Keeping It In The Family?

No, not skeletons in the cupboard, but a delightful propensity to burst forth in rhyme! The story behind the example I intend to share with you today, goes thus...

 My Bro and I have nicknames for each other, which date back to our teenage years - ''Herb' and 'Pud', respectively, if you really want to know, but that would be another story...

So, in a recent spate of emails, we've been writing a little 'Franglais' to each other, a happy mix of English and not-quite-French , as if you couldn't guess. As luck would have it, he signed one of his missives 'Herbergage', which I chose to alter to 'Herbgarbage', in view of the erudite conversation we'd been holding. (?!)

This morning, in true brotherly fashion, back came this poetic gem:-

 Herbgarbage? HERBGARBAGE?! I suppose you think that's funny!


O weilawei! O lackaday!
Myne owne sustre thenketh
Her broder hys nam to mock.


Nu, Adam hys rib! Unnatured sib!
I'll mak thine een to blenketh!
I'll give thi sic a knock!


Myne nam tis HERBERGAGE I tell thi.
Mi wyf's a witch -- ond nu shee'll spell thi!


X


PS: Yes, I know 'blenketh' is third person singular, not infinitive. I gave up authenticity for the sake of the rhyme. So sue me. Herb

 How could I not share that with Blogland in general? Perhaps if you read this, you may like to comment in your own version of Olde English - or Anye Othere Olde Tongue - or should that be Tong? Or even Language - or Long-age - or whatever else you choose to invent...

This May Explain...

Why Napple has not been making many notes, recently. After all the Woolly Mammoths (?) crochet projects I've worked on this year, I had such a great assortment of left over bits, that I decided to launch into creating myself a 'coat of many colours' - well, a poncho, anyway.

Having completed 80 motifs, it was decision time as to which to join to what, colourwise. I laid them out in a poncho shape on my carpet, then row by row, picked them up to edge with white and join together. Here's the proof of the pudding. Sorry, poncho.

There was a snag at this point. I had to buy more white yarn, as I knew the 100g  I already had wouldn't be enough...and the snag? I bought a ginormous, 500g ball. This means the remnants of it are sitting looking forlorn. How long will I be able to resist it's unspoken plea for a crochet hook to spin its dreams into reality? Will I never learn?And will I ever reach the bottom of my yarn stash? Perhaps I should keep it under lock and key, out of sight and hopefully, out of mind. For a while, at least!

The luscious fringe, by the way, took the best part of a whole day and a half to cut and tie, so I thought it deserved a photo all its own...
And my next blog post, I promise, will be a yarn far removed from this kind!

Still In New Zealand

And not six but sixteen, this other great niece of mine, currently into doing quick change hair colours! I think her Mum said there'd been five over recent weeks. But that's not the reason I had to share this - no - it's because of the magical ability her Mum has to take stunning photographs. Don't you just love 'em?

Arty Farty

Once again, my six year old great niece has come up with a corker of a collage, with additional painting of her own. I simply had to share it. Enjoy!

She seems to have an inbuilt exuberance that transfers itself to the paper, and her artistic mama must be given full credit for encouraging her creative talents at every step along the way. I can hardly wait to see what she will be producing by the time she reaches sixteen...

Good Thinking

I received this handy reminder in an email from my cousin this morning.
I've noticed, many people who forward emails, do so by using a whole string of names and addresses in the 'To" slot, which is just asking for trouble, as my knowledgeable, techy son explained to me when I first began blogging and emailing.
It only needs ONE of those people to be blessed with a computer virus, and it will spread to everyone else on that list, with the speed of light!
The simple expedient of sending mail 'BCC' (blind carbon copy), prevents this annoying possibility.Think on fellow bloggers...

A Hodge-Podge

That's a good name for this patchwork of  photos, as well as my sad collection of tubs and containers, minus flowers! 

After a chance meeting a couple of weeks ago, I was given the name of a friend-of-a-friend's lady gardener. I telephoned, using the wonderful  "You don't know me, but..." opening gambit, which always delights my sense of the ridiculous.

As a result, this lovely person came and inspected the shambolic space outside my patio doors and two days later re-appeared with a tub of tools and plenty of sacks for rubbish. The weather was on our side, and in glorious sunshine she began to set everything to rights.

She pruned and tidied, and I clipped the heap of offcuts into pieces, to stuff into the waiting sacks. Of course, while we worked, we talked, and I learned how she'd had a mother and grandmother who were both interested in gardening. Because of their toting the small girl along when they visited gardens, garden centres and all places of horticultural interest, she learned much, without realising. In fact, she spent many years avoiding anything to do with gardens - until eventually, she became the owner of a house with a large one! 

With both mother and grandmother no longer living, she now began to realise what a wonderful legacy of gardening lore she had acquired from both of them - learned, literally, 'at their knees' back in the days when she was hardly beyond the height of those knobbly appendages of theirs.

Thanks to this trio of ladies, one living, two dead, I can now look forward to having an outdoor area which will soon be a thing of beauty again. Watch this space...

Learn Something New Every Day...

