Albert

Life seems a bit surreal at the moment. It’s quite possible nothing ever seems ‘normal’ when cancer comes into the equation. We’ve had a lot of sleepless nights, both aware the other is tossing and turning and then M will flick on the salt lamp casting a red glow over everything and just enough to lipread by. We’ve chatted at 3am about all sorts of things that he’s often too distracted to fully focus on by day. I don’t know if it’s a myth about helping you to sleep but I also make hot chocolate using our fab Hotel Chocolat Velvetiser. We usually just sip and remark how bloody wonderful it tastes. Sleep remains elusive. Salted Caramel is our fave. It’s subtle and not as salty as you’d imagine.

This week we learnt that M will have to undergo some more procedures. It was a blow. We weren’t expecting it. Communication hasn’t been as precise as you’d think for this kind of thing. Somewhere between that consultation and now we managed to go completely bonkers and buy a campervan. It wasn’t as impulsive as it sounds. It’s been a lifelong dream. Perhaps my only one, or so I thought until I told Jake to look out of the window the day we brought it home. He said, so you’ve finally got what you always wanted, a campervan and two springers. My children know me better than I know myself.

The two Springers aren’t sure about the gravelly engine noise and the side opening door. They’ve been out in it several times and Harvey insists on waiting at the end of the vehicle thinking that’s where the boot is. Riley of course is a bit smarter but really only settled when I conceded and put a dog blanket on the sofa.

We went to a motorhome show earlier this year and it only served to confirm what we didn’t want from a day van. I don’t think there was anything much under £30k and I was quite despondent after that experience. In the end it was a question of going full circle and realising that my heart would really only be in owning a classic vw. Albert needs a bit of work here and there, I’m sure he always will. For now though we will fix the heating and a rear door seal (which leaks) and then he will be ready for a short trip.

It’s been a while since I drove a really old vehicle. One of my jeeps had a pretty basic gear arrangement and the campervan is similar. It’s taken some getting used to so we’ve been going out for short drives. I didn’t realise that we’d get stopped quite so much. A chap in the supermarket car park drew up alongside and shouted out, what a beauty! Turns out he had one in the seventies from new and his biggest regret was selling it. Another vw van driver pulled up at the end of our drive (in a modern van) and asked if we’d take his number in case we wanted to sell it. Then there’s the story of the RAC man…

I’ve long been a standing joke in the family over an eccentric old jeep I purchased when I was about twenty. It broke down every time I took it out and my Springer, Algie, used to rest his head on the passenger head rest sideways on as much to say, here we go again. Given that old vehicles have rough suspension and things literally rattle off I’m sure I’m about to relive those days. So, day one, with Bert the 1970 T2 Bay and we have met one local RAC man already! It was lucky I wasn’t out on my own and M was able to make the call. 3-4 hours wait was the estimate! He arrived within half an hour having heard the description of the vehicle on the radio and hastily said yes, I’ll have that one! So we’ve made a new friend who knows a fair bit about classic cars. As for the breakdown reason. A dodgy ignition wire which was easy to fix. We’ll be replacing it with something I’ve forgotten the name of already but between the RAC man and our classic car enthusiast neighbour they both agree it needs doing!

So, the van finally came about as the result of not being too gracious about this round number birthday I’m heading for in a few weeks time. In fact I think I might have said that fifty was seriously old and if I didn’t buy myself a campervan now it might be too late! It’s certainly softened the blow about turning fifty and it’s totally true whatever you’ve read about not giving a flying monkeys after that age. I really don’t. It’s liberating. I might even start to wear purple. Heck no, maybe not.

I’ve been a bit distracted with the van and with various other non yarn related things going on at the moment (like having a tooth out which has been a right pain). Nonetheless I have still managed to gather dyestuff and brew leaves and bark on the hob and produce miraculous colours on wool. It doesn’t seem to get old. I used crackly dry oak leaves thinking they might be past their best and they gave up a rich caramel colour with not much coaxing. I love the slowness of it all. I love how it dovetails into everything else that’s good in life, like walking with happy dogs. Thanks to last years considerable investment in good quality wellies I’ve had warm and dry feet despite the relentless heavy rain.

