We are finally here..........

Well, we have actually been here six weeks, during which time we have:

1. Built the cat enclosure and laid new turf to create a cat garden for them. Collected the cats from their holiday home in Dorset. Watched them gingerly walk across grass for the first time to stare in disbelief at the sheep in the field that borders our garden.

2. Donated several items of furniture to the North Devon Hospice, as this cottage is way smaller than our old home in Camberley.

3. Replaced the vile cooker and refrigerator, both of which had not been visited by the Cleaning Fairy for a very long time. Bought a combined washing machine and dryer because the cottage is too small to accommodate two separate appliances.

4. Had the oil tank installed and filled and the oil-fired boiler commissioned, so that after several weeks using the electric shower to wash and Kevin's Swan Boiler for washing up, we had the luxury of turning on a tap, from which steaming hot water gushed (the pressure here is phenomenal). First long soak in the bath was absolute bliss (big bath with a lovely view over the fields and the garden). The central heating gets connected next week, but with an 8kw woodburner, we may not need all of the radiators switched on!

5. Unpacked a number of boxes and visited the Anvil Corner Recycling Centre on numerous occasions with cardboard boxes and other detritus - some of which was left here by the previous owners.

6. Hung curtains, altered curtains on the old Singer machine (because the Bernina is in a box in the Conservatory, under lots of other boxes that still need to be unpacked!) and ordered new cushions for the sofas which are third-hand to us and the cushions are somewhat "stale, flat and uncomfortable". to paraphrase Shakespeare.

7. Started to get to know our neighbours! I have already been asked to join the Ladies Choir (first rehearsal for Christmas is next week in the Village Hall Bar) and another neighbour would LOVE me to join the local brass band - had to 'fess up that I haven't played the french horn in years, to which he blithely said 'Oh, you'll get your lip back in no time'. Have ducked out for the moment as studying two OU modules at once is likely to take up most of my time this year.

As you can see, we are sideways on to the road - this was
taken when I first went to view the cottage.

This is the view of the cottage from the garden 

This is the sitting room - the woodburner was installed last year and
 our next job will be to build and stock the log store! 

Hobbes has, as usual, claimed his place on the sofa!

This is the view from our bathroom, just after sunrise

Our big blue Land Rover 'SallyB' - the farmer kindly allows us to park her here,
 while we wait for planning permission to widen our access.

The view from one of our bedroom windows.

Paddy and Bearz in their purpose-built Cat Garden.

This is the detached conservatory - once we have moved out
all of the boxes, it will be my studio

A view down the garden to the wildlife pond, taken on our third visit.

We are two miles from the market town of Holsworthy, half an hour from my cousin in Hatherleigh and fifteen minutes from the coast at Bude. Exeter is an hour and fifteen minute drive (I will have my tutorials there) and both Barnstaple and Bideford are about 45 minutes away.

We have been so fortunate with the weather for most of our time here so far; the late summer allowed us to get so much more done. Now it has changed, Autumn is truly here and we have had torrential rain, gale force winds, thunderstorms and hail. The wind really wuthers round the cottage but it has been here for the best part of two hundred and seventy five years, so it is only those new additions (the greenhouse and the conservatory) that might see some damage.

The cottage IS small, but it has made us think about what we truly need to have around us and how we are going to live our lives from now on. And frankly, there is nothing better than waking up and looking out over fields, or down the garden after years of living fifty feet from a road used by traffic twenty-four hours a day

Getting closer to the Big Move!

We finally exchanged contracts on 21st July and have a completion date of 14th August!

This meant that we had just four weeks just to clear out the house and get ourselves ready.

Kevin has been here since 1988, I've been here since the end of 1992 and that's an awful lot of stuff to go through. We have a suitcase full of photographs - some of which are memorable like the photos of our grandchildren as babies, photos of me with my beloved mum, odd wedding photos that for some reason never made it into the wedding album. I can see us spending winter evenings going through every photo and deciding which to keep and which to throw.

There are enough glasses in boxes in the attic to stock a pub; there are two sets of china, now surplus to requirements. We are moving to a Really Small Cottage - it is highly unlikely that we could accommodate more than six of us in there at any one time, so we hardly need all that tableware.

The local charity shops have done REALLY well! We have been through all of our clothes and donated six big bags to Macmillan Cancer. The Pareto Rule certainly applies to us, we are definitely wearing 20% of our clothes 80% of the time so someone else may benefit from the things that we no longer wear (or in my case, which no longer fit, sadly). We have also cleared a lot of bric-a-brac - vases, pictures, ornaments that we no longer loved or cherished - again, this stuff was taken by the British Heart Foundation.

