Spring

Posted on May 11, 2023 by The Little Room of Rachell

MAKING Still crocheting my coastal colours cowl. I haven’t done a lot of anything crafty recently, April was ‘a bit of a month’ to use typical British understatement! I’m focusing on it now, and then will try to finish the Coast blanket next

LIKING Sitting in a holiday cottage crocheting and watching the lead up to the Coronation from 9:30am, just for a little while before going out. Then, it absolutely poured on and off all morning and so plans to walk, or go anywhere were shelved until the afternoon. Crochet, tea and the whole of the Coronation service (though not the balcony and fly-past) followed. I really enjoyed it all

COOKING Tray bake fish with olives, lemons & cherry tomatoes. I swap the fish, sometimes using haddock, or cod and last week it was salmon. I eat the cooked lemon too. See John Torode’s recipe

BAKING Sourdough rosemary focaccia. Woah! This is so good, it’s left to prove in the fridge in the tin overnight so develops an amazing texture. So good I made it twice in as many weeks

SIPPING I did Dry Lent once again and since then haven’t really drunk much alcohol at all, unless you count last Friday night’s spiced rums? No, we probably don’t count those, as it was holiday refreshments

READING A novel I saw recommended in Good Housekeeping magazine. I’m not entirely sure about it at the moment as it’s quite chick-litty, not my usual genre really. It’s One Moment by Becky Hunter

LOOKING A bit funny? Woolly slippers, no socks, joggers and one of my favourite bright pink patterned tees. Open windows and a rather cool day, but too lazy to go fetch a hoodie

Cowslips are everywhere, we’ve recently walked alongside a field full

LISTENING to Weightless by Elbow, on my liked songs playlist on Spotify

WISHING for free train travel for a year, including the sleepers. I’ve wanted this for ages, since someone once said they get it through their job working for a rail company

BAKING Sourdough pitta bread regularly now. I have now stopped buying any and freeze half of each batch. It’s always handy to have emergency bread in the freezer. You can defrost them in the toaster then warm them. I can’t recommend them enough. So much tastier with the sourdough flavour, than the supermarket equivalent

Part of the first batch, now I make them half them the size, weighing the dough for accuracy still

ENJOYING Warmer weather, it’s very on and off at the moment but my flowers have doubled in size in the garden

Parsley seeds are growing well on my sunny windowsil

BUYING A variety of seeds, plant labels, thr May issue of Gardeners World magazine mainly for the 2-for-1 Garden Card, a sprouter (actually this was with the last of a birthday garden voucher), pots, bottle top waterers, propagators, compost, top soil, plug plants … it’s that time of year again

The Cotswold Sculpture Park has reopened, hurrah! GW mag 2-for-1 card still accepted.

‘Despair’, the detail on this is incredible

OBSESSING Over seeds and sprouts and microgreens. I’ll show you a few pics, but if you’re interested go to highlights and keep an eye on stories for progress pics on my Instagram

Look at the roots on these microgreens! Grown in a hydroponic sprouter, they have replicated the pattern on the base of the section in which they sat

Mung beans in a soup mug covered with muslin, after 8 hours soaking. I think we’ll eat them before the roots grow so long this time. When they looked like tiny tadpoles they were at their crunchiest and sweetest, that might be the time to add a few to salads

APPRECIATING Salads for lunch again with home sprouted beansprouts! Delicious with this dressing and toasted pumpkin seeds

MANAGING To produce mouldy and rotten peas, instead of pea-shoots, in the new sprouter. So I’ve gone back to growing in soil, I’m not sure about hydroponics for those. I have put my first lot of lentils (puy) in it today though, we’ll see how they do

WONDERING If you know that sprouted lentils are meant to be good for chickens too?!

Mustard, mizuna & beetroot, they are packed with so much good stuff. You’re going to be seeing grown microgreens and sprouts for sale and I predict there will be an explosion of sites about how to grow them

For sale from the shop pictured below, in Chichester. Spotted on Monday

EATING More chocolate, Easter always gives me a taste for it again. The less I eat, the less I fancy any

WAITING for my pea shoots! They’ve just starting to show. I can’t wait to eat them

WATCHING Annika. (I’ll generally watch anything Nicola Walker does, apart from the Marriage thingy with Sean Bean.) I’ve only watched the first episode on UK TV Play, it’s free with ads, and Annika breaking the fourth wall, quoting literature is refreshingly different. Have you seen it?

