one good apple

My little sister hasn’t been well over the last few weeks and I’ve been holding off sending her a get well soon package until I finished this little cushion for her,

Jane’s own family portrait; her, her boyfriend and three hamsters who sadly are no longer with us.  She is as soft about animals as I am and I thought that this would be a nice little something to remember them by.  Not her boyfriend, he’s still around, just the hamsters.

And to go with this present, some facts about my sister,

1. When we were kids she had an imaginary friend called Helen and when we argued she’d go off and play with her instead, making me very jealous.

2. She can speak and write fluent Japanese and is learning Chinese for work at the moment.  I have no idea where this ability for languages came from but it’s pretty impressive when she’s in full flow.

3. Jane makes the most amazing greetings cards and scrap books.  She can draw like your best manga artist and for some reason doesn’t sing about this ability half as much as she should do.

4. Despite the fact that she’s the younger sister and I should be looking after her, she always texts me to remind me about important dates like birthdays and anniversaries so I don’t forget.  And forget I would if it wasn’t for her.

5. She has blonde hair and blue eyes unlike me and my mum who have dark hair and brown eyes, and our dad who was ginger.  It was a common theme of our childhood to tell her she was adopted and sometimes I think she may even be considering the possibility…

Get well soon sis x

When I was a kid our babysitter used to live across the road from us and she wasn’t your typical teenage girl.  She had three kids of her own who were old enough to be left on their own when she came over to mind us.  When I was about eight or nine her daughter must have been about sixteen.  She was into The Cure and had this amazing Robert Smith hairdo, all black and long and spiky.  Of course I didn’t know who Robert Smith was, but I was in love the haircut, hers and his.

And so it was that when I went for my regular haircut at our local old ladies salon I asked my mum to ask the hairdresser (you could not imagine how shy I was as a kid…) to do my hair like Ruth’s, which in turn would make it like Mr Smith’s himself.  I’ve never to this day figured out whether my mum didn’t know what I meant, the hairdresser didn’t know what my mum meant or my mother used this unique opportunity to get the haircut she thought I should have.  But when I left the hairdressers that day I left with what could only be described as a short back and sides.

Now, I’ve never been one of those girly girls.  I like dressing nice like everyone does but I’m not big on make-up unless it’s a night out and I was never one of those young girls who insisted on having hair down their back even though it was straggly and split.  But that haircut.  Boy, that haircut.  I cried.  And cried and well, you get the picture.  Ever since then it’s been safe haircuts all the way for me.  Always below the shoulder, sometimes a fringe but always one that I could pin back and get rid of if I wanted, boring boring boring.  Then on Monday my friend came round to cut my hair and I thought to myself, well it could never be as bad as that hairdo could it?  And so I went for it.  It’s by no means a short back and sides, it’s a bob.  A lovely, shiny, curls under without me asking bob.  According to one of the kids I’m an Indie Cindy.  I am unfeasibly happy.  So happy in fact that despite the fact that I am an intelligent, professional woman, I have written an embarrassing amount of words about a haircut.  I’m going to hang my head in shame and think about what I’ve done.  And make you wait for a picture x

I’ve been tagged by the lovely Jenn who was my first ever swap giftee though god knows why anyone would want to know the following things about me…

La rules,

1. Link to the person that tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself.
4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
5. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.

1. I love the smell that comes out of drains when you’re really close to the water level.  This is one of the reasons why I loved Berlin.  My mum and sister went out shopping the other day and caught a whiff of that sewage smell and my mum told Jane, ‘Emily would love that’ and Jane had to phone me up and ask because she didn’t believe it.

2. Having said that, when we used to go to the dump to drop stuff off we used to drive past the sewage works and I would have a panic attack that somehow I would fall in and smell forever like in The Labyrinth and the Bog of Eternal Stench.

3. I was a horrible teenager.  Think about your worst nightmare and double it.  I don’t know how my mum put up with me.  Sometimes when a kid is giving out to me at school I feel like telling them to give up, they’re talking to a professional.  I never swore at my mum though.

4. When we were little we used to have picnics in front of the fire on a Sunday afternoon where we’d toast bread and marshmallow and eat the left over Yorkshire puddings from dinner with golden syrup and watch The Box of Delights or Chronicles of Narnia on the telly.

5. I hate to drive because I can’t look at of the window at the scenery.  I can look at the car in front and the car behind and that’s it.  My drive to work takes forty minutes each way.  That was a smart choice.

6. Even though I’m nowhere near being a fan of Elton John, I can’t listen to Your Song without crying.  It has no association with another place or time or person whatsoever but I still start to well up the second it begins.

Good grief, I’m odder than I thought… I will now tag Mick, who makes scarves that make me jealous, Mandy, my first ever swap gifter, Fatema, my UK Swap giftee and Meg, who made me an amazing scarf for the Miss Marple Swap.  I know I’m meant to pick six.

This time next week I will be beginning a two week break and getting ready to travel to my parent’s for Christmas.  I can’t wait. 

In all the time the boy and I have been together, we have never spent all of Christmas day in the same place; we’re both too stubborn to go anywhere other than home for the big day. 

A couple of years ago we spent Christmas morning at his mum’s then I drove over to Yorkshire for lunch.  That did not go well.  I arrived two hours late, having got hopelessly lost, to find my mum stood on the door step full of something in no way resembling Christmas cheer.  And that was when I vowed never again. 

Now I drive up well in advance with directions pinned to my dashboard that I still have to refer to despite travelling this same road at least every couple of months.  And that’s what I’ll be doing again in a week.  Christmas is bacon sarnies made by the old man, going to see the Christmas lights at the dairy near our old house, drinks with old friends on Christmas eve and getting picked up by my mum like I was 18 again, swapping presents with my sister, Auntie Eileen’s Christmas pudding, my Snoopy stocking filled and left on the end of my bed in the morning, watching cartoons and The Great Escape, leaving some part of dinner in the oven by accident and discovering it too late, crisp walks down the village where people say hello to you when you walk past and getting tipsy with my mum. 

This year Christmas will include a new bunny to take home with master Donald but also a goodbye to Rebus who died last Saturday.  He is now at rest in the boy’s parent’s back garden with various other family pets.  He isn’t at rest of course, he’s up there somewhere stealing biscuits that have been left of the side and rolling his ball into another rabbit’s head and standing up on his back legs to say hello with his front paws hanging down in front of him  like some kind of camp pantomime baddie.  He is already missed.

I’ve had two days off school to go on courses this week and it has been heaven.  Not that I don’t like my job, I love it, but you underestimate how tired it makes you.  In other jobs I’ve had the best parts were where you get to play around a bit, slack off a little and do something creative instead of the usual.  In this job the best parts are the hardest parts so you’re having loads of fun but tiring yourself out at the same time.  Very odd situation indeed.  Anyway, it’s been nice to be taught for a couple of days rather than doing the teaching so I am a happy little bunny.

Speaking of (not so) happy bunnies, I’ve been playing around here making pictures for Christmas cards for this year.  This is my favourite so far,

My very own Scrooge.  I’m going to couple more different ones I think and then order a batch.

This weekend will be filled with baking, knitting and making some Christmas decorations - it is the first tomorrow after all - as well as sorting out a last little package for my secret pal.  I have two parcels waiting for me at the post office that I’m going to pick up in the morning, I have a feeling that one might be my SP sender reveal - can’t wait!