welsh hills again

It is time for a blog about day to day things. I am sitting by the woodburner with a new load of logs in the basket and it is raining gently outside. Only a week ago we were hanging on to the last days of a golden autumn which almost converted me from my long held dislike of this time of year. The garden was looking better that it ever has in October, thanks to a combination of the endless flowering of masses of self seeded cosmos and a soft warm light which washed everything the pale straw colour of Fino sherry. I planted out a hundred tiny wild tulips, tulipa sylvestris, which will fling open their star shaped cream and yellow flowers in spring. I sowed Sarah Raven sweet peas and annuals, Orlaya Grandiflora, Ammi Majus, and white foxgloves by the box full. I considered once again cleaning out the aluminium greenhouse and once again found something else to do. That must be one of my least favourite jobs, on a par with cleaning the oven. I spent almost as much time outside as I do in s...

I dithered for a few minutes about joining the choir on Monday night. It was raining and cold. I can't really sing. What if no-one I knew turned up? What if I was asked to sing something by myself and they could tell how rubbish I am? But in the end I went. I had said I would and in a little place like this you don't want a reputation for unreliability. I arrived a bit early. I almost always do. As I opened the door I could tell the church had its heating on so maybe I didn't need my many layers. There were two older men there already, pleasant but slightly wary. I wondered how the older members of the male voice choir felt about allowing women to sing with them at Christmas. Perhaps they thought it was wrong, spoilt the traditional sound. There has been a church here since the 13th Century. Much of this one, embellished and added to, dates from then. It is a lovely building of pale stone and polished wood and smells of warmth and flowers and use. Not for the first time I w...