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Bedtime for the Boat

Posted on by Jackie B

Today was the day for taking our little boat, the Isla Mia, out of the water and putting her into winter storage. Sadly we’ve not really used her this year. Throughout the spring we were in lockdown. Collecting the boat from where she’s stored and towing her 12 miles to her summer mooring at Alnmouth could hardly be described as an essential journey. It was therefore much later in the year that we’d planned when she was finally back in the water. Conditions had to be totally perfect to get out of the estuary as the river channel had changed position so sailing out to sea was always going to be tricky. After lockdown was lifted everyone seemed to migrate to the coast so parking became an issue. No wonder we never managed to do more.

Today there was a very high tide so K took the trailer down and positioned the boat ready to winch on to it. Son joined him to help…

… and Buddy supervised.

There was quite a lot of traffic on the river today. The sailing dinghies were racing and this rather beautiful skiff came in.

One dinghy crew were launching off the ramp and kindly lent a hand to keep the boat straight.

We watched a young girl take her paddle board out – she made it look quite effortless.

There are still quite a few boats in the water but many of the smaller ones will be brought out over the next few weeks. If we get severe winter weather boats can be torn from their moorings or damaged by debris such as fallen trees floating downstream. As the tide inched higher over the salt marsh it formed tiny islands.

A group of children were having a brilliant game of pirates. Sword fights determined which band of pirates won control of a tidal island. Actually they were using toy light sabres but that hardly matters in a game of imagination! Their dog was enthusiastically fetching a ball and digging in the mud. Every one of them was wet and muddy but they were having such a great time. They looked like they had escaped from the pages of old children’s adventure stories like Swallows and Amazons or The Famous Five series.

With Son operating the winch and K guiding her on to the trailer as the rising tide lifted her up, Isla Mia inched onto the trailer The engine at the stern of the boat adds a lot of weight so the water does all the heavy lifting work.

Eventually she was fully trailered, secured and hitched up to the car.

The backboard with tail lights was put in place and she was towed away to her winter home. Happy hibernation Isla Mia!

Do you have to make any preparations for winter?

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Quizzy Wednesdays

Posted on by Jackie B

With a total lockdown earlier in the year and various degrees of restrictions ever since (seeming to change on a daily basis), my social life has changed radically. Most of it is now online.

It began with a group of female friends having a virtual coffee morning on Zoom which became a weekly event. …..then went international as one of our group now lives in Australia and joins us most weeks. Several of us were in the same ukelele group and that went online too.

Our partners were beginning to feel left out so we started doing a fun quiz on Zoom. I know that during lockdown quizzes have been really popular for online get togethers of family and friends. This is how we run ours. Currently four couples take part. It can be quite onerous for one person to set a whole quiz worth of questions so each couple sets a round of ten questions and takes their turn to ask them. They give the answers after their round and we all mark our own scores. Of course you can’t score on your own round. It works well and we get a great variety of questions – it’s probably more interesting than with a single question setter. Some of us devise our own on a theme, but its as easy to look up quiz questions online if you run out of time or ideas. We’ve had questions based on the Monopoly board game, famous brothers and sisters and song lyrics to name but three. Anything goes! We do keep the scores and announce the overall winner, but it’s all just for fun really.

This week I found out that Wednesday was World Desserts Day, so we set our questions on that theme. I have a very sweet tooth and was feeling quite hungry by the end of it! I thought I’d share them.

  1. Which dessert was created for a famous opera singer? Ingredients include raspberry sauce and ice cream.
  2. What is the main flavouring in a traditional tiramisu?
  3. Which Italian dessert literally means”cooked cream”?
  4. What is the name of the upside-down French dessert made of apples and pastry?
  5. In Doctor Who, the 11th Doctor famously ate fish fingers and which dessert to revive himself after regenerating?
  6. Which very sweet Greek dessert comprises layers of filo pastry, syrup or honey and chopped nuts?
  7. Which dessert is traditionally served on US Thanksgiving and Christmas?
  8. Which dessert was named after a famous Russian Ballerina?
  9. Which chocolate and cherry confection is known as Schwartzwalder Kirschtorte in its native Germany?
  10. Which British cartoon cat and dog were named after a popular UK dessert combination?

I’ll post answers in the comments section. Have fun!

Have you been taking part in any online quizzes? I’d love to hear about them.

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It’s Good To Sing.

