flock book and puffin hats

October 8, 2019October 9, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

There is so much more to Wool Week than knitting. It may seem that everybody spends dawn to dusk with various needles (straights, circulars, sock dpns, long dpns with a makkin belt … ) tucked about their person, but you only have to scratch the surface a little to find a wealth of other activities and tours. Granted, they may have a knitting bent, and there may be plenty of knitters clicking their needles, but that isn’t the main event.

The Flock Book Prizegiving evening at Tingwall Hall was just such an event. A flock book is pretty much what is says on the tin, a record of a flock over a period of time; pedigrees, numbers, registration details, movement etc. This evening was the prize giving following the Flock Book Show and Fine Wool competition. Tingwall Hall was full to bursting and that was just the food! The ladies of Shetland excelled themselves with plate upon plate of sandwiches, cold meats, dips, rolls, cakes, sweets as well as hearty soups and of course endless tea, coffee …. and the bar!

Then just as we thought we could eat no more, the band stuck up and the dancing began. There is nothing like a couple of rounds of The Gay Gordons to aid the digestive process! and yes I know this is not the Gay Gordons, I was too busy dancing to record at that stage. I think this is a two step but am ready to be corrected as I am not an expert at all!

Finally it was time to award the prizes. We had already been to have a feel and a sniff of the fleeces in the back room. I love raw fleece, I love the smell, I love the feel of the lanolin, I love the crimps scattered through the fleeces.

I would like to point out that I was not the only fleece sniffer, and not one person seemed to think that is was a strange thing to do 🙂

Winning fleece

And owner of said fleece receiving his award from Oliver Henry of Jamieson & Smith (the Brokers) and this year’s patron of Shetland Wool Week and designer of this year’s beanie (or toorie as it’s know in Shetland).

This one:

And whilst we are on the subject of winners and hats. Stuart won a puffin hat in the raffle! Apparently it is going to be his new fishing hat, assuming it doesn’t scare them off!

Love Gillie x

the craic was 90

October 5, 2019October 5, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

It’s not all about the classes. As any knitter will know, whether you are just learning to cast on your first row and filled with disbelief that this row of irregular knots on your needle can become a beautiful scarf or you can knock out an Italian twisted cast on and twenty rows of dual coloured brioche whilst holding an in depth conversation about the state of the economy, knitting is about the craic.

I will knit anywhere, I always have a small knitting bag with me. I have knitted in long queues, polling stations, every conceivable form of transport, school parents’ evenings, cinemas. I’ve knitted socks dressed as an Edwardian for a WWI re-enactment (and put a stainless steel knitting needle through my hand, be careful, your granny’s needles really are dangerous weapons!). I’ve knitted and even spun on stage (did you know Joan of Arc’s mother was a spinner, when I played her she was!). I can’t imagine hanging around somewhere without my knitting to keep me busy, and when you whip out your needles people start to talk to you. A lovely lady and I caused a state of panic on the tube from Kilburn to Baker Street. I noticed her fine yellow cable socks, clearly hand knitted and she noticed the needles sticking out of my back pack. Reader we started a conversation. Two strangers on the tube, the rest of the carriage was aghast!

The best yarn festivals have a knitting area. Key elements for a good knitting area are:

lots of space, not everyone knits on circulars and needles can be a weapon (see above!)
A mixture of seating. Some people want comfy chairs, some people like to curl up on a sofa, some people, particularly if they are doing a complicated lace pattern or colourwork, want a table on which to lay out pattern and yarns and of course the essential tea (or coffee)
Seating arranged in areas conducive to chatting and making new friends. No lines of tables and chairs please.
Occasional tables. We will be drinking tea (or coffee) and we have big bags full of our classwork, exciting new purchases and the jumper we promised ourselves we would finish this week. We don’t want to put our drinks on the floor.
Good lighting. We don’t care for mood lighting and we are not remotely interested in the interior design. We want to be able to see what we are doing, especially when we were having such a good time that we have to undo the previous two rows. Lights and lots of them please.

