The evening light

I know my reach has dropped tremendously since blogger has been playing silly bloggers but I'll keep typing away like I know all of you are too. Keep in touch - don't disappear! 

Having had a glorious walk earlier in the afternoon, we set off back towards Lancaster. There are so few places where you can park wild in the lakes, understandably, as it would be soon over run by all sorts (I am including us too) so we use a tried and tested and accepted park up with one of the best views ever looking over Sunderland Point.

We parked up at that point when the light of the day begins to morph into smooth golden and purple shades. And despite our nearly 7 miles earlier, we just had to get out and fill our eyes and stretch our legs on a favourite 'dog loop'.

The reflections on the inky black waters of the canal were sublime and due to the time, there were so few other walkers about - again we felt to have the place to ourselves. We stopped at the marina to take a few photos as the sun slid behind the horizon. It was rather magical watching lights flicker on in the canal boats or yachts as their occupants prepared for the evening.

The reflections on the water turned to beaten copper and bronze while black silhouetted ducks paddled past searching for last minute morsels before heading to roost.

Back at the van we too set up for our evening, cooking and then eating whilst watching the sky soften into pinks and greys followed by the richest of blue black filled with stars.

The sounds of the day -  cheerful bird trilling and chirps, the occasional farm vehicle or car heading down to the marina changed to wistful whistles of evening song and the distant cronk of a skein of geese heading to their evening rest.

We knew that Saturday would be wet so we made the most of every moment of Friday, sitting up late, listening to the gentle sighs of a retreating tide and snores of a tired dog.

And yes Saturday was very wet - however there is something quite lovely about being tucked up in a very cosy nest, cuddling a mug of tea as you peer through a rain misted window..... time to go home.

I am now going to physically tap on everyone's blog I follow and see what you are up to! Sod blogger!

edited to add: I have managed to find a contact/forum page on the blogger site and left a query as to why and what can be done - see what happens ....

......and if you feel fed up enough to comment here is the LINK to that page

Friday afternoon

As with everyone else it seems - blogger is being dreadful - according to their page there is nothing untoward, but there is definitely a problem - hopefully it will get sorted and if not, I might start looking for another platform. Something I don't really want to do.

We managed a magical 24 hour escape in the van - with both of us having to deal more and more with aging parents who seem to be struggling with the speed of the real world - these microadventures help clear our heads and make us more able to cope.

We packed Zeb (van) with just the necessities and with an overexcited Wills, we drove up to the South Lakes, parked in a favourite lane, strapped on our boots and set off. Wills was horrendous on the lead for about the first 20 minutes then I out of desperation, discovered a slight change in her lead and harness made all the difference. She pulls and pulls and is completely unresponsive when I try to rein her in - but (fingers crossed) with this new lead/harness arrangement - I might just still have a left hand after a walk..... sigh.

But on to more enjoyable things - our walk was utterly delicious and just what we needed. I find being nearer the sea restorative. Our route took us through meadows and woodlands, gently dipping in and out of villages then back through fields and trees.

We chose to stop at the 'Pepper Pot', a Victorian folly on the crest of Eaves Woods looking over Silverdale and Morecombe Bay. The folly's official name is the Queen Victoria Golden Jubilee Monument which is quite a grandiose mouthful for a six metre tall rough stone tower with a wonky conical roof. But the view is utterly sublime.

We sat on the edge of the limestone slab for our lunch - and for the most part of our stop, it was just us, the folly and the view. As we started to pack away, other visitors started to appear from all sides and we smiled quietly at how lucky we'd been to have had the place to ourselves.

We dropped down to the cove and followed the coastal path all around the headland to Jenny Brown's Point. Like all these places given a name, its history is ambiguous. However, Jenny Brown just might have been a local living in one of the 17th - 18th century cottages along the coast near the remains of the old quay.

We love meandering through the National Trust's open access land called Jack Scout. There are a number of lovely nooks where you can just plonk yourself down and crack open the flask and watch the world go by. Or if you are a dog - have a nap....

The trees have been hammered by the onshore winds sculpting them to sinuous coastal hugging topiary.