The attic is finally empty of all but the things that we are keeping,which have been stored to one side of the hatch. Everything else has slowly made its way downstairs and out, either to eBay or to the local Recycling Depot.

We have been through the sheds (garden and tool) and done a lot of "rationalisation" - much of which has gone into the big yellow skip-sized Hippobag. I have tidied up my workshop and store, carefully packed the essential oils and stock and disposed of the soon-to-be past due date base oils at the Recycling Centre.

The interesting thing is how liberating all this feels. We are starting a new life in Devon and it feels good to be taking only those things that we know to be useful or believe to be beautiful (good old William Morris - very wise words).

Got soap?

Oh boy, do I have soap!

Despite the need to get rid of STUFF before the move, I was desperate to do something creative yesterday. I had packed up some of the Green Witch equipment and was checking the oils and butters for their Use By dates when I realised that I could "reset" some of those dates by making soap. That way, nothing would be wasted and I wouldn't have to dump a whole bottle of Rice Bran Oil (for example) just because it would be out of date by the end of the month.

So....I soaped.

I made a Hot Process "Keen Cook's" Soap, with pumice, coffee grounds and citrus oils; this is great for removing strong smells like fish, onion or garlic from your hands when you have finished preparing these foods - and my sister-in-law likes to use it on her back and her feet!

I then made my "Lemon Sherbet" soap with May Chang and Lemon essential oils - great for brightening up the day when used in my morning shower. I even did an "in the pot" swirl with this one.

Next, I made Kevin's favourite "Bay Rum" soap - I usually do this with a line of cocoa running through the middle, but Kevin requested a plain one this time round and as I only make it for him, I did so. I also used the sheep moulds that my soap-buddy Elaine sold me, and made some "BaaaRum" ones too *groan*.

The last soap of the day was a new one - using rice bran oil, palm and coconut and adding some oatmeal to make a scrubby bar, fragranced with rosemary and lemon essential oils. I'll be interested to see what the soap made from this blend of base oils is like - I haven't made this recipe before.

All soaps are now ready to be cut into bars and set to cure.

And I have got that "itch" out of my system and am ready to tackle the attic (well, almost ready).

Getting ready to move...........

and wondering where on earth all of my craft materials are going to go!

Believe me, I am the epitome of "Who dies with the most (insert appropriate object here), wins". I couldn't resist a wool sale or a fabric sale and any "Fest", be it fibre, wool or craft-based was my idea of heaven. Oh, and don't get me started on my soap supplies and essential oil stash!

This is all very well, when one is living in a big three-bedroom house with a husband and four cats. There is plenty of storage (big attic), plenty of space to make into a sewing/spinning/weaving craft studio. However, in a few short weeks, we are moving to a cottage in Devon, which is beautiful, but small. Really small. As in "two bedrooms, a small sitting room, a dining/kitchen" small.

So there is clearly a problem - what do I keep, what do I try to sell, what do I give away?

It ought to be simple, but as I survey the gorgeous Shetland fleece that I have just scoured, ready to be carded, I know that there is no way that I can get rid of it. I also have fleece and tops ready to spin - definitely keeping that, along with the natural dye kit that one of the girls gave me for Christmas and the maslin pan that I bought specifically to use as the dye vat for the spun yarn.

Then there is the fabric - a collection of beautiful wools and silks - nope, they are staying, along with yarns that I bought in Italy, Germany and Alaska as "useful holiday souvenirs".

This then brings me to the UFOs - the unfinished objects (mostly knitted items) started with huge excitement and then back-burnered for any number of reasons.

Finally, there are all the raw materials and the equipment associated with my artisan soap, bath and skincare business, Green Witch Crafts, also back-burnered when we put the house on the market.

I know that from October this year, I am going to be devoting the majority of my time to two Open University Level 2 courses. By taking on two courses, I will be a full-time student and there will be little time to spend on crafts and none at all for Green Witch Crafts. And I suppose that I should let someone else have the pleasure of using the yarns and materials but I know that I will never be in a position to buy them again.

So the plan is................vacuum bags for the fleece, wool, yarns and fabrics. As for the rest, well, I'm still thinking about that!

Until the clouds part............

My darling mother died in hospital in South Africa on Friday 30th May - she was 88 years old and immigrated to South Africa when she was 78.

In recent years, her hearing had deteriorated, though she refused to consider a hearing aid because "it would make me look old" but this meant that our telephone conversations were all but impossible and with the financial difficulties that Kevin and I were experiencing, the notion of flying out to spend time with her could never be contemplated.

