Little Rituals

Monday's coffee in Rob Ryan enamel mug

I recently read a lovely post on my Bloglovin' feed called Little Rituals by Gillian from Tales From A Happy Home.  Gillian's post was about the small daily rituals which, after moving home, are the things that make your new house your home.  And it set me to thinking; I LOVE our new house and in the short 9 months that we have been living here it has become the home of my dreams, for the rest of my life, absolute heaven.  I don't mean to gush, but it has.

And Gillian is right, it is the day to day rituals, things that you only do in your own house that make it your home.   So, here is a very ordinary day, Monday to be exact, but one that brought me much pleasure.

Little Louis seems to always get up first, and too early.  He comes into our bedroom and wiggles around in our bed, making snoozing impossible, but, I have a new trick up my PJ sleeve.  I send him off to let the chickens out of their house.

Little Una Fox has a barking dog alarm clock which goes off just after 7am, over, and over, and over again.  Mr Fox gets up for work, and brings me a cup of tea in bed before he goes - Isn't he grand!  I don't feel alive until I've had my tea, washed my face and applied my Fushi Oils.  They are an indulgence that I decided I deserve now that I am in my 40's.

 
But my day begins proper, much like Gillian's by the sound of it, after I drop the Little Foxes at school - now only a 90 second walk rather than a 30 minute drive away. On my return I have my best coffee of the day.   Fresh ground, made in an espresso pot bought before the Little Foxes were born.  The cup I use is very important.  It is usually one of a choice of 3, but each cup has a slightly different meaning for me.  The one I went for on Monday means - "a day in the garden".

Even though the school run is now such a brief excursion I still get greeted by our two dogs, Bea and Beau, like I've been gone for days.  Sometimes this ends in disaster, as I trip over them extracting a yelp from the victim and a non too savoury word from me.  On other occasions disaster eludes us and we have a bit of a love in, the dogs and I.  Tails wagging, neck scratching, jockeying for position and general over-excited chaos on a small furry canine scale.

Then we do our tour of the garden.  When Mr Fox is home he and I walk the garden, but otherwise the dogs like to accompany me.  We check the chickens,...

and this is why we check the chickens; evidence of a fox having taken a rabbit in our garden last night

I gaze at my apple trees for a bit, and dream of my orchard.  Planting the three apple trees was all quite a palaver, so to see the blossom on them now is wonderfully reassuring.

We also take in the veg patch and green house where I've sown seeds that I'm hoping have germinated.  Little green seedlings are a cause for celebration.  Hopeful watering of all other seed trays and plants in pots elsewhere in the garden brings my garden tour to a close.

I sit at the computer for a bit once inside.  I'm still not sure where my favourite spot for sitting at the computer is in this house.  I've been moving it around.  But I quite like the table in the back room at the moment.

I check emails and Facebook; friends are so scattered these days, all over the world from the US and Canada to Australia and Bangkok.  Do a bit of writing, upload some photos.  Then remember that I am supposed to be doing the shopping online not getting distracted.

I do agree that a home is not a home until you've broken in the kitchen.  And most of my toil in the garden is all about edible crops.  At Ash Cottage the kitchen wasn't in too bad a state when we moved in.  But shortly after our move, one by one, everything functional broke down, including the cooker. So, we bought a reconditioned Aga, built on site it was great to watch it grow in my kitchen, and as we are talking rituals, it has become something of an idol to be worshiped.  I do a fair but of cookery exchanging (my marmalade for her pesto, sloe gin for elderflower cordial, that kind of thing) with my friend Jennie and last weekend she leant me her ice cream maker.  I've made a batch of blackberry ice cream and with the spare egg whites a batch of meringues.

Where one woman's rituals is another woman's chore, in Tales From A Happy Home, Gillian writes eloquently, and supplies beautiful pictures, of her house-work; bedding changed and beautifully made up beds, washing on the line.  With the greatest respect to this lady I'm not going to do that.  I go by the adage that no woman on her death bed would say; "I wish I had spent more time doing the house work".  My house work is done as quickly as possible, the bare minimum, "a bit of dirt never hurt" as my granny would say, in her spotless house(!).  It's a quick, kitchen - post breakfast detritus cleared, bathrooms - given a quick swipe (yes, swipe not wipe), beds made, kids clothes picked up off the floor and stuck in the washing machine, then get back out in the garden.