We turned inland at the smelting chimney but not without replicating a photo we had taken with Moss some years before. Willow obliged quite happily as we snapped away.

We then walked inland through the woodland back to the van where we sat, sans boots and listened to the birds trilling while we drank freshly made mugs of tea. Willow scoffed her biscuits in record time then threw herself into bed. A good sign, a very good sign indeed.

Dog days, lavender haze

I worked today in a favourite moorland garden and apart from doing what was supposed to do, as well as 'entertaining' Willow, I cut back a lavender hedge.

The scent was utterly delicious and I could not bring myself to throw the clippings in to the compost.

So I brought them home!

After I had showered and eaten a late lunch, the girls and I went into the greenhouse to see what could do with the fragrant cuttings.

Then I remembered that somewhere I'd seen mini lavender head wreaths so with a bit of prepping I collected enough useable blooms to make two tiny circles. 

They are now hanging up on our bedside lamps ... Happy me💜

So, if you have access to a bunch of lavender , this is what I did .. 

You'll need floristry wire, sharp scissors or secateurs, wire cutters, piece of pretty ribbon and lavender flowers.

Choose a good strong stemmed stalk (leave that one long) then trim the others very short.

Carefully wire around the long stemmed flower, then add a couple of short stemmed flowers, wiring around them, keep adding more flowers as you go along, 

Once it is long enough or you run out of flower heads, circle round and wire it to the other end 

Tidy up any wire or stalks showing and add your ribbon.

Step back and rightly feel pleased with yourself 😊

September's Crunchy Ginger Biscuits

 Last night I made a second batch of ginger biscuits and yes - they are still yum. As ever, I have modified the original recipe to our own tastes which if you make them - feel free to tweak 😊The original recipe has the cooking times as  10 - 12 minutes however I found the biscuits were still soft even after fully cooling down. 

I returned them to the oven on 100 deg c for about 15 mins and that made all the difference. The second time of baking, I turned the oven off, allowed to cool a little and put all the biscuits back in on metal cooling racks (like the photo below) to crisp up for a further 15ish minutes. Then, once fully cooled they have a delightful crack and crunch to them.

Crunchy Ginger Biscuits

Ingredients

• butter (softened) 170gm
• sugar 190gm
• 1 egg
• Self raising flour 320gm
• Golden syrup (or treacle for a darker taste) 150gm
• Ground ginger 2 heaped teaspoons
• Cinnamon 1 teaspoon
• Ground cloves 1/4 teaspoon
• pinch salt

Two tablespoons of granulated sugar, shake of ginger and cinnamon (to taste) - mixed in a saucer to roll biscuits into

• Preheat the oven to 180 deg c
• Cream the softened butter and sugar, add the egg and syrup and beat well
• Mix in the spices and salt then add flour - mix well
• shape into golf ball sized balls - don't flatten and roll in the sugar and spice mix
• Place, space a little apart on greaseproof paper lined baking trays and cook for 10 - 15 min until a lovely golden colour
• Place on rack to cool and return all biscuits to the switched off but still warm oven to crisp up - leave 10 - 15 mins. (This is optional - if cooked and cooled they have a soft centre but we like a good crack as we bite into them)
• Cool and scoff with a good mug of your favourite hot beverage 😄

I used an online 'cups to grams' converter which made it much easier.

Hope you give them a go and enjoy them as much as we do 😊

Trying to banish the autumnal blues

*if I don't leave a comment on your lovely blogs, it seems that blogger is not playing nicely - fingers crossed it won't be for long 🤞 

Today, in and effort to prevent my head imploding from a murky mix of autumnal blues, post holiday drearies and driech weather - I threw myself and the dog into the glasshouse to see if I could sort it out .... 

Almost a reset for both the greenhouse and for me I suppose, especially as the weather kept drizzling and that in itself is rather a downer for me, so armed with a large travel mug of tea, the radio and an easily excitable dog we trouped off to the garden much to her disappointment!

Most of the morning was wading through all the things which have been temporarily homed here from my parents move, I am hoping that this weekend we can takes lots over to their new place once Himself and I have built their shed - weather permitting of course......