I was recently shaving bark with one of my small French penknives and decided to try carving a crochet hook. I was day dreaming more than focussing but somehow it turned out to be the occasion where the penny finally dropped. I managed to get a fairly good finish by fine shaving with the blade but when I later bought fine sandpaper it became really smooth and usable. Quite a few hooks later, all useable, I can safely say I can carve a decent hook now! I’m also getting to know how different woods handle. Oak for instance, is a great one for hard wearing furniture and will make a nice hard finished hook but it is more of a challenge to work in small scale. Lime turns to lightweight balsa type wood when dry so that’s a no go. Birch behaves well. Willow is nice and straight but you need to get at the older shoots for strength.

We took the dogs to a local woodland recently and I was able to gather a bit more variety than just the back garden, hence the large jug full! It was after days of rain and the wind was considerable so our attempts at lighting the Kelly Kettle for a cup of tea were rather comic. We persevered though, finally managing to get a decent flame when I managed to persuade M to stop fanning it with an old cereal packet! Oxygen is good for fires but not when you don’t give it a chance to catch too. We eventually had enough of a fire to heat two cans of Heinz’s soup too. It’s all going to be so much less bother with Bert. I can see us rolling up in the middle of winter for a dog walk and a bowl of Heinz soup. I guess it’s no different to when we used to take our boat out on the River Medway in all weathers and Mum produced hot soup and fresh bread which softened the blow of having to be the one who had to sit on the front of the boat in a pac a mac ready to jump off with the mooring ropes! Happy times.

I’m nowhere near the pace of crochet makes of last year. It is never far from my mind though and I’ve managed smaller projects like a hat and pumpkins. I designed the hat from scratch after suddenly having an image in mind. I’m mainly wearing crochet hats to keep the rain off at the moment, never mind the warmth. I come home from dog walks and pop a soggy hat on the radiator, it’s much easier than umbrellas or hoods.

I don’t know what it is about crochet pumpkins that holds my interest. They come under the banner of ‘not very useful’ things to make which I usually avoid but since they are quick and can be done whilst half watching a rubbish bloke movie your husband has chosen then I guess they have a time and a place.

Albert is going to need some crochet adornments. I dug out the blanket you can see in this blog heading. I haven’t changed that picture since I switched to WordPress some time ago now and even then the blanket had been a wip for a while. Anyway, it seems to be just the right colour scheme for a pale blue and cream van. I think I’m just over halfway to what would be a useful size and there’s a stupid amount of ends already but this will finally get finished thanks to Bert’s arrival. I might intersperse it with smaller projects like cushions. There’s a whole Hawaiian theme going on in the van at the moment, none of it is particularly horrid but we aren’t surfers so I fancy doing my own thing instead. I don’t think I’ll feel quite at home until there’s some rustic wood in there somewhere!

I’ve been busy emptying twelve years worth of junk from the caravan. The kids were five and eight I think and there’s buckets and spades, kites, board games and all sorts. The local Sue Ryder is going to do very well. The absolute worst thing about our house is the fact that the precious garage was converted to a bedroom long before M bought it. It’s a nightmare not having one. On the plus side though, having a fairly small campervan will really focus our ‘kit’ right down to the bare essentials. It’s taken a good long time to persuade M of the virtues of a small van, now I need to work on the benefits of not kitting it out with all mod cons. My heart sinks when he mentions being able to charge laptops and phones from ‘consumer units’. I’m more of an off grid type so I’ll have to coax him in the solar panel direction! Not that we’d be getting much input to a panel this week… it’s been positively dark and wet with more to come. Ugh.