Today, I wanted to get the second bed of potatoes into the ground.  Which involves moving huge piles of soil from an old compost heap onto the veg beds on the other side of the garden.

Can you spot the potato?

This quiet, simple, sometimes strenuous, repetitive to the point of meditative activity is why I love gardening.  Sharing a chat with my elderly neighbours over the garden fence, exchanging tomatoes for runner bean plants.  A quick snack for lunch, and a couple of drink and chicken watching stops mean that I am little more than started on the potato beds when it is time to pick the Little Foxes up from school.  Gardening eats time.

On a Monday the children have no after school clubs, so they come straight back home and go say "Hi!" to their chickens.  As it was such a beautiful day they persuaded me to turn the sprinkler on for them to play in after tea.

I had to stop my toil to watch them screaming and jumping into the cold water, a beautiful end to the day.  Straight into the shower for those two, PJs, hot milk and a madeleine while they wait for daddy to come home.  Mr Fox usually puts the children to bed while I do our dinner.  That is his most important ritual and sometimes I join him to listen to the bedtime story.

As Gillian asked; outside my open bedroom window I can hear birdsong and cars.

And I can hear the creaks and groans of my house bending and stretching her old bones.  I talk to my house, she is a she. I like to think our inhabiting her is something that she is a willing participant in after some years of neglect.  That we are gently restoring a lady in her middle years (I don't like to call her old!) to something of her former glory.  Each day we live in her, no matter how ordinary or normal, is nourishing her as much as she shelters and protects us.



 

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The Garden at Ash Cottage - An Introduction

The mild weather that we had before Christmas, along with keeping the ladybirds out and active, allowed us to get a really good start on the garden.  One of the main attractions of our new home is the garden at Ash Cottage.  It is about an acre in size, with several out-buildings and a 60ft chicken run, loads of BIG trees and incredibly over-grown.  The first thing we had to do when we got in was cut everything back, so that we could see what we have.

What we have are a lot of very large trees that make the house and garden dark and prevent other plants from growing, but with views and hints of how beautiful it could all look once we get to work on it.

So, we went for it with the trees, all the leylandii except 1 were cut down; that's 8 trees (1 felled by the other Mrs Fox & I); plus an 11ft hedge of 7 more leylandii cut down by Neil with his trusty chainsaw; plus the 3 or 4 trees cut down by the electricity board (at our behest) to make safe the power-line that runs across the garden.

Most of the trees had to be climbed to be felled, there was not enough space to allow any of them to go down without them falling on a house, out-building, chicken run, caravan or other trees.  The tree surgeons didn't think any of the trees had been touched for a minimum of 20 years.  We still have tonnes of dead wood that needs to be cut out of the remaining trees to make them healthier and safer.

After all the cutting down we've had huge bonfires to get rid of all of the wood and leaves, that are of little use in wood burners due to all of the oils in their timber.  We are still working our way through this wood, huge long piles of tree limbs have been; trampolines, pirate ships, castles and forests for the children to play in and on for the last 3 months.  They will be sad to see it finally all gone, and we have re-learnt that primeval enjoyment of just gazing at a big bonfire, poking it and stoking it and listening to it crackle and flame.

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Despite all our felling we still have plenty of mature trees in the garden, including a large beech and sycamore tree that are over 100 years each, 4 more young sycamore, 5 silver birch, a willow, field maple, a cherry tree and several damson and greengage trees, 3 more substantial evergreens still standing, numerous hawthorn and elder, and I'm not even mentioning the various large shrubs.

Along with clearing the trees here has also been a vast amount of rubbish; old swings, barbed wire, garden machinery, chairs, wood, oil drums, cabling, concrete, glass, rubble, an old MG engine buried in the compost.  The compost heap itself was about the size of a small urban garden and needed to be moved as it was rotting the neighbours fence it had been leaning against.

All this space in the garden allows us to say "Goodbye" to our allotment (sad day though it was) and incorporate the veg patch into our garden.   Here's the final destination of that compost heap; but it's back breaking work.

