Dear Zoo

Happy Birthday!

I've passed my half century, along with my First Ever Best Buddy Beth, Cerys Matthews of 6 Music, and the Open University. Balloons and cake to us all!

Like your typical eight year old fifty year old, I made the excellent decision to take a picnic to the zoo.  I say zoo, I mean the Yorkshire Wildlife Park in Doncaster which is a friendly and excellent place.  It functions partly as a normal zoo and partly retirement home for animals no longer in the zoo breeding programme. It's one of my favourite places and somewhere all five of us enjoy.

Feeling pretty lazy, I bought a pack of fondant fancies to serve as a mini birthday cake. Feeling hungry, I made spanokopita to take with us on the picnic.

Leeds used to have a place called Salt's Deli, and their spanokopita was to die for. They vanished some years back and I really had a hankering for the lovely spinach and filo pie. As usual, I turned to Felicity Cloake of The Guardian for recipe advice. I roughly followed her recipe here.

I reduced the spinach from 1kg to 750g and would recommend increasing the feta to 350g. Chopping and massaging a tablespoon of salt through the fresh spinach did work, but I had to put it in a colander with heavy weights on to help remove the excess liquid.

It was a pretty easy recipe and I highly endorse it - it was delicious and kept me in lunches for several days. My VEM Kirsty had a taste and went home to cook it herself.

We had a brilliant time at the Wildlife Park. The baboons were busy with new babies, and freaking out about a male mallard that was somehow terribly threatening as he swan serenely around the pond. There were fights over a stick, brawls over getting too close to the babies, sibling jealousy, male posturing and female impatience with all this crap.  Pretty much like the rest of us. Except for the mallard phobia, obviously. That was just weird.

The painted dogs were remarkably laid back in the face of their neighbours' noisy chaos. I'd swear one of them was rolling her eyes, but anthropomorphising is too easy. 

One of my great delights is visiting the polar bears in their 10 acre playground. Polar bears are HUGE. Really, really huge. Not "gosh, that's big" type of beast, more "Holy Geez, look at the the size of him!" It's hard not to want to go in and give them a cuddle, even if they'd eat you - they are gorgeous and hey, a bear's got to eat. You don't get to be the world's largest land carnivore without a heck of an appetite. This is beautifully demonstrated by the sign on the staff entrance to the bear enclosure "Do You Know Where The Bears Are?"

Victor is my favourite. He's a behemoth of a bear - old, wonderful, father of 10,  grandfather of many. He had a lovely swim in his lake and spent a lot of time blowing bubbles because he can.  

I love the capybaras and the maras; if a rabbit and a deer had babies, they'd be maras. For my 40th birthday my Best Woman SJ bought me a hutch and two guinea pigs (Lola and Lotta because they were small and very funny) and it's hard not to see the capybaras as giant free-range guinea pigs, happily bimbling around and dozing in the sun. They *definitely* want a cuddle and a scratch on the back.

Guinea pigs on steroids

We were delighted to see the tiny baby anteater, Licky Minaj, having a cuddle with her mum then having a little wander in the outside world. She's ridiculously cute. Top work crowd-sourcing the name, YWP. No Anty McAntface for you.

Our big surprise of the day was discovering that armadillos go jogging. Watching them trot in opposite direction around their well-worn circuit had us transfixed for ages. Sure, the marmosets were cute, and it was exciting last time when they escaped, but jogging armadillos are adorable.

After our picnic, a visit to the tigers and giraffes, total failure to find the Amur leopards and a pause to admire the black rhino standing to attention, we met with Elvis the Emu. Elvis is under the misapprehension he's an ostrich. No one wants to hurt his feelings, so he lives in the African enclosure and hangs out with the female ostrich who's too polite to say anything. Maybe it's in the name.  We adopted a hen called Elvis from my good friend Lisa recently. She and her lads all refer to Elvis as "he" despite Elvis laying eggs daily.  Emu, ostrich, boy hen... Live your best lives, Elvis.

