Wow, what a difference location makes.

May 9, 2020

VE day yesterday was amazing, mostly due to hwere we live and the people around us. Our streeet was decked out with bunting, mostly home made and some of it amazingly creative. I especially liked some paper bunting. I know the fabric nut liking the paper, but it was so crisp and their technique so clever. Also it showed the spirit of making to. What have I got and how can I make it fit the bill. It also tells me that when I get around to making mine I might be best to use a single layer of either interfaced or very heavily starched fabric as I like the sharp edge so much. Yes, I forsee needing to own bunting, and a really good door wreath and lots of fairy lights, it’s just that sort of place.

I had save (aka quarrentined) May’s gin club box for the day. Wonderful idea and an amazing gin this month. It struck me that had things not gone the way they have I would never have discovered this gin. I had planned to make the gin boxes quarterly I only kept them on becasue of the virus. This month is a the first gin made in Monaco. My goodness, if this is their first I can’t imagine what will come next. It is one of my favourite gins now. I have realised I much prefer the more subtle gins. Last month was a good flavour but just too much flavour. With most things I like over engineered and subtle as a brick, not gin. With lunch I had the gin with it’s supplied Sicilian tonic (also excellent) and for the afternoon I went with the cocktail of the month, the Race car. If you want to try the gin club, just let me know, I can give you a discount code for your first month. This was my 5th box and I feel even the weakest have been very good value, if you like gin.

About 4pm the people in the street did bring their afternoon tea out into their front gardens. It was amazing to see so much closeness and community while everyone kept away from each other. I wish every community could work like this. It makes a massive difference to the quality of life and costs nothing. Being a good neighbour and supporting the commuinity is so good for everyone. It doesn’t mean you need to be sociable, putting a bear or a rainbow in your window, saying hi when you pass is still participating and being part of the community. Each person does what they can.

Poor Fenrir managed to stand on a thorn while he was out for his walk. He is mostly a silent dog but that caused some fuss, and I really can’t blame him. Well over an inch of thorn through your foot would make anyone make a noise. I was so proud of him claming down and letting me deal with it. We were worried he would wriggle and struggle, but no as soon as he knew he had communicated his problem and I was on it he settled down and let me remove it. These last two weeks he has really made great progress. He is getting less excitable and listening faster. I am starting to have high hopes that when we are let out he will deal well with society. It is very hard for him not getting proper socialisation but with luck he will remember what we did before lockdown and adjust quickly when things change again.

Our afternoon tea was a little sparse, we had no bread so no sandwiches, and I still didn’t get as far as making brownies, but I did find a cake in the freezer which we enjoyed. I did get as far as making the rest of the cream into icecream. Another batch of coffee and a batch of orange. It will be very hard to go back to commercial ice cream. Even the good ones are not a patch on home made. I think I will worrk the icecream maker into the ground. I am really looking forward to trying some sorbets. When I did the fruit and veg order I picked up a couple of mangos, thinking they could be ice cream or sorbet or just part of fruit salad. As I am now out of cream mango sorbet is sounding very very tempting. Oh on the subject of fruit, yesterday morning I had breakfast in the garden with the Red Arrows. Well they flew over while Iwas eating so I am counting it as with them. Yes, that was a late breakfast I said it would be a lazy day.

Today I really have to suck it up and make borders. No I am not wildly excited by my plan for them, but it is the plan I have and really it’s not likely to get better at this stage. I need it done so I am ready to move on on Monday. Wish me luck I am going in.