Riding in Wales

Mum and I just got back from a weeks riding. We started at Hay-On-Wye and ended up nearly back at home on the beach at Ynyslas. We only got very wet on one day, and on the others we had a few showers, but some fantastic sunshine and beautiful views.

This photo in particular makes me smile so much.


The weather was rather cold for June though, I only rode in a T-Shirt on the first day.


By the end of the holiday going along the beach I was well wrapped up in my waterproof!



We go from hotel/B&B to hotel/B&B carrying everything in the saddle bags, it's amazing how little you can get away with taking when you really try. You ride in one set of clothes, and have another set for the evening, add in a couple of books and some knitting and you're all set!
The horses we ride belong to the company who organise the holiday, and are really fantastic, they're very hard to spook, forward going, and will go for miles (the longest we did was 25 miles).
Now I'm back home I'm finishing off marking exam papers and then it's back to stocking up the shop.

Everything in the garden was lovely...

After the hot spell in April, most of the plants in the garden were really struggling, we've then had a wet May (though not everywhere in the country was so lucky), and now June is warming up again and everything is bursting in to bloom.

Mum and I go off horseriding for a week tomorrow, and when we come back the garden will be awash with colour. All these foxgloves will definitely be out...


The poppies are starting to appear, and the Honeysuckle is just teasing us.



We're fully expecting the hedgerows to be beautiful as we ride along the country lanes. Speaking of Hedgerows I'm leaving the shop up while I'm away, anything sold will be sent out when I get back. Once I'm back I need to spend a few more days marking exam papers, then I'll be settling down with the fluff to create some brand new colours.

Now with even fewer coherent sentences

I possibly shouldn't be trying to write this now as I just had a tooth extracted, my mental state may be somewhat questionable...

However, we can but try.

As you may have noticed I have a bit of a thing about churches, it's not the fact that they are a church so much, as the architecture, and that they are places of extraordinary beauty.
No churches survive from the time of this cross, but even it has a simple beauty, something about the proportions and the setting speaks to me.



Some of them are just plain magnificent, and come complete with a crypt.






Others are far more traditional, yet still have there own unique features, this screen is just fantastic.





We often plan a day out and then visit a church as part of that day, mostly with the help of this book, we definitely didn't pay £140 for it, and I'm fairly certain you can get it from somewhere, but if not there are probably other equally good books.

I'm now off to work out what I might be able to eat tonight.... the answer could well be, not much. I knew I should have found time for lunch before I went to the dentist, even if it meant eating in front of a class!

Up on the moors

I've spent the last week in the the North York Moors National Park, for the most part February is a horrible time of year to be in the countryside. After the harsh winter we've had everything is very grey, brown and dead looking.
Some things were still beautiful though.



The dogs met their first grouse, much to our amusement as Gwen tried to chase one through a pond and emerged dripping in pond weed.


Not everything is grey and brown though, the first signs of spring, some Snowdrops.

Skiing

I've just got back from a fantastic weeks skiing in France. We stayed in a chalet that was 2 minutes away from the slopes and had some fantastic days skiing, with falling snow for the last 2 days.

Happy Birthday Mum

My Mum's birthday was on Saturday, as I was actually there for her birthday I didn't write a blog post for the day itself. I did however make it to Wales bearing gifts.



A Quincy



And some hand decorated mugs, slate floors are hard on mugs so their life may be short, but in a beautiful location.

Speaking of a new lifestyle in a beautiful location...


The view as you take the dogs out in the morning is spectacular, the dogs approve as well!

Lots of hills

I've spent the week riding in Mid Wales, the area just north of Hay-On-Wye. None of the hills round there are very big, but they are beautiful swathes of open land where we saw no one all day. Beautiful wide grassy tracks to ride on, and of course the sunny weather all helped to make for a memorable week.



This picture was taken from the top of The Begwns at a place called The Roundabout, which I can't find any information about. It's a circular stone structure on top of the hill, with trees, the sort of thing that there must a history to, and if it was in snowdonia you'd have no trouble, but in this less visited part of the country you struggle!

Pembroke

My Dad describes this part of the UK as God's country, and this week, I think he might have been right. The sun shone, I actually wore shorts and exposed my pasty white legs to the world for the first time this year. We did lots of climbing, lots of relaxing and generally forgot about the world for a whole week. Bliss.

