonies. My favourite element is ‘Et misericordia’, the high notes at the end are just sublime; seemed apt for the time of year

Last week’s musings about ‘home’, what it means and how it forges memories, has left me thinking much more about family this week, especially the connections we have with our ‘close’ family, our ‘nearest and dearest’. These thoughts have coincided not only with the first visit of my parents to the house and the return of sundry children to our (their – discuss?) home, back from university to ‘revise’, but also a significant birthday of my eldest sibling.

I was convinced that my parents’ first visit to the house, long delayed due to illness, would be a failure; they wouldn’t like the house and would struggle with the layout, the little steps between several of the rooms, the stairs etc. (They are both of an age at which ‘being in my own bed’ seems to be the most important thing in their lives!) But should I really still be worried about what they think at my age?…. I need not have been concerned, as they were charmed by its character and potential. In a melancholic moment over a glass of wine, I could see the regret in their eyes that they hadn’t done something similar themselves when they were at the age they could have….

My siblings’ visit was an altogether more challenging affair, as we haven’t really spent much time together recently. However, trips out on local walks and music brought us together and, combined with the Ice cider I have mentioned before, we laughed in front of the fire and reminisced about our different tastes and the fact the we all love music despite growing up in a house with no music whatsoever.

My eldest sibling’s significant birthday meant a trip to the parents’ house and a ‘party’ with a bizarre mix of people. As she does not live in England my mother was in charge of the ‘guest list’ – so, invited were: Tim-the-vicar, Tom-the-taxi (obviously we all call him Joe, in a nod to Vanessa Paradis!), angry-artist-Angela (lives with Tom, but not in that sense and in 37 years, this was the first event they had attended together), as well as some distant relatives who live close-by- an ‘interesting’ mix! The writer her indoors saved the day with a spectacular cake and the event was a success, despite, or perhaps because of, its inauspicious beginnings.

So, family…This week has confirmed that it doesn’t take too long before you find that all families have their quirks and foibles, the estranged uncle, the distant brother, hidden (or not very well hidden) feuds/illnesses/relationships, stories that are shared, or will never be told…Is it about being bound together by blood, feeling bound together by memories? Do our friends fulfil the needs our families can’t? And when are we truly at home and with whom? So many questions which, having just finished watching the excellent Bohemian Rhapsody, still give pause for thought….

Eating: Lentil and roast vegetable salad, based on Meera Sodha’s recipe, but with extra aubergine! I served it as a warm salad, with soda bread fresh from the Aga and a green salad on the side. The chilli, garlic and lemon in the dressing gives it a lovely zing!

Drinking: Sibling #1 brought this over from Spain – robust enough to work well with the above salad.

Listening to: In a desperate attempt to avoid the tension moments with family, I spent lots of time listening to chill-out music while cooking – the writer her indoors’ favourite at the moment is Chet Baker very laid-back jazz; my current preferred song is Autumn Leaves, the writer’s is It’s always you. Going to bed singing a variety of bastardised Queen songs tonight, though!

When I first moved out of home with my first ‘proper’ job, I don’t remember how long it took for my first flat to feel like home. It was certainly the first time I had ever had to consider the advantages of one type of floor covering over another, or had to discuss the pros and cons of tile splash backs over glass. Even as a student, my parents seemed to have played a large part in choices to be made; possibly they were getting rid of sundry items of furniture, or was it just that their car was big enough to hold a particular armchair? By the time the children arrived, I was definitely more attuned to the game of furnishing ‘our home’, part and parcel I’m sure of the whole ‘nesting instinct’. I can still vividly recall the terracotta front room we had in our first house, and the deep green of our second (finished late one Christmas Eve, slightly the worse for wear and painting around the tree, not behind it!). These colours are also fresh in the minds of our children and linked inextricably to memories of growing up. We were in our last house for well over ten years – how long would it take for a new place to feel like home? Perhaps some time spent away from the house would renew our perspective?