Summer’s End

Timing is everything isn’t it? I bet you can remember at least one book you tried to get into, abandoned and picked up years later only to find it was a great read after all? I’ve got a pile of bedside reading, all natural dyeing related. I’ve become my best friend from primary school. His obsession was birds, he collected fallen eggs in egg cartons with handwritten labels and knew everything about them, their habits, their flight styles, their nest shapes. All kinds of facts that probably went in one ear and out of the other while I focused mainly on teaching him how to climb trees without breaking your neck so that we could sit very still amongst the tree tops and observe. I may have done more cloud gazing than bird watching but it was his passion for the subject that I admired and supported. I’m feeling that same passion for natural dyeing now despite buying books on the subject ten years ago.

M’s homecoming and me going down with summer flu magnificently coincided, so much so that he had to get a taxi home from the hospital. I did warn him that if he needed my help in any shape or form then he should stay where he was! The kids were both away at the Leeds Festival, Jake camping for the full five days and Ella going as a day visitor over the weekend. Drugs are always a huge worry for parents of kids who attend these events despite knowing that your kids are pretty sensible so it was ironic that M was the one at home on a complete high with some Class A medication. I swear that’s what was making him so damn cheerful.

I think I barely moved in three days without feeling dreadful, by day three I was bored with the limitations of sitting still (even with books and crochet) and attempted to finish off shovelling rotted leaf matter into a wheelbarrow to reclaim our side path. Not a good idea with flu as it turns out. Meanwhile M has had ups and down and post op issues. We’ve been muddling through. He’s in good spirits despite everything. We’ve been talking about travel and my birthday in October.We always leave actual bookings until the very last minute, the right kind of getaway always seems to present itself nearer the time.

Although things have been moving steadily towards a simpler life, it wasn’t until I burrowed my hands into the fresh soil of the bin we planted with potatoes and pulled out handfuls for our evening meal that I felt we were finally making progress. I’m not about to become a market gardener but the small amount of edible things in the garden are satisfyingly useful and could easily be expanded upon. This year we’ve had apples, plums, blackberries, raspberries, not many gooseberries (I’ve swotted up on this and I need to prune very vigorously!) and potatoes. It wouldn’t be difficult to grow a few more things in containers out of the way of dogs.

M made a simple cheese and potato pie over the weekend when neither of us were up to much. It was one of the best things he’s ever made. Despite agreeing that simple is best we are back to twenty ingredients and half used jars of stuff in the fridge once more. It was good while it lasted. We’ve also made blackberry jam, just two small jars but it would be possible to make more with the remaining fruit, I just need to balance on top of a step ladder to get to it!

I think my battered old jeep is on the decline now. It’s touch and go when I take it out for a random drive in the countryside. It has quirky ways but it’s still a very good vehicle for driving up on to big grass verges alongside oak trees covered in Knoppler galls. Standard kit in my boot is a basket or two, my trug, secateurs and a bottle of water for rinsing hands (knopplers are very sticky!) If the gall has a hole in it then you know the wasp has left the building so to speak and they are safe to pick. This particular type happen when a small wasp invades an acorn and the tree reacts to this invasion. (There are probably more scientific explanations online). There are lots of different types of oak gall determined by the type of oak tree and the type of insect.

Oak galls have high levels of tannins which is useful in natural dyeing, once smushed with a hammer and soaked in hot water they release colour straight away. The resulting dye baths have produced gorgeous coffee tones and would react strongly to a little iron solution to produce darker browns and greys. I’m enjoying the way natural dyeing means working in tune with the seasons, now seems to be a good time to collect galls. I’m looking forward to trying all the plant matter I’ve tried since May again during the autumn months to compare results.

For now though, I’m harvesting marigolds and coreopsis daily. They just bloom and bloom. I bought three big old farm crates and they’re perfect for drying the flowers out throughly before I stash them away for deepest winter. It’s a good job M isn’t too precious about ‘his kitchen’. He has no idea how many crevices are now full of dried plant matter!