And it is the veggie garden that has absorbed most of my attention this week.  At one side of the garden is a hexagonal greenhouse that I have been renovating the last few days, clearing of ivy, cleaning, re-hanging shelves and re-making benches.  Sadly neglected like the rest of the house and garden, it is being returned to it's intended use and now is home to two trays of tomato seeds.

And to make up for my decimation of bird habitat, we have put out feeders and bought nest boxes to go up in the remaining trees.  Yesterday I ordered 3 apple trees and we've a walnut tree waiting to go into the ground too.

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And, We're In...

Today I've got to give up the never ending clearing and cleaning for the sake of my newly manicured nails - we're off to a 70th Birthday party this weekend.  It gives me the perfect excuse to sit amidst the mess of our move and blog instead.

Ash Cottage, our new abode, is a Victorian cottage with an old butchers shop attached and an acre garden.  She has been sorely neglected for a good 20 years or more and so we are gently clearing, cleaning and restoring the old girl to her former glory.

It has been non stop since we got in here, as I'm sure is always the case when you move house.  We have a list of jobs as long as your arm and more constantly added.  Some days I can't believe how much has already been done, sometimes I can't believe how little.  But, I'm quite chuffed at what we have achieved so far.  The list is something like:

• Man living in the garden - gone (long story for another post me thinks).
• Dangerous gas fires - gone.
• Meters of unnecessary copper pipes, electrical cabling, redundant heating systems, motion sensors, air freshners, burglar alarms, thermostats and fitted desks and shelving (2 skips worth of the stuff) - gone. 
• Bathrooms and kitchen - steam cleaned.  Showers - working.
• Trees, shrubs, nettles and grass cut back so we can; a) see out the back room window and b) walk down the garden.  Doors to the garage - openable, "Thanks Jack!"...

 ...although, the old blue sign above the garage door, for what was once an MG Dealership, is no more.  Held together and yet destroyed by the voracious roots of the ivy that covered the garage roof.

• Garden fenced so that dogs can't a) commit kamikaze attacks on the cars on the A120 that passes outside our front door or b) chase our neighbours alpacas.   

This gate, part of the new fence, was the first completed job on the house.  The river Ash that runs along the side of the garden is now off limits to dogs and children without adult supervision and I can't tell you the difference that has made to my nerves.

So, here she is the old girl awaiting whatever is next for her.  And, oh, Mrs Fox has plans - crafty Mrs Fox!

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Ways to make you feel like you really are moving No1 - Make Curtains

I've unpacked the sewing machine (we thought we were going to move during the summer hols!) and am making a set of curtains out of a vintage curtain & bedspread given to us by Mr Fox's mum.  They will be for the children's bedroom.  They'll be sharing a room again at first.  That way, we only have to get one room clean and decorated.  Initially I'm just going to paint their room white, the curtains will stand out and add the main colour to the room; well, along with all their brightly coloured toys, books and pictures of course.

This may take a few days, just unpicking the seams is taking an age.

But I love this bright bold pattern, these 'flowers' are about 40cm each.  I'm looking forward to the end result.  And it is taking my mind off the lack of movement on our sale.

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Decorating Inspiration: A Room of Colour

A room in Virginia Woolf's home

It's taking a while to complete on the new house, so, I am channeling the energy born of frustration into lots of decorating ideas.  I want to be bold with colour in this home, no more minimalist white walls for us.  A muddle of texture and colour, pattern and pleasure for the eye that's what I'm after.

from The Black Dog by Levi Penfold

Inspiration is coming from all over the place; the little fox's books and children's TV shows:

CBBC's adaptation of Katie Morag by Mairi Hedderwick

Inspiration has come from nature - I love the colour of this lichen, but hate yellow walls in rooms, so I have to think of a way to use it as an accent, maybe with grey.  

And our holiday in Sardinia - I am itching to use bright orange somewhere, kitchen maybe. 

There have been surprises, I've found myself attracted to the idea of a green room and using pink - a colour I have always thought of as one of my least favourites.

Pinterest has been a treasure trove of ideas.  I'm particularly pleased with the development of the ideas for our hall cum bootroom:

Follow Mrs Fox's's board Hallways & Utility on Pinterest.