The last week has involved much travel, mainly by car (though both the writer her indoors and I have enjoyed excellent train experiences too – a chance to sit and read/listen to music, trains running on time, no traffic jams on the M25). I was looking forward to returning to London for the first time properly since moving out -a chance to catch up with former work friends and to be back in the smoke. Whilst it was an absolute delight to meet up, it did feel strange going back to where I used to work. A lovely evening of chatting was filled with the sense that I just did not miss the work at all and that retiring from the profession was ‘definitely a good thing’.What was equally a delight was pulling in to the station nearest to our house, to be met by the writer and then walk back in to the kitchen and warm myself by the Aga.

Driving to visit children #2 and 3 at their respective universities also re-affirmed the nightmare that British roads can be, when journeys that should take 2 hours last 3 and a half (why do I ever drive anywhere near Stoke on Trent?), to say nothing of the constant tailgating (don’t people take any notice of tv ads?), or the overpriced petrol and coffee in many service stations. We did however, love the road across the Northumberland moors, atmospheric, with the cloud cover at 100% and falling to cover the road ahead – we might even have spied Vera’s car beside a deserted field…Again, though, the moments of familiarity with the rolling hillsides in our area and the breathtaking views from many stretches of road confirmed that our journey was bringing us home, content in our choice of village and of house.

So different experiences over the last week have merely served to confirm that, within three months of moving in, we have settled and really found a place that encompasses all that a home should be…

Eating: Pan fried salmon with wilted wild garlic (foraged – I’m so happy!) and new potatoes, baked in brown lemon butter, sauce verte. Recipe from Skye Gyngell, apart from the new potatoes, which was from the Guardian.

Drinking: Grüner Veltliner, from Waitrose – a nice change from Sav blanc and Viognier!

Listening to: As a result of my efforts over the last two weeks to listen to complete albums, Aztec Camera‘s cover of Jump on Knife made me start thinking about covers – current favourites are Ben Watt‘s version of Dylan’s Gonna make me lonesome when you go and Take Yo’ Praise by Camille Yarbrough, used by Fatboy Slim for Praise You.

The house into which we have moved didn’t seem to need any work when we looked at it the first time, nor the second, or even the third. We would, we thought, just spend time living in the house and slowly make changes to suit our taste. I have discovered that patience isn’t my thing where houses are concerned. I will blame this on my grandmother, who was legendary in our family both for punctuality and for getting things done immediately. The first time the writer her indoors met her was at 4.00pm on the dot, for tea. Sibling #1 arrived at 4.03pm, to find that the empty tea cups had been cleared away, cake back in the fridge. There was also the Christmas Day we dropped in to surprise gran, only to find that the tree was in the garden and decorations packed away: ‘I couldn’t be doing with the mess, so cleared the house yesterday and got Christmas done with for another year!’

The changes we have wanted to make to our house have necessitated several trips to the multitude of antique/junk/curios shops and reclamation yards which seem to flourish in this part of the world, as well as to the charity shops which are also thriving. We have one particular favourite antiquesy place. Their display cabinets host a really wide range of glassware (the writer her indoors’ obsession), coffee cups and saucers (my re-discovered obsession), surprising pieces of furniture and yes, vinyl. What is it about records that make them so appealing, especially to men (note to self, check this statement for lazy stereotyping)? The charity shops tend to stock the usual range of records, from ‘The Brotherhood of Man’s Greatest Hits’ – yes, I know, quite a short album, and ‘Mantovani’s legendary classical Hits, to ‘The King and I’, Handel’s ‘Messiah’ and more Roger Whittaker albums than you can shake a stick at. Our antiques centre stocks an altogether more ‘sorted’ range of albums and singles, from rarer Bowie and Stones picture covers, to some eclectic jazz and blues albums.

Reclamation yards are a whole new ball game for us both, but what a game! The sheer range and variety of things that you can find there is just unbelievable. Old wooden and metal tools, wooden decorative crates, toy model cars, and metal signs all mixed in with old doors, dressers, garden statues, mirrors, wash stands and even a Russian tank – bit steep at £80,000! We have been ostensibly looking for a door to fit an unusual shaped frame, but have been distracted by many of the above. The writer her indoors is more willing to dip into the bank balance than I am for several of these items. My defence strategy is to go down the route of: ‘Yes, it is certainly giving us food for thought. Are we ready to make a decision based around that colour yet? Or do we need to change our whole plans for the room?’

