Blog Archives
Crows, lines and rain.
My dog walks have gained two additions.
Meet my two new corvid friends. I’ve been made honorary human in the great sausage and cheese crow supply chain. These two have been following me for a few months, flying over when I enter the park because they know I carry treats for Frannie.
They will come within a few steps of me now. The most beautiful pair, one is slightly bigger and more bossier. Frannie is getting slowly used to them as they follow us around the park waiting for something tasty to be thrown in their direction.
A year of pictures.
I got lost in my pages for a bit there.
I think I will for a bit longer.
Posts will be images for the moment as I would like a return to what I love doing best, drawing what is around me and what no one else sees. Something that is mine. Something I have done from a very small little girl that is, inherently me.
Enjoy the lines. I’ll post everything, mistakes and tea spills.
Fa la la.
Yes it has been quiet here hasn’t it but one pair of hands I have and trust me, I’m very good at burning food and leaving ingredients out of cakes this time of year. Hectic rushing does indeed send me into a headless chicken state.
Yes Frannie can indeed sleep two legged. This is her version of staying off the sofa.
Yes the cats sleep like that, how else does a cat sleep? Please let me know if your cat sleeps in a sensible spot.
Yes my teenager is far superior at decorating a trifle than I will ever be.
Yes Millie is at university and I’m still shocked about that but she’s home and there is washing but smiles too.
I wish you a peaceful time and with much love because it is always better than sprouts.
Angie.
When you like mud but your human doesn’t.
It’s been raining for longer than I can remember.
That means muddy walks. Add in a rogue cat and we are now both needing showers.
The Grey is coming.
October is here with it’s greywash.
I have been playing hokey cokey with the rain and the washing.
I love this game so much.
I lost. (A rogue shower flew in and dumped a car wash worth of water in two minutes).
I’m not drawing my face as you can guess the shape of it.
House on a hill.
The evening light gets quite fiery this time of year. Lights up the hill and even makes the rubbish and the massive weeds in my front something extra. I adore an angry sky.
How the other half live.
Having a right laugh reading my meters so I can tell the readings to the energy company so they can charge me the price of my kidneys to not turn the heating on at all this winter.
I should stop there really and let you enjoy the picture of my cobweb infested ceiling.
Back to school.
Find me a phrase that drives up emotions in you like this one does, go on, have a try.
Then add in that you are young, with those said emotions.
A backpack, new shoes, and a dread so deep that it still wakes you up twenty years or so later in a cold sweat and a racing heart.
Now we are talking the stuff of nightmares. But then we realise, it was all a dream and we laugh at how it used to be. The relief is wonderful.
I don’t have to go to school any more!
And then we drop our own children off as the leaves gather colour.
I see you brave ones who hate school. Draw pictures in every exercise book. Day dream in maths lessons of better days. Draw on your arms in biro, draw on your rulers, on your rubbers, (stick holes in it too). Draw of robots and lasers, draw that evil student that hates you with a big asteroid plummeting towards them. Draw that teacher that shouted at you in the classroom being chased by a hungry minotaur. Draw of superheroes and villains and gather stories that make you snort aloud in the middle of French because it contained farting noises (and something awful in the dinner queue with a cheese and onion sandwich).
Draw it all and hold fast.
Thank you.
Just one woman with a pen and a sketch book who still really doesn’t have a clue how she thinks of the world. I guess that’s real honest drawing, I’ll figure it out. I always have perceived my world through these lines. Mistakes after mistakes. Processing and redrawing. I drew Bonnie after six goes, it helped me to do so.
On difficult days the only way for me to process events is to draw. A language in itself of sense.
I’m deeply grateful for all your well wishes regarding Bonnie’s passing, you’re all in it with me, some of you for ten years now. It’s not the Never Ending story though, it’s my life on concrete streets and there’s no dragons I’m afraid.
Just this cat who really is going to be the death of me. I make no apologies for the anatomical mess in this drawing, I will look like that if she gets me one day. Much love.
Illustrated dog.
I look, I see, I draw.
Bonnie. This was your life. You were an illustrator’s dog. This is your legacy.
I’m breaking the blog and the internet today with dog drawings. Enjoy.
The day I didn’t want.
