Just awaiting a baby...

...Ha. No. Don't freak out.

I'm just showing you the finished baby blanket that I've made for my new niece/nephew, when they decide to show up at the end of October/beginning of November.

Remember? I told you about it like a million years ago?

Well it's done. It's been done for a while but I've been incredibly lazy in getting it photographed but tomorrow it will be given to my brother and sister-in-law for them to take home to await the arrival of Niece/Nephew Number Four.

It's probably a little large to really be allowed to be called a baby blanket but I have rationalised this by saying that

a) it might be a very big baby, and

b) he/she needs to be swaddled up good and proper.

I did want to do a fancy edging but in the end decided to keep it simples and just did one round of each colour before finishing with a bit of the white. I felt it was already big enough without going anymore overboard.

I'll be sad to see it go. Do you ever worry that people don't quite get how much time it takes to make a blanket like this? It's not that I don't think they won't appreciate it but there's a small part of me that wants to hand it over and go "You'd better be appreciative you bitches, this has taken me friggin' ages". But instead I will hand it over and say "I just wanted to make something for my new niece/nephew".

And so now we wait...

Not just any old bridge

If you’re from Hull it’s practically the law that you have to love the Humber Bridge.

It used to be one of our main claims to fame. HULL – owner of the World’s Longest Single-Span Suspension Bridge.

However we only got to keep this accolade from 1981 to 1998 before China, Denmark and Japan came to ruin our party meaning that we are now the somewhat less impressive – HULL - owner of the 5th Longest Single-Span Suspension Bridge. (Click here for who else is in the running)

Whatever.

The Humber Bridge is special to us Hull People (still no idea what we’re supposed to be called – I might need to run a poll on this!) regardless of it being the longest or the 5th longest or whatever it may be. It’s especially special to those of us who travelled or lived away from the city at any point. When you’re coming in on the train you know you’re pretty much home when you see the Humber Bridge and it gives you one of those funny little feelings. Even though I was desperate to get away from Hull and go off to uni, I still used to have a little smile to myself when I came home for the holidays and saw it there, spanning the horrible brown River Humber.

It’s unfortunate really but there’s nothing to be done about it. The River Humber is brown. It’s just mud but, you know, it’s not the most pleasant of things to look at.

I think I’ve only ever attempted to walk across it once. I was a very little person and my Dad took me and my friend on an adventure. It was freezing and half way across we both cried and said we didn’t want to go any further so we turned and went back and went to play in a park, much more fun.

This Sunday however was my first time walking across it. I somehow got roped into accompanying a friend across who was walking across it and back with her dog for charity. It was one of those situations where I sort of casually mentioned “I’ll come with you!” in one of my excitable at-the-time-don’t-really-mean-it ways and before I knew it I was locked in and having to deliver on my promise.

How could I say no to this face?

The thing is, it turns out the Humber Bridge isn’t really that long at all. It’s only just over a mile long. Not a big deal. So can someone please explain to me why I found myself shattered by the time we’d completed the return journey and with pains in my legs the next day?! There are no excuses, I walk just over 4 miles a day going to and from work, this should not have been a big deal. What happened to me out there?!

Was it walking in a boring straight line? Was it the wind which was screaming through my ears on the way back? Was it just a little bit too much fresh air? Or am I just a wuss?

I have no idea but it knackered me out and I was too ashamed to admit that seeing as Alice, the 14 year old dog who accompanied us, was absolutely fine with the excursion and didn’t mind one bit.

And is it wrong of me to be jealous that the dog got a certificate and I didn’t?

I thought it would be great and I could take loads of amazing photos but it turns out:

Sludgy brown estuary + very flat landscape x limited photography skills = not very good photos

But despite my aching legs and slightly painful right ear and despite the lack of stunning scenic photos I still love you Humber Bridge and if I see you, or see a picture of you, you still mean home.

Criminal suspects

Last Friday afternoon was going to be fun. The reasons were twofold

a) It was Friday afternoon. Enough said.

b) It was Stitch in Public day and some of The Stitchettes were getting together to take part.