It was a lovely day spent with my best people. Dinner at Salvo's and home again to indulge in another birthday treat - watching the live-action Peter Pan from 2003, which remains one of my favourite film.

Over coming weeks I've a series of workshops, courses and performances to enjoy as I continue my bid to make this a year I look outwards rather than in. Textile printing, glass work, sewing garments, seeing ballets and shows... 50 has a lot to look forward to.

I'm handsome and I know it

Some Diems Need To Be Carpe'd

the fairy-like elegance of the Arctic Tern

Much of the UK tracks the televisual seasons of the year by Strictly, talent shows or celebrities in a jungle. Those aren't really my sort of thing.
I count down the days to Doctor Who, Game of Thrones and, most especially, Springwatch.

Springwatch is one of those creations that is so much a part of BBC's culture it's like the Beeb distilled. It's earnest, a bit geeky, silly, incredibly local and yet also national, and is grounded in a will to educate and inspire. I love the presenters even when they drive me crazy, I love the stories that carry across from year to year (Monty the Osprey! Chris the Cuckoo!) and I especially love how excited it makes me about new species every time.

A while back, Iolo Williams reported from the Farne Islands. As well as the adorable puffins, it was the Arctic Terns that amazed me. They had put a tracker on a tern to see if their estimation of the distances he flew was accurate.  Not a chance - he flew 97,000km in a single year. What a champion.

I wanted to see them myself - what an incredible sight it was, those thousands of birds ad grey seals  coming to stay on these rocky islands. Last year we just didn't have the opportunity. This June, we grabbed a two day gap while Mark was still not working and went north.

The Farnes were everything I'd hoped - stunning, exciting, teeming with wildlife and lit up by warm summer sun.

It was only through help of my ace friends that I could seize the chance to abscond overnight and see this marvellous sight, and I am very grateful.  The trip will stay with me for the rest of my life.

The stacks - more birds nesting than is plausible 

Glossy, gorgeous guillemot and her brood

Arctic terns thought Mark was a well dodgy geezer

keeping a watchful eye for the thieving gulls

every dot is a returning puffin

Razorbills are very handsome

back on the mainland, looking over a beautiful sea

Festival goer

Massive crowds, long queues for portaloos, a everyone there a massive fan: festivals are as much a fixture of the year as Wimbledon or the Proms. But you can keep for Glastonburys and your Reading festivals; the one for me is Yarndale.

Last year I blogged about the first ever festival of all things woolly and yarn-related in the beautiful Yorkshire town of Skipton. This year, the team of 5 behind the event learnt from last year's successes and glitches to stage a show that was bigger, better organised and still remained incredibly friendly and welcoming.

My Very Excellent Mate Rachel and I went to Skipton by train, then caught the courtesy bus to the show grounds. The lovely old Routemaster with its jaunty bunting was a lovely way to travel.   As we pulled up and saw the queues to get in, I felt a little smug about buying tickets in advance so we could just saunter past them all.

Our carriage approaches!

About 100 yards of people queueing

Last year's bunting filled the halls and decorated a cafe area, but the wall of crocheted mandalas sent in by over 1100 fans of the Attic 24 blog was the eye-catching exhibit this year. They were fantastic. I wish I could have shown you them all but my photo of them turned out blurry - I guess I was jostled as I took it.  I guess that shouldn't be a surprise to me. For the first 3 hours we didn't so much walk around the displays as get swept along by the tide of people cramming the venue to bursting.

The problems of last year - not enough toilet facilities, nowhere near enough catering, nowhere to sit - were much improved. Lots of portaloos, a new large cafe area and some stall spaces left empty except for chairs so there was a place to sit and eat sandwiches or just rest aching feet. 

