Autumn Treats and Christmas Lights

Yesterday was another wet day and M was working so I stayed indoors all day. Today was bit drier, but our walk was just into town and back to pick up some shopping, so I didn't take any photographs. The one below is from one of our regular walks, taken almost exactly a year ago on another dull October day. 

TG has been asking me where the best place to buy an autumn candle would be, and H loves both candles and unexpected gifts, so I bought them a Yankee Candle each -  pumpkin cider for H and clementine spice for TG. We also stocked up on Tesco dark chocolate digestives and Bourneville dark chocolate buttons, both dairy-free and big favourites with all of us (including the dairy eaters). I felt we needed a bit of autumn hygge to brighten up these dull days, and candles and chocolate treats should do nicely. 

I also booked tickets this evening for us to visit Waddesdon Manor to see their Christmas lights, which has become a  family tradition. They sell out very quickly and most of the weekend slots were already gone. For the last couple of years we have visited between Christmas and New Year, but this year we are going on 23rd December as H will have some time off work then. The house will not be open, so no beautiful Christmas tree displays this year (I posted pictures of some of last year's here), but there will be an outdoor Christmas Fair as well as the light show. We usually also go to Birmingham in November for a Christmas gift fair and to visit their German market, but they will not be happening this year. 

Walking in Ancient Footsteps

I meant to take Friday as my day off this week, but the weather forecast was nasty so on impulse I took Wednesday off instead so that we could go for a walk up on Dunstable Downs. There is a good 4 mile circuit along the top of the Downs, down a steep, stepped slope, back along the bottom past the gliding club, and up to the top again past the Iron Age burial site of Five Knolls. Part of the walk is along the ancient Icknield Way (so ancient it has a realistic claim to be the oldest road in Britain), and there is something extraordinary about walking along a path that was old before the Romans came.  The photo below is a view from the Icknield Way, across to Ivinghoe Beacon in the distance. 

We got home at lunchtime just as it started to rain, and it feels as though it has barely let up since. We are now apparently in the middle of Storm Alex. We have managed to sneak in a couple of mostly-dry short walks, but not enough to feel I am getting a reasonably amount of exercise. Over the last couple of weeks my home exercise routine has also gone to pot, and I need to get back into doing my Fiit classes again. I haven't done any weights classes since the end of August, and even the yoga has slipped. Note to self: get moving!

The sharp rise in Covid cases here seems to be slackening off, possibly because tighter restrictions were introduced, or maybe because the rising figures have made people more careful again. Whether it is possible to turn the tide and get case numbers to shrink again I don't know, but at least there is some progress in the right direction. There is an increasingly big divide now between north and south, with many northern cities under stricter regulations to try to get the virus back under control. Cases locally have risen, but from a very low level so it is not yet too much of a worry here. We can only hope it stays that way. 

I ordered myself a better desk chair, which arrived on Thursday. After six months using a pink plastic IKEA chair it will be nice to have something a bit more supportive while I am working. I haven't tested it out for a whole day yet, but it feels comfortable. Fortunately I don't have any back problems, but I think I have been pushing my luck a bit using the pink chair for so long - with judicious use of a cushion it isn't too bad, but it isn't really the right thing for longer term home working. H also has a new desk chair on order. She is working and studying long hours, and the chair she got when she bought her desk looks pretty but was leaving her with back ache. Until hers arrives, she is borrowing my new one as her need is greater! 

TG's school have not yet had any Covid cases among pupils and staff, and are gradually tweaking things so that the school day runs more smoothly. One change is that they are now able to use more "practical" rooms outside their year group's area - they have zoned the school so that each year can be kept in a separate bubble. Until now the only classes she has had out of the Year 10 zone have been photography, but this week she was able to have catering lessons in the kitchen classrooms and do some actual cooking - ratatouille and stuffed peppers, which she brought home for us to eat (as she doesn't like either). I think she will also get some science lessons in the labs next week. 

