Hedgehog Diarrhoea on My Doorstep

This morning when I left the house there was a long trail of hedgehog diarrhoea on the doormat (the doormat is outside).  I thought to myself that if I wrote a book about life in the country, I would call it "Hedgehog Diarrhoea on the Doorstep".  How do you think it would sell?

Here is a pretty picture for people who like their countryside pretty and not poo-ey.

p.s. if you look closely you can see a glimpse of Aimo on the far right.  Oops, gave that away, Aimo isn't really on the far right.

 

 

Art and Mushrooms (or Toadstools, who knows?)

Here are a few snaps from the weekend:

It was Wirksworth Festival again, so a visit there.  Everything was pretty bad, except for Cheryl's stuff, which was going to be in the Chemist shop window, but ended up in the vicar's garage, which was really creepy (in a good way):

Then the art showcased in the church was so poor I took a picture in the porch instead.  Quite arty, eh?

Then Sunday was really sunny, and we had a visit to Nine Ladies.

We saw some great fungi:

Possible ID: The sulphur Tuft?  According to the book it is extremely common, and grows on rotting tree-trunks, so that sounds like it to me, but you may know better.

All in all, a good weekend.

Misty Mountains and some other stuff

Here are two sides to our trip to Iceland:

the beautiful open views;

the Phallological Museum.

I will borrow some of Aimo's photos to show you some more things in Iceland in a later post.

Bridges, Brontes, and Unecessarily Tall Chickens

At the beginning of the month myself and Miss Aimson took our annual pilgrimage to Haworth.  This year we meant Miss Aimson's cousins there and had the night in the YHA.  The weather was amazing and we had some walks across the moors in the footsteps of Emily Bronte and Sylvia Plath.

I didn't take many photos:

But take my word for it, it was amazing.

Haworth seems to be set up for day-trippers: most places didn't open much before one o'clock, and most closed on the dot at five.  So if you stay there, and get up early, you can walk to Top Withens and back before anyone else is around, and have the moors to yourself.  We only met people on the way back, when we were nearly in Haworth.

Then we walked past the allotments and saw the unnecessarily tall chickens, before checking out the church (a bit boring really) and having lunch.  In Haworth there is the Bronte Parsonage, bookshops, an apothecary's shop, a couple of great galleries and some nice shops and cafes.  Quite a mini-trip really, unless you are going to do the walk to Top Withens.

p.s. another must is the grave of Pickles Parker, a particular favourite of ours.

Where the Willow Grows

On the recommendation of Old Allendonian, I bought this book:

It is the diary of a six/seven year old girl, and the story of what happened to her when it was published when she was an adult, trying to become a published author.  Both these parts are very moving.

I was struck by two things: was this the origin of the American study of Nature Journalling, which my friend had come across in home-ed circles; and the possible similarities with Emily Bronte.  Little is known about Emily Bronte, and people speculate about her loner-ish-ness.  Although I doubt Emily Bronte's mental condition was as unusual as Opal Whiteley's, I do notice connections.  As Emily died aged thirty, we do not know how her life would have developed.

Or perhaps I am just playing Opal's game of comparer.  This was one of the naturalist's study methods she used to observe things closely.  For example, she would take a selection of seeds, and compare them, in order to note all their qualities.  This is the sort of thing Nature Journalling is used for now, to teach observation.

All in all, an interesting read.

Cowboys and Mouse-ears

Me and Miss Aimson went to this in the Fringe:

It was the second time we have been to a Dr Sketchy event, the first one being during Miss Aimson's Easter hols.  I was pleased to see there was some improvement in my sketching.  This was especially good as I haven't done that much practice really.  What do you think? 

Of course, you can't really see the improvement because I'm not showing you my first sketches, because they were terrible.

I have done a tiny amount of sketching in my nature journal, but that tiny amount must be enough to have improved my sketching.  Here's a page from my journal you haven't seen:

As you can see from the date, it's from more than a month ago.  Still, these tiny attempts at sketching are yielding advances.  Imagine what results I would see if I sketched more often!  Something for me to ponder ...

Happy Things and Happy Days

An Orchid

Here's a happy photo for some happy news.  I've just completed the first draft of the first book of The Lost Book of Fleams trilogy.  Yes it has become a trilogy now!  The first book is "Fleams in the Mist", and I will start working on the second, third, whatever, final drafts ... tomorrow.  I've set myself a deadline of Hallowe'en for the final draft.

See you then!  Things should become a lot simpler when I've finally got all this Fleams stuff that's been just in my head written into a book.  It's been swirling around in my head for the last two or three years.  I'm sure the final two books in the trilogy will be fine.  No rush.