We came from all over the world. Even Antarctica!

Easy access to tea and coffee. Getting up and leaving our knitting and our new friends is something we only want to have to do in extremis. Please don’t make us walk upstairs to get a cuppa. On the same basis, loos nearby are good too. That tea doesn’t half run through you.
Food. And as above, we don’t want to have to go a long way to find it. Maybe not in the knitting area (though I have been to festivals where the two are combined and haven’t seen a chocolate cake/fine lacework disaster yet).
Information. We don’t always remember our festival guides and when somebody mentions a really interesting workshop it would be good if we could borrow a guide or see a timetable on the wall. Information about other local events (heaven forbid even non-yarn ones!), a list of local restaurants, taxi phone numbers, bus timetables etc. are all really helpful to the stressed knitter who has been knitting right up to the wire and now has precisely 15 minutes to get something to eat and cross town for their next workshop.

Samples of the patterns available in this year’s Wool Week Annual

Entertainment. Talks, music, demonstrations. I discovered Mawatas when Katie Seal of Sealy McWheely gave a talk at Loch Ness KnitFest. I also had my first spinning lesson with her a few months later. You never know what you will learn or which new musicians you will discover.

These were just what was on offer in the Hub

I can confirm that SWW achieves all the above with bells on. The hub is a knitters dream. Even Stuart quite happily came and sat with me and chatted to people, admired knitting and tapped his toes to the bands.

That was of course, when he was not bothering the fish at Muckle Flugga. The record catch, a 40 lb cod. Fish and chips will be on the menu in several friends houses this weekend!

I have made new friends from all around the world. I have laughed until I could hardly speak. I have watched in awe as knitters create the most beautiful work. I have discovered new yarns and new patterns. I have learned to knit with a makkin belt. I have watched spinners turn wool into gold (Rumpelstiltskin eat your heart out). I have listened to the most talented young musicians and I have enjoyed just being somewhere where I felt so utterly at home.

Enjoy your weekend

Love Gillie x

hap boards and squared paper

October 2, 2019October 2, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ 5 Comments

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Morning has broken in Sandwick and a jolly fine one it is too. Today I will be mostly knitting in the Hub and doing some natural dyeing. But yesterday was all about the technical stuff. Sometimes it is when you are forced down a route you had not planned upon that the journey becomes most fun. Yesterday was a case in point.

I had not been able to get one of the classes I had hoped for, it had sold out in minutes. So as my second choice I opted for Dressing Shetland Knitwear, in other words how to block your knitwear once you finally get it off the needles. When I first began to knit I was desperate to wear my creations, I didn’t want to have to wait for them to be blocked. But now I understand the magic that takes place when the knitting, upon which you have bestowed some of the best hours of your life, is transformed from mere knitting to a thing of beauty – and a thing that actually fits – blocking can be a dark art too!

I, like most knitters, usually block with pins. This involves finding a very large unoccupied double bed or a room with a huge clear floor upon which no animal (two, four, six or eight legged) will roam unhindered and then painstakingly shaping and pinning and reshaping and repining, stopping for tea, resuming the pinning stopping for gin to lift the sagging soul and finally accepting that this is the best that can be achieved (and that sleeve hanging over the side of the bed will be fine really).

Rachel and Freya Hunter put a stop to that pain. It will involve Stuart (a) doing some magic with 4 x 4 and creating a hap board and possibly “investing” in a jumper board (if I can find one for sale) but it will be worth it.

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This hap is about 5ft square. That is a lot of hap! Once washed and spun dry a single piece of mercerised cotton is threaded through the edges (being careful to thread through a couple of rows of knit to ensure the yarn doesn’t snap as it dries!)

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Once all the loops are wrapped around the pins it is time to start pulling and stretching to ensure that the hap is evenly laid across the board. It is slightly scary pulling something so beautiful so tight but the yarn (in this case 2ply jumper weight) is strong – AS LONG AS IT IS DAMP! If you let it dry and pull tightly it can snap so keep a spray bottle to hand if it feels as if it is drying before you have finished the adjustments.