What is perhaps most exhilarating, or depressing, depending on your point of view, are the times we say: ‘Oh, we used to have some of these… I remember throwing my one away… Did you used to play with these when you were younger?’ Do these places thrive on some sort of national obsession with keeping ‘things’ in the hope that at some point it will be saleable, or the possibility that we are incurable romantics, often seeking to relive our younger days in some vicarious way. Or even, picking up on a really interesting discussion I heard on Radio 4 about changing concepts of ‘cute’ and ‘kitch’ (Thinking Allowed), to what extent do we seek to give ourselves meaning in the possessions and artwork we chose to display in our homes and gardens?

Eating: Dairy-free chocolate brownie cookies, recipe from all recipes.co.uk

Drinking: Dark roast Monsoon malabar (Whittards), last one of the coffees from around the world taster pack I received as present from child #1. Complemented the cookies perfectly!

Listening to: The soundtrack to the tv series Killing Eve. Family favourites include: Issues, by Julia Michaels, Killer Shangri-La by Psychotic Beats and We gave up too soon by Leigh Gracie. Personal favourite is Dark Eyes by Sergei Trofanov. Good luck to the nominated stars in the upcoming Baftas!

Part of the deal in moving out of London and giving up work was to embrace difference, so this week I am in the process of developing a new set of skills including: gardening and learning about wildlife.

The most exciting things I have ever achieved in the garden are well cooked steaks and moist fish en papillotte on the barbecue. So Spring in the garden has both filled me with dread and excited me at the same time. I am not a gardener, have never been a gardener and have therefore hitherto fully supported the writer her indoors’ green fingered activities. These consisted of hanging coloured lanterns from the bare trees in our garden in London and putting a variety of brightly coloured plastic flowers around the garden. The dead and dying plants, colours ranging from the more attractive browns to a less attractive dirty green, looked like a carefully planned backdrop to showcase exciting bursts of colour. Things needed to be different here…

A quick internet search for the best local garden centres and we were soon walking round a large site filled with plants the names of most of which I had never encountered before. Luckily sibling #1 was visiting and was able to guide us through the advantages of ‘hybrid tea’ over ‘climbing’ roses, to help us understand what sorts of plants might go against the shaded wall and to indicate which fruit trees might be successful; I quickly realised how little I know. We bought plants with names that sounded like frittata and syphilis vowing to return after more research. My favourite moment, however, came in the café, which, despite being ‘highly recommended’ according to the poster on the wall, failed to live up to such billing. It took an hour and a half to be served with some teas, coffees and toasted sandwiches. To be fair, at the moment when the cafe filled up, one lone worker was left to explain that the sandwich toaster had just stopped working and that she couldn’t make ordinary sandwiches as the bread was frozen…. need I go on? We left exhausted by the effort of watching the poor woman trying to juggle the lunchtime rush in such difficult circumstances. You don’t need to stress about the time that things can take in the countryside- just enjoy the moment (well several long, drawn-out moments!).

Despite, or perhaps because of the above however, I have discovered a real satisfaction in some elements of gardening. There is the fact that you are outside, in (glorious) sunshine for long periods of time. Clearing a small flowerbed of weeds, digging it over and then planting the frittata/syphilis feels like a job well done. It is also hard work, so I don’t need to feel quite so guilty about not jogging for the last week. The writer her outdoors has developed a worrying desire for a chainsaw to address the dead tree stump and wields an axe with an ability that has kept me on my toes. A day’s weeding and digging mean that a long leisurely bath, complete with wine and podcasts has been well and truly earned. And don’t get me started on the joys of a freshly mowed lawn…

… so much for a quiet life in the country!

Eating: Pistachio and cardamon cake with pistachio cream – recipe from Ruby Tandoh for the cake. I made up the cream using roasted pistachios, blitzed and added to whipped cream and icing sugar.

Drinking: Ice cider from the Somerset Cider Brandy Company – served on ice with the above… tasty as!

Listening to: I am trying to listen to complete albums at the moment rather than individual tracks. The The’s Soul Mining wasn’t as good as I remembered it (you we’re right, my friend), though Uncertain Smile and This is the Day are still great. I settled on Passenger‘s album All The Little Lights as an album which is consistently good throughout (no filler side 1 track 4, side 2 track 3 songs) – personal favourite probably The Wrong Direction – joyous rhythm, lively brass yet melancholic sentiments.