All tennis balls have been marked safe today. All socks and fluffy toys. All annoying spaniels. All cats and chickens too. Sausages have been marked safe today. Grass is less yellow, there is less hair and no mugs of tea have been knocked over.
You were the good girl.
There is a crater were an almighty heart once beat.
Your long legs and huge ears, the pneumatic tail, the gaze of absolute, unconditional love right until the lights gently dimmed.
Goodbye my sweet, gentle giant.
Look at all the pretty woodpigeons.
Disclaimer…..no pigeons were harmed in the drawing and the writing of this factual happening. Frannie has great recall now unless I give her permission to run (and on a long line) as she is so fast
The pigeons have launched a petition to attach mini cymbals to Frannie’s paws to announce that turbo mode has been engaged.
Blind ambition.
My blinds take a daily battering as Renee likes to “post” herself through them and then stare back at me.
I thought it appropriate to capture this athletic moment in my cat’s day.
Enjoy.
Making Bob.
I know you all know how I am happiest when I am drawing in my sketchbooks.
Bob came out of my sketchbooks so here’s a little gallery of how I developed the drawings from rough sketches.
She started quite wolf like. (Obviously my own dogs had a bit of a say here and Pat the Cat is looking a bit like Renee…) Bob is a very clever dog and I felt the best place to start was with a smart pair of pointy ears… I drew Bob doing awesome things. (predicting sunny weather in Wales is awesome ok?)
And then I tried making her legs shorter and her ears fluffier. There was lots of room for expression here. I gave Pat a white face so we could see her better.
And then I added some colour…
And then, make some roughs.
Bob isn’t any particular breed of dog, I didn’t want to draw a specific breed, I’m probably biased towards mixed breed dogs anyway haha but I like the fact you can’t tell what she is. She is simply Bob and rather brilliant at solving problems in her own way. Pat is along for the fun too, in her very cat like way, (there under your feet and then gone in a flash).
Basket case.
One of Renee’s many sleeping places is a little wicker basket on the landing. She likes it here very much as she can place all her knitted kitty puffs in one basket before a days screeching (carrying them all around the house and leaving them in random places).
This was a fine plan.
Until we got Frannie.
Stair gate is up but skinny necked pilferers do find a way.
Kitty Puff numbers have declined rapidly since the introduction / invasion of this blonde, dog tornado.
Renee is not impressed.
I need to knit more.
Bob.
I’d like you to meet someone.
This is Bob.
She’s the reason I’ve been a bit quiet. She’s been very, very busy… I’ve had quite a time keeping up with her.
There’s a book coming! I hope you like ice cream…
Baggage.
Sunday baggage check. Filmed too because it has been a while (because I’ve been up to something rather exciting).
The bottom of a school bag is never a pretty place. Don’t go there. If you’ve lost something in your bag, accept it’s loss, just stuff more books back on top. It will turn up in a few months with that old banana skin you forgot about.
Window cleaners are overrated.
Had to paint the window for Christmas, other windows in the house have had a makeover too. Beats cleaning them.
A saw and an attitude.
We got a tree!
Millie and myself chopped it down ourselves too and carried it off the hill.
Talking, laughing, wiping pine needles from our hair, our car filled to the brim with prickly branches and laughter.
I care not for mess, I care not for resentment, I care not for mistakes. I care about my children, growing up and becoming free.
And it is the most liberating experience watching them fly.
I am proud.
Job done good Mam.
Bright, bright lights.
Swansea is glowing. NASA have confirmed we are shining out to the universe a message of neon and tinsel through the endless, cold rain and wind. Even through the grey, permanent cloud that envelopes the city in a wet hug, we are shining. I haven’t tripped over in the dark all week, it’s lovely and bright.
Every plug socket, overloaded with nine cable extensions, of course it’s safe, they’re LED’s, plug it in Mam, light it up.
We are so bright, we are shining, come on then Santa we haven’t got all month you know, can’t you see we’ve been ever so good?
Now pass me a mince pie, no it is my first one, honest.
Perfect recall.
No not quite there with the coming back to me. In fact it’s a hilarious game of catch me if you can. Being a sight reactive dog is a tricky one to navigate as Frannie is very fast and there is no way I can catch her. Poor Bonnie is too old to join in and too busy sniffing out crisps to eat.
We get sneaky and cunning. We use sausages and chicken, we throw fluffy toys.
Today was a new tactic.