By lunchtime both the dog and myself were fed up so we trudged back to the house and we had a bit of time out. In the afternoon with the shredder and the dustbin in full use, I finally discovered that I do actually have a floor in the glasshouse again.

Woo hoo I was finally able to reach my glasshouse grown vegetables and harvest what was ready - a glimmer just at the right time.

On a different note - I am launching myself into 'hand made chrimbly' I am going to attempt to make at least one gift per person. I have quite a stash of 'useful crafting stuff' and I think it is time to start using it up. I am thinking along the lines of crochet (can't knit any more as one of my thumbs just cries in pain), painting  (carefully - again hand issues), air dried clay, sewing and baking.

And talking of baking, I have just made some cracking ginger biscuits. It comes from an American site so everything is in cups. I shall do the 'Himself taste test' and if he thinks they are worth making again, I will do but I will convert the amounts into grams.

*later* 

I swapped some of those ginger biscuits for a bowlful of windfall apples - hmmm what shall I make with these? And the 'Himself verdict?' They are definitely have again.

I spent most of last Tuesday painting my folks shed which had the bad grace to fall on both the dog and myself courtesy of a huge gust of wind. Willow decided she'd rather sit inside the van for safety and I had to wash paint off my arm, out of my hair and chuck my shirt into the washing machine!

Any hoo - end of grumble, tomorrow is another day (shed building) and to round up Friday - Himself has lit the fire - autumnal vibes anyone? 

Let's get a raidin'

Continuing on our lovely bank holiday weekend up in Dumfries and Galloway and still on a high from the wonderfully unexpected proposal in the gardens, another request was to 'Do' the Raiders Road. A forest drive that, in places, feels delightfully wild and magical. 'Off roading' enough to satisfy the off roading drivers in our midst and safe enough to cope with normal road vehicles for other members of our convoy. 

Four vehicles in total - us in our van, Youngest and his lovely girlfriend in his converted ex mountain rescue land rover, Eldest and his fiancé in their land rover defender and my brother and sister in law in their electric suzuki off roader. Plus three rather overly excited and enthusiastic dogs - Willow (Welsh collie) has two 'cousins' (American Labradors - yellow and fox red). So you can imagine the chaos....

We met up at the Clatteringshaws Loch side of the road and carefully picked our way down the forest road - stopping for photos and chats and swapping of drivers. The first park up was for the dogs (collectively known as the girls) so they could hurl themselves into the river. And bless her - Willow was the first in by a country mile - my little silly dog who would not walk through a puddle managed to out do the labs at the first swim!

After a vigorous rub down, the girls were dispatched to their vehicles and we all set off, trundling along. The weather had been promising potential rain and so far it was sunny and warm. 

We eventually reached our chosen lunch spot - Otter Pools - and found a park up that took all four vehicles and cracked on the kettles (yes kettles in the plural - Youngest's van and ours are both togged up to turn into instant cafes so there were teas, hot chocolates and coffees made on the spot) and opened tubs of home made cakes, biscuits and fruit pies and between throwing sticks for the dogs, drinking brews and munching cakes, chatting and batting away the midgies (we were all covered in 'smidge and had incense sticks smoking away!)

We had to retreat to the vehicles once the rain began, Youngest and I had already planned how to cope if the weather went bad - so we had his awning out between the van and landie making a safe dry space.

We must have spent aaaaages there - mid morning cakes turned into a delicious lunch while chatting and playing with dogs - it was wonderful. But it was time to move on, the rain was getting a little more persistent so we packed up and headed off, trundling through rain sparkly trees and gushing streams.

We pulled up into another favourite stopping place (Stroan Viaduct)  and set up for afternoon tea and cake (this off-roading business plays havoc with the waistline!!) and we just about managed to keep out of the rain - but we all agreed that it actually added to the adventure of it all.

This was our last planned stop - as the road was nearly done, so we said our good byes to my brother and sister in law and their girls and headed back to Kirkcudbright to dry off.

What a lovely day - despite the rain - we absolutely enjoyed it 

And in this last photo - it shows you how small Willow is compared to her cousins....