When we first started looking in earnest at making the move out of London and in a desperate attempt to bring a focus to our house viewings, given that we were having to travel some distance to view houses in person, we put together a ‘must have’ and a ‘definitely not’ list. Internet house porn only gets you so far in sifting the possibles, the no ways and the ‘oh that looks nice’ and our list helped slim down the potential viewings list. Every weekend we were looking though, we always threw in one to ‘challenge’ us, or rather, to rule in or out a particular feature. (Were this to be a tv programme, I guess they’d call it the mystery house!) From what you know of us already – the heart versus head blog post earlier this year- you won’t be surprised that the part- thatch house we bought ticked more of the ‘definitely not’ list than the ‘must have’. And with the thatch come some unplanned for issues.

The first of these came when trying to insure the house where we found we had a limited range of possible insurers. The upside is the fun I have had with companies who cold call trying to sell insurance, whom I have delighted in stringing along in an overly cheery manner until they realise that they cannot help me…. simple pleasures! The second has grown since we have lived here and it is the utter joy I get from looking at the curves, angles and sharp, crisp edges of the thatch – water reed (also known as Norfolk reed), I now know, is amongst the best of thatching materials, with a life span significantly longer than other thatch materials. The writer her indoors, when looking for me to run some errand or other, has all too often found me in the back garden staring at the roof, one of my new ‘guilty pleasures’. Having said that, another thing I have enjoyed as I get older is that I just don’t feel that guilty about these sorts of things any more. (When pushed by friends at Spotify dinner parties, I always used to say that Supertramp were my go-to guilty listening artist, but I’m not remotely guilty about them or their oeuvre anymore, even Breakfast in America!) The third issue is the fact that mice love a nice thatch. Mickey, as we have unoriginally named our current co-habitor, has hitherto resisted the peppermint oil which we have liberally sprayed around the house, as well as the humane ‘pest reject’ plug-ins, which emit a frequency designed to drive away all sorts of minor pests. All these plug-ins have achieved thus far is to cast a nice glow at nighttime, when all the lights are off and stimulated spiders to spin fantastic webs. Luckily these webs have been beautifully highlighted by the Aga, which ‘had a moment’ and coughed up lots of soot into the air. Pampered city dog has managed to ignore Mickey completely, choosing instead to share her food with him – methinks a cat beckons!

As indicated above, having behaved itself for some time, the Aga chose this week to falter/overheat/put itself out/cough soot all over the kitchen. Child #1, living up to his male stereotype didn’t even notice the dirt when he graced us with his presence late morning and proceeded to walk soot all over the new stair carpet, leaving unimpressed parents. Aga fixed once more, after our new best friend, the plumber, came and sorted out the faulty oil filter, we are now back to Aga toast and Aga ironing, the writer her indoors’ new best thing (apart from the now slightly scorched duvet cover, left for too long on the hot plate cover).

I still wait for the complaint from Mickey for the lack of heating over the last week….

Eating: Cider and cheese soup – recipe courtesy of Nigel Slater, using Somerset Cider and Montgomery Cheddar cheese, both from The Somerset Cider Brandy Company, whose shop and farm is a really fascinating visit (be prepared to stay longer than planned!) with homemade seeded wholemeal loaf.

Drinking: The above, a really pleasant surprise – eminently quaffable and also from Somerset.

Listening to: Eric Dolphy, Don Cherry, Robert Maxwell and Andy Williams. Not my normal habits, but, after meeting up with an old friend recently and re-discovering our shared love of the novels of Murakami, I am re-reading The Wind-up Bird Chronicle and the above are all artists name-dropped during the novel; I have taken to making a Murakami playlist when reading.

Having moved out of London in late December, we have been here long enough to feel settled in. We know several of our neighbours, we can find our way to various supermarkets/DIY stores without having to use the satnav and we are beginning to find new routines. Not working full time has opened a realm of possibilities and has changed many things.