Keeping still and lying flat on the ground.
Click, back on the lead.
A quiet time of year.
Here’s the highlight of the season, hunting for my dog’s “gift” in the beautiful autumn leaves.
Autumn is a quiet time of year. I am a bit quiet on here after the chaos of last year.
Life has needed to slow down, and enjoying the winter months is something I look forward to each year.
So hello soggy leaves and drenched, muddy clothes.
Sneak.
You can’t see me.
I am very very sneaky.
I am so flat on the ground, like a little golden pancake.
This pancake is stalking you and I will pounce on you and eat your shoes.
Or I might just chase that crisp packet…
Back to school.
Oh that phrase. Strikes anxiety into the hearts of every school child that didn’t think summer would ever end.
Like a guillotine for fun times and lie ins. The harbinger of Autumn.
Here come hard shoes and stiff trousers, time tables and breaktimes, packed lunches and P.E., assemblies and assessments. Gym hall smells and nippy mornings.
Heads down parents, morning battle has commenced, get on the road and growl at the morning traffic.
Growing.
Lockdowns and isolation never stopped growing bones.
Obligatory family drawing to show that my clothes budget was grossly underestimated this year.
Gruff is saving all his growing for night time, coming downstairs in the morning, visibly taller.
Bow to your leader.
We’ve had Frannie a whole year now and only now has she realised who the boss is in this house.
It’s a small black angry creature who eats, sleeps and screams if you get in her way.
And she is very very angry that you ate one of her kitty puff babies.
A moment.
It’s all change they say.
You’ll look back and wonder, where has the time gone?
A big fast moving blur just happened and we’re ten years on.
And then I see all the drawings and I smile.
Artistic snapchat, illustrative Instagram, whimsical facebook all in a little sketchbook and all from the day I’d lived.
Technology is indeed great and I love it too but there really is something lovely in looking at your day and picking out what mattered to you, what was funny, what was hurtful, what was just great and then detangling it through lines.
Cloth mountains.
I hate socks right now. Who invented socks? Please show yourself and pair all these please.
That is all.
Coversation starter.
There’s a dog on the other side.
We must make contact.
We must let them know we are here.
And then tell them that we’re bigger than them and their mum.
Still life. (Hot weather edition).
Humidity and thirty degree heat means one thing. Ice lollies, shade and fan on.
Frannie is being kept in as she has only one fast speed setting and Bonnie is setting a lovely example of a dead dog and sprawling her long bones wherever I seem to step.
Everything is sticky.
Swansea is baking hot today and our old stone terrace house has heated up lovely and is roasting us slowly.
Last day of primary school.
Just like that, it’s over.
No more mornings at the gates.
I wasn’t allowed to take a photo and that’s quite fine as your mam would prefer to draw you anyway.
I’ll remember more that way.
But I would like to know who stole the years from me.
The last year in particular was a huge heist.
Bee kind.
Lots of creepy crawling flowering plants grow in little places on the old stone walls. They always have thrived and grow on everyone’s walls. Brightest of purples this time of year with the happy drone of busy bees.
I’ve added lots of pots this year with herbs and trailing flowers. It’s plant chaos and I love the mess.
The lavender is enormous this year so the bee party is going to be lovely. I’m hoping to see a return of the hummingbird hawkmoth I saw one year, it really looks like a little hummingbird.
No chemicals, no weedkiller, just a pair of hands and a cat interested in digging.
Vaccine of the day.
Today on the menu, AstraZeneca part two.
Part one was four days of feeling a little rough and a sore arm, not much to get concerned, I grew no second head and disappointedly I didn’t develop an affinity with anything Microsoft.
I drove to the same building as I originally went to for part one, a small community centre, one way in and one way out. I waited 5 minutes before being ushered to a chair where a trolley was moving up and down the line of waiting people. One to inject and one to ask the questions.
Are you well?
Are you allergic to anything?
Whispers in my ear…Are you Pregnant?
My enthusiastic shaking of my head went on a little too long.
Fifteen minutes of waiting and wondering will this make a difference. Will enough of us get the vaccine? Will it work? Truth is we will have to wait and we will have to hope that it will. I feel very small again, insignificant in the bigger picture.
I got my phone out and ate melted sweets from my glovebox.
Sky cat.