The hap board is a VAST improvement over pinning on the floor. Not only is it far easier to adjust and obtain a neat square (or circle) but it stands upright so takes up almost no space and as it is open to the air on both sides it dries faster and more evenly. Stuart has been given his instructions!

The jumper board was a thing of wonder and beauty, but also rather hard to obtain (believe me I have been trying).

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This too is fully adjustable and ensures an even blocking on both sides. I think creation of this may be beyond even Stuart, but if there are any joiners out there who would like to give it a go, please let me know.

Lacework has to be blocked, even the most beautiful work (which mine is not) has a tendency to look like a dishcloth until it is given the blocking treatment. But did I ever think about using a board for lace scarves? Reader I did not!

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First we folded this cockleshell scarf in half and tacked the sides using running stitch. Then it was pulled over the end of the board and adjusted until the sides were flush. Three lengths of yarn, each four times the length of the end of the scarf to the end of the board were threaded through each peak (again make sure you thread at least two rows in). Then the thread was carefully pulled and tied with a slip knot and the peaks adjusted until they were exactly (ish – we weren’t entering our scarf in a competition where symmetry is measured in mm!) the same length and matched on the back on the front. How simple, yet how clever is that?

Finally hats, gloves, socks and mittens. Meet Fred.

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This is my 2019 Wool Week Roadside Beanie. Traditionally hats would have been blocked on balls but a balloon (ecological caveats notwithstanding) enables you to match the hat size to your own head. Measure your head where the brim will lie. Blow up the balloon to the same size, thread waste yarn through the edge of the ribbing and fit the damp hat over the balloon (and in my case insert ear plugs as the noise is horrible!). Tighten the waste yarn. Face optional.

There was time for a very quick cheese and pickle sandwich and then I hotfooted it (with Fred in tow) up to Market Street for a workshop designing a stranded colour work motif for a shawl based on flowers from the Shetlands.

I had no idea what to expect and Felicity of Knitsonik did not disappoint any of my rather wobbly expectations of what I might be able to achieve. First we had to choose our colour. No problem there, orange please. And then our flower. Fox and Cubs (Pilosella aurantiaca).

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But then the hard work began, how to turn the idea of the flower above into a motif that can be repeated throughout the shawl using the colours not to paint a picture of the flower but to represent the flower throughout the shawl. Much chewing of pencils over squared paper and much creation of strange pacman like flowers but I got there in the end.

I’m not explaining this very well I know. Maybe it’s best to have a look at Felicity’s website!

However these are my colours

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I would love to show you my finished motif. But sadly I didn’t finish it! However, I now think I know what I am doing and have the resources to start the multicoloured swatch. Watch this space.

Now time to get my tam out and get those needles clicking.

Love Gillie x

ferries and fair isle

October 1, 2019October 1, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ 3 Comments

There are several signs that you are grown up:

Snow has the ability to be a pain in the arse as well as quite pretty;
You no longer get excited by an envelope with your name on, in fact frequently quite the reverse’
Christmas comes around jolly quickly these days.

Fortunately, whilst Christmas may rock up with greater speed each year, so does Shetland Wool Week. It is almost a year ago that I returned from Loch Ness Knit Fest with the knowledge that there were three other knit festivals that definitely warranted attendance. Today I am tucked up in Da Peerie Hoose in Sandwick on Shetland after my first day at Shetland Wool Week and I am still pinching myself (I’m getting quite sore actually!)

Accommodation was booked first (I can highly recommend Da Peerie Hoose, it wasn’t finished when we booked it back in October last year, but it’s already a popular cottage and rightly so). I registered for the summer sailing alert on NorthLink Ferries and then waited anxiously for the morning in March when I could book tickets for the vast array of workshops, tours and events that comprise Shetland Wool Week. For those old enough to remember, it was like a hybrid of the first day of the Harrods Sale and opening your A-level results; mad chaos and intense anticipation.