Happy Day everyone!*


* For those of you who didn't know, that's a quote from the cult children' TV series of 1977, "Children of the Stones".  I can recommend it if you are looking for a cult 1970s children's TV classic to watch.

Mermaids and Doxeys: Can you tell them apart?

Here are the last of the solstice photos, taken at Mermaid's Pool:

Very mysterious!

Celebrating the Arts

You know me, I wouldn't normally show off about Miss and Master Aimson, but on this occasion I will have to force myself.

One of Miss Aimson's 'A' Level Art pieces is being shown by the Royal Society of British Artists and Master Aimson is performing in three plays in the Buxton Festival Fringe. 

They have been able to achieve these things because of the dedication of the Arts teachers at the school.  In the face of senior members of staff calling the Arts "doss" subjects, the Arts department staff have worked above and beyond to offer these opportunities to the pupils.  So big up the Arts Faculty!

Now the situation is even more dire as the senior staff have been justified in their opinions as Michael Gove has declared the Arts as doss and said schools don't need to offer them on the curriculum.  What kind of a society do we live in that lets politicians do things like this?  Having trash-talked Fine Art, Contemporary Dance, Music and Drama, next on Michael Gove's hit list is English Literature, which he says is not an academic subject.  Really?  What is society coming to?

When there was a brou-ha-ha in the press that Michael Gove had said only British texts should be on the curriculum, what the press didn't say was that less texts can be taught because English Literature is to become one module of English Language, so almost no time will be allowed for reading literature.  In a so-called civilised society.

So celebrate the Arts wherever possible, folks.  Before the government tells us that only people who go to Eton are allowed to know anything about them.

 

 

 

 

Caterpillars, Oaks and Eggars

Here are some photos of very large caterpillars that we saw on the solstice.  I identified these as Oak Eggar moth caterpillars.

And with a knife (legal blade size) for scale:

Luckily we saw and photographed an Oak Eggar moth last year in much the same area.  So here is a moth I prepared earlier:

Solstice, Poets and Sunsets

Here are some more of the solstice photos:

Where is this incredible place?  In Derbyshire!

 

 

 

A poet on a rock:

 

You can see how magical the evening was:

And the sun setting:

 

 

Solstice and Swallows

Here are some photos of swallows building a nest on the house opposite the garden at Aimo's House:

 

 

 

And here's the first few from the solstice:

The incredibly exotic looking location is Ramshaw Rocks on the Derbyshire/Staffordshire border.

Swallows and Brambles

These are some pages from my nature journal:

Quite a lot of nature going around the garden at Aimo's House at the moment.  Some swallows are making a nest on the house back-to-back with us, so we can watch progress.  If they had built on our house, we wouldn't see it as well, so it's a win for us.

Bracken, Bluebells and No Nastiness

I was just leafing through Cecily Parsley's Nursery Rhymes the other day,

Like you do

when I saw this picture:

A Bunny Pub

and was pleased to notice on the right, that Beatrix Potter had put bluebells and newly-unfurling bracken together, just as I did it my sketchbook.  I felt sort of warm, and fully justified, like I'm doing my field journal right.

I got another warm feeling when I read this brilliant biography of Beatrix Potter recently:

A Very Good Book

as it explained the whole it-was-a-patriarchal-conspiracy-to-diss-Potter's-mycological-fieldwork-discoveries in a way that made it all seem less nasty than you thought.

Less nasty than you thought, always a good thing to discover.

An Interesting item

This week's (or last week's if you consider how long it has taken me to post this) Buxton Advertiser had a very interesting item.  No, not "Threw bottle at window of ex's grandparents" but "Town Team puts Buxton on the map".

An Interesting Item

Mister Hope and Zoe Badger don't get a mention in the paper, but it was they who slaved for months to get this project done.  It was an incredibly time-consuming process, as they did all the research themselves, and co-ordinated the other artists, making the different elements fit together, as well as doing large amounts of the artwork.

You can see my small contribution around the Timeline.

Well done Thomas and Zoe!

Buzzards, Bluebells and Bracken

I've been to Forest School.  Me and Mel took the kids (well just her kid actually but it sounds a bit weird for me to go and not drop off any kids) and then did some sketching ourselves.  On a sunny bank, covered with bluebells and overlooking the Cheshire countryside and a lake.  And we saw buzzards.  It was all a bit idyllic, after we managed to meet up.  The bus dropped me in the middle of nowhere and it took a bit of work for Mel to find me.

Anyway, I'd like to show you my journal pages, but the scanner isn't co-operating.  Here's one double page, with the buzzards on; and the only bit it would scan of the bluebells page.  It's probably the best bit after all.

Buzzards and Bracken

 

A bit of Bluebells