I happened to look up some details on Google, after a picture of my wooden Buddah, which I posted with a poem on Alias Jinksy, brought a query from a blogpal. This is what I found...

"Scholars believe that the Laughing Buddha is in fact modelled on an historical figure, a fat, wandering Zen monk named Pu-tai.
All sources describe him as obese, with wrinkled forehead and a white, protruding belly which he left uncovered.
There was another feature of his bodily appearance that captured attention.
Wherever he went, he carried a pu-tai (Japanese Hotei) or cloth-bag. Thus he came to be known as Pu-tai Hoshang, or hemp-bag monk.
Legend has it that in this bag he carried candy for the children. Over the centuries within China, Buddhist notions of happiness based on self-mastery and enlightened insight were fused with popular Chinese life-ideals of happiness through material prosperity, so today the hemp sack may be interpreted as being filled with gold, with happiness, health, and other aspects of abundance.

Happy Hotei's come in many forms.

• Laughing Buddha of Love - sitting in love and compassion
• Laughing Buddha of Prosperity - holding a Ru-Yi Pot or Bowl of Plenty up to the universe for receiving abundance
• Laughing Buddha of Safe Travel - on a journey with a hemp sack full of protection
• Laughing Buddha of Happy Home - sitting on a large gold nugget representing solid foundation, with a smaller nugget in his hand to give to others
• Spiritual Journey Buddha - dressed for the journey in fine robes, with a fan for understanding and a sack to collect insights
• Laughing Buddha of Long Life - sitting with his fan hat and enjoying the good life!

Hotei travels the country spreading joy and happiness wherever he goes.
His big belly is a symbol of happiness, good luck and generosity. Hotei is the deity of happiness, laughter, abundance and the wisdom of contentment. The image of the Hotei Buddha is almost always seen carrying a cloth or linen sack. It is usually filled with many precious items, including candy for children, food, or the woes of the world. His prayer mala is carved with a symbol meaning "good fortune". His large elongated earlobes are a sign of wisdom. The bag represents fulfillment of wishes or can also be the blessings of Buddha. Happiness is one of the Laughing Buddha's greatest gifts.

Many believe that rubbing the Laughing Buddha's belly brings joy, luck and prosperity. As a result, Feng Shui has adopted the Laughing Buddha as a prime symbol of wealth & prosperity.

He is supposedly the only member of the seven based on an actual person. Back when Buddhist missionary monks were delivering the message & way of Gautama Buddha onto the islands of Japan, they devised a method to more efficiently reach the local Shinto inhabitants. By manifesting Buddhist principles, with Shinto Kami, the monks were successful. Kami are seen as Shinto gods and were worshiped as such.

The Buddhist monastics were able to better communicate their ideology to Japanese natives by using the Kami's as examples in common Buddhist practice. Thus, Buddhism became very widely accepted in Japan and from one of these manifestations, came Hotei."


Now you know as much as me...

Time Flies

Especially when blogging takes a back seat, and the driver (me) steers a different course! However, like the proverbial bad  penny, I always turn up eventually...So here I am with a 'free gift' post, ready made, thanks to my Bro in new Zealand. One very early morning this week (3.30am) I gave up on sleep, and came downstairs to the computer, only to find a long email from him, which included this 'Tale Of A Tree'- he's given me permission to share it with you today.

 ".. We went past our old house - the first one we ever bought, the one we lived in for 14 years, from 1979 onwards, while the girls grew up; the one eldest daughter was married from; the one we were so sad to leave. We sold it to the Council a few years ago, when they wanted to widen the road, and there it has sat ever since, empty but cared for, lawns mowed, my old workshop used for storage. And there it stood yesterday, half-way demolished.

Mutti went back today with a camera, spoke to the gang taking the old place to pieces, and was allowed to wander through. Here's a couple of pics: the deck I built (well, the half of it that's still not gone), and the workshop that we built with friends and neighbours to help. So sad.

But one good thing. At the front is a tree. This tree we bought as a three-foot Christmas tree in 1974, but when Christmas was over, I looked at it and thought that, since it still had its roots, I would plant it. And it took, and grew, and for the next few Christmases we would dig it up, with its attendant soil, and put it back in a bucket in the house. When we moved, we told it we were going, dug around it carefully, took it with us and planted it in the next garden. Again, it took. Finally, in 1979, we dug it up again, again explaining what we were doing, and put it in our own garden. It's now huge and grand, and we were saddened to think our first Christmas tree would be cut down. But It isn't going to be. It's been identified as a rare Japanese cedar, and is now a protected tree. It will stand by the new road, proud on its corner. How's that?"

More Play Time

'

At last, here's a continuation of my dabble in the delights of a theatrical extravaganza.

Having spent weeks working on the costumes, at last came the performances. My singing buddy and I  (Lady Anne and her maid Prudence, remember?) were in four of the little playlets, each enacted at a different location around Chichester.