All we had to do was just take some pictures of us stitching in public. Easy peasy. No big deal. But no. It couldn’t just be us stitching in public, we do that every week in a nearby coffee shop, we had to go one better and do something really interesting. One person described it as “epic”.

It was decided that we wouldn’t just sit in a park and take some nice photos. Too easy. We would instead go and stitch in public against as many Hull landmarks and as many weird places as we could fit in.

We went to Ferens Art Gallery and posed among the pictures. All was good but our next move was the biggest mistake I think I’ve ever made.

We decided it would be hilarious to go into one of our shopping centres and take pictures of us embroidering in there. Then we decided it would be even more hilarious for one of us (me) to stand at the bottom of the escalator and to take a picture of the other three coming down it whilst embroidering.

I snapped a couple of pictures and we were marvelling at how hilarious we were when we discovered that actually we weren’t so hilarious after all. The bearer of bad news was a power-tripping security guard who came rushing down the escalator in a style akin to Jack Bauer.

He could have said to us nicely that actually we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside the shopping centre. He could have explained that this was to do with terrorist risk alerts that meant you couldn’t take photos inside shopping centres. He could have told us that as the shopping centre is private property they are within their rights to not allow people to take photos. He could have done all of these things and we would have said we were very sorry, we had no idea, and gone along our way.

Instead the following conversation ensued...

Power-tripping security guard: No no no you can’t do that in here
Shocked Stitchettes: What? Why?
PTSG: Terrorism. We’re on a terrorist risk alert that’s one down from severe.
SS: Yeah but why does that mean we can’t take pictures of an escalator
PTSG: Reconnaissance
One Stitchette in particular [who hadn’t heard what he said]: Sorry, what did you say?
PTSG: Reconnaissance. Do you want me to spell that for you?

For. Reals. My mouth immediately fell open. Seriously did he just say that?!

At that point we were kind of, sort of, escorted out of the building which was mortifying to say the least. We are all good girls. We’re not crazy risk takers. We are not rule breakers. But apparently we could be terrorists.

I understand that these polices might be in place and I understand that they can’t discriminate against particular groups of people but surely a little bit of common sense and discretion must play a part. Do four middle class, white women, embroidering, really look like trouble? And besides all of that was there any need to be quite so obnoxious?

I think it’s a ridiculous policy. It doesn’t make the slightest bit of sense. And I have also found out that the terrorist risk that our delightful security guard was talking about refers to government buildings, not empty shopping centres in Hull that no-one goes to anymore because there’s a better one round the corner.

If we’d have been more together and less taken aback by the treatment we’d just received one of us might have had the werewithal to take him up on his offer of spelling reconnaissance. Just to see.

So lessons were learnt. You can, by all means stitch in public, but for god’s sake don’t try to capture it on camera for posterity.

Or. Don’t bother visiting Princes Quay (which isn’t getting a link to it like I normally would because it doesn’t deserve one).

Stitching at The Deep which apparently doesn't pose a security risk.

(And yeah none of those people is me either.)

Hell yeah this is in Hull - Part Two

Yeah we’re still on Bank Holiday. Yeah I know it was over a week ago.

Sometimes it is possible to complete forget what is right slap bang on your doorstep. Case in point, Pearson Park.

Now I walk through this park every single day on my way to and from work (apart from the days when I’m ridiculously lazy/late for work and get the bus in.) and I appreciate that it’s pretty and I appreciate the whole nature vibe it’s got going on but I’ve never really looked at it. Never really stopped to take it all in and I’ve never really thought to until I took someone else there. It’s strange to see things through someone else’s eyes. Instead of being the place I walk through to work or the park that I used to play in when I came to see my Grandma, it’s a totally new experience, a never before seen bit of greenery.

Like the archway. I know this arch. I walk through it some days. But I’d stopped noticing until the person that I was with wanted to know what it used to be.

Erm......I don’t know?! (Kidding I do. Kind of. I'm guessing it used to be the rather grand entrance.)