She LOVED her life in South Africa; her pension from British Airways and her State Pension went far further than they would have done in the U.K. and the weather meant that the arthritis that plagued her back in England bothered her far less in the warmth of her adopted country. The medical care that she received was second to none, albeit that she had to pay for it, and the little house that she bought, with its pretty rose-filled garden, was easy to run and care for.

She had visited my brother in South Africa often and even went out to Tanzania when he was flying there but after my brother's daughter was born, Mum decided that she wanted to move there permanently. Africa had found its way into her heart and soul, and like so many other people, she yearned to return.

 I was heartbroken. Somehow I knew that I would never see her again.

 I missed our phone calls - we usually spoke at least twice a week and sometimes more often and I missed being able to drive over to her house at Leatherhead to see her but how could I deny her the chance to spend time with her only grandchild?

At first, she would write; then she would send emails, but as time went on and her hands became more arthritic, even the emails stopped. Her hearing loss meant that phone calls were frustrating for both of us and (in the end) terribly upsetting for her.

So when Mum finally passed away last week, part of me felt that I had lost her long before.

 My brother, who returned to the U.K. almost three years ago with my sister-in-law and niece, is in South Africa at the moment dealing with all the things that you have to deal with following a death. David, who became an honorary son to Mum and was her carer, companion and friend, is as bereft as we are - perhaps even more so because I think he really believed that Mum would recover from this latest illness as she had done so many times before.

Mum, you did exactly what you wanted to do. You had the courage to leave England and settle in another country at a time in your life when others are looking at retirement homes and you lived more in those ten years than some people do in their entire lives.

I haven't cried yet - not properly. I know that it will catch me when I least expect it - a piece of music, a line of poetry, something will bring it back to me that Mum is gone from the world.

And then I remember, that it is only until the clouds part, until a new dawn breaks, and we will be together again.

Love you, Mum.

From frugal beginnings....................

My parents were pretty traditional, in that Dad went out to work and Mum was a housewife. Dad started as a clerk in the Import Cargo division at B.E.A. and ultimately ended up as a Training Officer with British Airways before his untimely death at just 51. Mum sewed most of our clothes as well as her own, cooked from scratch, and like her mother before her, bottled fruit and made jam and pickles. I was lucky in that I grew up watching her cook and being allowed to help. She also taught me how to alter and cut out patterns and to sew. My Grandma D. taught me to knit, my beloved Auntie Judy taught me to read and write, starting when I was three.

Grandma and Grandpa D. and Aunty Judy lived next door and we spent most Sundays with Grandad and Grandma P. a few miles away. Grandad P. had been blinded and partially paralysed in WW1 and never really worked again, although he had been taught to read Braille and a number of craft activities as one of the first St Dunstaners. So Grandma had borne the burden of raising and providing for the family as well as stretching Grandad's War Pension as far as it would go. These lessons were passed to my Mum, who passed them on to me.
Somewhere though, in the following years and with an excellent salary from the oil company where I worked, all of the frugal, thoughtful lessons that I had learned went on the back burner and I became a pretty good example of a Material Girl. Every so often, I would have a twinge of conscience and by the time that Kevin and I married, I owed very little on credit cards, money was never really short and we both had reasonable savings.

The fire, Kevin's kidney cancer, the mess-up with another operation that left him with biliary sepsis and kept him away from the business for two months while we were fighting with the insurance company for our Business Interruption payments - all of this really messed up our plans and our finances.
Our production manager, backed (we believe) by a competitor, left with 6 of our staff, and set up in competition. He also told our customers that Kevin was terminally ill and that I was closing the company. Nevertheless, we battled on through; our son-in-law left his job to act as our production manager, we engaged a really good guy to manage the plating shop and began to get back on our feet again.

We had always had six months income saved up but that had gone during the period following the fire in order to keep our staff paid - the insurers had said that we could not lay anyone off or they would disavow the claim. So when we did finally reopen, we owed money to HM Revenue and Customs for PAYE/NICs and VAT; then we discovered that our landlord had received no rent payment from his insurers and was looking to us to pay £25,000 for the period that we were out of action. Although the Revenue were happy to help and make a deal, the landlord was not, so we had no choice but to put the company in to liquidation and make ourselves and the rest of our team redundant.

We suddenly found ourselves unemployed and apparently unemployable. We visited the Job Centre, applied for every job going, signed on with every temp and permanent agency, but we didn't get to interview stage and only two places had the courtesy to contact us to say that they felt that we were both too well qualified for the positions that we had applied for.

The final kick in the teeth was that we had signed Directors Guarantees on plant and equipment and the leasing companies wanted their money. Rather than go bankrupt, we remortgaged the little factory that we owned as part of our pension scheme, released the funds and offered all of our creditors a one-off payment as an Individual Voluntary Arrangement. 