Miya likes to come in through the roof window this time of year. Obviously as late as possible and normally making quite a racket as she plops onto the floor of the loft, startling Millie.
How does she climb up?
Well, she scales a stone garden wall and then leaps vertically up the side of our house to access the roof. Terrifying.
Both agree the swift show is wonderful and are very happy the sun is warmer and the clouds are bubbling high into the long, light evenings.
Roll up.
There are drop in clinics running this weekend for currently the youngest portion of the national Covid vaccination program, the eighteen year olds.
Millie had her text through a few days ago notifying her she could attend one of these clinics.
She had to take a photographic identification so we dug out her passport.
I drove down with her to the enormous film studios on the outskirts of the city, it was quite something driving into it, lots of run down industrial units colonised by flocks of noisy seagulls.
We parked up and she put a mask on and joined the queue with lots of other young people. Red stripy tape and orange bollards, they all stood apart without being asked. Some on their own, some with mates, some with parents, most on their phones probably checking in with a nice selfie and a hashtag #gotstabbed
Our children have had many vaccines in their lives already, this one felt different. Probably because of it’s newness and it’s immediacy. The other vaccines as babies you knew there was a slim chance of them getting the said diseases. This one is different isn’t it?
I waited an hour in the car watching other parents in their cars, watching the shuttle bus pull up bringing more young people. It was busy.
Millie texted me while inside, in her words:
There was no daylight inside, the building was really big but the ceilings were low and everywhere was white..
Corridors were white too with small windows in where I could see people sat inside. Lots nurses and doctors walking around in their uniforms often wheeling trolleys with large computers on and stacked up carts with the medical supplies on.
I sat in a waiting area next to another girl (well 2 metres next to her) and we chatted about stuff. When it was my turn, I was taken through to a station and they asked me some questions about if I was well. Then I received the injection and waited for a few minutes to make sure I was feeling fine.
And then out she came, clutching an information sheet and asking for lunch.
Pocket pilfer.
Pointy nose, perfect shape for sneaking in pockets.
We have a pocket thief and she loves tissues. Tissues are very nice and tasty, sweet wrappers are lovely too.
Beware.
After the rain.
The council weed killers were out last week spraying down the walls and pavements to get rid of the weeds.
Most unfortunately, it poured down right after and washed most of it away judging by the explosion of colour between the cracks and the gutters.
The smallest little flowers, easily ignored by big feet but loved by little bees and insects. I never really noticed myself until I was drawing on the pavements last year during lockdown. They grew through discarded masks and broken bottles.
Last year, because of the pandemic, we had less spraying and as a result, the most beautiful wildflowers grew on the pavements and the gaps between the old walls.
Beats all the grey any day.
The wall of green.
Two hedge trimmers in action, one cuts the other shreds. It’s a good combination.
Eighteen years of Millie.
We have an eighteen year old in our house! A grown up!
Here’s to Millie Lion Heart. You are amazing, we all love you and are so proud of you.
Seeds.
My hands are filthy with cool earth because the cat is lying on top of my new gardening gloves and I’m not getting swiped.
A small packet of seeds with 100 count, how many to sow, to broadcast or a few in a tray? (There’s no way my long sighted eyes can read this tiny packet print).
You know the answer already.
I sow the lot and I’m hoping a few will come and not be like last year when I couldn’t bear to thin out one seedling and ended up giving the whole street tomato plants potted into toilet rolls or any container I could fill with soil.
This year there are vegetables but also flowers.
Catmint or the snuggle plant as I like to call it as my cat will snuggle the poor plant the minute the first tiny leaves appear in the spring.
There will be violas, phlox, cornflowers and poppies. Nasturtiums and hanging pots with trailing flowers.
For now, empty soil trays with little labels.
I’ve just to wait.
Hoopla.
The cone has it’s fun for a pup that misses her favourite toys.
Hoopla.
Throw them into the cone for chewies.
To see.
I think they call it mindfulness these days.
To be present and part of the moment without self conscious thought or overthinking.
I’m absolutely rubbish at it.
But
I can see the moment like no one else and I can slow it down, turn it upside down, take it somewhere and show you.
To watch a moment and the hand to produce a heap of lines on a page that my brain understands. That’s crafted over and over and over for years and years and never perfected but perfect in it’s imperfection.
