Spring is raising her head all about us

Madam Pounce enjoying the sunshine at the hall door last week end.  It was delightfully mild - indeed it was surprisingly mild and to be able to leave the hall door open and let fresh air in was a wonderful treat. 

A few of my favourite things.

The tea-pot came from a charity shop, the tins were a "find"  reduced from €36 to €16 a couple of years ago and all because of a tiny dent in the largest one.

A reminder of last year's snow, and a reminder to say THANK YOU GOD for a mild Christmas this year.  I spent most of early December panicking in case it would snow over Christmas.  Eldest now lives in London and I had visions of not being able to get to the airport to collect her, or flights being cancelled...but she got home and we had a wonderful Christmas.  Mother in Law passed away last June, and Sister in Law decided to spend it with friends instead of with her brother's family [us].  The dynamics changed with that one decision.  For over 30 years dinner was always served up at 14.00hrs, in order to enable SinLaw and MinLaw to return home as they "never liked to be away from home for too long".  This year we dined at 7, after a leisurely day chatting, going for a long walk on a nearby beach en famille, played Ludo, and ending the evening with lovely hot creamy Bailey's Irish Coffees.

There is nothing like a few farmyard animals to remind us that this was once a dairy farm; hen-keeping is on the agenda.  That is if we can get past his insistence that a cockerel is a necessity, and mine that hens are independent and need no male to make them cluck happily!  He only wants a cockerel for two reasons, one is to back answer the neighbours two donkeys, and the other is he is blessed among women.. YD and I, and ED when she is around...another male voice to crow about the garden would suit him well!  Yeah! Right!

For some reason, this cloud reminded me of someone being blown along! YD says it reminds her of Mary Poppins.  Taken at dusk at the end of a lovely day.

We had a mad rush to finish the decoration in the "sitting room" [as my Grandmother used to call it] for Christmas, but gone is the 80's taupe/gold/brown squiggly carpet and a nice wine Axminster with a small pattern on it graces the floor.  Far more complimentary to the fireplace, with its blue tiles, and the walls are now cream instead of a dull beige as they were when we moved back in in 2008.  For some reason the fact that ED was coming home for Christmas put a push on OH to get the long promised decoration finished; and, even if I do say so myself, the sight of her face as she viewed this room and her own newly re-decorated bedroom was the best present we could have had.

We are now in the next phase of the five year plan, but a year ahead of ourselves; conversion of an outbuilding to a cottage to let.  I still haven't decided if I will use if for holiday lets or full time letting; but with the way this Government has clamped down with its austerity measures, the extra income will not go amiss.  Nowadays, here in Ireland, you turn on the t.v.,/radio with fear and trepidation; newstime announcements only seem to bring news of more taxes.  We have taxes for owning a house, septic tank taxes,  you name it and they'll tax it, yet nothing seems to stop them from paying exorbitant amounts to "Advisors"  way beyond the cap on their income.  A cap that is mesmerising to the ordinary Joe O'Soap in the street.  Bets are now being taken on how long before we find ourselves with another General Election to rid us of the Government that was going to put things right after the unholy mess we found ourselves in reached mind boggling proportions.  We're still wa..................it.......................ing.....................!

However, they haven't managed to tax bird song.             Yet.          We hope.         It was wonderful today to stand in the garden and listen to the thrush, blackbird and robin form a quartet with a dunnock and treat us to the best Opera going.  The hedges and trees are alive with the sound of flitting wings as blue tits and coal tits roam from tree to tree.  The long tailed tits arrive promptly at eleven and four and the greats lurk around the fat balls ready to attack all would be incomers.

The narcissi and daffodils are showing willing, and if the wind that has blown us out of the garden for the past week drops for long enough we may even see that river of daffs we planted last year come to bloom.  In the lane the flowering current [Ribes] is showing its pink petticoats, and the dwarf Iris are abundant.  My favourites, the snowdrops, are late this year, they usually show by Christmas, but this year they are peeking daintily at us - maybe they await St Brigid's day on Wednesday.

From Monday on for the next few weeks the sounds of building will be ringing in our ears, and this year it won't be just the birds. 

It is that time of the year again, winter is on its way, a chilly breeze greets me on the door step each morning as I check the post box and the range has been lit.  At the moment there is a pea souper fog obscuring the view, and I like it.  I am in that mood to hide behind it, the range crackling, the smell of roasting lemon and herb chicken coming from its oven, the kettle hissing on top and the prospect of a large cuppa and a chance to sit down and blog.  Somewhere out there someone is out with his gun shooting at rabbits; I think the local woodpigeon population may be safe as nothing is flying in this weather.