WATCHING Would I Lie to You? But nearly at the point where we watched the latest series, it’s the best thing after an urgh day. It makes us laugh so much. (Newer series is on the BBC Iplayer. Old ones on UK TV Play for free, with ads)

HOPING for sunnier days please, today we had everything: a dramatic hailstorm, torrential rain which was so heavy I had to stop the car, then weak sunshine and super fluffy white clouds in a blue sky

NOTICING A MASSIVE spider by the bed this morning. The spider pot (an old ricotta tub) and birthday card was fetched from the bathroom cupboard, along with Someone to pop it outside as I was only wearing a towel. Then I peered out anyway, as it was walking along the garage roof. I warned it not to even think about coming back in again

FOLLOWING The weather forecast

Inside The Gothic Temple at Stowe, a National Trust property. It’s a holiday let and this was an open day so visitors to see what it’s like inside

SORTING Seed packets. Oregano, carrots, beetroot and lettuce need to be planted soon

GETTING Teased by a friend, Lucy, for taking my beansprouts away for the weekend

COVETING Raised vegetable beds

FEELING Pressed for time. I need to add photos, change and go to take someone for their Covid Booster (and ummm collect the 34 tomato (including a few which look suspiciously like pepper or chilli) plants which were babysat for the long weekend. I thought taking a freshly baked fruit cake for a Coronation Street Party would be a fair exchange. In retrospect it went as well as I’d anticipated, haha

HEARING What’shername – Self Esteem, this song

A nice pot of lemon & ginger tea in a super dooper cafe we came across in Chichester: Real Eating Co

How’s your spring? Busy and productive? Happy and calm? Are you managing to keep all the balls in the air?

Joining

Posted on May 2, 2021 by The Little Room of Rachell

Why is it always that I join significant lengths of crochet, before deciding I don’t like the seam?

It’s been weeks since I picked up my patchwork strips of linen / moss stitch. A conversation with a friend, Lucy, on Friday about the advance copies of books we’re both reading and reviewing reminded me that I need to get on with the joining. Quickly. There’s a border to do too, of course.

In theory I like the texture of raised seams. In practice they’re always tilting a little to the side. It’s rustic. It’s just not right though. I’m not convinced rustic looks good or feels good. Right. Rip, rip…rip it up and start again. (Remember that song?)

I took to looking around at my books and crochet sites.

Although there is quite a caution about the slowness of crocheting the Zipper join, this is the one for me. Here’s the instructions I found on Dedri’s ‘Look at what I made’ website. Look at the neatness of the seam. It’s so flat too. It is indeed very, very slow to crochet, but I like the look and feel of it a lot.

I’ll be back with the finished blanket at some point. Lucy’s baby is due in the next fortnight or so. S/he better not be too late because the poor girl is desperate for a large bowl of cereal, having developed gestational diabetes. Poor love.

I might do a slightly retrospective Taking Stock for April in the meantime. But I may not. We’ll see. I’m sure either way you’ll cope.

Have a pic or two of some lovely bluebells in the woods I visit every spring. This was on Friday ….

What are you up to?

Bluebell woodland

Posted on June 2, 2019 by The Little Room of Rachell

A walk on a lovely warm May morning in the bluebell wood.

It is an annual tradition to go whenever the bluebells are flowering, to listen to the swell of birdsong, to notice the leaves on the trees rustling in the breeze, to drink in the haze of colour of the bluebells and to smell their dusky sweet perfume. This only seems to happen if the breeze is blowing in the right direction, or the sun is filtering through the leaves of the trees above to warm the flowers. When I catch the scent it instantly reminds me of other walks in this wood.

When you see the candles on a horse chestnut tree you don’t expect them to be such pretty flowers, do you?

We were the only people in the woods this visit, apart from at the beginning of the walk when a girl came out of one of the paths onto ours, carrying her puppy. She said she was worried because he is very young and gets so excited, he would be jumping up at us. I’m ashamed to admit that this country girl replied: “Oh good because today I put new jeans on and I don’t want muddy paws all over the legs!”

It was a dachshund puppy…I’m blushing as I remember.

Mum and I have looked out for deer since the time we came across a huge pair running in the field at the back of the woods.

I regularly see muntjac deer where I walk at home, but that pair (roe deer I think) near the bluebell woods were enormous. And scary. But exhilarating and wonderful too.

This time we experienced mild disappointment when we left, the wildest animal having been a small over-excited puppy with mucky paws…

Celandine and bluebells look so eye catching together. There are delicate patches of celandine in the woods. So fragile, some are along the very fringes of the paths, that I watch where I place my feet. Aren’t those dark green heart shaped leaves lovely?