That’s drawing. I like drawing, the only reason I ever started was not because I wasn’t any good, (I was just a toddler) I just saw the moment.
I was a young child sat in a church silently drawing with my finger, the backs of people’s heads sat in their benches.
I was a sad teenager with no escape from my head so I drew my moments that gave me hope.
I was a tired mum with seeing no value in my life that picked up a sketchbook and saw a moment.
I’m getting older and my glasses are thick (and give me huge eyes) but the moments are there and they matter.
So I will draw.
Mini break
Four days back in school.
Four. Days.
One positive Covid test in the year group and it’s back to isolation for the whole of that year and back to online learning.
This is very hard, this is very frustrating. We understand but it’s not easy.
Masks have been handed out to each school child to wear. Shops have free masks in their entrances.
Hand gel in every pocket, mask in the other. Don’t forget your car keys, your phone and your mask and know the year you live in.
Covid is here to stay.
The cone.
When you run at one hundred miles per hour over broken glass it’s not going to have a great outcome.
Enforced rest and knocking over of everything for the next few days while the superglue and antibiotics mend those power pads then it’s back to flying.
Trees.
Wild garlic and a cacophony of bird song, there’s no social media in the woods, just the excited chatter of a new season.
It’s been a week of snow, sun and dying Royals. A week of sad television.
We all go the same way, we’re all earthworm food.
I’ve always liked that thought, I don’t want a golden carriage, just chuck me in the hole and plant a cheeky dandelion on top.
Hope.
Late last night I had my first shot of the Astrazeneca’s Oxford vaccine for Covid 19.
Got my little card with a date and a batch number on it for when I need my follow up dose.
Hope in a little vile but with so much media opinion.
When it came down to it, just quietly administered with small talk and a smile.
Twelve hours on, just feeling tired and a little peaky, nothing more.
Hope.
Hair.
I had a lovely hair cut and colour the other day. The first one in a long time too.
I wore my mask and enjoyed it being styled and cut.
Then I went home and popped it back in a bun.
That’s better.
Spring
The march of the dandelions and my dog is as relentless as the flying masks in the spring breezes.
The sun is coming back…well now, in a minute, as we say.
The first invitation for a vaccine has landed on our doormat.
A little unicorn for breakfast.
Frannie likes fluffy and soft things to chew.
Anything inanimate or living, no preference really, slippers, shoes, Bonnie’s legs, cushions, cats, chickens, it’s all lovely.
So we’ve given her a little blue unicorn to love.
He has now been loved very much for 2 minutes and there isn’t much left of him.
But everyone else is safe and my shoes…for now…
Lateral flow before breakfast.
Millie and her classmates are testing for Covid 19 twice a week before school. They do it themselves. For the record I have tried a test to gain some empathy for this process.
There will be sneezing and retching.
Do not touch the fuzzy bit of the swab.
Do not let the dog touch the fuzzy bit of the swab.
Do not let the dog touch the test.
No silica gel is not the liquid.
Did I mention do not touch the fuzzy bit of the swab?
Enjoy your day at school.
Coffee and a bite.
Little nip anyone?
Training is underway, teenage pup loves to nibble and it’s easily redirected. Just don’t give up on them, they want to be good.
Home help.
The cats love home learning, piles of paper and warm laptops.
Makes essay writing a challenge but I have it on good authority they have never missed an assembly.
Our lockdown restrictions are slowly starting to lift. We can stay local, schools are opening next week on a gradual slow return, more people are receiving the vaccines and Covid infections are for now, very low.
This three months of lockdown has felt an awful lot longer. Two of mine are taller, one has got into college and one dog has grown gangly legs.
Feels like spring is coming and with it, more changes.
Who’s there?
Who’s there?
Not sure really, it’s a strange dog, lady creature clutching milk bottles and dressed in pyjamas. Blinking at the bright morning light and scowling at a passer-by for daring to look at her and her two dog heads peaking out of her legs.
The schools in Wales are starting up for the older children, staggering the return until full time education resumes after the Easter holidays. They have been learning from home for three months this time. It’s been challenging and lonely for them, the lack of interaction has been hard.
There will be years ahead when we will see this play out I think.
Summer catch up school brings a look of sheer horror to my three’s faces. I can’t imagine there will be much enthusiasm at the prospect of that.
