Birthday Present

First, I meant to show you all Maggie's portrait of Mum that she did a few years ago and gave to me in September. She has exactly caught how Mum used to sit and read.
Well it arrived at last, my 70th birthday present from the family ... thank you all. Now I can fall asleep safely by the stove!I'm snowed in and the first I knew about the chair was when the man from Streamline and the postman knocked on the door after carrying it up from the roadend ... he couldn't get his van up! It was lucky that they met because the Streamline man could not have done it on his own and I would not have been able to help him much.
Now all my guests can have comfortable seats.

I shall sit in it this evening and raise a dram to you all.

Finished!

Today, finished work on the bedroom completely and tidied it up.

This is the old window which now has 9cm more depth. I've lost the same amount on the other two walls.This is the new window.

When I get back in February I'll get a carpet laid. The whole thing is as good as new. The colour is a kind of olive and a little greener than it looks on the photos.

Window continued

After Archie finished putting in the window and took away the shuttering I put up the framework for the panelling, inside of which I put 75mm of insulation.There were only a couple of boards that I had split in taking them off and it all went back together relatively easily. The room will be a few inches smaller all round ... but cosy!
Yesterday, I finished lining the window recess ... it's the photo that's distorted not the handiwork!
Archie comes tomorrow to disconnect the electric switches and sockets on the final wall (where the original window is) and then I shall start all over again there. I should get it all done, filled, sanded and maybe the first coat of paint before Xmas.

A Grand Day Out

On Wednesday I go an invite to join Jonathan and SNH counting grey seal pups. The last time I did this (regularly) was almost 40 years ago. Then it was aboard inflateables with the Seals Unit from Cambridge ... rugged stuff in November in Shetland! Today, it was aboard the Dunter III with all mod cons.

We cruised the wee islands and holms around Whalsay, Fetlar, and Hascosay. My job was to count the white coats (they thought I might still possibly manage that). These white coat pups are just a week or two old. The large seals beside them are the mums and the larger one on the beach is the dad.
I had planned this summer to get to Out Skerries ... but never did. But on Wednesday I made it, at least around it. From afar a few wee low islands.
We scooted through the harbour ..

and onto the lighthouse.

... the Lighthouse, built by the Stevensons. It was at this lighthouse that an Orkney man with the surname Laughton was working in 1863 and my impressionable great grandmother took the name for her son, James Laughton Johnston. There you go!

Room with a View

Today Archie finished the window. It changes the whole aspect of the gable, suddenly there's an eye looking out and a warmth looking in.Archie and Andrew have fixed battons for me on the floor and ceiling. Now time for me to construct the rest and begin putting in the insulation and then the panelling back.
Polly checked out the view and seemed satisfied. Now (when all my contribution is done) I just need a pair of binnoculars on the window sill and I will be able to check the driftwood situation on the Breiwick beach from my bed!

The hole in the wall

Archie, Andrew and David have now been a week at the job.

A nice tidy bedroom to start with.I started inside by stripping off all the panelling as carefully as possible and was relieved to find the walls fairly dry. However I did find that some stone that was used as the lintel for the wee fireplace had not been suitable ... in places it had turned to sand with the heat. So Archie is making that safe. If someone had gone on using the fire eventually part of that inner wall would have collapsed. So, I'm glad I stripped all the panelling off!
This is Andrew - a bit camera shy - putting in the shuttering prior to filling in with concrete
The hole was initially rather large for comfort, even though it was shored up with scaffolding, but at this stage (below) Andrew and David have rebuilt the sides around the frame which will be the window.Some pretty big stones came out!
I am expecting that on Monday David will point up all around the window space and Andrew will tidy up the inside, then, hopefully, the new window will be in place sometime this week. When that happens I will start building a frame on which to re-fix the panelling and within which I will put insulation.

It's a bit draughty as we are having southerly gales! However, it could be freezing, rather than mild!