Socially Distanced Band Practice

I have a long way to go when it comes to digital minimalism. I tried to find a couple of photos for this blog, only to discover they hadn't transferred from my phone to my laptop because the poor laptop was so clogged with the accumulated junk of the past few years that it had no storage left. I have just spent 20 minutes deleting files, and still have a very long way to go. And there was I naively thinking that I stored most things in the cloud. Apparently not. 

On Sunday afternoon we had our first indoor band rehearsal since March. As we are now a registered charity we are allowed to run rehearsals for more than the normal limit of six people, so long as everything is properly risk assessed and we follow Covid-safe guidelines. This means we have to be spaced at least 2 metres apart, keep doors and windows open for ventilation (layers and warm clothing are needed!), have bell covers on our instruments, and wear masks when not playing. Fortunately we have been able to hire a school hall which gives us space for up to 30 people, where our normal rather cramped rehearsal venue would only take about six. The rules seem to be constantly changing, but it works for now and feels safe and well managed.

As the days get shorter and life gets busier it has got harder to fit in our 3 mile walks and we have tended to cut them shorter and stay closer to home. The colder, wetter weather doesn't help either. There is a 2 mile route round our local woodland that is our current default walk. I noticed today that a new signpost has appeared, that I'm sure wasn't there a few days ago.  It was also much muddier today that it has been for a while, thanks to all the recent rain. Hard to believe that just a week ago it was hot enough to lie in the hammock in the garden wearing light summer clothes. 

With TG back at school and dancing four evenings a week we have four car journeys each day to drop her off or collect her. None are long journeys, but it means we have to live by the clock much more than we have done over the past six months. Her friend's mum used to take her in the morning and we used to bring both girls home, but now car sharing is discouraged so I have taken on the morning school run. This is a good thing as it makes sure I get up, showered and dressed nice and promptly in the mornings - I am not a morning person so having a deadline forces me to get moving. Even though the local schools are all staggering start and finish times, the traffic is as bad as ever in the morning and last week seemed to be worse each day. This week I am trying a different route, which is longer in miles but when we tested it on Monday was quicker as it circles round the town and avoids all the traffic. It also means TG gets dropped at the school entrance, rather than a few minutes walk away. On Tuesdays and Thursdays she goes in earlier as she is doing "early morning French" as an extra subject. The school allows students to take GCSE French as an additional option if they are prepared to get to school for 7.55 instead of 8.45 twice a week for extra lessons. It is very much to the credit of both the school and the modern languages department that they have over 50 students in TG's year who take up this opportunity. At least the early start means we get a nice clear run through town before the traffic starts to clog up. 

Fashionopolis

While we were away in the Isle of Wight at the beginning of September I read Fashionopolis: the Price of Fast Fashion and the Future of Clothes by Dana Thomas. I knew I needed to be better informed about the human and environmental cost of what we wear, in this age of fast fashion, pile 'em high, sell 'em cheap clothes retailers. I found this an excellent book, not just because it was well researched and informative about the damage caused by the west's mania for fashion, but because it also gave positive examples of how clothes production can change and adapt to become more sustainable and ethical. 

While I am no fashion-conscious shopaholic, I admit I have got slightly sucked in by three daughters who all enjoy clothes and clothes-shopping and I both have and buy far more than I need. I see looking back at this blog that over three years ago I was writing that I hoped could get to the stage of having a capsule wardrobe but I am no further forward now than I was then. It is still an aspiration, and I followed up Fashionopolis with a short book by Sarah Eliza Louderbeck, Secrets of a Capsule Wardrobe. I also recently read Project 333 by Courtney Carver, which explains her minimalist clothing challenge, in which the aim is to wear just 33 items over period of three months. 

Over the last year or two I have used a couple of wardrobe apps to help me keep track of what I have, to try to pare items down to what I "need" (which I am sure is more than I actually need!), and to experiment with combinations that could make a capsule. After reading these three books, fiddling around with my current app (Stylebook), and sorting out my wardrobe (and the storage boxes under the bed!) I have come to various clothing conclusions. The first is that Project 333 just won't work for me. Our weather is too unpredictable and needs too many layers of different thicknesses. Also if I have more clothes that I actually like for a season than the challenge allows, it seems kind of wasteful to put them away and not use them just to meet a self-imposed target number. 

