A New Cosy Corner

Florence loves to browse my books as she sits on the conservatory window sill and toasts her toes on the radiator.      She particularly likes the old handwritten ones, enjoying that feeling of connection, through the ink, to the hand which wrote the words so many years ago.

Cosy Corner, the place where I sit to read/write blog posts, do most of my craft work, read my books.     Until last year Cosy Corner was in the kitchen, next to the Rayburn.


Things have changed,  the Rayburn has gone and there is a log burner in the conservatory and this corner has become my favourite.   


Of course that means that the animals have all decided that it is their favourite, too.   If I leave my seat you can be sure that when I return, one of the cats will have taken it, even though they have very cosy beds of their own.





This week hasn't all been about reading or crocheting.      We had a few glimmers of brilliant sunshine the other morning, I was easily tempted out to do a longer walk than normal.   A walk which I haven't done since last autumn - through the village, around some fields, then up to the old gravel pits.

Trouble was, my feet decided to lead me up to the Wild Wood instead.   

This is one of several paths which lead out of the far side of the village.    Over the bridge, follow the muddy path through the barley field and then you can turn left or right.




My intention had been to turn right, but when I reached that point I found myself turning the other way instead.  The Wild Woods then!

We cut along the edge of a field,  crossed this little bridge.     One path leads to the Wild Wood, a remnant of the woodland which covered the land 10,000 years ago.   You can see it in the distance.

Wild Wood

As Toby and I approached, I could hear a woodpecker hard at work hammering on some trees, searching for his breakfast, busy as a workman with a jackhammer.      We didn't venture far inside because

of this.    Old bottles and jars, mangled metal.   In little heaps.    I assume that the trust which owns the woodland has started a programme of making the place clean and safe.    I couldn't risk having Toby cut his pads, so we stuck to the fields margins instead, made do with peering through the hedges and over the boundary ditch.   

Little glimpses of big fairy doors, glorious green moss, brilliant orange lichen.    A place of great beauty.   






I hope you are all enjoying a wonderful weekend.
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Lincolne Shyre and Weather Lore

This is a very early map of Lincolne Shyre/Lincolnshire, dating from around 1600.

The original is beautifully coloured (I have seen a copy) but this image is taken from a black and white photograph in a very old magazine.

Beautiful as it is, I'm glad I don't have to use it to navigate my way around the byways and tracks of Lincolnshire.

For that I print relevant sections of the OS Explorer map,  which is just as well, because sometimes public footpath markers mysteriously disappear. 

Today was was a case in point.    I came over the hills, through fields with spectacular views punctuated by copses of ancient trees.     We were following a plethora of public right of way signs, down a steep hillside and out onto a quiet village lane.  No signs in sight.     Luckily,  I knew I had to turn left, so I did.

I passed a small handful of very quaint cottages with outbuildings, but then the lane disappeared and became a beautifully mowed green swathe bordered by a neatly clipped low privet hedge on one side and a cottage on the other.

I went back along the lane, tried a few other lanes and footpaths, none of them felt right.

Returning to the original grassed lane I decided that it had to be the correct one -  took a deep breath,  then ventured into what is really the cottage garden.   I fully expected an irate cottager to tell me that I was trespassing!

Thirty yards further on, round a bend, there was a public footpath marker.  I had followed the correct path.   Phew!

This photograph was taken when I was even further along the footpath, if you look to the right, middle height, you can see the neatly clipped privet hedge and the green sward of the garden.  The land beyond the hedge is also their garden, they have a public right of way and bridle path running right through it.

This village was listed in the Domesday Book as having 21 households, it has a few more these days,  but not too many.   

The original village church was yet another one which was destroyed by Henry Vane, back in 1658.   He also had the church dismantled in the village I live in, he used the stone to build the manor house. 

The path led through a glacial overflow valley and a site of special scientific interest, because of the soils, habitats and flora.    All I know was that it was muddy after all the recent rain.   There was a chalk stream running through the bottom of the valley, lovely old trees, and shelter from the worst of the cold breeze.

