>A precious gift
>
Around a year ago our little family, having been thrown up in the air by C’s redundancy, finally came to land up here. Relief that a new job had been found was somewhat counterbalanced with loneliness as I came to terms with having moved a long way from friends and family and having given up what had been a happy balance of teaching three days per week and being at home with P the rest. Loneliness could have been a big problem if it hadn’t been for a chance encounter at the local child health clinic when I got chatting to the mother of a little girl there about the Steiner playgroup P and I were going to. Turned out she lived at the other end of our street. Turned out that she was also a teacher. Turned out that she liked the idea of going walking in the Lakes with the babies. Turned out that she and I shared a lot of values, ideas and a sense of humour. Turned out our children got on like a house on fire, stretching out from their car seats or buggies to hold hands when we went out and about.
One year later and we’ve been on many, many walks; eaten a good number of picnics; many including hilariously lumpy vegetable soup and the obligatory flask of redbush tea; dealt with a few medical emergencies; seen our babies become toddlers (and tag-team wrestled them into car seats when necessary!); discussed our worries and shared our joys about family life; both got pregnant again and shared sunshine and showers in so many ways.
Today we went on a walk by Elterwater and realised that this was one of the first places we had walked together when we first met. I hardly need reminding of how much I appreciate the precious gift I have in this friend of mine, but today was as a good a day as any to think about it.
>Still summer
>
After a week of rain or threats of rain (we’ve discovered that our little corner of Cumbria seems to do a good line in threatening clouds that don’t actually dump their loads on us, saving it for the fells- good for staying home and washing, bad for escaping on a walk), the summer seems to be giving us one last glorious blast. We met up with an old friend and his new wife at the weekend in lovely sunshine coupled with a soft breeze. While C and Mr A went for a bike ride, Mrs A and I took the children on a walk by Elterwater. Note the restraining hand on P’s hood- he feels a little bit too invincible in his waterproof suit and wellies and sets off into lakes as if he can wade across! The rain that had lashed down the previous day meant that Skelwith Force, the turning point of our route, was in full spate and pretty spectacular as it sent spray up onto the path we were on, metres above it.
Meanwhile, having finished my teacosies, I’m now started on another knit using reclaimed wool. I posted a picture of the much loved but never worn ‘Iceland’ sweater a while back. At the weekend I finally got around to frogging it and have now cast on ‘Rosamund’s Cardigan’, its new incarnation. Managed to mess up the cables on the first attempt, probably because I was trying to squeeze all the stitches onto straight needles. A quick ferret through a yet-to-be unpacked box unearthed one of my few circular needles which actually happened to be the correct size (I’m thinking about getting an interchangable circular needle set for Christmas) and things have gone better since then. Please note my gorgeous new workbasket- a long promised ‘new home’ present from C- more on this at a later date.