The second conclusion is that a capsule wardrobe is still my ultimate aim, and after reading Secrets of a Capsule Wardrobe I have a better idea of how I might get there. I liked that she did not make up any rules about numbers of items. She did however come up with some colour rules, which I had not thought of but which make sense. She suggested choosing three neutrals and three highlight colours and sticking to those, and distinguishes between bases (trousers, skirts and dresses) and tops. The idea is that once you pick up a neutral base item, pretty much any top will work with it. The neutrals should also include only one out of black, navy and dark brown, which makes sense - I realise I tend to end up with unnecessary duplication by having essentially the same items in both black and navy, which don't work together. I can see that when I buy clothes randomly, I often end up with items I like but which don't really go with anything else, and that by limiting myself to certain colours it would be much easier to work towards a smaller capsule wardrobe. 

The third is that I really want to buy less but better, so that I end up with a capsule wardrobe made up as far as possible with sustainably produced and better quality items. I have started actively looking for affordable options to fill some wardrobe gaps, with the benefit of much greater knowledge of how to read the small print and assess whether things genuinely are more ethical and sustainable or whether it is marketing hype. 

The photos above show the colour combinations that a bit of wardrobe shuffling threw up for winter clothes - my summer colours will be a bit different. Once I looked properly, the colour choices were surprisingly obvious and I didn't have to take out much to get to this. 

A Windy Walk at Stowe

Yesterday we paid a visit to Stowe Gardens, probably our favourite local National Trust property. The gardens are described on the National Trust website as "one of the most remarkable legacies of Georgian England", and are not flower gardens but 250 acres of parkland designed to illustrate various aspects of early 18th century politics and morality, with carefully placed statues, follies, temples, bridges and landscape features. I don't think we have ever seen everything in one visit - yesterday we probably walked about 4 miles and didn't cover the whole estate.

The weather has been quite miserable since the it changed so dramatically from summer to autumn on Tuesday, but yesterday was better with at least some glimpses of blue sky. It was also very windy - just the sort of bracing autumn day I like, so long as I am wearing enough layers!  The building below is rented out by the Landmark Trust as a holiday home - I was curious so had a look at the details here. It is mostly one big open space with circular bedrooms, kitchen and bathroom in the corners.

While the gardens belong to the National Trust, the house is a very expensive public (meaning private!) school- it is the sort of school that has its own golf course. This is one of a pair of stone lions guarding the main entrance to the house from the gardens and enjoying an extraordinary view across the park. After our  walk we had lunch at the cafe. The menu is more limited than in non-Covid times, and it only has outdoor seating, so we warmed up with hot pasties (my vegan spiced cauliflower pasty was exceptionally tasty). I was fascinated by a dog whose owners were seated at the next table - he was a black and white border collie, with one light blue and one dark brown eye. I had never seen a dog with different coloured eyes before, but I discovered later that it is not too uncommon in certain breeds and is known as heterochromia.

H spent the day at her office for the first time yesterday. She had been interviewed at one of their big city offices, so it was the first time she had seen the inside of the building. Some others on the grad scheme were in too, and she enjoyed getting the chance to chat in person rather than online. She is still flying through the courses for her first two exams at 100 miles an hour, but seems to be getting to grips with the content. Next week is another college / study week, then she starts some technical training. As the government is now recommending that people work at home where they can, I don't know how much - if at all - she will be going in over the winter. We had three friends over in the evening and ordered a "click and collect" fish and chip takeaway. H was out so we we just nicely within the six person limit. We were all a bit tired and M had an early start this morning, so they didn't stay late. The way the seating is arranged in our sitting room is quite spaced out, so we were all able to keep our distance quite comfortably. 