Garden walls and gable walls

Before the severe gales came and blew away the leaves the north west corner of the garden looked like this. I decided that the wall was too low, needed repair and raising to the height of the other part of the north wall by the terrace.I have done that ... after it falling down once when I thought I was nearly finished. It looks like this now as I have removed a boring bush and planted some lupins and foxgloves that will come up next year.
The outside side of the wall with part of it rebuilt and heightened.
This is the wall now completely rebuilt. Note the vertical stone at the foot, just left of centre. Behind it is a very large stone (I could not move) which resembles a steep sided back. The first time I thought I had bridged it successfully. The second time (!) I put in the vertical stone to hold the bridge.

In the longterm, Sorley's house will provide shelter and we may reduce the height of the wall again. But in the meantime I can grow more things in the garden.
Archie has now started work on the gable window. First off, David (who works for him) has taken out all the old pointing and repointed deeply with plenty of cement. Towards the left (not pointed) is where the window will be. The plan is that all the new pointing will hold the wall together when he takes out the hole for the window, long enough for him to install a concrete lintel. Having built walls with the 'pigs' heads' stones of Bousta, I know the problem!
Archie is now making the window (a sash window same as the kitchen and bedroom windows, which he made) and I have a two week gap to nip down south for family and culture. I'm hoping the weather will be better than last week when the boat took 12 hours (into the northerly gale) from Orkney!

Bell(e) Heather

Just had to share the wonderful colours of the bell heather as some flowers go over and some are still fresh.I don't think I have ever seen it like this ... maybe I just haven't looked!

I think it is also very rich just here - on the way to Breiwick - where there is only very light grazing ... of Cass' ponies and a couple of rams.

Mushrooms

Yesterday collected 3lbs of dinner plate mushrooms, around Bousta and in Gordon's field by the Hall. The recipe was for 1lb, so I tripled the amounts.The result was delicious! And I have five servings tucked away in the freezer.
Yep ... finished the crossword.

Rebuilding old garden wall

I thought the old, north, wall of the garden needed to be rebuilt. I think it was the last piece of wall put up by the original builder of the garden walls, perhaps in the 1950s, and he just wanted to get the job finished. I also thought that I had left too big an opening through to the new garden (when the extension was built) and where the wind whistled through in the winter ... and sometimes in the summer too! This is it before I began and after Sorley had moved a few very large stones for me.
It took a couple of hours to pull just half of it down.
And a few days and most of the best stones to put that half up again ... with the inclusion of a seat, for fun.
Then I pulled the other half down, minus a few stones to keep the old gate up. There was not a lot of room to put all the stones!
Now it's finished ... and I'm quite tanned and fit.
There are still a few stones left in the pile so maybe I'll carry on with the wall on the other side of the old gate ... after a few pairs of younger arms have moved them closer for me!

Nigel's visit

I just found these in my downloads from Nigel. The first should have been in the previous blog showing Nigel's gate before I painted and hung it ... and before I re-did the wall.Nigel and I at teabreak.
The guide who lost his clients ... and his way.

Garden

Couple of additions to the garden. This is my 'fishvane', a piece of driftwood with fin and tail. Mind you, the wind has to be Force 4 and up to make it spin. I'll have to work on that.When Nigel was here he kindly made a new gate for me to replace the rusting wrought iron gate we brought from Forneth. I rebuilt the wall to fit, painted it 'company colours' (baby blue) and hung it so it is now in action ... a great improvement.Next project is to rebuild the wall between the old and new garden.

A Kist of Emigrants

At long last ... David will know the feeling ... I have passed the last CD of material to Shetland Times today. I have seen the proofs and I think the book will look good. I think it could have looked better but ST do not have a designer. On the other hand, most readers are probably just interested in the people and the photographs. The cover design was difficult. I saw a friend's design in the archives (he made the piece that hangs above my bath also) called Diaspora (it's made of wood) and thought it ideal. It also gave me the inspiration for the title ... the boxes and chests at the bottom of the boat. I wanted a title that didn't suggest that the book contained all the emigrant stories but a collection, and I think that a 'Kist' (or chest) does just that.