Posted on by Jackie B

I’m a member of the Newcastle City Council Choir. We formed several years ago when I worked for the Council. It was originally one of several staff health and well-being initiatives at a time when pressure of work often meant people would grab a sandwich at their desks for lunch and never took a break. That’s never good for stress levels and productivity! Since then we’ve continued singing both for our own enjoyment at hour-long weekly lunchtime practices and also performing, including at a number of civic events. Fortunately I wasn’t kicked out when I retired. We actually have several retired members, along with current staff who attend when they can, work commitments permitting.

We had to stop our sessions earlier in the year as the pandemic took hold and lockdown became imminent. After a few weeks our lovely choir leader started to run our weekly sessions online on Zoom. She’s done an amazing job keeping things going this way. It’s not exactly the same. We mute during the session while she is teaching us and we are singing along to the backing tracks she has created with all the different parts that harmonise together. Singing this way does have a few advantages though. Nobody can hear you screech if you make a mistake! If you normally sing a particular part (soprano, alto etc) you can experiment a bit and try other parts (again, nobody can hear you screech!). It takes time to learn all four parts of a new song. You can practice your own part to learn how the harmonies work together with the others as they learn theirs without disturbing them. When we met face-to-face I had a 60 mile round trip to get to Newcastle for choir practice, so I’d combine it with a shopping trip or maybe lunch with a friend – so I’m saving time, petrol and money. Above all it means I can stay in touch with my lovely choir friends and still do something that I really enjoy.

The jury was out for a long time on whether singing carried an additional COVID infection risk, in terms of projecting exhaled breath further during singing, but more recently scientific study has revealed that singing carries no more risk than talking. With the second wave of the virus taking hold there is no sign of getting together in person anytime soon but Zoom is working well as an alternative. We can share music and lyrics on the screen or through our shared Dropbox account, which also includes audio tracks to practice with in between sessions. The others kindly gave me permission to share some screenshots from yesterday (but I blanked out their names)

It was such a lovely session yesterday. We have a wide repertoire of material and we sang a fun Danish Halloween song, a pop classic (Titanium) and a couple of slightly Christmassy tunes. A beautiful, haunting lullaby (Lully Lulla Lullay) and Gaudeamus (that’s Latin for “we praise”). We finished off with one of our favourite rounds (and so appropriate to end the session): it’s called “Adios Amigos”.

I love singing with my choir!

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Sea Glass Spheres

Posted on by Jackie B

Being on the beach a lot, walking Buddy the Labrador, provides lots of beachcombing opportunities and lots of craft materials for me, especially sea glass and driftwood. This is only a small selection of the sea glass K has gathered on his dog walks.

The action of the sea and sand has two effects on glass. The surface becomes abraded giving it a frosted appearance, then the corners and edges are smoothed away. Eventually a piece of glass will be transformed into a rounded translucent pebble and these, especially those in interesting colours, are the most sought after. Much of the sea glass in our collection is still quite angular, So I’ve been thinking of more ways to use it, especially since I made some mosaic coasters earlier this year. I had an assortment of polystyrene balls, so I wondered how they would work covered in a sea glass mosaic to make Christmas tree baubles.

I started with the loop to hold the hanging thread. I cut a piece of wire about 12 cm long and bent it round a pen to form a loop.

I threaded the ends through a glass bead and pushed them into the ball. I kept the ball in position on a toothpick pushed into a piece of polystyrene packaging, then began to glue the pieces of seagrass in place. I tried PVA glue first of all, but it doesn’t dry quick enough and the glass started to slide off. I needed a quick drying alternative.

I ended up deploying my trusty glue gun. I’d avoided it at first as I thought the hot glue might melt the polystyrene but it was fine. I continued hot glueing the glass pieces to the ball, occasionally cutting a piece to fit with the tile cutters.

It was soon covered with glass sections. I then mixed up some grout and filled the gaps, pushing it into the spaces with a finger. I allowed this to dry slightly then wiped over the glass with a damp sponge to remove the excess.

Then it was simply a case of adding a hanging thread. You can spray with polyurethane varnish to protect the grouting and give the glass a sheen, or even shine it up with a tiny drop of vegetable oil.

I think this would work even better using a clear plastic base. I’ve see these in craft shops, with a hanging loop incorporated. This would make the whole bauble translucent.

Overall I’m happy with it. It might be a little bit early to think about Christmas decorations, but I can live with that!

Have you started thinking about Christmas decorations or presents yet?