1. Exercise – firstly, the writer her indoors is able to indulge her exercise passion on a weekday morning, rather that struggling into lycra and t-shirt last minute at 7.54 pm on a Tuesday and risking missing the start of a class she’d rather now not be doing because her day went completely tits-up at work. I run, or should I say jog; less Mo Farah, more Brendan Foster post double hip-replacement. In London, having once suffered a painful ankle injury courtesy of a wobbly pavement, I learnt to jog looking down at my feet. And, whilst this also had the advantage of hiding my exercise face by and large, it did mean that I was confident about surviving a run. Here, in the country, I am learning to look up, look around and be able to enjoy the countryside views, one of which is above. It also means that I can see and thus avoid the tractors which take up 9/10ths of a road…..In addition, there is carte blanche to say ‘good morning’ to passers-by and not feel like the token ‘nutter in the park’.
2. Cooking – I am one of those sad people who, when we used to have dinner parties in London, would have an idée fixe about a recipe to do, only to be thwarted by the line 2/3rds of the way down the page which said:’now leave in the fridge for 24 hours’, noticed 2 hours before friends arrived. I am lucky enough now to have the time for beef to marinade for 8hrs, for cheesecakes to ‘firm up in the fridge overnight’ and to try out new recipes on people because I have to time to re-do them if it all goes pear-shaped.
3. Eating – We are still enjoying several weekends with friends visiting, which means a greater number of three course meals than we are used to on a Friday and Saturday, with more finishing up left-overs on Sunday/Monday evening. This has opened the door to some interesting mix and match suppers – frittata and cumin quinoa was not a success: veggie moussaka and coleslaw was fab – shouldn’t work, but it does. I am keenly enjoying the range of foods that coleslaw complements, even when it has no right to whatsoever.
4. Reading – In full-time employment, reading was definitely only a holiday activity. I developed a love of short stories to try to compensate for this, but even then, all too often, Christmas presents were enjoyed fully at Easter or in July. Now I have the opportunity to sit and indulge, almost when I want and, most importantly, not to feel remotely guilty about it.
5. Watching – With young kids, we used to watch soaps, as 7.30pm provided a real focus for them to be in bed and sorted. As they grew up, habits and the technology changed. The ability to record and store tv programmes made life so much easier (apart from when the box went wrong and we lost a variety of episodes of series we had been saving up!). The box set culture was great for holiday watching and really changed how we engaged with some favourites. ‘Spooks’ was a particular world we loved spending time in and watching 3 or 4 episodes in an evening really enhanced the feeling of being with Ruth and Harry. The same was also true of ‘Madmen’. What is different now is that we can inhabit different worlds now at different times of the day. Our current favourite, a mediochre but engaging medical series, works really well if you start at 4.00ish and then just keep going…

So what difference does it make? Morrissey was wrong with his ‘it makes none’ assertion. The combination of not working full time and living in the countryside has opened up new possibilities, new routines and a renewed enjoyment of some old hobbies.

Eating: Slow roast tomatoes with goats cheese and squash frittata. Served together with basil oil and roast red onion chutney. Recipes from Skye Gyngell, A year in my kitchen.

Drinking: A lovely and local English sparkling, with nibbles and prior to eating the above.

Listening to: I don’t know if you ever wake up with a song stuck in your head for no reason, but I do, so this week I have been obsessed by the late, great Colin Vearncombe, lead singer of Black, best known for ‘Wonderful Life’, a song written when he was broke, so I appreciate the irony; also a favourite for use in adverts. My preferred song – The sweetest smile. I love the fretless bass on the original and there is also a great live version from 2001, recorded in South Africa.

I never thought that I would have any angst about the writer her indoors wanting to ‘have a clear out’; she is a dedicated hoarder and has accumulated some amazing memories over the years. She is the one with the camera, taking all the piccies when we are on holiday, whilst I just wander round inanely, storing memories inside my head. All our children have memory boxes, comprising photos, travel tickets, theatre programmes, old school exercise books and pieces of art etc. And, truth be told, I also have a memory box, well, an old, small briefcase with a few items in it – a couple of badges from my youth, a favourite of which is from Stiff records – ‘If it ain’t stiff….’ (I’ll leave you to fill in the rest!) – happy memories of artists like Nick Lowe, Ian Dury and Elvis Costello. I also have the cover notice from 1990, the day when I threw a sicky on the same day as my wife to be (and my apologies to those staff who had to cover us both that day!). So it was with mixed feelings that I approached the conversation with the writer her indoors about the phenomenon that is Marie Kondo.