Rach said it was crucial we had tea and cake at some point during the day. We passed so many little cafes and tea shops on the bus up to the grounds, but knew they'd be closed by the time we left the festival. Despite her intentions, when we got to the front of the cafe queue in the venue itself it was the locally made pork pies that had her waxing lyrical. It was one of those "didn't know you'd missed them until you had them again" moments - a proper, hand made pork pie with wonderful pastry.

(I'm taking her word for it. I don't eat meat. The custard tart was nice, though)

One of my favourite things about Yarndale is how lovely the people are. A stallholder called Jo taught me how to crochet without needing a foundation chain. That will mean nothing to most of you but to me it means I can tackle loads of projects I'd shied away from because I am RUBBISH at foundation chain crochet. I am very grateful to Jo for taking 5 minutes to show me until I understood how to do it myself.

I bumped into the teacher of my NCT antenatal class from 15 years ago, a woman I took sugar craft courses alongside and a former neighbour.  we hailed each other like long lost mates, all caught up in the friendliness and enthusiasm of the day.

Jo Speckley from the lovely Baa Ram Ewe spent ages with Rachel helping her choose the ideal yarns for a very gorgeous and adventurous scarf. Rach now knows precisely what she wants for Christmas from her family. I love the colours of the Titus yarns nearly as much as I love the names - eccup, chevin, aire...

While Rach shopped, I did a workshop on advanced crochet booked months ago. Finding myself rows and rows behind the others in the the workshop after 10 minutes, I had an urge to scuttle out in embarrassment. I wasn't a complete beginner but perhaps trying 'advanced' was sheer chutzpah on my part.  However,  it wouldn't be in keeping with the spirit of Fearlessly Attempting things to give up. I was clearly the duffer of the bunch but with perseverance I learnt some fab new stitches and feel confident I could do them again. 

What was particularly lovely was the effort and thoughtfulness of the tutor, Maureen, in hand-making each one of us a Work in Progress bag to keep the project in - complete with french seams, beaded drawstring and a little lavender sachet to stop our yarn getting musty. The bags had yarn, patterns and a crochet hook in as well. It was fab of her. 

When we met up again, Rach took me to a stall with knitted knickers as bunting and a fantastic pair of fingerless gloves with 'tattoos' on them. I also loved the shawl/scarf in bright triangles. Fellow Yarndale fans on Facebook tell me it's a pattern called Wingspan. I'd love to try it.

I loved this collection of tiny needle-felted birds that charmed all my kids when they saw the photo. That small lad's hand reaching out to them on the photo was typical - no one could resist touching them.

Actually, that's another striking aspect of the day. It's a tactile overload. The yards were so soft or luxurious or scratchy - we shopped by feel just as much as by eye. Some of the fine carded wool was so soft and snuggly you longed to surround yourself in it and fall asleep - what a cloud would feel like if dreamt by a child. I bought some beautiful and very expensive merino and silk mix yarn in lace weight (that means very fine) as a present for Mark's mum. She wanted to make a shawl and asked me to keep an eye out for something special.  It felt so lovely it almost seems a shame to do anything other than stroke it. I think it will knit up beautifully.

For myself I bought a much cheaper yarn to attempt a crochet pattern I admired and a kit to make a hooked rug Christmas stocking from Hooked By Design. I'd admired the kits she had last year but had run out of money. I was determined to keep enough cash on one side to buy one this year. I also picked up a pleasingly dinky tin of pins from The Stitch Society. Their gorgeous attention to detail in packaging and a shared dislike for cutesy embellishments had Rachel and I hankering after most of their stuff. Some teal merino and silk yarn from the Mrs Moon stall was to die for, but they hadn't got it in stock, only made up in a shawl on their display.

It's a good job Yarndale works on cash only - I spent all I'd brought right down to my last £1. Had I been able to use a credit card we'd have needed a new mortgage to cover it.