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Wildflower of the Week: Hedge Bindweed

Posted on by Jackie B

I haven’t written a Wildflower of the Week post for a while as there are not too many wildflowers in bloom at this time of year. There is still Hedge Bindwood in flower however.

Hedge Bindweed grows rapidly, twining anti-clockwise as it grows upwards, smothering out other plants. On a warm day when it is growing rapidly, it can twine a complete revolution in an hour. It’s not popular with gardeners being a pernicious perennial weed. If you try to dig it out and leave the tiniest fragment of root behind it will grow back!

The plant is hairless with arrow or heart-shaped leaves.

The large white flowers are trumpet shaped, formed from five fused petals.

The flowers are popular as a source of nectar for bees, butterflies and moths, including night-flying moths as the flowers do not shut at night. Hedge bindweed is the food plant of the Convolvulus Hawkmoth.

The plant is toxic, containing alkaloid chemicals that have a purgative effect. It is also considered harmful to livestock and thought to cause colic in horses. The stems are tough so can be used as string in an emergency.

The plant has many country names including Windweed, Devil’s guts and Granny-Jump-Out-of-Bed. Children played a game, squeezing the calyx and making the flower “jump” off the end, giving rise to that name.

As one of the few wildflowers still about in October (and quite an exotic looking one) Hedge Bindweed is quite a welcome sight….unless you are a gardener!

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Crafty Throwback: Proggy Heart Cushion

Posted on by Jackie B

I haven’t posted about any crafty makes in a while but I found some pics of this so thought I’d write about it.

Known as proggy mats here in the northeast of England, but variously called clippy mats, peggy mats among others names elsewhere, they were a way of recycling old fabrics to make rugs. This would provide welcome warmth underfoot when carpets were unaffordable. In that respect I suppose it has much in common with the American quilting tradition of producing beautiful home furnishings from old recycled fabrics. I’ve seen some amazing proggy work in local heritage museums like Beamish and Woodhorn .

The technique involves poking strips of fabric (cut from old clothes and bedding) through a backing of hessian (recycled sacks) using a “progger”. This was basically a spike either whittled from a piece of wood or made from anything else that did the job. A similar technique, making hooky mats, involved hooking loops of the fabric strips through the backing fabric.

I’d seen a demonstration of it done using old t-shirts. When these are cut into vertical strips and stretched slightly the fabric curls up to form a sort of tube, which gives the finished object a really interesting texture. I had to give it a try. I had lots of old t-shirts that Daughter had grown out of, that seemed to be mainly in shades of pink and red, which made me think of the heart design. A cushion seemed a good starter project – not to big for a first go at proggy. I cut the t-shirts into strips, about 2cm by 10cm, lining up vertically with the grain of the fabric. I found a few other old red and pink items that were destined for the charity shop and when the project progressed and I was running low on fabric I supplemented these with a couple of very cheap t-shirts from Primark. Men’s size XXXL represented the best value!

I drew my heart shape onto a square of hessian, hemmed the edges and tacked them onto a tapestry frame which could be wound tight to hold the backing fabric taut. Then it was time to fill in the heart outline with the fabric strips. I put them in quite close together to create a thick pile and each subsequent row would tighten up the weave of the hessian, locking the strips tightly into place.

The different shades of pink and red and varying fabric thicknesses gave a lovely texture to the piece.

When full. I cut out the heart shape with a 2cm margin, zigzag stitched all the way round to stop it fraying, then machine stitched it to a heart shape of plain canvas, leaving a gap for stuffing with polyester filling, which was hand stitched closed.

I was really pleased with the finished article, with it being my first go at proggy.

Do you have a favourite item that you’ve made from recycled old fabrics?

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Coastal Capers

Posted on by Jackie B

Here in Northumberland we have the most beautiful coastline, with glorious sandy beaches, expansive mud flats and romantic rocky shorelines. Somehow I can never stay away from the sea for long so we had a couple of trips along the coast this week. It’s so much quieter since autumn arrived and the tourists left.

The first took us to Sugar Sands. which I’ve blogged about before. It’s a hidden gem, reachable down a gated farm track. It was pretty deserted apart from a few seabirds and a lone seal that came in quite close to shore.

It was day of showery rain with sunny intervals which led to some moody clouds.

Buddy and K dodged the rain and had a good walk.

Our second trip began early in the morning and took us to the north of Budle Bay. We parked by a gate with a good view towards the coastal mud flats

K and Buddy set off for a walk, but before long I had some visitors.

They soon lost interest and wandered off.