First we were part of a motley crew storming a building, then members of a hymn singing entourage of a preacher man. Next we had the country dancing to do, but our final scene was the most impressive. We had to station ourselves in the garden of a large and imposing house which had a wonderful set of  high-arched, wrought iron gates, so that at the appropriate time it would appear that we'd rushed from our 'home' to see what all the commotion was.

By the time this stage of the performance began each evening, dusk was falling, and I had to carry a lantern when we trooped to the gates which kept us safe from the 'rabble' outside. This crowd, (armed with a supply of cabbages to throw!) were protesting at the incarceration and possible eventual hanging of a young mother, who had somehow offended the powers that be. It was all very touching, but to tell you the truth, I can't remember whether the cabbages or the law won the battle! I'm pretty sure it was the cabbage throwers who rescued the mother and baby.

'Baby' was a prop supplied by me, a life sized doll wrapped in fake-dirt encrusted swaddling clothes. I have the doll still, and it's wrappers, but they have been restored to their pristine whiteness, thanks to  Persil.
Here's  a photo of the imposing entrance to the Bishop's Palace Garden, which served as ready made scenery for the 'prison'  in the play.

And this illustration give a fair impression of how we all looked in the scene where we had to do our country dancing on the still cobbled road of South Street.

I think there were five performances altogether, but the first in particular caused us much mirth. The horse and waggon which transported the old and infirm amongst the audience from location to location, had passed over the cobbles shortly before we began our dance. We discovered that the horse's digestive system was well regulated, as you might say...it reached the end stage at precisely the time it was trotting over those cobbles, and we had to watch carefully where we placed our feet between the still steaming dollops of manure it gifted us with! And the next night, the horse manage a repeat performance as well as us. After this, word must have got back to the people responsible for feeding the animal so they altered his meal times, for the remaining performances were trouble free...

There are still more tales to tell, but I don't want this post to stretch any longer, so will save them for another day...bear with me, eh? If you missed the previous installments, you can find the first here and the second here.

Linked to Sepia Saturday 

Here I Am!

Bless those of you who have remarked on the conspicuous absence of  Napple Waffle recently. I can now reveal the culprit which took over most of my spare time during daylight hours...this!

OK, so I only took one photo and didn't check I'd got the whole thing in the picture.

But the pointy bit at the bottom, looks exactly the same as the
rest, anyway. Hehehe!
You see, last time my daughter and her family came to see me, the weather was decidedly chilly, and I lent her my poncho to sit in. "Oo, Mum I'd like one of these - but I'd need the neck a bit smaller..."
So I can take a hint...
I had a rather large cone of a wool and silk mix tucked away in a 'safe place', so after they'd gone home, I started on the first of the 192 squares it took to complete.
The wool had not been washed after spinning and dying, so it had about it a somewhat pungent aroma of sheep and chemicals, as well as a rather coarse feel.
But a machine wash in Woolite worked wonders. It now smells sweet and feels as soft and cuddly as one could wish. Normal service may well be resumed forthwith...

My home made pattern instructions have now been posted on In Tandem, for those who wish to have a go at making one for themselves.

Hurrah For The Smitten Image!

No, this is not an advert for a destroyed work of art, smitten by some dire blow from an unseen hand, but a heartfelt THANK YOU extended to one of my long term Blog pals, Hilary. I strongly recommend you go and visit her IMMEDIATELY!  In  this Smitten Image post  she explains, far better than I could, exactly how to rid our screens of Blogger's latest excruciating and farcical Word Verification.

What possessed the originators?
The black and white Ink Blot Alphabet was enough to make all compositors turn in the graves, where no doubt, they had been dispatched at an early age by the resultant heart attacks caused by this insult to calligraphy.
As to the aspersions cast on the intelligence of Bloggers, implying they needed to think more about the word verification letters they were asked to type - well - words fail me!

Please, think seriously about following Hilary's concise instructions for removing this scourge from our busy blogging lives! And take a few minutes to watch the YouTube clip Broken Biro introduced.

Down to basics

Intermission over, I continue from Not Quite Treading The Boards...

Corsets! The costumes for myself and two other ladies I dressed,* had to begin with these old fashioned garments. This picture from Google is similar enough to the ones I made from unbleached calico and boning, to give you a good idea of what ours were like.

Next I had to create voluminous cotton petticoats, demure mob caps and dainty muslin or lace fichus which would give the finishing touches to yet more curtain material gowns - which were the things I enjoyed sewing most.

We were given diagrams which explained the complex stitching of tape loops needed under the skirts, so that a draw string threaded through them could create soft drapes like paniers at the side, or a bustle at the back of each skirt.

The head gear started life as modern sunhats which I  steamed, re-shaped and painted, in the case of the one for My Lady.

Then in a charity shop I found a pair of black brogues, similar to these, for maidservant Prudence, while the other ladies wore  simple flat shoes, and we were ready for the show to begin...

Continued from earlier post...*HERE 

Through the week, I'd intended to tell a couple of fun stories associated with all these theatrical shenanigans, but once I began writing, it turned into something else. Bear with me, the funny bits will surface eventually... Meantime, I'll share a little more with Sepia Saturday, whatever colour the post turns out to be...
Still to be continued...