So, debt-free apart from  the mortgage and with credit scores damaged for the next six years, we started to put our lives back together again. I had been given an Ashford Traveller spinning wheel and learned to spin just after the fire - it was the only thing that kept me sane during the weeks and months of Kevin's illness and the fight with the insurers. I had a good stash of fleece from my cousin who bred Shetland sheep and also a large wool stash, so it made sense to invest in an Ashford Rigid Heddle loom.

As for shopping, I would take the minimum amount of cash with me and go to Aldi (had to go to Tesco for cat food, they wouldn't eat the Aldi one :( ). I had always cooked from scratch and the internet became a valuable source of information on frugal living. I am ashamed when I look at what we used to spend on groceries and what we spend now! All of Mum's and Gran's old lessons have come back to me

We cancelled every subscription, changed suppliers for utilities where we were able, made sure that we only heated the rooms that we really needed to and got a water meter fitted when it was offered (that REALLY cut our water bill, because we were paying for what we actually used!). We were able to get the house insulated (cavity wall insulation) which has made a difference. 
We have made our own beer and wine, although we don't actually drink that much (Kevin, bless him, suffers with gout and alcohol aggravates my arthritis).

The move will finally see us mortgage-free - and living in a beautiful part of the world with a garden that should provide us with fresh vegetables and with access to farm shops and produce markets.

I can't wait :)

Well, I've decided................

I signed up yesterday to restart A230 (the compulsory module for my degree) and A215 (Creative Writing).

It was a no-brainer in the end - I hope to tutor students in English Literature and English Language and although Worlds of English looked fascinating, I felt that I would derive more benefit from Creative Writing and possibly enjoy it as a change from pure academic study.

So what am I doing now? Well, I deferred just before the need to submit TMA03 (Shelley) so have re-read that section of the course book and am launching myself in to Wuthering Heights. I will basically follow the module programme that I printed out from the StudentHome website before officially deferring, so by the October start date, I should have more or less caught up. I am hoping that by doing this, I might find running two modules in parallel less stressful.

I have a fair idea of what the Creative Writing module involves - the Facebook groups are incredibly helpful in this respect - it will be challenging but then, anything worthwhile usually is.

I could not be doing without the help of my husband. Kevin has always supported me in my decision to study, has put up with my occasional tantrums, my highs and lows, my exam panics and has never failed to tell me how very proud he is of my achievements so far. He has listened patiently to innumerable readings and re-readings of my assignment essays. When I do finally graduate some time in 2017, I really should share my BA with him - he will certainly have earned it!

The Music in my Life

Many years ago I was, for a brief period, a music student. My first instrument was voice, my second was French Horn and a very poor third was the piano.

I spent a year at the University of Hull, realising day by day that although I had a good voice and was good at the History of Music, I was not making the grade with the other required elements of my degree, particularly where playing ex-tempore from a figured bass was concerned. One of the most embarrassing moments of my time at Hull was the First Year viva voce exam;  I was expected to accompany a flautist who, by the time I had figured out where my hands should go on the keyboard, was merrily tootling away several bars ahead.

None of this was a surprise - knowing that I had made a mistake, I tried to change degrees to a BA in English Literature a scant six weeks into my first term but the course was over-subscribed. At the end of my first year, I decided to stop wasting my parents' money and my time. I gave my (required) year end recital and left.

It was a pity that I didn't play the piano well, otherwise I might have chosen to go to the Royal College or the Royal Academy instead and focussed on my voice; however, good keyboard skills were a requirement of entry. I had been told at my interview at Hull that my deficiencies with regards to the piano would not be a problem, so when I was offered a place there, I accepted.

I left Hull in 1976 and after a brief spell working at Terminal One, Heathrow (a previously-arranged student summer job), I went to live in Copenhagen for a time.

Looking back at that year at Hull, I don't regret it for one instant. I got to sing and play some wonderful music with the University Orchestra, the Chamber Choir and the University Choral Society. I met some lovely people, studied Drama with a very young Anthony Minghella who had us re-writing 'A Confederate General at Big Sur' for the stage, met my first real boyfriend (who was Danish - hence the time spent in Copenhagen) and was part of the choir that performed Verdi's Requiem. Finally, the fact that I didn't complete my degree was the catalyst for my decision to study with the Open University.

The years have passed and the last time that I sang in public was a solo at my brother's first wedding in 1984.

And I MISS my music.

 Listening is one thing, but performing......being part of a choir or an orchestra is the experience that I crave. So when it became clear that we would be moving to the West Country, I started looking for choirs that I might join and it looks as though there are some that might welcome me.

I do hope so - there is still so much music that I have never sung!