Covid infections are now at levels we saw in October 2020. The vaccination program brings me hope we will see normality of some sort and a return to leaving the house very soon.
Perception.
Nearly a year in a new captivity, a new world of masks, home learning and fear of getting close.
A year of extremes.
A year that screens became the window to the world.
A year of superheroes in blue.
A year that saw my children grow out of their shoes and I didn’t need to replace them.
A year of insomnia and stars I didn’t know existed, early morning breath and bird song, dogs racing through discarded masks and gloves.
A year where the doorstep and the sky outside felt too big.
A year we are still here, lucky to continue, reluctant to move forward for fear of leaving behind that which we’ve lost.
A year.
Child on wheels.
It’s the art of making things look funny when really I’m hating every minute and would rather be sipping espresso martinis on a beach in Barbados with sunburn and giving no hoots about beach body ready or any of that rubbish.
The news has caught more people going to parties, having their hair dyed in car parks or actually being outside and having the audacity to drive somewhere nice and drink a coffee. We are told we must wait another few weeks and see if we are allowed out to travel to a destination for exercise without infecting each other with more variants named after nice places.
But the sun is shining!
Do you not know how lovely it is in Swansea when the sun shines? It’s so rare that a day without rain would be classified as a drought. I walked to my local park and felt the warmth and smelt the fumes from a passing moped piled on with screaming teenagers.
But anyhow, children on wheels are much easier to manoeuvre.
They think it’s over.
Last week Boris Johnson gave tentative dates for England to come out of the lockdown.
Wales, where we live, gave a more tentative approach to lifting the restrictions we have been living under since before Christmas. We are still under lockdown, we are still very much restricted to no travel and no unessential journeys, meet ups or socialising.
The media have erupted into euphoria.
I can’t share that sentiment. I am not euphoric, I am far from euphoric, I am tired and I am fed up and my hair is resembling an aged Rapunzel. My children are all still at home, their school lessons are still on a screen. They struggle, they can’t see their future as all they can see is the back of their bedroom door.
But moan as I do, Hope has been lobbed at us, like a big floundering fish that might flop away and slide slowly back into the water while I in slow motion grab it with both hands and miss.
The speed of sound.
Frannie is a year old now and in the middle of being a beautiful terror in our lives.
But when she runs, she flies. If she had wings, I don’t think we’d see her again. Once this lockdown is over, we are going to walk for miles on long sandy beaches. Until then it’s apologies to the *seagulls in the park.
*No seagulls were harmed. She just enjoys the chase, if it was a crisp packet it would be equally fun.
Milk is back on the menu.
Stepping outside in a sideways ice blast to get those milk bottles is as far as I’m reaching today.
Dog print pyjamas, bobble hat and complete the outfit with some fluffy socks. A passer-by scurries on past either oblivious or terrified at the sweary mess of a women trying to keep her glasses on and picking up milk bottles with hair writhing in the cold wind like the wicked witch of the morning.
Where is my coffee?
An ordinary day.
The wind is bitingly cold today. Straight from the North Pole and very bitter it is. Flurries of snow in my face and my hair.
A boot full of food to last the next week, no end to the lockdown as yet but we all are holding our breath and hoping.
The house we live in was built around 150 years ago by miners and their families working in the area. That means that at one point. there were families in these very houses, going through the last pandemic of 1918 when a flu virus ravaged through the world and took out indiscriminately, from our communities.
Also a place of birth, I know Gruff wasn’t the only baby born in this house, there have been many births too. He arrived on a mid Tuesday morning cheered on by a small handful of midwives (and a few neighbours stood outside listening to my swearing).
I have dreamt of death a lot in the last year, of about people I have lost, often I have conversations in these dreams with these people and they are angry at me. I’ve got no idea why, (for probably talking too much?) In real life I have no idea what I would say as I would really rather dream about dogs or food or a nice day on a warm beach getting sunburnt.
They say death is an end, but also a beginning, and of better times ahead. I’m clinging on to that thought a little to much right now.
Cat walk
I see where this is going and I am powerless to stop it, my jumbled corpse and broken bones while being lovingly purred at.
Pandemic didn’t cause a washing shortage that’s for sure. I’ve lost the will to live pairing socks and everyone’s got each others and is having fun negotiating them back. Don’t say I don’t make it fun.
