Friday 27 March 2015

Glass- things that make me happy

Something that I have really loved as a thing of beauty for quite some time is glass. I began collecting in a small way pre children so a loooong time ago!



The photos I have taken are not great-again having to use my camera phone doesn't produce the greatest results. Anyway, when we moved to our home last year it was fairly obvious to me that the place to put all my (not a huge amount of) old bottles was on the 'Lancashire range'.


 As we have such horrible wall paper in that area of the house I had to put some plain paper behind the bottles to stop anyone viewing them from being dazzled! (I apologise if anyone has and loves this wallpaper, I am sure if you have chosen it you love it, however, we did not choose it and definitely do not love it and it just doesn't 'go')




Some of these bottles are old photographic ones, used for holding developing chemicals. One is etched with 'Developer Number 1', another with 'Developer Number 2' and the third from the same amateur photographer has a raised line with the words 'Acid Line' on it. I know where these came from-an old lady who's long dead husband dabbled with photography and it makes me happy to think of him in his shed or bathroom with these beautiful glass bottles.
The other bottles are ones that I have picked up over the years and I tend to go for interesting ones with a label or some writing etched or raised in the glass.
I wonder what 'Flowers of Sulphur' were-scrap the query, theres 'POISON' in raised letters on the neck of the glass...hmm
,  I am sure that I know what its neighbour held, each edge has raised lettering spelling out "Favourite, Daddies and Sauce'. There is also a small bottle of Lung Tonic. Its quite sad that these days our bottles of sauces or medicines are simply that, a bottle with something in it, not things of beauty anymore.



We regularly travel to Amsterdam-if once a year can be called regularly, the fact we go on the same weekend each year makes it regular for me I think! Each time we go anywhere I like to bring 'a thing' back as a reminder of a happy time and one year we went to an eclectic shop near Keizersgracht and I was happy to see they had lots of glass-modern but I was drawn by the colours. I got 4 of these balls-one has fallen down from the window so it missed having its picture taken, that'll learn it! When we go to Amsterdam we only ever take hand luggage and I can remember wrapping these glass spheres in socks and then t-shirts and hoping for the best before placing 2 in each of our duo of rucksacks. Happily they survived and now I see them several times each day as the hang on either side of the french doors and it often makes me think back to the city that I love so much.










Tuesday 3 March 2015

Winters walk.

In an effort to try and help my mood I have decided that I really need to start making an effort to go out more. Where we are it is easily possible for me to see no-one from one day to the next-other than D. This is mainly because of the layout of the house but also because where we live is a quiet area. With this in mind i decided to go for a short walk this morning-no matter what. I have taken a small amount of pictures but they really arent very good but sadly this is all I can manage for now!
It was absolutely bitter today and I was confident I had chosen the right time for me to be out: a hail storm had just paid and I could see brilliant blue skies when I set off.I decided to start off with the hardest bit first, I walked up the steep hill-very very steep past the golf course.I peered over the wall and I could just spot some snow still lingering. I do love the look of a golf course but its such a shame they are usually such private places with no-one else allowed in.
I carried on, down the lane a little while...The golf course is on the right of this picture just over the wall. It might look like this rather uncared for road is full of potholes but no, its just a dirt track-no tarmac here! At this point, the hail started again, and boy did it come down, my hands were freezing, if I hadn't been able to see them I would have disputed that my fingers were still attached, it was so painful. I turned around and headed for home, but instead of heading back down the oh so steep hill, I thought it would be better (more interesting) to head back at right angles down a 'path' using that term loosely that runs between two fields. In the summer the fields had some young bulls in and I was wondering if maybe there would be some more livestock but no, just empty fields, for now.
All the time the hail was still hitting me quite painfully and because I had decided to go this other-very muddy path I had to take it slowly as I was slipping quite a lot. At one time my boot came off, luckily I noticed before I put my foot back down! Oh how we would have laughed about that tonight when I told D.
Now this last, even more rubbish picture is where you will need you very large magnifying glass and even larger imagination! If you look kind of in the middle and to the left ever so slightly there is a pale coloured building, it's not ours, but if you move you eyes slightly to the right theres what is an obscured by a tree house, that's where I live. The walk has reminded me why I love where I live, even if I don't see other people much. Being in a semi-rural area, with neighbours (very nice ones) around us and countryside like this right outside our door is wonderful.
My walk left me feeling ready for the day and I came back and have washed the bathroom, scrubbed the horrible showerscreen..seriously cant wait to rip all this out, but for now scrubbing and cleaning will have to do. Anyway, whe I had finished that I felt invigorated and decided to go downstairs and have a go at some more tissue paper pom-poms. I'm making some for the wedding. However, as soon as I sat down at the (very messy) dining table that I use as my HQ for all things makey I suddenly had company...company of a furry mewy kind.
Slinky, in the middle started off at the other end, then he moved onto my ripple blanket and then started backing up into Cleo who had positioned herself next to the iPad..as he moved slowly further back (towards me) she moved closer to me. So, I have come upstairs on the PC to complete this..closely followed by Slinky, aka the Singing Cat. Hes had a quick burst of something from one of his favourite power ballads and has now settled himself down under a huge groundsheet on the floor (don't ask)..when I say settled, hes moving around and is sighing a lot. Its a hard life when you are such a beautiful boy.
Right I better get back to it..those chickens wont let themselves out

Be well all x