While M was out at work today I did sorted out an online grocery order, did some laundry, had a soak in the bath, read a bit, and did some reorganising of my wardrobe, switching out some summer clothes for winter ones and clearing out a bag of things I don't wear any more for the clothes bank. I'm not one of those people who is constantly clothes shopping, and yet I always seem to have far more than I need. I aspire to a more minimalist wardrobe and have been doing some thinking about how to achieve this, and also about clothing and sustainability. I still have quite some way to go, I'm afraid. After lunch TG and I watched the live version of Aladdin on Disney Plus. By the time that finished M was home so we went out for a short walk as we were both feeling tired and it was drizzling slightly, then spent some time trying to  unravel some wonky figures on his payslips - something went haywire and ended up with an underpayment that he is trying to get sorted out.

This evening H went out for a meal with friends and I cooked stir fry for the rest of us - chicken for M and TG, and vegan "chicken" chunks for myself as I am want to try to cut out meat, dairy and eggs again as much as possible for a while. I'm often feeling quite stiff and achy, and when I switched to a vegan diet a couple of years ago it made a noticeable difference to how I felt. I want to see if it will help again. I'm going to carry on eating fish, for now at least. 

Six Month Blues

I have been feeling unusually down and anxious this week. It is unusual for me, and I put down to a combination of the prospect of a winter with rising Covid cases and tighter restrictions, worrying (probably unnecessarily) about the workload and exam stress H has taken on, the darker evenings and an unusually busy work week. Oh, and starting the week feeling under the weather (much better now, I'm glad to say). However, a friend reposted on Facebook a series of tweets from a doctor experienced in working in crisis areas. She has learned to expect that six months into a long crisis will be a difficult time and is the point at which it is natural to hit a wall. Her recommendation is to take care and be gentle with ourselves, look after our physical and mental health, accept that just managing the things that need to be done is an achievement, and ride out the slump, which in her experience normally lasts a few weeks but then resolves itself. Her advice is not to fight the wall and just trust that it will pass. I found this incredibly reassuring, as it seems to explain how I am feeling. I'm just going to try to sit back and ride it out. 

On the positive side, TG has got over her cold and is feeling pretty much back to normal. I'm also feeling much better and had more energy today. M and I went for a two mile walk after lunch, which was the only time we could fit it in. I had to get back for a work Teams meeting so we didn't have time for our usual three miles. H is still slogging away, but has learned a phenomenal amount about how to compile accounts in just four days. This evening R and her partner came over to visit for a while. They are going to Turkey tomorrow night for a week's holiday - they had originally booked to go to Lanzarote, but switched as it would have meant two weeks of quarantine after they got home. She was her usual cheerful, upbeat self. I have finished work for the week, and now have a three day weekend to look forward to. I'm determined that we will manage one day a week when neither M nor myself are working - that will be tomorrow, then he will be working over the weekend but I won't. It has meant a bit of a struggle to get everything I needed to do finished in four days, but it was manageable and tomorrow will be payback. 

I woke up early (for me) this morning as I had to take TG to school early for a French class., and I am now too sleepy to look for a photograph to add to this post. 

Autumn has Arrived

A quick note this evening as my laptop has only 4% left on the battery and I don't want to go and hunt for the charger. 

Summer ended yesterday in the space of around two hours. It went from unseasonably warm and sunny to cool, grey and damp, and today has been thoroughly miserable ending in heavy rain. The very worst sort of autumn day. I love crisp, cool autumn days, but not this! It should be better by Friday, but still very much cooler than it has been. Strange that the change of season should happen so abruptly on the autumn equinox. 

TG's cold is much better and she went back to school today, though missed dance again in the evening because we didn't think they would appreciate the tail end of her sniffles in the current climate. H had a routine medical appointment this morning which went well, and has spent the rest of the day buried in her studies. M and I were both busy working this morning, and I spent the afternoon on archives before Zoom band this evening. It seems that the latest tightening of restrictions will not affect our band's plans for more live playing. We recently got charity status, and that means that so long as we carry out a comprehensive risk assessment and have all the recommended Covid safety measure in place we can still meet in a larger group indoors.  All the players have to be spaced out by 2 metres, but we have been able to hire a large school hall where that will be feasible. 

Battery is going. Just time to add an autumnal picture from last year.