Boldly going nowhere.
Covid infections are on the decline again, the roller coaster once more is slowing down.
There’s talk of the children being phased back into school throughout the next month.
My children are drained, they are bright, articulate individuals but they are deprived of their friends, the contact, the interactions, the conflicts.
They long for a nice day, without rain with some warmth and sand in their toes, not litter, discarded masks and gloves.
Snow business.
Stop everything. It’s snowed!
Just hearing the silence and knowing that there’s a snowfall on the roads and not just because it’s lockdown.
Magic.
There’s children screaming all around my area from tea tray sledge rides on an icy road and snow down the backs of their necks. They’re all off their screens and legging it down to the park to enjoy the light dusting from the skies.
And yes, my son is in shorts and wellies. I care not, he’s outside and he’s laughing.
Yellow snow, gritty snow, icy snow, roll in it and look up at grey gentle skies dusting us with frozen kisses.
Advertise here.
You going “out out?”
That, in Swansea, means out on the town, all glammed up, drinkies, heels and hair done.
No I am not. I’m dressed in yesterday’s jumper, my shoes are muddy, my coat is soaking and my dog is clearly delighted to be dragged around the block in sideways, January sleet.
Still no winter beach, no big sky.
My only essential travel is to buy food and growl, masked at people who come close. It’s hard to feel so anxious when people forget and reach over to take stuff off shelves. What on earth do you do?
Bonnie looks at me…
She’d growl first…
I might try that next time.
Tuna.
It’s going to take time for the cats to accept this bundle of puppy energy. We’re six months in and tuna is the magic that brings these two opposing parties together.
Today was let’s eat Tuna together and not chase or swipe.
We sit on the stairs as that is neutral territory, both can retreat if it gets too much.
Frannie sits as still as she can but the tail always betrays her, the faster the swoosh, I know we have imminent chase pending and to cancel negotiations quickly…
Gloom.
On some nights, the steelworks on the horizon in Port Talbot, light up the clouds with a fiery glow (like Mordor from the Lord of the Rings). It’s eerily beautiful, you can see flames reaching high into the sky. Last night, it was full aglow, quite something to look at and I was very much enjoying the view.
I was so busy staring, I very nearly collided into a man holding his small dog high on his head cursing my little evening day dream and accusing *Bonnie, (on the lead, by my side, looking as puzzled as myself) of wanting to eat his small furry thing.
I muttered an apology along the lines of “So sorry, miles away, lovely hat” and scurried away.
Cue a fox running across our path and I really wondered where I was, Mad Max or Swansea.
Swansea Angie.
Swansea in a pandemic, Mad Max is little too sensible right now.
*Being a big sized dog, she quite often gets accused of wanting to eat smaller dogs but she’s actually a huge fan of dogs smaller than herself as she can play Queen.
Covid School.
School days are a strange business during these lockdown days.
No car run, no rush out the door in the morning.
Still, early to rise, in the dark for a morning check in, registration or daily work download.
Gone are the assemblies, singing and hanging up of coats and hellos to friends.
It’s find a space away from whiskers and paws and chewing mouths.
Please let mum have a coffee and I’ll figure out that maths I promise.
Dressed and ready but no where to go.
Funny, lonely business this learning on screens but there we are right now, in the midst of a pandemic and figuring out the area of Tom’s Toblerone chocolate bar.
Let me tell you a little secret, us mums are looking at you and are very glad it’s not them having to do this.
Children of 2020, you’re doing amazing, don’t ever forget that.
Snow wet.
It’s cold.
Very cold right now, just above freezing and it’s decided to rain so we are slipping our way around the streets tonight.
Even the billboard is half arsing the light.
There are warmer and lighter days ahead but this month is the queen of dark and cold and she isn’t shifting herself in any hurry. January won’t be rushed.
Dragging our way through this lockdown January.
Drone face.
Can we update the puppy training manual to include how not to chase and destroy drones please, that would be great. Frannie has had a whale of a time chasing one a hundred foot high, she’s got ambition but not wings.
Still in lockdown, still in alert level 4 or whatever that’s come to mean as we’re all out on the covid numbers.
Graphs, charts and projections, I’ve seen more this past year than I ever did at school, all pretty like my tired looking Christmas decorations, must take them down Angie, before twelfth night.
As it’s bad luck.