Grubstake

OH's constant companion, this little chap knows how to find the juciest grubs.  He is never far from OH as he gardens, and how he has survived Mme Pounce is beyond me.  His is a derring do attitude, and he will risk feather and beak to pursue his desires.

Madam Pounce, doyenne of our house, boss of YD, bad tempered, fussy, ocd, mouser extraordinaire who has recently discovered the futility of trying ot catch one of our local robins.  Her Ladyship was seriously underwhelmed last winter when it snowed, this is one of the early days, the Heuchera behind her was totally invisible two days later.  She declined to go out when it turned really bad, and upon being helped out the door at meal and "ahem!" times, turned a vicious and baleful eye upon the simple minded one who thought her life would be improved by a snow clawicure.  That was me by the way.

Winter wonderland

Our local Golf course, scene of many a happy childhood hour.  Mum would gather up my friends and I, pack an enormous flask of hot tea, sausage sandwiches with apples [we were big 3 Jays fans] and head off across the snowy plains.  She would leave her basket in one of the shelters, and we would try to trace the tracks in the snow.  Rabbit, hare, birds, fox and the ubiquitous badger.  After an hour of imagining we were in some Canadian backwood, we would tuck into the sandwiches, sponge cake and piping hot tea.  Arriving home to a huge casserole  fresh from the oven and some of her apple pie, we would sit before the fire and voice our day dreams, our imaginations ran around the world and sleepily, at seven, everyone returned to their homes dreaming of more fun in the snow tomorrow.

Ironically, during ED and YD's childhood, snow was a rare sight.  When it did come it lasted but a few hours, yet I would pack a backpack, same basic ingredients and head for the grounds of Kilruddery House.  Adventures when we are children are the foundation of our adulthood, Mum used to say.  She was right.  These are the days and hours we can never get back, but boy! wasn't it grand to make the best of them?

Becalmed!

No matter where I roam, the road home always calls me.

I have a strong sense of belonging living here.  I loved my life in Wicklow, made many new friends, discovered blogging, made new friends,  lost the Queen of my Heart and came home.  I realise now that sometimes you have to "emigrate", be it locally or globally, to appreciate what it is you have.  All the years of slogging home carrying a heavy school bag, dashing for buses and trains to take me to work, heading off on "foreign" holidays in an era when the holiday abroad idea was just beginning to take a grip, leaving to get married,  this road, in those days, was the portal to the world and  preparation for coming home eventually.  My soul is at peace here.

Monarch of all he surveys!

Night time nature

It is night-time, 00:38 a.m., to be precise, and I am not long in. OH, YD and I decided to go down to the village pub earlier. Something we had been promising ourselves for quite some time. We usually drop down to the next village, OH and I, catch up with all our friends [well, mostly mine, I grew up here] and last night, after Downton Abbey we decided to call into the local.

Pubs in Ireland have taken a hammering with all the pc rules that came on board in the past decade or so. No smoking; so now everybody sits out in the cold in winter in draughty shelters...well, where else are you going to have a bit of craic with your pals. In our village it's not an option, go out and be blown out of it with a howling gale...the village has become very healthy regarding smoking in the past twenty years.

It was lovely to meet up with the neighbours, catch up on whose who [my God, hasn't she aged...look in the mirror dear at yourself!] and could your one over there really be a grandmother? For heaven's sake she was three years behind me in school. How could she be a granny...and of course the questions flying back at us. YD got the usual inquisition "Have you a boyfriend love?!" or "if you're not dating pet, I have a lovely son, he's 36, on his second marriage and has 14 kids". Yes. Indeed.

As OH works anti social hours, most of the neighbours were amazed either with the fact that we were still together after 32 years, or that we still went out together, or that we actually have a mid-twenties daughter. He worked in the place 40 years ago and I was tickled pink when two of my former disco-dancing days pals informed me that he hadn't aged a bit since those days. One cast a cold eye over me and asked me had I heard of botox, the other patted my hand and said I was still quite presentable. Thanks Gals! You don't look a day over 80 either. [Loud giggle!].