Obviously it would be madness to go to Yarndale and not say hi to Lucy from Attic 24. It must be weird to find yourself such a celebrity at the event you've organised. There was a queue to speak to her some of the time.  Every time we passed the Knit and Natter lounge I could see she was surrounded by people. She was friendly, welcoming and interested in people. I expect she'll sleep for a month and be a hermit to recover after such intense socialising. It must be absolutely exhausting.

 Rachel and I stayed at Yarndale to the very end. Then we walked back to Skipton along the Yarn Walk in the evening sunshine, charmed by wild rabbits grazing, a hot air balloon drifting though the trees and a park decked out with bunting, yarn-bombed bikes and lampposts, and brightly crocheted signs.

See you next year, Yarndale!

Changing my mind

This year the Grand Depart of the Tour de France was in Yorkshire. If you live here you couldn't escape it - for months it's been the focus of events, festivals, exhibitions, the whole nine yards. There is a basic insanity in a French cycle race whizzing around Yorkshire (seriously, what's that even about? The Tour d'Italia left from Belfast, too. It's madness) Suspect geography aside, I was all for it. I have many cycling enthusiast friends and I knew it would make them happy.

But personally? I couldn't care less. I don't ride a bike. I don't want to ride a bike. I am not interested in watching other people ride bikes.  I'd see them go past because it's An Event and I approve of Events in my city but it all left me a bit blank, really.  Like when the Olympics came to London in 2012 - nice for people who like that sort of thing but I don't want to watch people doing PE so I didn't bother with it.

That was before.

Before crazy, lovely knitters made 23,500 tiny Tour de France jerseys as bunting. Before the city's flower beds were replanted yellow. Before Yorkshire Tea had commemorative boxes made. Before the sun shone, the whole county came out to stand and cheer, and the glorious event kicked off in style.

It was wonderful. People laughing and chatting, the promotional vehicles flinging key rings and gewgaws into the crowds, police motorbike riders high-fiving everyone. 

The cyclists were an anticlimax as they flashed by because they were in a big pack, whizzing past us on their way to the official start line at Harewood House. They weren't racing as such on our bit of the route.  They were also bunched up so close it was hard to pick out individuals from the peleton. Clearly the hillsides were the place to be for the exciting race stuff. 

After the cyclists had gone by we walked home for lunch. I only meant to turn the race on the telly so our visitors could see it but I was hooked and watched the whole thing. From cheeky Jens claiming King of the Mountains to the drama as Mark Cavendish crashed out metres from the finish line I was fascinated.

I haven't kept up with it since - I think I need my friend Alison with me to explain who is who to properly enjoy it. But I remain immensely proud of this region for putting on such a good natured, enthusiastic and beautiful show. Three cheers for the remarkable Gary Verity for bringing the Tour de France here. If he can make a convert out of this doubter, he can do anything.

Chasing rainbows

Hello, webby mates,

Last night we went on a wild goose chase. Mark, the kids and I went out chasing rainbows at night - the Northern Lights. We knew it was a slim chance, we knew the kids would be horrid the next morning but we did it anyway and it's one of the things I love about our family.

About 5 o'clock yesterday afternoon there were talks of the Northern Lights being visible in Britain. Not the North of Scotland, but right down into England and North Wales as well. I know newspapers like to whip up a bit of drama when there is only a slight possibility of something happening, so I tried to lower my expectations. It didn't work. Even a whisper of the aurora had me bouncing on my toes with excitement.

I once almost saw the lights in Canada as a kid. We lived in Southern Ontario - about the same latitude as Milan - so in 15 years my parents only saw the aurora borealis twice. The first time I was a toddler. The second time I was about 13. My parents woke me up to see but I was so groggy with deep sleep I couldn't focus and fell back into my slumber without registering the sight at all. I have regretted it ever since. Like many people I have promised myself that one day I will finally see them. Whatever it takes.

