Bounce

The camp I went to was in Northamptonshire and called Bounce, my Mum commented when she saw me today that I seemed really up-beat and happy, and I am, going away for a week, away from the phone and email gave me a chance to escape for a while and not think about anything more than eating, sleeping and teaching climbing.

Anyway I've uploaded my photos, and thought I'd share a few. I took my own knitting to camp, but one of the activities was also chance to teach the Guides to knit with the aim of making a charity blanket. I had to cast on a few squares, and fix a few mistakes but didn't get chance to do alot as it was at the same time I was teaching climbing.
There was also a stained glass window we were painting, which ended up being really beautiful.

Then of course there the outdoor activities, I was running climbing on the oldest mobile climbing tower I think I have ever seen, they also had bungee trampolines, shooting, archery, and a huge bouncy slide. The girls got to do so many more things but I was so busy running the climbing I didn't get chance to see.

I belong....

There was a t-shirt produced by Girlguiding UK, on it it says I belong.... and then lists a load of amazing facts about the organisation, it talks about the brilliant things we do an says something like this...
Almost half of the women in Britain have been involved in guiding at some point in their lives
Around 30 per cent of eight-year-old girls are in Brownies
Seventy per cent of five- to seven-year-olds, 73 per cent of seven- to ten-year-olds, 81 per cent of ten to 15-year-olds and a massive 96 per cent of 16- to 25-year-olds like to spend time together without any boys being there

I've just got back from a week at camp where I have been reminded just how much this movement can do for girls from any walk of life, and how much pleasure I get from working with them. I've come away re-energised about my own unit and have made so many new friends. I arrived at camp a stranger, with in 6 hours I had made so many new friends.

I'm just trying to catch up after a week away, I have taken some photo, I'll put them up tomorrow.

This could be one of those posts....

You know, the ones where I have nothing really say, ramble on a bit, make lots of spelling mistakes, and talk about lots of things where I forget you guys don't know the back story behind it!

Anyway without further ado, I am feeling yucky, not really unwell, just a bit headachey, nauseous, and run down. I've spent most of today and yesterday listening to the cricket (england are playing South Africa), knitting, and sorting out some things for when I start teaching in September. I've also spent far too much time on the internet!

I leave on Sunday to go and do some climbing instruction at a Guide Camp in Northamptonshire, I get back Friday so will be a whole week away from my laptop. I'm hoping to get quite a bit of knitting done while I'm away, everything knitting right now I've been knitting for ages and I just fancy a change. It will also be nice to have nothing to do except a bit or=f work and then my time is my own but in a place where I don't have to worry about cooking or anything like that, like a paid holiday really!

I've still not managed to get out climbing personally this summer which has been a bit annoying, we (my housemates and I) had grand plans for Thursday and then it chucked it down all day. Still I'm sure that the week in Pembrokeshire with friends will make up for it!

Right I think that will do for now, before I write something odd, I'm off to get tea out of the oven and settle down looking forward to the return of The Tudors and hoping that this series features more of the delicious bum of Jonathan Rhys Meyers!

Swap

I just received my package in the Teachers who knit swap, it's full of wonderful things, my first ever salt water taffy (mmmm), and some gorgeous Alpaca sock yarn. I can't wait to knit it up. there is also the most gorgeous tape measure, a little sheep whose tail you pull to get out the tape and then squeeze it's belly so it retracts!

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I also got a package from The Yarn Yards latest update. I couldn't resist some particularly lovely sock yarn in blue, some shiney merino tencel and some pencil roving which can be knit on to a fabulous tea cosey!






I just got back from a meal out with friends, which was lovely except for the feeling sick due to being a passenger coming home and not driving. I get such bad carsickness! Anyway, I think it's time for an early night, it's been a hectic week, and I'm up early to go to the bank tomorrow.

Six Quirky Things

Sam over at The life and times of me tagged me for a meme. In it I basically need to tell you 6 quirky things about myself.

Here are the rules.
1)Link to the person who tagged me
2)Mention the rules
3)Tell six quirky yet boring, unspectacular details about myself
4)Tag 6 other bloggers by linking to them
5)Go to each person’s blog and leave a comment that lets them know they’ve been tagged

Here we go....
1) I love all vegetables except boiled carrots.
2) My toes are double jointed.
3) As a child I would amuse myself most happily by hammering nails in to a piece of wood.
4) I like my meat plain, no beef and mustard, lamb and mint sauce, or pork and apple sauce.
5) I love gerkins, love, love can nearly eat a jar of them.
6) I hate phoning people up, I'd much rather email if I need to arrange something.

Now 6 people to tag....

1) Slipped Stitch
2) Domestic Blissless
3) Doolittle
4) Uppercase Woman
5)Dead Baby Jokes
6) The Number Twenty Three To stop him complaining about lack of posting material!

Leisure and Pleasure

This was the theme (I hope, memory is like a sieve!) of this years Floral Art Competition at my parents local show. Mum entered 7 classes, and did very well. She's gained another couple of pieces of silver ware to polish, one for the most original use of colour, and one for the most points gained in the overall competition, she won 2 of her classes.

Last time I posted some pictures of her arrangements you were all really nice and left some lovely comments, she does read here so I'd love for her to hear that other people besides her daughter think she's wonderful!
I've uploaded all the pictures on to Flickr so they can be nice and big, if you click on the pictures it will take you to a version you can see larger.
This first one is in the category called Another Opening of Another Show and Mum chose to represent the Lord of the Rings, I have posted about this before but we have a large collection of animal skulls.

This one is World Wide Web, and unfortunately the only picture was taken with a shaky hand!

I can't quite remember the name of the class but it does represent Ballet.

This is a miniature class (it measures 25cm across) and again I've forgotten the class title!



This is the entry in the Fantasy class, which was a hanging exhibit to be viewed from all sides,


This is another class name I've forgotten and it's also a little wobbly! It represents a day at the beach.


This final one is in a class called Sporting Life where in true style Mum decided to represent Ice Climbing, we don't do those boring "safe" sports!


Finally, some Nether Garment progress, I have done the first leg, and started the second one, maybe I'll have 2 legs by the time the tour hits Paris!

On the green band I've put a 50p piece (approximately 3cm across) to give some scale.

A day out...

We (my Mum, dad and I) went for a good old fashioned day out today, and for once the British weather decided to be obliging, certainly not wall to wall sunshine and blue skies, but sunny enough to make me regret forgetting the sun cream, my back and shoulders feel a little warm!
We went to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and it was fabulous, some of the sculpture was not my thing, but some of it was amazing. I was particularly taken with some by an artist called Sophie Ryder. she uses a figure of a hare alot in all her sculptures. But she also does wire "drawings" which are amazing, I only have photos of one of these as the others were indoors so I couldn't take photos. I really recomend you take a look at her website.

For me one of the best things about her work was the sense of fun, when she made the original sculpture to be cast in bronze she embedded scrap objects in it, and they just made me smile!


How many household objects can you spot in this hand?




Recognise him?



The trees were also very beautiful, this was the biggest Beech tree any of us have ever seen.

This was the wire drawing I was talking about, so unbelievably clever.


The park also has sculptures by many other artists including Henry Moore.

We wished we'd managed to see the Andy Goldsworthy exhibition as I love his work. There are still a few permanent pieces there, but none of the more natural pieces that I love so much.
The cafe is fabulous, and it's free to get in you just pay car parking of £4. We spent all day there and still didn't managed to see everything. If you want a day out then I really recommend it.