Diaspora is actually quite funny and that has worried me a little in case the people who gave me their emigrant forbears' stories get upset ... some, naturally, take their stories very seriously!

The background (this is a mock-up) is supposed to be the grain of a box and the title a stencil stamp on it. It's going to be slightly larger than A4 and will cost 30 quid.

The book is to be launched on the evening of the 14th June ... first night of the Hamefarin ... and is supposed to be one of the 'highlights' of the Hamefarin! That kinda worries me as there is not a lot of excitement in launching a book. We'll probably show the illustrations on a large screen (it will be in the Museum lecture hall) and have some music, nibbles and wine. I have also persuaded my old friend, Jonathan Wills to be MC; he will be very entertaining! And Jamie, Elizabeth and Tim will be there too. Most of the time I will be signing and trying to remember who people are ... I have had over 100 contributors whom I have mainly corresponded with by email and they will expect me to know them or remember their story. Ah well, it will be fun ... I hope.

I have got tickets for all of us to the big Hamefarin concert, Aly Bain and Phil Cunningham and Catriona MacDonald among others. It's Tim's birthday the day after so we'll go and have a meal at Burrastow. Should be quite a week.

Snow and Mum

Dug myself out yesterday! Although cold (-6 last night and around 0 today) and covered in snow it is all very beautiful and a little strange. The oystercatchers have been back a week and are calling, while it was warm enough to have lunch in the front porch with the doors open! While I was sitting there I saw the kestrel again on a rock above the beach ... now been here for around a month.

Mum was in her room, quiet but in good form.

Showing just a degree of patience ...

'That's enough, now give it to me!'

She has a new pair of shoes (I got in Lerwick on Monday) as she has worn out the slippers she was given at Xmas! She's good.

Skullduggery

A brief and sad tale.
I was working at the desk and Polly was fast asleep on the couch the other afternoon, when there was a loud bang. Something had hit the large glass windows and hit them hard. Even Polly woke up (she kinda hibernates in this winter weather). Outside on the terrace was a newly dead meadow pipit, still warm. But it was not it that made the bang. It was the kestrel who had just caught it!

The kestrel was almost knocked out and also on the terrace with its wings spread out, not knowing what had happened or where it was. I picked it up and put it on the stone ledge by the terrace. Several times its eye started to close and its head droop. Each time I stroked it, muttering the lines I had heard from the last bit of TV drama I had watched, 'stay with me'.

Gradually, it took almost 20 minutes, the kestrel recovered and eventually got up and flew away.

I'll need to stick something on the window as other birds have hit it before. I think that from some angles they see through the windows and out the smaller ones on the seaward side and think they can fly right through.

First time I have handled a kestrel, a beautiful little hawk ... the pipit was beautiful too. I buried it.

The Icing on the Flan

Wonderfully still, sunny - with just a little snow - and freezing weather in Shetland since Xmas while, it seems, the mainland (England predominantly according to the BBC) come to a stop under deep snow. Yesterday, so beautiful in the morning that I took a walk to Breiwick and fell three times before I had gone 100 yards. The ground is like concrete with an icing finish! However, it was very enjoyable, though very cold out of the sun. Although there is very little snow around Bousta there's a good coating over Ronas Hilland inland (yes, I know that term is a bit of a joke in Shetland).

All the lochs are frozen over ... weird to see the sheep nonchantly taking shortcuts across the surface. I just hope that those who have settled temporarily on the little loch islands get off before the thaw! This is Burga Water on the way to Walls. Even the sheltered voes are frozen.

After my walk I made a smoked-salmon flan (a la Gudrun) using my new dish from Joy, the Durham's potter-neighbour. Must get another one next time.

The flan was good and is not finished yet!