Choosing OU Modules

Having deferred 'Reading and Studying Literature' (A230) until October, I am now faced with a decision to make regarding the module that will have to accompany it if I am to retain my Transitional Arrangements and graduate before the December 2017 cut-off date.

I would prefer whatever it is to be exam-free, which cuts down what I can do somewhat (really cannot see myself revising for two June exams).

So there are a couple of choices......

I could study 'Worlds of English' (U214) which, to quote from the OU Website,has the following scope:

This course looks at the history, diversity, and use of English around the world and explores the origins of the English language, how it has spread internationally and whether worldwide influence of English is a cause for celebration or concern.

Alternatively I could study 'Creative Writing' (A215) :

This practical creative writing module identifies your strengths and interests, and helps you develop as a writer of fiction, poetry, biography, autobiography or travel writing.

I am really not sure what to do at the moment - fellow students have been really helpful, especially one who is currently doubling up on A230 and A215, which she says requires less 'academic thought' and less reading than perhaps A230 and U214 would require.

I'm just not 100% sure about my Creative Writing skills; I have always been OK with academic subjects because there is a clear-cut pathway.

Gah! Well, I have until 24th April to decide, I suppose.

The Theatre at the Cinema

Hats off to the National Theatre Live! We've now seen two productions at our local Vue Cinema - 'Othello' last year and 'War Horse' on Sunday and there is a live streaming of 'King Lear' to come in May, with Simon Russell Beale in the title role.

The Royal Shakespeare Company's encore performance of Richard II (David Tennant) is to be streamed on 15th April, to be followed by 'Henry IV Part ' in May and Part 2 in June,and then 'Two Gentlemen of Verona' in September.

 At the Farnham Maltings last December, we saw a production of 'The Taming of the Shrew' filmed at the Globe Theatre; we have both wanted to experience a play at the Globe but could never afford to go.

These streamed performances are not simply confined to plays; the English National Opera, The Royal Opera House and the Met Opera are also involved in this method of getting productions out to those who otherwise might never experience them.

There is no way that we would have seen any of these fabulous productions, had it not been for someone's brilliant idea to stream them to cinemas around the country and indeed, around the world. We desperately wanted to see 'War Horse' but the combination of theatre and train tickets put it out of reach, financially. It was as enthralling and as moving as we thought it would be - the puppeteers seem to 'disappear' as one watches and in the end, one only sees the horse.


Some might find the filmed experience to be somewhat second-hand - we did not. We were as engaged with all of the productions as if we had been there in the theatres, watching the live performances.

So again, hats off to the genius who started this, whoever it was!

Aching knee and very sore tooth.

Kevin had his operation on Monday - arthroscopy and both medial and lateral meniscectomy in the right knee. In at 0800 hrs and back home by 1245hrs, feeling woozy and nauseous. Poor lad, he had a bad night (typical reaction to a general anaesthetic) and so did I.

He is using ice packs four times a day to reduce the swelling and of course, can't drive until the knee is stable but he can (and indeed, must) put weight on it and do the recommended physiotherapy exercises as soon as he is able. The sobering thing is that even though they have operated, the meniscectomies are likely to lead to further joint deterioration and ultimately a replacement knee joint as arthritis sets in.

It's a bugger, getting older! Mind you, the alternative ain't so hot either.

My problem is painful but easily- if expensively - sorted. I have a Cerec attached to my top premolar - well, actually, I don't because the damned thing pinged off when I was using those dinky little TePe brushes as instructed by the dental hygienist! This will be the third time that it has to be put back and the second in under a year - so much for it staying in place for three years!

It was done when I was in full time employment and could afford a comprehensive dental plan; I can no longer afford the full plan and am even having to scrimp to save enough to get a filling done (no NHS dentists around here, sadly) which is going to cost the best part of £125.00. The tooth with the Cerec is on the top left of my mouth but the tooth that needs filling - because it is worn and there is an irritating gap where food gets painfully trapped - is on the bottom right. As a consequence, chewing on either side is currently difficult and painful.

The filling is one thing - but I think the Cerec should be put back FOC - it is supposed to stay put for three years and I don't chew bones, break nuts with my teeth or even eat toffees any more, so it isn't anything that \I have done, except to follow my prescribed oral hygiene routine.

Getting back to Kevin's knee, we changed the dressings today and so far the operation sites look very neat - he should have very little scarring. He goes in two weeks to have the practice nurse check the sutures but apart from that, he is left to his own devices as far as physio is concerned.

And my errant Cerec will be glued back in place at mid-day today, so I can at least eat on one side without pain!

Motivation regained!