I laughed a bit too much at that.
Luck rhymed with my reply.
End.
The giant cul-de-sac that is 2020 is gasping it’s last wheezy covid filled breaths, slowly melting at the bottom of my beer.
I won’t miss you.
New year does not promise much either but we can hope and hang on through the dark months.
I’ll raise a glass to that.
Best wishes to you all and all the love from a small sketchbook in Wales.
Ring the bells.
It’s Christmas Eve 2020.
Put down your worries, put down your mobile, turn away from the television, switch off the radio, it’s six o clock. Come on, now, hurry!
It’s time to go to door with your bells, open it and listen. Our street is ringing out into the dry, cold, clear night. You can hear them!
The sound of bells all around, up on Townhill, over to Brynhyfryd, even on Kilvey hill, there’s a fella with a bell app ringing it while sucking on a cigarette. The scrambler bike stops and toots.
We are ringing them. We are little but we are shouting you Santa and you must come this year. The adults have been rubbish, please do your magic.
The moon is lighting the way and we are calling you Santa.
We’ve been so good this year and we’ve tried out best to wash our hands and do our work.
Please come this year, please bring a present.
Merry Christmas.
Covid central.
A letter has arrived from the local council and health service reminding us to remember to stay away and stay at home. Infections here and in the surrounding areas are very, very high. Our hospitals are in danger of being overwhelmed if numbers keep rising.
The electronic bill board is still promoting Christmas deals with the odd public service information asking us to keep our 2 metre distances and stay at home whenever possible.
In other news, the cats have decided Gruff’s window is wonderful to watch the birds from and bring their muddy paws in.
It’s still raining, we may need a boat soon.
Flying.
The rain is playing games with me.
Every day this week, I’ve arrived at the park and the heavens have opened.
Nothing stopping Frannie lightning bolt puppy, she’s been busy herding the crows and seagulls and did attempt to herd the red kite that soared over our heads but it wasn’t having any of it.
We are now very wet, muddy but happy to see open space, (even if I’m soaked to the bone).
The news is pretty grim right now, Swansea still has stupidly high levels of infections. Social media is full of experts.
I’m just an expert in tea making and puppy drying. I don’t smell very nice right now.
Midnight.
Midnight last night we went into a full lockdown again.
The news was announced a few hours before and the ensuing rush in my city to the shops was like a tsunami of panic. My social media filled up pretty quickly with images of miserable queuing and cars gridlocking car parks in the rain, in the dark with the backdrop of blinking Christmas lights.
I walked the dogs later and the roads were very busy with speeding cars and honking horns, you could genuinely feel the atmosphere. One of anger and frustration.
The news says it’s a new variant, it spreads faster. We’re all to stay at home indefinitely, there will be a review in three weeks but numbers are flying here as I’ve said before so Christmas day is the only day we are ok to go out and see our other “bubble”.
A very strange Christmas this is going to be. I’m quite deflated to be honest with you as I imagine the whole of Wales is right now but I understand why.
More milk it is then.
Grab Bag
I have a problem.
I want cakes.
But the plastic bag that I have to put my hand into won’t open and I can’t lick my finger.
My glasses are also steaming up so it could very well be a bread roll I’ll be picking up instead.
That’s going to cause riots.
Focus pocus.
Millie’s studying A- levels and Welsh Baccalaureate. Being at home means she has to study remotely with the school.
I can tell she’s doing Welsh, the pencil has been chewed and she’s ignoring the dogs while giving the laptop a stare that would make a grown man cry.
I’m going to hide in the kitchen.
Walking in a winter wonderland.
The lights this year are lovely on my street. I can ignore the litter and the rain when I see the houses lit up.
Schools out for Covid.
Feels like forever for those who only went back recently after more isolating.
So many blaming schools for the rapid spread in our area right now.
So many not seeing how education and school life is everything when you miss your friends and chips at lunch. (Even if you have to study in the classroom with the windows wide open). Please go easy on our young people, they’re struggling too.
I think this break over Christmas will go on a bit longer as Covid infections are not slowing down.
Shortest school run in the world.
Leave for school at 8 am.
Back home by 8.30 am because your school year has to self isolate again as there are covid positive cases.
Fun times.
One is mortified, one is delighted because they missed P.E.
And we wait. Again.
Doodlemum 