Over the past few days the sun had thrown a strop. This solar activity resulted in a coronal mass ejection, or CME. This meant that electromagnetic particles and a plasma of photons and electrons were sent out into the solar system. As a CME hits Earth it can cause a display of the aurora to be seen beyond its usual boundaries.  Add to this the fact that we're in the peak of the 11 year aurora cycle and there was cause for cautious optimism. Or "Northern Lights To Be Visible In Cotswolds" if you are a headline writer.

Obviously light pollution and cloud cover would  prevent us from seeing the lights even if they reached England. However, if I'm prepared to save up to go to Scandinavia to see the lights, getting clear of the city is nothing. It was a school night, so as responsible parents we should consider the effect of a midnight jaunt on the children's education.  On the other hand, seeing the aurora would be pretty darn enriching. Far more so than the PE lessons 2 of the kids faced today.
Mark and I talked it over and decided to risk it.

He assembled the telescope my Very Excellent Mate SJ donated to us this week. I looked up areas within an hour's drive north of us with little light pollution and a clear forecast. Our best bet seemed to be Sutton Bank in the North York Moors National Park. There was patchy cloud cover forecast with some clear spells and best of all it is a Dark Skies Discovery Site, meaning it is recommended for star gazing.

I filled hot water bottles and flasks and we drove out about 10pm.  The Aurora Watch website and the NOAA were busy downgrading the likelihood of the lights being visible as we made our preparations. However, Miss B was giddy with excitement at a late night adventure and even a slim chance was enough to keep me motivated.  We set off into the darkness.

The drive went by quickly. B fell asleep within about 5 minutes. There was little to see until we arrived in the National Park area, when we had to swerve to avoid a large hare. Hare are ENORMOUS in comparison with rabbits. It was very cool.

The star gazing was more than cool. It was very, very cold. Those hot water bottles came into their own!
Our 14 year old was very proud to have focused the telescope on the bright moon and we took turns peering at the craters.  Jupiter was the next brightest thing we saw, which was also pretty neat.  I saw a shooting star. Obviously that called for a rousing chorus of The Shooting Star song by They Might Be Giants before we retreated to the warmth of the car to wait out some cloud cover.

 I read aloud from Miss B's storybook, the lads played on their tablets and Mark played chess against his phone. Whenever the skies cleared we'd bob outside again - Mark and our eldest playing with the telescope and me staring to the north horizon willing it to light up. We lasted until 12:15 am, when the cloud in the north had thickened and the Aurora Watch index made it clear there was nothing likely to happen.

Somehow, although seeing the Northern Lights would have been beyond wonderful, we still headed home in good spirits. We'd been out adventuring. We'd gone somewhere new, and we'd stayed out on a school night and didn't even care. The younger two fell asleep in the car again; Mark and I drank tea from the flask and chatted as we drove. By1:20 am we were home, huddled up under duvets drifting to sleep.

Of course this morning was difficult. Of course the kids were late - although not our insomniac eldest, who broke with his usual habit and got to school on time.  Filling in the school's Late Book, I decided to be honest about the reason.

Reason for Lateness: Irresponsible parents.

Getting in at the ground floor

Hello webby mates,

How are you all? Have you had a nice weekend? Did you spend it doing chores, or having fun, or just relaxing? I hope it was full of sunshine and good thoughts.

One of the truly great films that I can watch endlessly is Frank Capra's It's A Wonderful Life. James Stewart is one of the most delightful actors there ever was. I can almost quote the whole film from memory.

There's a bit where George is offered the chance to invest in his friend Sam Wainwright's new business - plastics. "You can get in at the ground floor" is Sam's refrain, but George has more pressing matters to mind - the most heartbreaking and tormented proposals of marriage I've ever seen.

Because of that scene, Sam's telephone chatter of 'Getting in at the ground floor" has snagged in my mind. Although he meant it in a capitalist, money-making way I only associate it with being there at the start of something big.

I took the chance to be there at the start of something big on Saturday. I went to the Yarndale event in Skipton. It was one of the most inspiring things I've seen in a good long time.