And still it snows

I woke up this morning to 4 inches of snow.... not quite sure where it came from. The forecast seemed to indicate we might get some, but certainly not as much as this. I was meant to be taking my Rainbows to our city's Thinking Day event, but got a phone call saying that was cancelled. I was then left with the dilemma about what to do with this bonus day off!
Of course with all that snow it seemed silly not to take advantage of it. I was also inspired by Kate Davis of Needled. Kate is a designer extraordinaire, she designed the iconic Owl sweater (look in the sidebar to the left for my version). A couple of weeks ago she suffered a stroke, and lost use of limbs on her left side. Kate is just a few years older than me, and like me combines knitting with teaching, and a love of being outdoors. She posted in her blog today updating us on how she was doing, she's posted so many pictures of herself over the winter of her out enjoying the snow that I felt it would be wrong not to go out today. I already commented wishing Kate the best, but wanted to pay tribute to her here as well.



I feel so lucky to live in a city where I can enjoy walks like this within 5 minutes of leaving my door, if I wanted to I could walk for miles following the park right out in the countryside.
My return route takes me through a graveyard, I have a real fascination with graveyards, I love reading the headstones, imagining the story behind the dates. No reading today though as everywhere was very snowy and slippy. The gravestones are slowly being taken over by the wood, everything is going back to nature. I'd much rather see this than somewhere immaculate.

Early to bed, early to rise

I wish I could say I'd been up to something interesting but alas I've not. I did go to a pancake party last night so have had my yearly dose of pancakes. I'm also off out tonight with one of the other teachers from school, after all it is the holidays and I've not had chance to relax for very much of it.
My one concession is having a lie in, normally I get up at 6am, which means I'm asleep for 10pm. I don't mind getting up that early but going to bed that early really hurts at times. So many social activities become difficult if you have to leave at 9.30 to go to bed!
However while it's the holidays I'm enjoying being able to spend time in bed... though a new mattress would definitely help,but I'm working on that!

Lists

I am busy making lists, lists of things to do this week, lists of what I want to knit, lists of where I want to go in life...
Nothing like a good list to still that inner voice in my head, I am very much one of those people who need to write things down to remember them, and to organise myself.

Mind you lists have their place, and being sat on the sofa with SB (aka smelly boy aka best boyfriend ever), is not one of them. I'm about to start a weeks holiday and while there is a to do list, there are also several pleasurable things to do on it. Not least is casting on a cardigan as my Knitting Olympics project, nothing like a bit of pressure to bring out the best in me!

Half Term

Holidays for me are a chance to catch up. Weekdays are full of work and exhaustion, weekends are jealously guarded as a chance for a lie in, and a bit of time to escape. Holidays actually a chance to get some much needed jobs done.
I've wanted to put a proper TV aerial up for ages, and on Monday Mum and Dad bought ladders over and very kindly got the job done for me.
Mum and I spent the entire time waiting for a scream and a crash, however none happened, which is a good job really as later today I'm off to help them move to their new house!

Charlotte's wedding

My old boss got married this weekend, over the year she became someone who I could call a friend, always prepared to fight my corner and someone who when you went on a night out would practically guarantee you had a good time. Her wedding was everything I would want in my own wedding, beautifully personalized, relaxed and a true celebration.

I'd wanted to make her something special for her wedding, Charlotte crochets and can also sew, if anyone can appreciate something hand knitted it's her. She was the recipient of the Hemlock Ring blanket in my finished objects pictures to the left. I also made a shawl to go with my outfit for the day, after all September is not known for it's warmth!

The pattern is Laminaria, knitted using 1 skein of Yarn Yard Kelpie which is pure cashmere. How could you not feel like a million dollars wearing it!
School starts officially tomorrow, wish me luck, I may need it!

Pembrokeshire

I had a lovely week, the wind blew a little too strongly, but apart from that we only had one day of rain.
Oh, it also rained as we took the tent down, it's now sat in the back of my car waiting for a dry day (possibly tomorrow) waiting for me to pull it out and dry it.
We didn't get any canoeing done, but did climb nearly every day. We also did a couple of morning's body boarding which caused great amusement trying to squeeze me in to the same wet suit I've had since I was 15, now while I haven't grown vertically since then, nor indeed much in any direction the wet suit is now snugger than it once was!
Now I have a week and a half until school starts, I'd better do some actual work! (oh and get knitting, I have 2 projects I need finished for a wedding the weekend before we go back!)