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I'm turning into a 1950's Housewife?

1950's Del Monte Ketchup Advert

In that giant all-knowing child rearing manual that we are all given at the birth of our first child, selfishness is not one of the things they cover much is it?  I mean parental selfishness.  Obviously the kids are self-obsessed little bundles of desire.  But once you’re a mother you are meant to become all selfless, suppress your needs, give up your own dreams and desires, live FOR your children - but not THROUGH them, that's BAD!

And how do you do that then?

After 3 years juggling a full-time job, I gave up working outside the family home when we had our second child.  Mr Fox is a very involved parent, a GREAT dad, but I was the primary carer even with a full-time job.  It was my career, being the one that contributed less to the family budget, that was always compromised by child care needs, last minute chaos, illness and the like.  Mr Fox was quite happy to let me take the lead, as if through divine maternal knowledge I knew something he didn’t know when it came to raising a child. 

There was no pressure to give up work from Mr Fox, or anyone else.  Although the Old Man has since admitted to liking it.  He has to be the least macho man you could come across, but he said that he likes knowing the kids and I are at home and safe while he's out there providing.  Far be it for me to rain on his parade.

I try to run a small business with my best friend, the other Mrs Fox.  We work from home and the business has to fit around our families.  Someone asked me if it was a “hobby” the other day.  And it made me think.  

Is Mrs Fox's just me indulging my need to feel as if I am working?

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy being at home.  I liked my job, but I like this more.  It's not that I'm terribly domestic in the traditional sense.  I'm not house-proud, though I love my home.  I clean as little as possible and find much of the mundane stuff frankly boring.  I parent by trial and error, with errors probably winning on the score sheet of parenting.  I most miss the adult company of a working life, but love to watch the kids growing and changing, that much used phrase; "the time passes so quickly"  is so true with children.  

Being at home is often harder, but infinitely more satisfying than my career was.  I had good jobs; ones that other people probably thought were more exciting/interesting than they actually were, and good enough that I don't fancy doing jobs I hate, just so I can say that I'm a working mum.  I ended my career a little disillusioned and ready to explore a new path in life.

Which I guess also reveals that Mr Fox's earnings are enough to support the family on a single income, while I follow this new path.  And you have to factor in childcare costs, I am a pretty frugal housewife, there are fringe benefits to the re-cycling and vintage aesthetic.

Staying at home releases me from that need for butt clenching organisation, the military precision of the household with both parents working.  I have IMMENSE admiration for the parents that pull that one off.  But, I confess I cannot do it without feeling stressed beyond belief.   And that is the reason in a nutshell, so complex but so not, I decided to stay at home - because going to work made me unhappy.

Deciding to stay at home and look after the kids was a selfish decision.  While there are benefits for our whole family, I think I benefit most.  I feel as if I should feel guilty.  I’ve let the side down, the Women’s side I mean.  But, wasn’t feminism all about giving women choices?  My choice seems to be to become a bad 1950’s housewife that hates to clean and shouts at her children.

I just chucked the last of my personal savings into the (joint bank account) pot for the deposit on our new house.  I am now in my 40‘s living in Hertfordshire, not working (and haven’t been for 5 years), entirely financially dependent on my husband.  I sound like a 50’s housewife and yet I feel like a selfish little kid.  And this blog is part of that selfishness, I want to record the new home we are going to build, the family life and the fun it entails.  I'm looking forward to choosing tiles, raising bees and chickens, going to village events, digging the garden, growing and making food.

I've decided to accept my selfishness, get over the guilt and embrace the 1950's housewife in me.  Still don't intend to do any more bloody cleaning tho!

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A Room of Ones Own: The Studio

After my last post I have been thinking some more on the whole room of ones own theme.  And talking to friends who are (trying) to work creatively from home too.

Building the studio for Mrs Fox's was, in the wider scheme of things, quite selfish.  My family and I live in a relatively small cottage and I got my own exclusive work space.

Yes, my husband used it on the one day a week he worked from home, but he had to fit around the mess in there.  Yes, it was money from my redundancy that paid for it, but it could have been used for something else.  Yes, we sometimes used it for the little foxes' craft sessions too, after all most of the craft materials were up there.  Yes, the building provided us all with extra storage space, the little foxes a play area under the stairs and added value to our home.  But ultimately it was a selfish decision.