One of the advantages of a couple where one is a yarn and fibre lover and the other loves to bother fish is that both activities can usually be accommodated in similar geographical locations. Note – Shetland Wool Week, Loch Ness Knit Fest, Fanø Strikkefestival (Denmark), Iceland Wool Week. Stuart has ample opportunities to dangle a line in fresh and sea water whilst I indulge in some fibre love. Consequently this is Stuart on Sunday morning at the start of our travels to Shetland.

This is the equipment I took with me.

Hmmm….

The ferry crossing was pleasantly uneventful (I gather crossings earlier in the week were a tad bumpier, I am glad I missed them) I was faintly amused by this sign.

I wondered if it referred to bad weather when perhaps walking up and down stairs was replaced by a more rapid “transit”.

Monday morning was bright and clear and we managed to pack all of Stuart’s fishing tackle/bait/goodness knows what into our little hire car and went to explore. Our priorities were:

Check location of Fishing Tackle shop (no prizes who that was for)
Obtain 1 x 2.00 mm 40 cm circular needle (even I was surprised I didn’t have one!)
Obtain hearing aid batteries. Whilst I am quite happy to potter around in semi-sludgy silence when it’s just Stuart and me (!) I did want to be able to hear the workshop leaders and chat to all the other knitters from around the world (New Zealand is the furthest travelled I have met thus far) and I had forgotten my spare set.
Breakfast.

It was in forgetting the hearing aid batteries we met Tommy who is the Lerwick equivalent of Six Dinner Sid and was planning his adventures for the day whilst chilling out in Boots.

Breakfast at The Dowry and this was our view.

The food was pretty darn good too and after a potter down to the Hub we returned for lunch and met Stuart’s partner in fish bothering crime, the lovely Adam from Connecticut. His wife Anne, who I met through the SWW facebook page also has a fabulous knitting podcast, I thought I knew how.

We also spotted these

Are they not quite beautiful? Currently on my needles is the Twageos Tam O’Shanter from The Vintage Shetland Project by Susan Crawford.

When I have mastered that, I may try some of the other glorious vintage patterns, but whether I achieve the delicacy and intricate colour work of these is debatable!

Then time for our first workshops. Stuart was playing with fused glass and I learned to knit my first ever afterthought heel. I am so impressed with myself, I kept having to stop and admire this thing of beauty.

Front

And back.

This is where I have to confess that I didn’t knit the sock itself, that was prepared for us by the wonderful Lesley Smith who made Fair Isle Afterthought Heels a complete breeze!

Finally we arrived at our home for the week. Oh my, it is like living in the little house you dreamed of when you were a little girl.

The welcome.

Our cosy and very comfortable bed.

The amazingly well stocked kitchen.

The instant meals are ours – we weren’t in the mood for cooking!

This morning we are up bright and early after a night knitting (me) reading and planning fishing (him) by the fire.

Have a great day wherever you are.

Love Gillie x

gowns, gardeners and gongs

September 13, 2019September 14, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ 2 Comments

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Advice I was given yesterday.

Don’t eat the black pudding (ignored that already at breakfast today)
Be nice (excellent tenet)
Don’t work for anyone you don’t like (I will add a codicil of “unless you have no choice”, rent and food are not luxuries)
Say yes (presumably unless you don’t like the person asking)

Notwithstanding the fact that these are huge generalisations and there will be plenty of exceptions to prove the rule, I have added some of my own already, as far as advice for graduates as well as mere Certificate holders such as me they are more succinct and more relevant than much of the stuff that has been doled out to me over my many years in many very different educational institutions.

I rather wish I had a video of the man in question during his talk / speech / stand up routine, as James Alexander Sinclair , reknowned ~~stand up comedian~~, garden designer has a wicked twinkle in his eye that belies his sober appearance and is an accomplished choreographer, taking control of the stage that we, the graduates had merely marched across, certificates in hand, only moments earlier. However, pop over to his website for a photo – he looks rather good in a floral headress, and perhaps read his blog to get a little taste of his way with words.

My journey to the lecture hall at RBGE on 12th September began something like this.