I also can’t remember the last time I went in to the Conservatory. In my mind’s eye it was this incredibly boring and muggy old place just filled with a load of plants. I think I’ve been to too many botanical gardens in my time and they’ve all merged into one because actually the place is rammed full of birds and fish and a ridiculously large iguana called George. I spent a good five minutes convinced that the dinosaur hanging off a branch couldn’t be real and must be a toy iguana whilst the ‘real’ George was much smaller and hiding in the undergrowth. Only when he blinked did I realise the truth. I’m sure iguanas shouldn’t be that big.

There’s all manner of very loud and very brightly coloured birds. I’m not a huge bird fan but I am a huge fan of pretty colours so I can put up with a fair amount of chirping and cheeping.

There’s more fish than you can shake a stick at including an incredibly large black fish who would scare the living daylights out of you if you were to ever come across him in real life, minding your own business and having a little swim. And way more importantly than any of the fish are the axolotls. When I saw these guys I began a little Axolotl Dance and immediately started snapping photos (no flash of course) because I know that I certain Mooncalf enjoys a good axolotl or two.

Apparently the day before we were in there it had been the 150th anniversary of the gifting of the land to create Pearson Park. I had absolutely no idea this was happening – why didn’t anyone tell me?!

As we sat and watched a bloke allow pigeons to land all over him to impress his delighted daughter, and watched a rather creepy bloke in dark sunglasses stand and stare at the ducklings I couldn’t help but wonder, how had I been so blind and never seen what was right in front of me all along?

Hell yes this is in Hull - Part One

Can you indulge me for a couple of posts please? Can we pretend that I’m not posting a week after Bank Holiday and that instead I am a mere day late? I could be wrong, but just lately I get the feeling that my employers want me to actually work for a living. It’s incredibly inconvenient and has really gotten in the way of my blog posting duties.

So you remember Bank Holiday right? Of course you do, it was a just a day ago.

You might have picked this up by now but I love my Hull. I’m not the only one, all of us Hull citizens (do we have a name?!) are fiercely proud of our mothership. And when I say fiercely proud I mean scarily, up in your grill, proud of it. Don’t be talking shit about our city. Only we’re allowed to do that. I think it comes from being constantly under siege, we have to be proud, we have to believe that we are the greatest because if we believed everything we heard about ourselves we’d all throw ourselves in the Humber and have done with it.

I don’t know why everyone hates us but nobody wants to say anything nice about us. Like, ever. Instead people will say “You’re from Hull did you say? Oh yes don’t you have the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Britain?” “Isn’t Hull the obese capital of Europe?” “Don’t you have the worst schools in the UK?” “Is it true that the streets are so vicious everyone wears stab vests?” “Didn’t you get voted number one when the Crap Towns book was first published?” (Yes. It’s a sore point.)

The main problem appears to be that there is this general impression that Hull is a not very nice place, for whatever reason, which is then perpetuated to the point where it becomes fact. You’ll get people telling you about the city who have never even been there. Bad form, people, bad form.

I am on a one woman mission to promote my city. Yes at times it is a little bit shit but I bloody love it thank you very much and you know what? Some parts of all cities are a little bit shit sometimes.

This Bank Holiday someone came to visit me and I wanted to show Hull at its very best. However with no car and with guinea pig duties pressing heavily on me I felt somewhat at a loss as to where to take them.

Inspiration came in the form of East Park. The house I grew up in backed on to it so I was there most weekends when I was growing up. It’s where I first learnt what a wallaby was. It’s where I got bitten by a goose (horrifying experience). It’s where I played bob-down tig with my Dad only didn’t bob down fast enough, leaving me with a crescent shaped scar on my forehead where his fingernail punctured my skin. Aaah happy days.

The best thing about East Park is that it has it all. Playground? Check. Animals? Check. Grassy areas. Check. Places to climb? Check. Water play area? Check.