Once through the valley we skirted some more old trees, then found ourselves back out on a lane, a lane which would lead us to Henry Vane's old estate.  Just a few fields more then home.

We had walked about 6 miles.


There is a countryman's saying, found in another old magazine(!), 

"If cold sets in on February 22nd, it will last for fourteen days."

Today is the day.   The garden is heavily frosted and the weather men are burbling on about some cold weather settling in for the next ten days or so.    

These old countrymen knew a thing or two!

Nooooo... You can't Make Me

This poor dog of mine really doesn't like to get his feet wet.  He flung himself backwards and dug his heels in, tail lowered and between his legs.   

A passerby could have been forgiven for thinking that I was being mean to him.

In his opinion I was being very cruel, after all, I know that he doesn't like water, don't I?

The local fields, which we normally walk, are wet, wet, wet.   The rain has come down and the local clay soil is very slippery and awash with muddy water.

I have a tendency to go base over apex in such conditions, so for both our sakes,

I was trying to be kind by walking him along our quiet lane to a much drier, local bridle path on slightly higher ground.

A short walk down to the watermill, up the hill and branch off to the right

along a green bridle lane.

Simple!

We finally made it this far, perhaps two or three hundred yards, it was hard work.      I stopped and had a chat to the mill owner, and a local farmer.       They were highly amused at the sight of me having to coax and cajole a dog to take a walk, their grins said it all.    I'm used to it, I have been coaxing and encouraging Toby dog for over four years now.   It is just as well that I am patient.

The mill itself looks as though it is sitting in a huge pond of weak tea and the water is very high, much to the delight of the wildfowl.

Soggy, boggy and gloomy.   Can't blame Toby for being less than enthusiastic really. 

I noticed there is a lot of rubbish strewn along the road between the railway bridge and the turn off to the watermill.   I intended to go back with my little grabber gadget and a couple of bags - one for recycling, the other for rubbish, but the heavens opened and I decided to save that little treat for another day.   Lucky me.

Instead I went to visit a couple of local friends and this little chap, Bill.

Other than that, I did a little baking ready for when my grandchildren come back from school (we have them for a couple of hours, until their parents come home), tried to do my best Florence Nightingale nursing for my husband, he's got bronchitis again, and that pretty much sums up my day in soggy Lincolnshire.

It rained heavily through the night.

I expect another less than sparkling day.   Thank goodness for books and a warm fireside.
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Waking Ned

This is the old railway line, decommissioned in the 1960's, thanks to Dr Beeching.  A local farmer owns this stretch of it, dog walkers use it.

I used to walk along there four times a day.   That was when we first came to live in Parsonage Cottage.  We had three dogs.   Pip, Toby, and Ned.

This is Ned, he was a very large dog.   He belonged to my daughter and son-in-law, but as they were at work all day it fell to me to look after him.   Somehow that looking after him also meant that we fed him and he slept here, too...    He was a rescue dog, of course.    

He was deaf and hadn't had suitable training.   His deafness made life quite difficult for him.   Eventually I managed to teach him some hand signals, simple commands, which made life a little easier, although he still got very easily startled by things 'suddenly happening'.    He was a heavy sleeper and had to be gently woken.  That pesky deafness.

On one occasion we had to put all the dogs in kennels as we had to attend a family funeral at the other end of the country.   I had explained to them about his deafness and special needs, was assured that they would handle him carefully.  When we picked him up the young girl who fetched him delighted in telling me how she'd spooked him when she took him his breakfast and again later in the day.     He was never put into kennels again.  

He'd just follow his 'pack' - and given that they were led by Pip, a very intelligent and manipulative terrier, you can probably imagine that it was bedlam at times.

Pip was a little older and extremely bright.  She got me turned out of a dog class once, so that the trainer could show how well trained and intelligent she was.  She was the bright star of the class, as long as I wasn't with her.

