out and about...a trip to cragside

dear radio times and national trust, thanks ever so for the voucher to get into cragside for free yesterday. me and my friend had a lovely day out in the fresh air with the smell of autumn crowding our nostrils and the woods all atmospheric and slightly misty. the flask of tea served in enamel cups (like camping) with shortbread biscuits to share was delicious (thanks to me for that bit).

the house had its own sauna, lit with the first non-commerical use of light bulbs in the world, designed by joseph swan...here's the reflection on the floor

the plunge pool

i couldn't use the flash in the house so the photos aren't the best ever.

something a little more serious...eric and his bin crusade

eric’s at it again with his bins.

not content with ruining bradford city council in the late 80s, eric pickles, secretary of state for communities and local government, is intent on damaging all councils through his extensive cuts and ridiculous hobby horses such as weekly bin collections, flags and council newspapers and magazines. he specialises in contradictions – championing localism and claiming to give councils power to do what they know is right yet micromanaging councils on things like council taxes increases, numbers of magazines a council can publish and how frequent a council should collect their bins.

he pursues his bin crusade with all the senseless, fanatical fervour of the original crusaders. this crusade has reached new heights today with the announcement of a new £250million fund to support councils to deliver a weekly bin collection service. he insisted in the department for communities and local government press release about the story that a weekly bin collection is a ‘basic right’. this is at a time of austerity where central and local government budgets are being dramatically cut, seriously affecting the lives of vulnerable people in the uk. i really don’t know where the money is from or what is not being paid for to release it.

eric thinks that a weekly bin collection will encourage recycling and reduce vermin and fly-tipping despite research (that I can’t find now, sorry) that shows that a less frequent bin collection correlates with an increase in recycling. perhaps, as someone I follow on twitter said today, the £250million is to pay for increases in landfill fines.

i wrote to eric in february about bin collections, recycling and home composting plus a few other issues like nudging, what taxes pay for and how councils communicate with their residents. i really enjoyed writing my letter so I thought I’d share it with you. i did get a reply from an officer from local government procurement on eric’s behalf. unfortunately it didn’t answer any of my questions and tried to reassure me about eric’s commitment to a weekly bin collection when my letter said I really wanted my bins collecting every two weeks. oh dear. i should have chased it up at the time but didn’t get round to it.

you may also be interested that I sent my letter in the post but included a ps saying i didn’t mind getting an email response because i knew money was a bit tight at their end…and yes, i did get a reply by email.

• my letter to eric
• local government procurement letter to me 

i’m clearly feeling brave today as not only am i writing this post but i’m also going to share it via twitter…the first time for me…perhaps more people than my one regular reader (my boyfriend) will read it, gulp. i feel quite nervous now...hope it will all be ok.

ps i've never being especially sure about sharing letters like this - in a way it feels like private correspondence - are there any issues about doing this? eric's pronouncement today has annoyed me enough to say sod it and just do it.

home sweet home...happiness is...

...an empty upstairs flat...the neighbours from hell have moved out! bliss.

out in the (neighbour's) garden...scrumping blackberries and apples

last week i went scrumping for apples and blackberries in my neighbour's garden, and got quite a haul - a jumper full of apples and a yellow bowl full of blackberries

which has turned into apple and blackberry puree from nigel slater's real fast puddings, yum. the photo doesn't look that exciting but it did taste delicious and was a perfect topping to my cereal last week with yogurt.

it's not as bad as it sounds - my upstairs neighbour's garden is behind mine - there's no fence, it's extremely overgrown and the upstairs tenants never use it so i might as well have the fruit than it go to waste, simply to make the wasps drunk on the sugar!

there's many more apples on the tree so there'll be plenty of appley food stuffs in the coming weeks. there's also some red ones waiting to ripen so an apple and blackberry crumble may be in order.

today (sunday 4 september) i had another raiding trip resulting in another bowl of blackberries, and about 20 apples. i gave some to a friend in an impromptu produce exchange (i came off best i think with rainbow chard, swede, green beans, yellow courgettes, broad beans); i'll take some to work; and will cook up the rest tomorrow evening. fab.

home sweet home...a colourful treat

how beautiful are these gladioli?  a treat for me from me. the colour is so incredible it has made my brain go empty, i have no words to describe them. the petals are wonderfully rich looking, like silk, like velvet, slightly dusky, tremendous.

 

and to think they were only £2 - half price, british grown flowers - a little price but a huge value!

getting crafty...vintage map garlands

i was really lucky to stumble upon a whole box of vintage maps ranging from fairly ancient cloth automobile maps to more modern (80s?) european city paper maps. i've got lots of ideas to use them in my crafting projects and my first idea that has come to fruition is the vintage map garlands for hampshire open studios along with the vintage button magnets. what's even better is that one of the maps i used covers portsmouth, which is just around the corner from the event! i couldn't have planned it better!

these garlands are made from very old cloth bartholomew's quarter inch automobile map of great britain numbers 22 (london southwards) and 21 (portsmouth) threaded on to green and red cotton wool. here's a snap - sorry the bag is a bit shiny...

it did feel difficult cutting up a beautiful old map, musky with age, and threading it up in to a garland but at least this allows others to appreciate its fabulousness, just in a different form. i've got plans for the little bits left over so not much will go to waste.

getting crafty...vintage button magnets

P's brother and his girlfriend invited me to contribute some crafty items to their studio space as part of hampshire open studios. outside of their day jobs they are both photographers and have set up a studio, purbeck cottage studio, to show their work and provide space for visiting artists.

i was thrilled to take part (even though i may be breaking the rules as i'm not a hampshire based artist) and have risen to the challenge with some vintage button magnets and vintage map garlands (a big vintage theme going on, clearly).

i'm really pleased with the button magnets. i used the buttons i've been collecting for years (some from my grandma, from my mum, from tins of buttons at car boot sales) from my button jar, which is an ancient pickled onion jar (don't worry, there's no lingering smell!) and some of those fancy neodymium super-strong magnets.

i've tried hard with the packaging too and have used some vintage matchbox labels featuring indian gentlemen, which i think look rather fetching. what do you think?

 i'll upload a post about the garlands in the next day or two.