Extreme Knitting Redhead: After the snow

Friday, February 1, 2013

After the snow

After the snow comes the inevitable melt. As the ground is already sodden from all the rain we've had over the last few months this has resulted in more squelchiness (I don't care if it isn't a real word!) in the fields with flooding in the lower areas.

This fox is now a regular visitor and the horses pay little or no attention to him as he goes about his business.

The ladies with beards of hay!

I took the next few photos on my 15 mile run last weekend. The weather was vile when I woke up with pouring rain and a strong wind so I delayed my run until late morning. This was a good plan as by then the rain had abated and the sun was shining although the wind was still quite strong.

Ditches with water overflowing from the fields

Time to get my feet wet

The acid-yellow flowers of gorse shone in the low light

It was a good run at a good pace and I was relieved not to have too many Darth Vader moments!

Rye in the sunshine

Having been 'stir-crazy' whilst the snow was around, Mike and I took ourselves off to visit the pretty little town of Rye. It's such a lovely place to potter around with lots to see and excellent coffee shops for refreshments. The streets are narrow and many of them still have cobbles which are not easy to walk on, especially on the steeper slopes!

There was a secondhand book fair on and I came away with 6 wonderful poetry books by poets I didn't know and Mike found some interesting books on music so we were both happy.

We took a walk through the churchyard of The Parish Church of St Mary, a beautiful stone built building with a lovely churchyard. The sun shone on the gravestones and this beautiful tree caught my eye. Just look at the peeling bark. I'm pretty sure it's Acer Griseum, aka the paper-bark maple.

The other things that caught my eye were these 2 wonderful canopies over doorways. The first one is Cap Gris Nez (which literally translates as 'grey nosed cape'), overlooking the harbour. I've walked past it many times but never noticed the beautiful mermaids before.

Cap Gris Nez

Mermaid detail

The next one belongs to The Tower House, a property available for holiday rental. I think they used to offer bed and breakfast some time ago.

The Tower House

2-colour brioche

I've finally got to grips with using 2 colours in brioche stitch and so I completed this swatch showing different techniques.

The lower section is just 2 colours in plain brioche stitch. Then the diagonal section is called 'syncopation' where the colours are reversed. I think it's quite effective. Then the final section shows increases and decreases to create a sort of fern pattern.

It looks quite different on each side:

The light side

The dark side

Now it's time to start a 2-colour scarf.............

Bread

I'm not quite sure why I've started showing photos of my various breads but what the heck! Here we have San Francisco Sourdough bread which is one of our favourites. It's from a book we've had for ages and refer to frequently.

It's not for the faint-hearted as it takes a week to make but it's well worth the wait as it tastes amazing, toasts well and keep for ages. The dough quantity is enough for 2 loaves so I always freeze one for later.

San Francisco Sourdough Bread

A beautiful texture!

2 comments:

Shan said...: LOVE the fox, love the maple, love the sourdough! Did you know the longer it takes to make the bread, the longer it keeps? Hence sourdough keeps ages, and French, which is only a couple of hours, keeps no more than about 1.5 days at most.; February 10, 2013 at 7:51:00 PM PST
Susie Hewer said...: Thanks Shan. I know our little bit of snow pales into insignificance when compared with yours! I love the whole process of making sourdough bread. It feels as if the slower pace of preparation makes it extra special and therefore more nourishing (silly, I know). Hope your running is going well - I'll pop over and check later.; February 14, 2013 at 1:02:00 AM PST

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Mum's Story

In 1997 my mother, then aged 81, had a series of minor strokes. Shortly after that we started to notice behavioural changes notably memory loss and confusion over everyday items. We thought it was just old age finally catching up with her. Then she started wandering and had violent mood swings. Although she already lived with us it became obvious that she couldn't be left alone for long and so I left my job to care for her. The next few years saw a gradual decline into the blackness that is 'vascular dementia'. My normally placid mum became violent and aggressive. She had psychotic incidents where she would see imaginary people (children hiding in her wardrobe, Russians sitting on the stairs, women stealing her clothes) and she would shout at them and sometimes throw things too. She was so convincing that we used to go and check that there wasn't anyone there! When my sister died mum did not know who Judy was or that she was her daughter. There came a point when I suddenly realised she no longer knew that I was her daughter and this was a terrible time for me. In the last 2 years that she lived with us, life for us all became almost unbearable as she needed 24 hour care - she couldn't be left alone at all because she would either wander off or hurt herself, she never slept for more than 30 minutes at a time during the night, she became incontinent and incapable of doing anything for herself. Finally my husband and I realised that we could no longer provide her with the care that she needed and she went to live in a special care home where the team did a splendid job caring for her in the last few months of her life. There she lived a zombified existence unaware of who she was, what she was or where she was. It was heartbreaking. She died in March 2005, the day after her 89th birthday.

Thank you for taking the time to read mum's story and I hope you'll dig deep and sponsor me using the link below to help find a way of beating this destructive disease.