I learned my lesson.   

We didn't return to class.

The third member of the pack was my little Toby.  Sweetest dog ever, though he thought he was a love machine when we first got him from the rescue kennels.   He was a kind-natured dog, loved travelling, wanted only to be with his humans.

Walks were - interesting.   

I found out the hard way, that I simply wasn't strong enough to hold all three on their leads when Pip got some mischief in her head.   

On one memorable occasion I had let them run free at a wild and deserted bit of seaside and then clipped their leads on to walk down the side of a quiet canal on the way back to the car.   I always chose my time carefully, normally we didn't meet anyone, but I was constantly scanning the horizon.

So was Pip.

She saw someone in the distance with a Yorkshire Terrier and set up such a hullabaloo, setting the two boys off.  She began to run towards her bit of mischief, so did the others.   I managed to hang on to the leads but lost my footing and was dragged along behind them.

Try picking yourself up with dignity after that!

The only consolation was that I hadn't let go of the leads.  I still had three dogs and we were quite a lot nearer the car.   I swear Pip laughed all the way home.

Then we moved to Parsonage Cottage.  Walks changed.  No need to bundle all the dogs into the car to find somewhere quiet to walk.  We are surrounded by quiet walks.

Just one problem.  To get to the nearest one, the old railway line, I have to walk about a hundred yards down a quiet lane.   Walking the three dogs together was simply not an option, even down a quiet lane.   

So I had to split them into two.  First I would walk Pip with Toby, that pairing worked because Toby was much slighter and more obedient.  

Then I would walk big Ned with Toby.  That pairing worked because Ned would follow Toby's lead and Toby wasn't being led astray by Pip.

Twice a day we'd perform this ritual, the rest of the time the dogs made do with our gardens and woodland.    Toby and I got very fit with all our walks.

That bit of old railway line became very familiar to me.

This week, I walked it with my daughter-in-law, Poppy.   It was fascinating to see it through her fresh eyes and to hear her enthusing over all the things which I used to find so exciting.

The acorns, berries, fungi, animal burrows, the birds.

It was truly wonderful.  She transformed something which has become so ordinary back into something magical and exciting.  I am very grateful to her.

(Dobson enjoyed her company, too.  Dobson is a single dog.  I know my limitations.)

We found a couple of ancient puffball mushrooms, it is difficult to tell from this snap but it is the size of a football.

We collected some acorns, simply because they are so pretty and plenty of blackberries.

Sloe gin to the left, Bramble/Blackberry Vodka to the right.  

This week has also seen our granddaughter start school, suddenly he brother seems so much older.    Now we have two for tea and fun.

Dobson loves his job as chief floor cleaner.   

Foraging

Yesterday evening, as I was walking Dobson, I spotted some plums

on the woodland floor.

I looked up and found half a dozen trees

laden with this glorious bounty.

I've been back today and picked a few.

Don't you just love the bloom on them?

These are destined to be made into a plum and apple crumble

one to eat now, the other for the freezer.

(the courgettes are from the vegetable garden)

I took a really long walk yesterday

heading off deep into the countryside.

The field hedgerows are filled with these beauties.

I shall return and pick some another day.

I walked through fields which I haven't visited for about four years,

not since my old dog began to find that particular walk a bit too far

for his old legs.

This time it was my old legs which protested.

I shall be sure to start doing that walk more often,

it was a really good work-out.

I couldn't resist calling in to the little churchyard

at

Dovecot Dell.

It may look a mess, but I was thrilled to see just how much hard work

has been done here.   

Someone has been working hard

to clear the brambles and masses of ivy.

It is a beautiful place with some very fancy stones for such a small churchyard.

Next time I shall take my specs so that I can read the inscriptions

and perhaps my gardening gloves to assist with the clearance.

The fancy stones are interesting, but the ones which touch me most deeply

are these tiny ones.

fliss&max

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