More tears

This has made me cry. If you're not a knitter it might not mean much to you, but just the act of investing all that time in something as a gift is enough to make anyone teary.
All those women by the way are the knitting equivalent of Premier League Footballers, they're best selling authors, and very clever women.

I'm off to Pembrokeshire for a week, I hope to return with recharged batteries, and a sense of peace from the place that truely is heaven on earth.

Switzerland

A brief selection of my photos from Switzerland. We took 26 Guides and Young Leaders and 7 adults overall it was an amazing trip, the weather to start off with was a little damp, including hail storms and thunder and lightning. By the end of the week however it was warm and sunny, with amazing views from the tops of the mountains. We shall gloss over the 24 hour coach journeys, and being pulled off the coach to go through customs at 1.30am, apparently home office instructions are that all youth groups must go through customs in case they've been on terrorist training camps....

Hghlights have to be the views from the top of the Schilhorn and watching a group of teenage girls relax and not worry about what they looked like, and what others were thinking about them.











Oh and apparenly when we next go I might be organising it.... (PS. I also found a wool shop, and yes, I bought wool!)

I'm back

I've arrived back safely from Switzerland ahead of schedule. the RSS feed reader has been caught up with (111 blog posts), and 139 emails have been read or deleted!
I still haven't opened my bag, I still need to shower but I have had an all important cup of tea. Photos are going to be forthcoming.

On my travels

I leave tomorrow for a trip to Switzerland with Guiding, I am paying to spend money with 30 Guides on a coach for 24 hours, at times I think I need my head examining....
I think the packing is done, the important things like what knitting to take were picked out several days earlier less important things like "do I have enough clean knickers?" were only thought about last night. The answer by the way was no, I went to sleep to the sound of a washing machine attempting take off. It needed this much time because the weather to be quite honest has been dreadful, I've done a few climbing instruction sessions this summer and have worn water proofs for every single one. Most summers they might get put on once maybe twice if I'm unlucky. My legs haven't seen daylight for weeks, I am ready for Switzerland to be hot and sunny!

See you all in 10 days or so....

Endings

I just finished my last day at my present school I will confess to shedding a tear over one delightful class who have been a delight all year. Others I could dance with joy at the thought of never seeing them again!
This is only a quickie as I have to leave the house in 20 minutes to go to my leaving do, and I am still wearing what I wore to school. I am however all organised for the last week of term. I'm taking our Year 12 pupils up to scotland for their Duke of Edinburgh Gold expedition, the packing has mostly consisted of me taking everything and the kitchen sink as I have no idea what I actually need, however most importantly the spindle that Natalie from the Yarn Yard posted for me has arrived so I can continue my effort for the Tour de Fleece.
I'm off to try and make myself look beautiful, see you in a week, check the twitter feed for updates on lost children!

Things that are making me smile today

Top left- I love this pattern, I love the alpaca, I knitted the first one and couldn't squeeze my calf in to it, went up a needle size for the second and it now fits (admittedly I have to reknit the first one, but c'est la vie!)

Top right- Aloe Vera was created to soothe the many scratches I have over my arms after chopping down a blackthorn tree yesterday!

Middle Left- I found Fight Club on sale in the supermarket for £2.99, Brad Pitt for only £2.99, bargain!

Middle Right- Someone decided to send me a skein of Croft yarn from The Yarn Yard. I'd expressed my longing for some over on the Ravelry forums but what with needing to pay deposit and rent on my new flat and pay for a trip to Switzerland I knew it as going to have to wait. I think I know who sent it, but whoever you are thank you so so much,

Bottom left- Banana bread in the oven. I cam back from a visit at my parents to find some spotty bananas that needed using. It's a pity that the oven burnt them, but that's another reason to be cheerful, in 1 month I will no longer have to try and cook in an oven that has burnt everything I have ever cooked in it!

Bottom right- The sun is out, and after all, the world is always a better place in the sunshine!

Also, I go back to work tomorrow, strangely I'm looking forward to it.