It was the rather lucky recipient of a £6 million pot of money from the Heritage Lottery Fund a few years ago for the purposes of redevelopment and it is now a work of art. Whereas I made do with a paddling pool which would be filled up in early July and not emptied until the end of August, children now have a whole trickling river to play in complete with fountains and Archimedes Screw. Whereas I used to vainly stand at the fence, willing an animal, any animal, to come near me, I can now lean over and touch goats and point at guinea pigs and get close to the deer and wallabies.

An albino wallaby! Hello my name is awesome.

The little sweet shop on the corner that was there when I was a wee thing is still there now and you can still get a bag of duck food for 50p and go and sit near the boating lake and get attacked by ducks and geese and pigeons.

(Luckily my life changing experience of being bitten by a goose has not totally traumatised me)

You can wander amidst the gardens and you can now go to a freakin’ cafe which they built with the new money. You can clamber amongst the rocks of Khyber Pass, albeit with a little more health and safety considerations than when I was young. You can climb up some steps and see this view in front of you.

Yes. That is in Hull people.

And even more exciting than any of this is the fact that I’ve discovered that East Park has a free outdoor gym in it! I saw a BBC Breakfast segment about this a long time ago but had no idea where was one here right under my nose. So much fun and I swear, if I lived closer (another misconception is that Hull is small. It’s not. It’s freakin’ massive) I would go here. Exercise bikes, cross trainer type contraptions (which are harder work than the real thing), leg press, chest press machines. All there and available for you to use. For free. Unbelievable. You might have to fight the kids for it however, I did a fair amount of muttering that went something along the lines of “I’m not allowed to play on their swings, why do they get to go on this stuff” but I guess I should be gracious and be pleased that young people are taking an interest in being active. (God I’m such a zen master.)

All this.

For free.

Just call me Hull’s Official Ambassador.

Surrogate Mother

Just in case you were wondering (and obviously you were) I’m done with the guinea pig sitting now. My short spell as surrogate mother to the three furry wonders came to an end on Sunday and I am most relieved to say that we all made it through the experience alive.

Guinea pigs were a new realm for me. I remember wanting one when I was young only to have Mum declare that they were smelly (an accusation I have frequently heard thrown in their direction, I can confirm they do not stink. Or else my nose doesn’t work.) and I couldn’t have one but could have a hamster instead.

And so Bunty entered my life. Yes that’s correct, I named her Bunty after the weekly comic that I would get from the Newsagents next door.

I would love to paint a glorious picture for you of how I’m such a huge animal lover and really I think I am but I hated that hamster. I hated it. She was nippy and bitey and I developed a complete phobia of picking her up in case my hand fell off. My only real pleasure came from cleaning her out and giving her a nice fresh cage, only to be horrified when she messed it up (a problem I also had with the guinea pigs admittedly, can’t they be trained to use a litter box like cats? Do they really just have to crap everywhere?). Smudge and Belinda, our cats at the time, used to sit either side of her cage, watching her swing from her bars like a pirate and there would be just the teeniest, tiniest part of me that would sort of, kind of wonder what would happen if one of them got hold of her.

Bunty finally came to pass 2 long years later. I don’t really know what she died of, we came down one morning and she was lying in her cage sort of rocking/shaking and not long after that she died. I did cry, I’m not a complete heartless beast, and she was even given a full burial service, thanks to the fact that my Dad was tongue and grooving the downstairs toilet and had some spare wood to make a coffin. Bunty still (as far as I know) resides under a tree in the back garden.

I will still linger outside the cages of hamsters at Pets At Home but my favourites are really the guinea pigs, despite the way that they scurry about and try to get away from you when you desperately try to reach into the enclosure to touch them.

I am happy to report that these guinea pigs lived up to all my expectations and more. They are basically a perfect size, not too small that they creep you out but not so big that they scare the hell out of you (I must be the only person on earth to be massively a little bit scared of big rabbits). You can sit them on your lap and they won’t move and are happy to just sit there and be petted, unlike cats which will only tolerate petting for so long. All they’re really interested in is grubbing about and just being guinea pigs. Brilliant.