As we staggered up the hill after mid-night, not inebriated but tilting head first into a howling gale force wind, a fox was sitting in the front garden having a staring competition with Mme Pounce. Pounce has not been feeling too well this week. More to do with convincing OH and YD that I have starved her and she has been indulging in extra packets of a well known cat food product - serve the hussy right for miaowing lies. My moneys with the fox. Anyhow, as soon as Mme Pounce saw us coming she hopped off the garden table and chased the poor, innocent, underfed, terrified little fox away. Am I biased? Yep, you got it. There were foxes in this garden before herself arrived.

She has put up a ton of weight since moving here. Life suits her, no big black and white bullying tom from the old house around to chase her round the garden. She has discovered the cosiest of hidey holes to rest up in during the day and with her cheating eating is as fat as a frump.

Our owl has reappeared, he is to be seen these nights floating past the dining room window. He was missing for a while, but is now back with us. A barn owl, he sails on silent wings across the garden. In the daytime we are treated to the cackling of a Jay. In my childhood there were a lot of jays around but now after an absence of many years one has come back to us.

Away with me to my bed before I fall asleep. I shall resist the urge to watch another programme on our forthcoming presidential election. I am tired enough to sleep without its benefit.

As Dixon of Dock Green used to say "Good night folks!!!".

A new Broom

I call out to visit an old neighbour, when I can get him at home that is. His social life at 87 years of age is better than a 27 year olds! He lives beside our old house, and even to this day ED and YD are convinced that he and his late wife were an extra set of grandparents.

Last week I dropped out to see him, and brought the poor man a jar of my home made chutney. He is, as far as I can ascertain, still alive and feeling no ill consequences. I have become interested again in home cooking. Three years of a tiny kitchen here, and about six months of lack of access to all my kitchenalia, I lost the grá and cooking became basic. I am back with a bang and my James Martin cook books are getting great use. Chutney [a glut of apples is great incentive] and apple jam and apple sauce and apple...you get the picture. I still have friends, apparently, all of them having survived their pots of chutney!

So, back to my visit to Tom, chutney included. Being the Miss Marple type, my deductive powers went into hyperdrive when I saw the skip outside what used to be our marital home. Loaded to the brim. The wardrobes from our old bedroom [only three years old at time of sale], the interior doors, and my kitchen. All thrown higgledy, piggeldy into the skip. A wail went through my mind as I sat, to all appearances searching for something on the floor of the car, taking in the contents of the new owners skip. A marital lifetime of choosing with OH the perfect doors, the family friendly kitchen. The kitchen where all my friends headed for, nevermind a sitting room with comfy sofa and roaring fire. The kitchen where ED and YD studied, indeed learned to write and draw, the kitchen window which gave birth to this blog The View from the Kitchen Window....all in the skip. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

Taking a moment to calm myself, to resist the urge to go and bang on the hall door and demand to ask what the hell she was thinking of throwing out the best kitchen in Ireland, the wardrobe that was good enough for...ah what the heck, I told myself. She paid her money for the house, you're benefitting from that money and aren't you thrilled with your new dishwasher...she can dump what she likes honey. You don't own it anymore.

I trotted up Tom's driveway, weakly rang the door bell and tottered down the hall into his kitchen. "Are ye upset alannah?" the ever-noticing Tom chuckled; "nooo, well not now Tom, I realise that different women have different kitchens, but it gave me a start to see my pride and joy out in a skip all the same" I breathlessly returned. "Well, ye see, tis like this, as I see it...once you'd left that kitchen, the spirit was gone out of it and she'd have to get a new one". Love that man! No wonder he had 52 years of very happily married life to his beautiful Sara, Lord rest her.

Yesterday I had a phone call from Tom. "Is it yourself that's in it alannah?" He hails from Tipperary and Irish is his first language. "Hello Tom, are you ok?" I asked, because at his age, every day he is still in our lives is a boon. "Faith I am", he said. "Yer wan next door has gotten a new hi-fi kitchen in, and the lad that put the plumbing in told me it cost €24k. God help us, now I'm wondering can the woman cook at all?". "By the way" he added, " Mary from number 61 took your kitchen from the skip, and has had it installed in the flat she built in the back garden for her young daughter and son in law, they love it". May Mary's daughter have as many happy hours cooking in her new kitchn as I had. I must give her a James Martin cookbook for a housewarming gift!

Harvest time

We are all together again as a family for a short while, in September ED will be leaving to try her luck in foreign fields. Recession Ireland is spewing its finest out to other shores. I am philosophical in most ways. I always knew she would leave even if we hadn't been bitten by the recession bug; but I will miss her and so we are harvesting.