The story of its creation is on the Yarndale Blog. In a nutshell, a Skipton Knit and Natter group were chatting about how great it would be to have a yarn festival nearby, and then, over the course of 18 months, they created one.  This weekend, September 28th and 29th, saw the first ever Yarndale festival, and I ran away from my familial responsibilities to spend a day there.

It was HUGE. The roads into Skipton were moving at a slow crawl, the 1000 space car park was full long before noon and the trains were bursting at the seams.  Bright crocheted triangles of bunting covered the route to the Auction Mart, which was heaving. No one could quite believe the sheer number of people.

The entrance lead to an exhibition hall showing knitted picnics and crocheted blankets from all over the place. I'd never seen anything like it. While for me a picnic-you-can-eat is infinitely superior to one made out of wool - especially in a venue unable to cope with the demand for coffees and lunch - the skill and the humour shown in these displays was just astonishingly.

Then it was in to the main hall.  Wow. Over 160 exhibitors dazzled me with different colours, materials and textures. There were crafts I've never hear of, equipment that amazed me, examples of work(wo)manship that dazzled me. Women outnumbered men by about 25 to one. We all chatted, mingled, ooo'd and ahh'd at each other's purchases.  It was so nice to be amongst a huge crowd of warm and friendly people who were so enthusiastic about making things.

I met a woman who wove fabric on a wooden loom to the design of those used by Romans, Tudors and beyond. I'd never quite managed to picture how the threads of the weft stopped getting tangled but after watching for a few seconds it all made perfect sense. Her looms were as beautiful pieces of craftmanship as the fabrics she wove on them.

I saw people who spin yarn, dyed it, people who made astonishingly beautiful items of clothing and lovely works of art. So many were from this region that it gave me a glow of pride that I get to be a Yorkshire-woman too. I also met some of the beautiful originators of  a very soft and beautiful yarn - Alpacas. They had alpacas. Mark is tense, waiting for me to wander home one day soon leading a brace of them to live in the garden.

I will love him and hug him and call him George

The Yarndale celebrity, the lovely Lucy of the fantastic Attic24 blog, was swamped all day by people wanting to meet her, take a photo, tell her how much her blog inspired them to attempt crafts. I was no different - a total groupie.

Happy groupie and tired but friendly Lucy

I didn't buy any yard to knit or crochet with in the end. Instead I bought stuff for crafts I'd never tried before. The first was a little octagon of slitted card - a braid wheel - with a leaflet and a few bits of wool for £1 from the Braid Society (there is an actual Society for braiding. I love this country. So eccentric). My daughter and her cousin are now enthusiastically braiding book marks and friendship bracelets for each other. Brilliant.

My other purchases? Tune in in a few days and I'll show you. I'm having a LOT of fun.

Easy Friendship Bracelets:

Cut a square of card approximately 5 - 8cm (3 - 4 inches) wide. (I used a cereal box) . Cut off the corners to make an octagon. (That's a stop sign, if you are explaining this to a little kid). Cut a slit about 1cm deep in the middle of each side and punch a hole in the centre of the shape.  That's your braid wheel.
Take 7 pieces of yarn/string/ribbon/embroidery thread etc about 20cm long.  Tie them together with a knot and drop the knot through your braid wheel's central hole. Tuck one piece of yarn in each of the slits.
You now have 7 slits holding yarn and one empty one. Count up from the empty slit three threads and move that thread to the empty slit.  Repeat. That's it.

If you are right handed you'll probably count up anti-clockwise from the bottom, and we lefties are more likely to do it clockwise. It doesn't matter at all as long as you stick to whichever way you started. Keep the empty slit facing you at all times so you don't lose track, mix and match colours and textures as much as you like, and perhaps thread little beads onto the yarns occasionally if you fancy.

It's easy, cheap and rather soothing to do. It certainly kept a trio of kids silent for a good while!