We at the peak of the bird migration season right now and the coastal flats and fields are filling up with geese and ducks. You always hear them first, then look up to see the V-shaped formations or skeins of geese far overhead.

We’ve seen Brent, Barnacle and Pink-footed geese recently. They have been spending the summer in Siberia and Northern Scandinavia and have arrived to spend the winter here.

My next visitor was a hare, than ran up the field towards me.

Hares are common here and we see them often. They are easily distinguished from rabbits by their larger size, black-tipped ears and because they run rather than hop. Hares also have the most beautiful big hazel eyes when you see them close up. They seem to stare straight through you and it gives then a strange mystical quality. It is no surprise therefore that the hare features strongly in myth and legend. It is associated with witchcraft, fertility and the moon in folklore from many parts of the world. It is one of my favourite animals.

I also saw this young roe deer.

The roe deer is also very common in Northumberland. They seem to be present in even the smallest piece of woodland. We see them more often in winter when they venture into the fields to feed. They can be quite a hazard on the roads at night. Several times I’ve had to brake hard to avoid hitting one. I’ve learnt to drive off very slowly and carefully when this happens as there is always another one! This one eventually left and bounded through the undergrowth on the field margin.

We set off back down the coast, next stopping at Budle Bay. The tide was out leaving a huge area of mud.

This is an important site for birds, especially waders and waterfowl, that feed on invertebrates in the mud.

We saw various ducks and geese, swans, gulls, oystercatchers and redshanks. There were huge numbers of shelducks further away. From Budle we headed for Bamburgh andNorthumberland White Hart Rock.

The image of the deer is repainted regularly. Looking south, Bamburgh Castle looked stunning.

Out to sea, Inner Farne was clearly visible.

Our final stop was at Howick. The sea was calmer than it had been, so we did wonder if we would be able to spot any dolphins, but there were none about. We enjoyed watching a group of gannets feeding.

It had turned into a beautiful day. It’s such a privilege to live in such a stunning part of the world.

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Fun With The Fig Harvest

Posted on by Jackie B

You wouldn’t think it possible that here in North Northumberland you can actually grow figs. I suppose most of us associate figs with a more Mediterranean climate. Our fig tree was bought as a cutting at a garden show some years ago. It is planted in a sunny sheltered spot between the conservatory and a garage and it has now grown to cover the side of the garage with it’s large lobed leaves.

I’d noticed that there were a lot of fruit and they were starting to ripen so K picked a large bowlful – almost 4 pounds weight, and almost half were ripe and ready or almost ready to eat. I’ve really enjoyed eating them – they are absolutely delicious – I even added them to a smoothie,

I wondered if it would be possible to ripen the rest. I once managed to get all our green tomatoes to turn red at the end of the season by putting them in a drawer with a ripening banana. The banana produces a gas, ethylene, which accelerates the ripening process. After a bit of research I discovered that this would work with the fruit that was just starting to ripen , but not the hard green fruits. I did however find several variations on a Turkish recipe for preserved unripe figs.

It took quite a while to prepare the unripe fruits for this. They contain a bitter white sap, that somehow disappears as the fruit ripens, so it had to be extracted so it wouldn’t spoil the flavour. The sap is also an irritant. Even though I don’t have particularly sensitive skin, my hands were itching after a few minutes of preparing the fruit. If I do this again I will definitely wear gloves!

I began by removing any blemished patches of skin and cutting off the fruit stems, then piercing the base of each one with a skewer.

To remove the sap put the figs in a large pan, cover with water, bring to the boil and simmer for 15 minutes, then drain and cool under running water.

When cool enough to handle I squeezed each fig to remove as much liquid as possible. I then repeated the whole process, by which time there was no more bitterness when a tasted a piece (you can repeat the process again if necessary) I dissolved 1000g sugar in a litre of water over a low heat and added the figs along with about 4 cloves and the juice and rind of a lemon. I brought the mixture to the boil, simmered for five minutes then, picking them out with a slotted spoon, packed the fruit into sterilised jars, topped up with the hot syrup and sealed the lids.

The syrup was darker than I’d intended as I only had golden caster sugar left after using the white sugar in all my other preserving this week! The fruit and syrup can be used on top of ice cream, or served on toast or pancakes or with yoghurt. I think it will taste better when the flavours have developed for a few days, so I’ll try it then and report back!

Have you tried fresh figs?

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Making The Most Of Nature’s Harvest: Apple And Rosemary Jelly

Posted on by Jackie B

Question: what do you do when you have a glut of cooking apples and the rosemary bush needs cutting back?