But, without it I do not think I would have got Mrs Fox's off the ground.  Not just because of the physical space, but the importance of the mental space that the studio gave.

Because, by building it, by deciding to prioritise that need for space within our family unit, I also gave Mrs Fox's priority, room to establish and grow.  Now that the work space is going to be more integrated into the family home I wonder what that says about Mrs Fox's?

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Reading List One

A new reading list for the move:-

1. The Story of Houses And Homes - A Ladybird Achievement Book   From my collection of vintage children's books, one for Ladybird Tuesday I think.
2. The Hive by Bee Wilson   I am very much looking forward to reading this book.  I started to read it a year or two ago but didn't get very far (I blame the little foxes) so it has gone on my pile of books to read in preparation for our new home as I really would like to keep bees.
3. 21st Century Smallholder by Paul Waddington   Neil bought me this book for my birthday before we moved from London to Hertfordshire.  I've be lusting after a big veg garden, bees and chickens for some time now.  I have to admit 21st Century Smallholder is more style over substance, but it is a beautifully designed book and it has been on my bedside table for about 6 years, keeping the dream alive.
4. Charles Dowding's Veg Journal by Charles Dowding   I found this book via some great images on pinterest (I've been looking for garden inspiration) and a competition in the Country Smallholding magazine.  Charles Dowding is a proponent of no dig approach to vegetable gardening.  My attraction to the idea of growing abundant food crops without double digging the plots once or twice a year cannot be stressed enough. 
5. The Great Indoors - Ben Highmore   Not even started this one yet, but the other Mrs Fox gave me it for my birthday this year, more inspiration.
6. Cabbages & Roses Guide to Natural Housekeeping by Christina Strutt   I bought myself and the other Mrs Fox this book a couple of years ago.  I feel I can only dream of my house looking like the pictures in here.  But a girl can dream right!  I'd like to really try and reduce my use of chemicals in cleaning the house and am hoping the new house will be a new start.

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Forget Me Not - 1: The Studio

I'm alternatively excited and overawed by the idea of packing up the studio for the move.

Mrs Fox's boxes presently spill into the garage and garden as I try to pack craft materials, party products, vintage books toys and dolls, a pre-loved fabric collection begun in my 20's, stationary, sewing machines, and my favourite/inspiring pictures, talismans and knick knacks.
But how lucky am I that I will still have my own space in this new abode of ours.  There is a room at the front of the house that the present owners (The Finn's) use as a dinning room.  We don't need a dinning room so Mrs Fox's gets the room.  It has a huge bay window and a half derelict yellow tile fire place.  80's-stylie "floral country" wallpaper with *horror* a floral border below the picture rail.  It's been flood damaged so the Finn's have ripped up the laminate floor they put down to reveal a damaged Victorian black & white tile floor.

Oh yes, did I mention the floods?  The reason we can afford our new home is because it flooded in the spring with the torrential downpours that we had.  Apparently caused by a wall collapsing into a open culvert nearby.  The wall was built (illegally) by someone who had decided that a culvert was too ugly for them to view from their garden.  Not the village's favourite resident these days I would guess, as it was not only our house that flooded.

Life for both sexes—and I look at them, shouldering their way along the pavement—is arduous, difficult, a perpetual struggle. It calls for gigantic courage and strength. More than anything, perhaps, creatures of illusion that we are, it calls for confidence in oneself.

Virginia Woolf
A Room of Ones Own

The studio is the one part of this house that I will really miss.  It means more to me than the sum total of the parts inside it.  I had it built and paid for it; it housed my creative life; I loved working in there; drinking coffee in there; making things in there.  It was indeed that essential "a room of ones own." The studio is a space that was mine when so much of my life is (mostly willingly) not entirely mine.

All the most important things in my life are coming with me to Ash cottage, all but the studio.  But the room that I will have in our new house is more integrated into the family space.  The studio being at the end of the garden, while great for my head space was not so practical with 2 young children in the house.  I'm looking forward to my new work-room, but I will miss the studio.

 Here is an ode in pictures to my darling studio, the first of many I guess.

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