As I explained in an earlier post, what with the house move and Kevin's looming knee operation, plus a nasty arthritis flare-up and the fact that I have not been happy with either my tutor or my progress on A230 this year, I had elected to defer my Open University studies until October.

I really DID try to continue reading The Romantics, but was getting nowhere, so I put all the books to one side and took a "holiday" away from them. In the meantime, I bought some books that have helped me to get my head round Wordsworth and Shelley, and a very useful book on Literary Criticism.

The house that we had hoped to buy has been sold - sadly not to us, but we have just had a firm offer on our house and everything is moving forward. We have also had our offer accepted on a cottage which is not in Devon after all, but in Somerset. It is smaller than "The One" in Devon, but actually ticks more boxes, so it is to be hoped that the very short chain (our buyers, us and the vendors) will remain firmly linked and we will be settled well before I start my two OU modules.

So now that (D.V.) we won't be spending time away house-hunting, I can get back to reading the A230 set texts and the module textbooks - never read any James Joyce, so I'm looking forward to The Dubliners, as well as tackling Wuthering Heights (again) and Conan Doyle's The Sign of Four. Still to come, Robert Louis Stevenson's  The Beach of Falesá, Brian Friel's Dancing at Lughnasa, then The Emigrants and The Lonely Londoners along with poetry by Langston Hughes, Jack Kerouac and Elizabeth Bishop

I have watched Metropolis, which is also part of the module materials.After rather childishly giggling at the hero's awful knickerbockers and the exaggerated facial expressions that were (of course) part and parcel of silent films, I concluded that this wonderfully distopian experience could well be left until I was in a more serious mood!

So all of this reading should distract me from the stresses of the house-selling and buying experience - I'll let you know how THAT is working out for me :)

Bye, bye wheat!

So on top of the arthritis and carpal tunnel syndrome, it would appear that I have an intolerance to wheat!
This is a PITA, because I looove bread. I mean really, really love bread.

Crusty french bread, warm from the bakery; salt and pepper baguettes; wholegrain loaves; my own home-baked efforts; croissants and (goddess help me) Danish Pastries; rye bread.....need I say more?

However, I don't think bread (or rather, wheat) loves me *sob*!

The trouble is that every time I eat bread, I get the most awful stomach cramp. My tum bloats like I'm six months pregnant and I also get awful wind and indigestion. Doesn't matter whether the bread is fresh from the oven or a couple of days old. I get the same with biscuits, scones, cake.......you name it, if it has wheat in it, I eat, I bloat!

Having done a little reading around the subject, I am now wondering whether my arthritis, as well as the bloating and 'digestive discomfort' might be alleviated by going gluten-free for a trial period. Then a Facebook friend directed me to the Doves Farm website  www.dovesfarm.co.uk and the recipes contained therein.

I have a breadmaker, so when I found a recipe for a gluten-free breadmaker loaf, I went out on Saturday and bought the gluten-free bread flour, yeast and xanthan gum specified, came home and mixed up a loaf.

I was a bit concerned after I mixed everything together as per the instructions - it was more of a batter than a dough, but I left the breadmaker to get on with it while Kevin and I made Whisky Marmalade.

Half an hour later, we had six jars of orange yumminess.

The bread took another two and a half hours.

It has an 'interesting' texture - more 'cakey' than bread-like and it tastes OK.  Also, it toasts well.

So on Sunday, I had gluten-free toast at breakfast and a sandwich at lunchtime.No other wheat-containing products at all, all day.

This morning, I had a gluten and wheat-free muesli for breakfast and a sandwich for lunch.

I have to report......zero bloating, zero - *cough* - digestive discomfort.

Hmmm - I may be on to something here.Will keep you posted!

Sometimes older is better!

I have an all-singing, all-dancing sewing machine. It is computer-driven, has umpteen squillion stitches built into its clever little brain and nearly sixteen years ago, it cost more than my first car!

I haven't had much time to sew in recent years, but today I got the machine out to make arm-covers to hide the mess that the cats have made of the arms of our sofa. I made up the pattern, cut the fabric and toddled upstairs to start creating.

My Bernina Artista 180 clearly had other ideas as it snarled at me and snapped the needle.

On close inspection, it was evident that the needle was hitting the bobbin case - meaning that somehow the timing was out.

I'd love to know how THAT happened. I mean, has the machine been taking itself off to sewing-fests? Getting down and dirty with overlockers and embroidery machines?

So I rang the Bernina people, who gave me a main dealer's number and THEY gave me the joyous news that the machine would cost £96.00 (incl. VAT) to fix and take 10 days. Humph!

I then found a mechanic who will do home visits - £89.00

Being somewhat short on funds (and wanting to get this job done asap), I considered my alternatives.

Then I remembered The Singer.

