Hello, hello here I am...over here!
- I'm finding it so, so hard to juggle my time at the moment with having to work everyday! How do people manage who have to work full-time all the time/run a home/have 3 teenage children at home and sitting exams/have far too many interests to squeeze into one day/and find themselves stuck in bed with migraines 4 out of 5 of the last weekends? Phew..the house is quite unrecognisable with mess/clutter and dirt and I've just had to let some things go - my blogging being one of them. But I have missed this space and am ignoring the dirty floor to sit and chat to you for a while. But I've had a great week this week and here's why.
:: A new crochet obsession- the 'ordinarily extraordinary' blanket ::
(thanks to the delicious and most wonderful Tif)
:: Singing in a choral workshop in Salisbury Cathedral last Saturday ::
(ooh, I was seriously excited about that folks. I asked Anth to take a photo and I'm afraid they came out a bit blurred to say the least but I've put an arrow pointing to where I am!)
Talking choirs - I spent a large part of my childhood in a church choir and I am desperately yearning to join another that has all the musical parts or a choral society. I'm finding it hard to find one locally but the search is on as the need to sing choral music seems to have been reawakened. It must have been all those times sitting behind the choir in the Quire in Salisbury Cathedral and being so moved by the soaring voices that I am covered in goose bumps and I have a lump in my throat. It is in my blood though as my father used to a chorister at New College Oxford and my lovely aunt Madelyn has her own choir and a beautiful voice. (Though mine does need working on so some lessons might be in order first.)
:: Discovering a new anthem ::
Carrying on from my choral bliss last weekend I was sent into the stars quite literally at Evensong when listening to the choir perform this anthem by Jonathan Dove, 'Seek Him that Maketh The Seven Stars'
I had the privilege of being seated in the Quire right behind them so was fully immersed in the beautiful sound which I confess moved me to tears. You can listen to a version here on YouTube but it isn't as good as the Salisbury Cathedral version on their CD, Praise & Thanksgiving Anthems (in my humble opinion) Don't tell anyone but I'm actually going to buy the sheet music so I can learn to sing it properly by myself so I can sing along to the CD! How sad is that? I told you I just had to sing in a choir didn't I! Well a girl's got to do what a girl's got to do.
Seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion
and turneth the shadow of death into the morning.
Alleluia, yea, the darkness shineth as the day,
the night is light about me. Amen.
Words Amos 5:8 and Psalm 139
:: The receiving of the most wonderful gift ::
Sometimes, very occasionally, I find myself lost for words. A week or 2 ago was one of those times. I was so very blessed to be gifted the most loveliest crochet cushion by sweet Emma from way 'up North'. The fact that someone actually made it for me still makes me tear up because I have never even met her and the hours of work that has gone into this...I'm welling up again. Sigh. You should see the back, it's just as lovely as the front.
The rest of the family were touched by Emma's generosity too and I have noticed them each studying the cushion carefully when it arrived - probably, me thinks, wanting to see what a real life finished crochet project looks like...hmm.
Emma, words still fail me xxxxxxxx
:: Alice has started to crochet ::
Well let's not get too excited just yet. She has started to chain stitch but has really enjoyed doing that and has made bracelets for her friends - so there's hope she might be turning out cushions like Emma by Christmas and I won't have to make any presents this year as she will! She's not interested in the least in making anything else so this photo is probably the last you'll see. Shame. I have to laugh because as soon as she said she wanted to learn I was up off my seat and over to the bookcase pulling out all my 'how-to' crochet books as fast as my little legs could carry me. The hooks were out and a choice of yarn colours thrust under her nose. Hopefully I'll be proved wrong and she'll be on her first granny blanket by next month and actually finish them, unlike her mother.
Wardrobe post coming up...