I have to say however that the whole cleaning out of the cage would begin to wear thing after a while. Much as I like animals I can be a bit of commitment-phobe at times, probably why I like cats so much. Guinea pigs are a commitment, you need to be there to give them their fresh stuff in the morning and change their water bottles and you need to be there at night to clear out any muck and let them have a little run around in their outdoor run. It’s kind of a big responsibility and whilst it was one I was happy to do for one week in the middle of summer, having to do it in the dark and the rain in the depths of winter doesn’t sound as appealing to be honest.

Much as I would like a guinea pig, I don’t think I’m ready for it just yet. I’d rather wait until I was a parent and let my child have one. That way I could pass cleaning and general care responsibilities on to said child and dress it up as a ‘learning experience.’

Wait a minute.

It seems strange that I’ve just said I would rather get a child before a guinea pig. Not living in reality? Me? I don’t think so.

(If you were wondering, Apple is the brown one, Blossom is the white one with evil red eyes and Poppet is the sandy coloured one and, quite frankly, my favourite. How could she not be given this picture...?!)

August Book Review

Don't hate me for being a day late. I'm horrendous aren't I?

Good news is I only read 3 books this month so it'll be a short one. It would have been even shorter if it wasn't for a train journey down to and back from Torquay which gave me a total of 14 hours good reading time. Even better I forgot to take notes like I usually do so I'll be lucky if I can remember anything of them bar the name.

Her Fearful Symmetry - Audrey Niffenegger

I was really looking forward to this, how could I not be given the amazingness that was The Time Traveller's Wife. But I was a little disappointed to be honest.

It took me a long while to get into this one, it was a bit like trying to sprint across the pool in aqua aerobics, I wanted to get to the other side but something just kept holding me back.

Her Fearful Symmetry is about a pair of twins in America who inherit a creepy flat near Highgate Cemetry in London from an Aunt Elspeth that they never met. The only stipulation is that they have to live there for a year and their mother (the Elspeth's twin) isn't allowed to step foot in there.

There is a kind of awkward bloke living in the flat below who used to be Elspeth's lover. There is a kind of awkward bloke living in the flat above who has OCD. None of it really flows very nicely.

Then somewhat bizarrely things take a very strange twist and we enter another realm of ghostly goings on. I shouldn't have been surprised, this woman wrote about time-travelling for goodness sake, but it kind of took me by surprise and I found myself enjoying it. Kind of.

Overall it was okaaaaaaaaaay, but it made me pull a puzzled face. And I found it hard to care about any of the characters which always makes it difficult to feel sympathy for them.

The Rose of Sebastopol - Katherine McMahon

I'm seriously struggling to think about how to write about this book. Which is not a good start.

Drippy heroine. Drippy fiance. Headstrong cousin. Crimean War.

It could have been amazing but it was all a little cliched and I just felt like it didn't go far enough. There were questions which weren't really answered, and not in that very clever, "Oooh I wonder what happened there, let's sit and have a think about it" way, but in an annoying "You couldn't be bothered to explain that properly could you?" way.

I mean I read it. But that's not saying a lot considering I was trapped on a train for 6.5 hours and couldn't be bothered to do any cross stitching.

Blah.

The Weight of Silence - Heather Gudenkauf

Hello The Times/WH Smith book offer, you reel me in again. Good job really considering that I finished the first book on the way down to Torquay and needed something to read on the way back up but man am I pleased that I only spent £2.99 on it.

Two little girls go missing and the story of their absence is told through the voices of the various people connected to them. Totally readable and I raced through it but when it was over I couldn't really work out why I'd read it and what I'd gained from it. I was left going, "Yeah, and?"

It is one of the Book Club's summer reads and I can totally see why. Very easy to read, sucks you in very quickly and as soon as you've read it you can leave it on the beach or at the hotel and never think about it again. I don't mean that as a damning review, more a pat on the back for the people that choose the books for the Book Club, well done them.

...........

The winner this month?

Her Fearful Symmetry.

But it's a bit like picking out the banana that's the least black and mushy out of a bunch.

Not a good month.