We are harvesting time together. Both she and YD moved in two weeks ago as we closed the door, for the last time, on the Wicklow house. Thirty + years living there; the main consolation was that, for me, I came home three years ago to my childhood home; Himself came with me, and the girls have now come to their other home, where they spent long summer days with Gran, playing on the beach, huge fried breakfasts, kite flying, chasing the hens into the hen run at night in case the fox caught them. Golden days. Memories cherished and memories are what made for a smooth transition back to living with THE 'RENTS! ED and I are harvesting those cherished memories and building more of our own.

I am up to the teeth with packing. ED had her room sorted within 48 hours; Himself has given me the privilege of putting his bits and bobs around the house [generosity itself!] and I have been raiding the Wicklow house for the past three years so my moving involved minimal packaging. YD, on the other hand, has enough boxes for all of us...she has enough to equip the whole house in fact. I have put a deadline of next Friday as the last day I want to see a packing box in sight. The dining room all but disappeared, my new long dining table vanished altogether, but I found it again this afternoon and I am assured that there IS a wooden floor under it.

My problem is sentiment. I have so much "memorabilia" from Mum - so much "memorabilia" from 30+ years in Wicklow and I am by nature a hoarder. I can hoard for Ireland. Mind you this is not always a bad thing. I saved over €3,000 on our new build extension with my hoarding, or recycled items as the builder termed it. Not bad going. I got tough with ME when leaving Wicklow, and a goodly lot went into the skip; I have made a new friend for life in the local Oxfam shop with the stuff that I brought down there, and now I am dividing things into Attic/Dump?/Awww! I have hit upon a cunning plan. I shall rotate. Six months on view and six months in the attic. Himself has asked me not to rotate him, he is quite happy to work in the garden and to hang pictures for me in the house!!!

My heart went out to him on the day we finally left Wicklow. He stood at the gate, looked back and said "I had parents when I bought this house". He bought it two years before he met me. July '76, and six weeks later his father died of a brain haemorrage. His mother died on 11-6-11, six weeks before he finally left that house. An era come and gone. He's happy here though. His favourite recliner in the study; ideal for those football matches; garden big enough to challenge him for the next 100 years and the pub just down the road, God give him health, energy and years to enjoy it all.

The girls love it here; YD has discovered the local talent. He's very attractive and nearly fell over his feet staring at her in the local restaurant the other day. Her mother is smiling and watching this space with amusement. Her father looked just the same 32 years ago!

Me? Well, I am in heaven. I pinch myself to make sure I am awake, alive and not dreaming. The house is coming around to the way I want it. I have taken over from Mum. She's still there in my heart. We catch a glimpse of a tartan skirt flitting around the crocosmia now and then, but it's my turn to put my stamp on it...third Lady of the House to do so. Granny Alice would be pleased to see how much influence she had on me, and Gran Lillian would be enormously chuffed as well.

Now, if I can get this flipping computer to speed up so that I can get to blog and keep in touch with my global pals...life will be totally amazing!

Packing up and the memories

We have had an interesting time since I last blogged; both YD and I were made redundant, we have just sold the old house and have to be out by the end of the month. This brings a rake of memories with it such as the day I first walked through the hall door, a new bride of one week, full of ideas, plans for redecoration, and hope. The day I returned from hospital two years later after we lost our first born child, and the safehaven the house became then. The joyous days we shared bringing ED and YD home from the maternity hospital. The storms that rolled down the mountains behind, the floods - particularly the one that threatened to make a swimming pool of the kitchen.

The times of tears, fears for the outcome of exams, times spent in hospitals, the laughter and joy all year round and the extra merriment at Christmas when the entire family of OH and I, ED and YD, Sister in Law and Mother in Law and my own beloved Mum gathered round the table. Mum who made Christmas extra special for me as she sat down to the table clasping her hands together, big brown eyes wide like a childs, and her compliment after dinner when she told me "you make Christmas Dinner just like my Mother". High praise indeed, she lost her Mother when she was ninteen years old.

Mother in Law passed away on 11 June this year in her 92nd year. Thirty two of those years were spent being my Mother in Law and it was not an easy relationship. I was not the daughter in law of choice, a Dubliner I was somewhere between earwigs and inert matter. Unfortunately for her I am resilient by nature so it all rolled off like water off a ducks back. I feel sorry for OH; she was not a hugely loving Mother, but she was his Mother and did one thing right in her life...gave birth to the best husband any woman could have, and a gentle but firm father to the girls. My pity lies with sister in law. Single and having shared a house with Mother in law for the last five years, she will miss the company. Ar dheis Dé a anamh.