Answer: Make apple and rosemary jelly.

That’s exactly what I did this week, along with apple and chilli jelly. Apples are so full of pectin that they make wonderful jellies – I tried apple and mint jelly last week and that worked well too.

Ingredients

  • 1200g apples, roughly chopped, including cores and peel, which are rich in pectin
  • 1 litre water
  • A bunch of rosemary sprigs
  • White sugar, 800g per litre of juice
  • 2 tablespoons lemon juice
  • a handful of rosemary sprigs

The first stage was to make the rosemary and apple juice. I added the apples, bunch of rosemary and water to a large pan, brought to the boil, then simmered for about 30minutes, by which time the apples had all broken down to a soft pulp. I then strained the mixture through a jelly bag over a bowl overnight, adding a weighted plate to press out as much juice as possible from the apple/herb pulp. You could use a muslin-lined colander or sieve.

Before I began making the jelly I put a couple of plates in the freezer and sterilised jars in the dishwasher. I then measured the juice into a heavy based pan and added sugar (I wanted to reduce the sugar slightly from what I used in the mint jelly) I used 80g sugar per 100 mls liquid. I added the lemon juice, and heated gently, stirring until the sugar had dissolved then brought to a boil, allowing it to continue boiling, testing until setting point was reached (when a drop is rapidly cooled on a plate out the freezer and pushed with a finger, wrinkles start to form) – I did this every five minutes and it only took about 15-20 minutes. I turned off the heat and skimmed all the scum off the surface. Placing a small sprig of rosemary in each jar, I waited until the mixture had cooled a little before filling the jars. I found the easiest way to do this was to ladle the liquid into a glass jug (not plastic – this stuff is very hot) and pour it into the jars. Then I sealed the jars firmly.

If you keep an eye on the jars as the liquid sets and invert them briefly when they are almost there you can suspend the rosemary sprig in the middle – otherwise it floats. When I did this I added chopped fresh rosemary at the end too, but the leaves are quite hard so next time I’ll leave these out .

The jelly is beautifully clear, even though the juice extracted at the first stage is quite cloudy. As you boil it up with the sugar it clarifies and the impurities that cause the cloudiness form a scum on the surface which you skim off. The sweet apple has a delicate hint of rosemary – it would be good served with cold meat or as a glaze on lamb.

I also made apple and chilli jelly, following the same recipe, omitting rosemary and adding 70g whole red fresh chillis, each split in two, to the apples in the initial boiling stage to flavour the juice , then in the second stage, as setting point is reached stirring in about the same amount of chillis, this time with seeds removed and finely chopped, and 8 dried birdseye chillis, also finely chopped. Again, you allow the liquid to cool, stirring again before filling the jars and agitating them as they set to ensure the red chilli fragments are evenly distributed. This is deliciously hot and sweet and would be great with all meats or cheese – or even seafood.

You could say I’m on a bit of a jelly roll!

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A Woodland Ride in Autumn

Posted on by Jackie B

Yesterday Buddy the Labrador and I joined Daughter when she went riding in Swarland Woods. There are some lovely trails through this mixed woodland, which skirts a golf course.

There is an avenue of horse chestnut trees, which are currently dropping their fruit (conkers). There were plenty of shells but none of the smooth brown conkers they protect. Maybe people had collected them. Apparently if you put piles of conkers around your home they deter spiders. When I was a child we played the game of conkers. This involved drilling a hole in the conker and threading it onto a knotted string. Players would take turns flicking their conker at that of their opponent until theirs shattered. There were all sorts of tricks like pickling your conkers in vinegar to harden them.

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The beautiful fan-shaped leaves of the horse chestnut are just beginning to turn gold for autumn.

T

There were plenty of ripe blackberries, but I didn’t stop to pick any or I’d have been left behind by dog and horse! My scooter keeps up ok, but not if Misty breaks into a trot!

There were other berries on show like these glowing red ones on the guelder rose….

…and the startling white fruits of the snowberry, an introduced non-native species. Neither plant’s berries are edible by humans, though are a good food source for birds.

I also saw this beautiful devil’s bit scabious. There are fewer wildflowers about as autumn sets in so this is a welcome splash of colour.

Misty is quite happy with Buddy walking by her side.

As we were almost back at the stables Misty neighed loudly at her two friends and they answered her. They seemed really glad to see us when we got back and posed for pictures.

Of course Misty had to pose too!

What a lovely afternoon we had!