Some years ago, a friend kindly gave me an old, hand-operated Singer in the iconic bentwood case. I intended for it to be a fun objet d'art, so had put it away in a cupboard to await the right place and time to bring it out on display.

I rootled in the cupboard and emerged with the machine. It looked in lovely condition, complete with all sorts of feet and the original instruction manual, so I pushed the Bernina to the back of the table and began to set up the 'antique'. I worked out how to fill the bobbin and thread the machine up and then gave it a trial crank.

BRILLIANT!! Beautiful straight, even stitches. This machine is AWESOME. I didn't even need to alter the tension!

I finished my arm-covers and proudly fitted them to the sofa, then decided to check out my Singer's history.

My neat little Singer Model 99 was made in Clydebank, Scotland in 1916 - yes, you did read that right! I have just sewn with a machine that is 98 years old, that has not been serviced in heaven-knows-how-long. O.K., it doesn't have any fancy stitches, it just does straight stitch, but it does it well.

I wonder what things have been made on it over the years - the childrens' clothes, the shirts made and mended, the pretty party dresses. I wonder when it was put away, in favour of the electric version. And I am really grateful that my friend thought to give it to me, instead of throwing it out. The repairs to the Bernina can wait, while I reconnect with sewing as my grandmother would have done!

Here it is, with the Bernina in the background.

Cat Update

It occurred to me that when I started this blog, we had four Maine Coons - Whisper (Silver Tortie Tabby), Spike (Black & White), Hobbes (Red and White) and Paddy (Classic Brown Tabby).

Sadly, Spike fell asleep forever in 2012; our big cowardy-custard boy, who hid every time that the doorbell rang, effectively had a stroke.

The house felt wrong without him; time passed and we decided that we should find another boy. On contacting our usual breeder, she said that she had a silver tabby lad that she had thought to keep as a show cat, but if we really wanted him.........

When we arrived at her house, we simply fell in love with him - big ears and all. There was a little red and white girl in the kitten pen with him, whose mother had rejected her, the only kitten in the litter. This little scrap had been brought up by the silver boy's mother, but had a tail fault so couldn't be bred from or sold.
We decided that we had to have the silver lad; then the breeder offered us the wee red girl - we hesitated, after all, Maine Coon kittens aren't exactly cheap - but we had misunderstood. We were being offered a BOGOF.

And that is how we left home, expecting to bring back one kitten and returned with two. We could never have separated Bearz from his little foster-sister Rosie, or Rosie from him. What we couldn't have anticipated was Hobbes' reaction - as Rosie hesitantly stepped out of the cat-carrier, Hobbes was struck with a coup de foudre! We have never seen such a perfect example of love at first sight and Rosie was similarly enamoured.

So,until mid-January 2014, we had five Maine Coons. Whisper had, over the previous year, begun to look very old and was becoming increasingly frail. The others took it in turn to groom her and to sit with her, walking out of the room with her (her eyesight was clearly beginning to fail) - we were amazed at the apparent care and devotion that they were demonstrating towards our old lady.

In December, we discovered that she was becoming forgetful (as in forgetting where the litter tray was), but we compensated by checking up on her and mopping up her occasional accidents. However, in January her increased rate of drinking and her enlarged pupils signalled something very wrong, and the vet confirmed that she had kidney disease and would not be with us much longer, even with drug treatment.

We decided to take her home. Our vet trusted us to know when it was time to let her go and so we had her with us for two more weeks. On 22nd January, Whisper slipped away, peacefully and without pain at our veterinary surgery.

So now we have four Maine Coons again.

See you again one day, Spike and Whisper xxxxx

Keeping motivated.....

I have been studying consistently but what with getting the house ready to sell, the possibility that Kevin will be out of action soon (he has to have an operation on his knee that will put him on crutches for a bit), trying to find and view properties (if The One falls through),  I was beginning to feel overwhelmed.

Unfortunately, I have developed RA and OA and Carpal Tunnel Syndrome in both hands and can't hold a pen to write for more than a few minutes without my hand cramping up, so the Open University allows me to take my exams at home on the computer, with an invigilator sitting next to me. The thought of doing this, surrounded by moving boxes, either here or at the new house, was too awful to contemplate.

With all of these factors in mind, I decided to defer my current module (A230, Reading and Studying Literature) until October 2014 and pick it up again then, alongside the Creative Writing module. I had the idea that I might be able to continue to work on the module, without the stress of submitting assignments or revising for the exam in June, thus giving me a head start in October as I will then be studying almost full time on two quite different modules.

I enjoy my studies immensely - so why is it that I can't seem to settle to study? I need to go back over the Romantic Poets and then read and work on 'Wuthering Heights', but today I sat staring at the module book, quite unable to start.