We moved here immediately after Mum died, and we have loved the past three years building the extension, recovering the garden and now we look forward to having one daughter live with us as the other emigrates. Such is the way of life in Ireland now she must head for foreign shores like many before her, and it is likely that YD will head in the same direction next Spring. My heart breaks at the thought, but our children must do what they must do. "Thank God", my Grandmother used to say of my father "that Liam only emigrated to Dublin from Kerry". Wasn't she lucky.

We are now in the process of discarding furniture that we have no need for, sorting all the stuff for charity shops, all the stuff for the skip and thanking God that most of what we want has already been moved here.

My new build is a huge success. The most frequent word used by all who come to tea is "WOW!". Tiggywinkle joined me for afternoon tea two weeks ago, and hers was an opinion I valued deeply. Her own home is so elegant and the lady has such style that her WOW! hit the right spot.

I am now hoping that I will have more time to blog; read my favourite blogs and get the house sorted...yet again.

Baby blue tits flit past the new side door, Mother calling anxiously to them that Mme Pounce is in the vicinity. She is like a shabby tiger, we think she has that word beginning with C; the vet cannot confirm it, but we watch her with some anxiety. If there is any sign of suffering she will go to sleep permanently; until then she is free to sit on the new balcony and insult all and sundry as they fly past. The magpies sit on a nearby elder tree and make fun of her, she just flicks an impudent tail and stretches out to bask in what passes for a sunny day in an otherwise unsummer-like summer!

Election Time Again

So here we are, back in the fray; it's Election time again. General Election time at that! The country is in a mess, financially we are - well, let's just say that we have seen better days, but I live, cockeyed optimist that I am, in hopes that we will see better days again. Hopefully more rational days when house building and bling overspending are only a nightmare memory from the past.

This has been the most tense campaign so far. The country is deeply divided on who to vote for, and former staunch supporters of the governing party are threatening to leave the party altogether or vote for the main opposition. That is, for many of them, like killing your mother. The would be contenders have, so far, left me stone cold and I am seriously underwhelmed. What does get my goat though is the media.

We are an intelligent nation here, well able to make up our own mind on what we want and what we don't want. I would love to watch one t.v., programme with all the contending party leaders allowed time to finish their points - so that I can get to make up my own mind and not have it made up for me. As OH says, no chance of that happening anytime soon. Far too independent by nature.

We had a candidate on the doorstep yesterday afternoon, in the rain, and he found us, buried away at the back of Godspeed as we are. God love him, I really felt so sorry for him. A mere child in his early twenties, he earnestly encouraged me to vote for his candidate, I pointed out that he was the candidate; he thanked me. Exhausted, wet and knowing that he is such a small fish that his chances of getting more than 40 votes are slim. I have decided to vote for him. He won't get a 1 or a 2, but sure doesn't he merit a mark for finding us.

Our extension is completed, since Christmas, and I was able to cook the Christmas turkey in my new range. This was the best Christmas we have had in years. The snow fell, the whole family was gathered together under one roof; not going anywhere fast in the whitened world outside, and it was cosy cheer from the 25th of December until the 3rd of January. By that stage the snow was getting tedious, life had to go on. There was a major task of painting the new rooms and, by that time, I was sick to the teeth of the white emulsion on the kitchen. The undercoat for the yellow sun haze that was to come after.

January dragged on, and on, and on, and on and...The Flu Virus struck OH and I. He got the milder form, I got the full whack and a relapse to boot. The computer started to act up and getting a signal became a luxury not a right. Talk about feeling cut off...however, I spent the time reading all those books that I haven't had a chance to get to. Going through all my Miss Marple dvd's with Margaret Rutherford, Joan Hickson and Geraldine McEwan all giving their versions. I'm a dedicated Hickson fan for authenticity, Rutherford for the comedy and McEwan for the two mixed together.

February has slinged by, wet, grumpy and better forgotten. Today, as I took out the laundry to the line, an exciting experience as rain has stopped that for aided by the relapse; I listened to the blackbirds at dusk giving the warning call, the robins scooting from tree to tree singing their beautiful song and thought that March is just around the corner. The primula in their pots outside the front door are rich and jewel coloured and the daffodils and narcissi and irises are all late but the more welcome for that. There are more snowdrops than last year and our resident hedgehog has appeared out of hiberanation. Maybe he's running as a candidate in the hedgerow elections.

Spring is spritely on its way.