Stereotyped views of men and women would have the man being the messy, boxers-on-the-floor person and the woman forever picking up and tidying away. This obviously works on a larger scale and, without wishing to be political, revisit the above with the names of David Cameron and Theresa May in mind… However, stereotypes are arrived at because there are enough elements of truth contained within them, for enough people, enough of the time. In our relationship (mine with the writer her indoors, not mine with Theresa or David), the opposite is probably truer; I am the one who still has vinyl arranged alphabetically by category, and needs the books on the bookcase to be in height order. The writer’s books are strewn in a much more haphazard, piles on the floor way.

Having heard much about the Kondo method and the extent to which many Charity shops are benefitting from an influx of product, including clothing folded ‘the Kondo way’, the writer her indoors sat child #1 down to watch and learn with me, as he was to be the (unwilling) guinea pig. I was struck that the american public seemed to have taken a programme mainly in Japanese so much to their hearts- it seemed pleasantly at odds with so much coming out of the US at the moment. The programme consisted of Marie and her translator going in to the home of a family and teaching them how to organise, de-clutter and prioritise what to keep or throw, by: asking whether a particular item ‘sparks joy’, by using boxes to organise, by folding clothing in thirds and thinking about how to assess their belongings in a different way. At the risk of ‘plot spoiling’ for those who have yet to enjoy the delights of Kondo, the family work through her method, have a re-vitalised home and learn to love again. I don’t mean to sound cynical about this; it it the tv format constraint. What I did find most interesting is the attitude to possessions, the near reverence that she tries to give people for what they have and the respect and thoughtfulness they need to ‘apply’, not only to what they keep, but also to what they throw away or move on elsewhere. It speaks very much to the current trend for mindfulness, for us being in control of elements of our lives in a healthy way…. I know that my picture cover single of Hong Kong Garden by Siouxee and the Banshees sparks joy, but my much played and slightly scratched Seasons in the Sun by Terry Jacks?

Eating: Home made scones (one of the writer’s specialities) and seeded wholemeal loaf. We like the loaf dense, so lots of sesame, chia and poppy seeds, as well as some sunflower and pumpkin. I am still using my bread machine, but will try baking in the Aga when I have the time…

Drinking: the above, a really enjoyable and quaffable English wine and yes, it sparks joy!

Listening to: Talk Talk- The Party’s over, which is the first (and my favourite) album – the death of Mark Hollis took me back to some early music memories –

When I think of skittles, I naturally think of those roundish sweets, which I only ever buy in a garage ‘as a healthy snack as they must have some fruit in them surely’ – yes, I know, who am I kidding? More interestingly, used by some friends of child #2 at university to flavour a bottle of cheap vodka….no, I’m not convinced either (but then I am not a 21 year old student!). It was with great pleasure, then, that with children #1 and #3 down with us for the first part of the week, we were invited by family to a skittles evening in a pub nearby. As designated driver – yes, a definite drawback to life without oystercards, contactless and 24hr tubes, I was able to enjoy a swift half of the local cider – I was up for a pint until the landlord pointed out that, at 7.5%, I might be better off with ‘just the half, son’ if I were driving. What followed was a real delight and I was left to reflect on the joy of seeing cousins mingling happily and the different generations laughing together- we all shared a collective, good old fashioned evening of fun.

The writer her indoors continued her creative streak with a lampshade making course in a local crafts centre, using our bargain of the week, an offcut of probably the most expensive fabric I have ever seen – who knew that 1 metre could cost that much?- to fashion a lampshade for an old and favoured lamp we have and for which we have put up with an ill-fitting, mis-matched and ugly shade for probably the last 15 years. And fair play, it looks lovely, matching expertly with the colour we don’t yet have on the walls!