Perhaps I just need a break; I have to register for both modules in April and maybe that will be the motivator but part of me doesn't really want to leave it that long - there is a lot to read and take in on A230, even though I have banked the (less-than-impressive) marks for the first two assignments that I had submitted.

It doesn't help that my study area is filled with sewing and spinning stuff - reminders of what I could be doing.

The answer is for me to take my books and study elsewhere - somewhere without distractions.

But it can't be somewhere without coffee.........so the Library is out!

Looks like the dining room may be my next port of call!

Dreaming of Devon

As I said in my last post, Kevin and I intend to move to Devon this year. Our home is lovely but it is a big family house with a massive garden and deserves to be occupied by a family, rather than two people and their four cats.

The house went on the market on Wednesday 22nd and we have had six viewings so far; the cats are completely confused by the increase in visitors, some of whom clearly love cats and others....not so much!
We have to be here during viewings because ours are strictly indoor-cats and it is simply not fair to place the responsibility for their safety on the estate agent. If the front door was left open accidentally, Hobbes would almost certainly dash through it and the gate from the deck to the garden is another vulnerable exit.

However, that means that we are very much 'in residence' - not ideal for viewings. We have to keep moving round the house behind the prospective buyers which makes us look as though we are stalking them.

We have been house-hunting virtually for a while, checking out places on Zoopla and RightMove and then looking at the locations on Google Earth. This is well worth doing, as some estate agents' photos tend to omit the less-than-attractive views, not simply of the property but of the buildings nearby. One particularly lovely cottage had a commercial coach garage, rather than fairies, at the bottom of its garden - unseen in the brochure but very evident on Google Earth!

Having selected some properties to view, we left the cats in the capable hands of our cat-sitter and drove down to Devon last Tuesday. We saw three properties and then spent the night at the Barnstaple Travelodge. On Wednesday, we breakfasted at Sainsbury's and then went to view four more.

The first place was a disappointment - a Grade II listed money-pit. The house did not appear to have had any maintenance carried out for years, and it was right at the top of our budget. We also knew that the vendor would not entertain any offers, so we sadly drove away.

We were, however, soon feeling much happier -  the second cottage we visited is (subject to a full structural survey) 'the One'. Like the first place, it is Grade II listed, but it is clear that it has been loved and cared for over the years. The village is lovely, with excellent amenities and the nearby market town has a 'proper' high street, rather than the cloned look so prevalent these days. There are TWO butchers, a proper greengrocers and numerous independent shops, a library, doctors' surgery, vet, banks, hardware store.......

We eventually tore ourselves away to view the other two houses, each nice in their own way but not The One and then drove to my cousin's beautiful thatched cottage in Hatherleigh, where we were to spend the night.After a great evening catching up and being given masses of information on local surveyors who specialise in listed buildings, thatchers to sort out the roof ridge (the only thing that The One might need replacing), electricians, carpenters and so on, we climbed the stairs and fell into bed, with details of buildings dancing in our heads.

We punctuated the journey home with two viewings, but these two cottages had one adverse thing in common - narrow, twisted and steep stairs that Kevin found really hard to negotiate.

So from that trip, we have found our prospective new home and I am trying hard not to pin my hopes too hard on it - even though it is The One. After all, we haven't had an offer on ours yet!

From Company Director to Student in one move!

Wow - life has a habit of throwing stuff at you and that kind-of explains why it is almost four years since my last post.

So what has the Spinning Witch been doing then? Being made redundant and generally surviving like so many other people have had to do.

Long story short.....we were forced in the end to close down the company - too many reasons to go into here but to say that the bank wasn't entirely helpful would be an understatement.

As a result, we and our staff were suddenly redundant, with the added bonus that the Job Centre staff didn't hold out any hope for me or Kevin when it came to employment. Too old, too independent, too well-qualified.............and that was just me - Kevin is eight years older than I am and apparently totally over the hill   *sigh*!

I applied for everything and anything (and I do mean EVERYTHING) - and didn't get a single interview. Not one.

That was when I decided to 're-train'.........and take an Open University degree in English Literature.
The intention is to get my degree and then offer private tutoring for GCSE and A Level English students.

Oh, and move to Devon.

Kevin has effectively retired now, although if we get the house that we are hoping for, we both could be busier than ever.

We have decluttered, decorated and put our house on the market. My loom and my two spinning wheels, along with fleece, fibre, yarn and endless boxes of books, have all been moved to a storage unit, so the Spinning Witch will have to wait until we move.

In the meantime, I will blog about the move, my studies, the cats and anything else that comes to mind, partly because my next degree module is to be Creative Writing!