Here are links to my previous bluebell posts:

My next post will feature some crochet!

Taking Stock – May

Posted on May 29, 2018 by The Little Room of Rachell

Making : nothing, still

Cooking : sausages to eat cold with tomato and basil salad and potato salad. Yum.

Drinking : hot chocolate, I just fancied it though it’s not cold outside

Reading: The Killings at Badger’s Drift by Caroline Graham. I’ve never watched Midsomer Murders on TV, but after finding the seventh book in the library last June, I decided to look for the other books and read them in orderFalmouth

Wanting: to knit and crochet

Looking: out at the birds feeding in the garden. Mrs Blackbird is huge and fluffy. I spotted a pair of green finches last week

Playing: The Secret Diary of Hendrik Goen, 83 1/4 years old while I do my arm exercises. Derek Jacobi is a superb narrator

Deciding: to use my iPhone knitting row counter as I do 4 sets of 15Rhubarb Sour and a Negroni

Wishing: to be back in Cornwall after a brilliant long weekend away

Enjoying: my photos of old and new favourite Cornish places

Waiting: for cold sausage time, aka dinner

Liking: the leafy green lanes and wild flowers everywhere

Wondering: how much heavier I am after the cider, pasties and ice creams Thatchers Blush and Vintage cider

Loving: walking the coast path from Pendeen lighthouse again

Pondering: how long till I will again

Considering: changing moisturisers

Buying: tissues (bit of hay fever…)

Watching: the film trailer for Edie

Hoping: to see that, the Solo film and maybe the Book Club film

Marvelling: at the recent drop in ticket prices at my local cinema. They’re struggling apparently and it’s now 1990s prices. Woo hoo! Rhododendron at Trengwainton Garden

Cringing: at nothing right now, unless I hear the news

Needing: more toothpaste

Questioning: who thinks of the pasty flavours. I had Reggae Reggae Chicken for lunch the other day and Croque Monsieur the next! (The chicken was best.) Someone always sticks to the Traditional onesFoxgloves, whitebells, bluebells, cow parsley, buttercups and clover along the lanes and coast path

Smelling: rain on the way?

Wearing: shorts and a stripy tee (and slippers?!)

Following: friends’ half term holiday pics

Noticing: drinks, the sea and rock pool pics Pendeen lighthouse and the South West Coast Path

Knowing: May is my new favourite month

Thinking: I never expected to see bluebells still out and along so many verges in West Cornwall

Admiring: my white watch strap mark on my brown arm

Sorting: washing. Soooo much after just 4 days away Trevethan gin at Porthleven Nauti pizza place

Getting: busy with lists

Bookmarking: my library book

Coveting: this sea facing house or that while away

Disliking: all the mad Audi drivers

Opening: Cornish loose leaf Earl Grey tea

Giggling: at stand up comedy on Netflix

Feeling: relaxed

Snacking: no snacking! See the cider, pasties, ice creams above!

Helping: friends

Hearing: builders at work. Everyone’s at it along my road

Mixing: light mayonaise, Dijon mustard and light salad cream for potato salad (it’s delicious!)

Worrying: about nothing much

Slicing: tomatoes Fowey (pronounced Foy to rhyme with joy)

Celebrating: a big anniversary

Forgetting: there’s usually something these days!

Winning: at guessing how many steps we’ve walked …occasionally

Pretending: I’m super fit and striding up really steep hills

Sneaking: …not going to admit to anything here, I’m not stupid

Embracing: friends and family

How are you doing? Did you have a good (UK Bank Holiday) weekend?

If you’d like to fill in your own, here’s one of Pip’s Taking Stock posts. I use an older version.

In the bluebell woods

Posted on May 9, 2018 by The Little Room of Rachell

A choir of birdsong, a gentle breeze and the rustle of leaves overhead

Ferns gradually unfolding

Celandines

Cowslips with a background of bluebells make such a pretty picture. I always think of Uncle Silas getting merry on his homemade cowslip wine…it might be time to reread that delightful little book.

The only other people Mum and I saw in the distance yesterday were a couple with a greyhound, later there was a ferocious sounding barking match between two dogs somewhere near the boundary of the woods. We never did see the other dog, but came across the couple again. According to the owner the dog had met his brother: “It’s like that in some families, isn’t it?”

A glimpse of a field of rape flowers through the trees.