Finally, friends down from London again this weekend and fabulous weather, so we were able to enjoy the great outdoors on both Saturday and Sunday, not even needing walking boots on the quickly drying fields, slopes and coastline. Too much eating and drinking, followed by disappointing results for all concerned in the weekend rugby internationals, leading to more eating and drinking – note to self, I need to start running again before a whole new wardrobe is required! I am left to ponder the similarities and differences between our ‘old’ and ‘new’ lives and the extent to which time has taken on a whole new perspective…

Eating: Lemon roast vegetables with scarmorza,taken from The Part-time vegetarian, ideal as a Friday evening ‘kitchen supper’. I especially love the caper dressing, which elevates it. I have served it by itself with just some leaves, or with both white fish and chicken as well.

Drinking: The above English wine, very kindly brought down by our friends from a vineyard they know in East Sussex and which had a very different sense about it from my normal purchases… a real ‘smokiness’ that complemented the scamorza perfectly.

Listening to: a playlist put together not so long ago for a relative’s 80th birthday, so mainly old school (please note not ‘skool’) jazz and swing – child #3’s favourite being ‘Something’ stupid – Frank and Nancy Sinatra, child #1’s favourite being ‘Woody wood-pecker’- Kay Keyser (no, I don’t know where his music taste comes from either!), mine ‘Petite fleur’- Chris Barber.

Both the writer her indoors and I are ‘heart’ people when it comes to purchases, even with (or should that be especially with) houses – the more expensive the purchase, the less rational we both become! We are lucky, as child #2 keeps reminding us – bitter, but he does have a point!, to have ridden the property wave, despite choices we have made along the way. We bought our first house without ever seeing the garden, guarded as it was by 2 rottweilers. Our second house was a total wreck and had a 70s style clad bar curving into the front room. So, whilst the house into which we have recently moved didn’t need any work noticeably doing to it, the reality has proved slightly different. Rooms which were ‘beautiful’ have, in our minds become ‘beautifully presented at the time of viewings’. Don’t get me wrong, none of this would have changed our purchase – as I said, we are both heart people and love the feel of the house, but it does mean that I need to face up to three letters that strike fear and dread -DIY!

I have only had one major success at ‘doing it myself’, but I am sadly no longer able to bask in the glow of success from the shelves I made and put up in our first flat 28 years ago. Not only put up, might I say, but they stayed up during the 2 years we were there and despite the amount of VERY HEAVY books with which the writer filled them. Since then, I have often been heard to utter the line: ‘I earn money to pay people to do the things well that I cannot do well’. I firmly believe that the first rule of DIY is that, if it can go wrong, it will. Our houses have been littered with slightly wonky curtains, blinds that you have to open very gently and sanded floors with strategically placed furniture to cover my inadequacies with sanding machines. So I was nervous/unhappy/fraught/resigned when it was decided (you will have guessed not by me) that the downstairs bedroom needed ‘sorting’ and that, we should do it, as we don’t have our former day jobs.

Sander, paintbrushes, screwdrivers, rollers all located, we happened upon an old pot of paint we found in a shed in the garden, which, with hindsight, saved us several hours choosing between sundry ridiculously named paint shades, all of which looked very similar but dried a different colour than you thought…. so antique cream it was! I think I am a slow but careful painter – the writer her indoors just thinks I am a very slow painter (she’s probably right, but my self-esteem is low enough in the DIY stakes, so I need to spin this slightly), and can knock off a room in half the time it takes me, regardless of spiders, cobwebs or any other minor impediment.

To be fair, the room looks really good now, with just curtains/floor covering/furniture etc to bring the whole thing together and there is that whole satisfaction thing that ‘we did that ourselves’. My major contribution, when all’s said and done, was to keep things tidy, make numerous cups of tea and open the wine at the end of the day.

Eating: Roast squash stew… can’t remember where I saw the recipe, but you roast the squash (I tend to use sweet potato instead) with ras-el-hanout, roast chickpeas also with ras-el-hanout. The stew is carrot/onion/garlic in tomato with harissa. I add spinach at the end and sprinkle the chickpeas on then top with coriander. Hearty, wholesome, tasty food, ideal at the end of a hard day doing as little painting as possible!

Drinking: A supermarket Albali…Gran Seleccion Valdepeñas 2017

Listening to:  Joan Armatrading – as you know, I generally prefer more chilled music when cooking. Lots of words, but the sort of songs of which I know all the words. Her indoors has a weakness for ‘The weakness in me’, my favourite is ‘Show some emotion’.