Me (observing husband deep in contemplation of expensive fishing tackle on a well-known on-line auction site): Do you remember how helpful you found the herbal healing salve I made you?

Him (not looking up from piscatorial porn): Hmmmm

Me: I wondered if I should apply for that course at the Edinburgh Botanics I was telling you about.

Him: Hmmm

I signed up on the spot. And so I morphed from Mum to Professor Smellie Sprout and have never looked back. Regular and observant readers will know that in October 2020 I take the next step in my herbal journey and start training with Nicki Durrell at The Plant Medicine School in Cork with a view to becoming a fully fledged medical herbalist. I certainly didn’t see that coming when I told my school careers advisor (in all seriousness) that I wanted to be a spy, or as a fall back, an actress.

And so, almost a year later Stuart and I arrived at Edinburgh airport from ten days in northern Spain at some silly o’clock hour and crashed out in our Airbnb, chosen to be within walking distance from RGBE, we didn’t think we were going to be up to much travelling the following day!

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Dress (suitably botanical) ironed, hair tamed as best I could I presented myself for registration. Gosh, there were a lot of people, and they all looked as if they were very knowledgeable. I was in awe of those that held little tickets that declared they had completed a course in botanical illustration, what witchery is that?! But lo, I spied a handful of my fellow Herbalogy Certificators (?) and then there we were, clutching our order numbers seated alphabetically by course ready for the off.

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I have been to a number of graduations of my own and more speech days and prize givings than I care to remember. There were three speakers …..

But the Herbology Gods were smiling, nay they were laughing. First up was David. If ever there was a perfect example of why Garden Design (new career) is better for the soul than Banking (previous career) it was David. Pim followed with a wonderful pictorial summary of the MSc in Biodiversity and Taxonomy of Plants which left me wondering if there was room for a Colombian field trip in the Herbology Certificate too!

Next up was Mr Sinclair above and then suddenly it was all over and we were being marshalled for photographs.

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Health and safety alive and well – this was our photographer in the aptly named cherry picker.

It perhaps says something about our particular group that we had all noticed that there we had two drink tokens per person for the reception, and there was rocky road. I believe there were other nibbles but champagne and rocky road did it for me.

And now …. ? Well who knows but for the time being I shall keep saying yes and see what happens.

Love Gillie x

siege, vows, pipes and drums

September 4, 2019September 4, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

Only three hundred people, mostly women and children leave the fortress of Hondarribia after a siege lasting two months. Over 16,000 canon rounds have been fired and the city is almost destroyed. But those three hundred people walk out, the city does not surrender and the French, all 27,000 men plus two warships are forced to scuttle away. After two months the Spanish army relieves a city that has been defended only by local men, women and children.

This was three hundred and sixty one years ago. However the gratitude of the people of Hondarribia to the people that helped defend the town resulted in a vow to the Virgin of Guadalupe (the patron saint of Hondarribia) to continue to thank her for her intervention during the resistance, siege and ultimate relief of the town. That vow is kept to this day.

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We arrived on day one. The first night we saw a single band, last night there were maybe two or three, this evening we lost count.

All marching and preparing, I hesitate to say practicing, because they are march and note perfect for the grand Alarde on 8th September.

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Three hundred years ago the defenders arrived playing pipes and drums and carrying what weapons they had from pitchforks to guns.

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Today they leave the guns and pitchforks behind but keep the pipes and drums. Each night this week the town is filled with more and more people and more and more bands leading up to the grand finale the Alarde, when the bands march up to the old city and a great feast of celebration begins.

It has been a pleasure and an honour to have unexpectedly been part of these celebrations. Thank you Hondarribia.

Love Gillie x

pipes and pintxos

September 3, 2019September 4, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

It’s always the French air traffic controllers. I wouldn’t be the least surprised to discover that Brexit is actually the result of a French air traffic controllers’ strike. For reasons that I will explain shortly I googled “French air traffic controller strike” and discovered there is actually a website that gives you a full list of planned French transport strike action for the year ahead. FOR THE YEAR AHEAD!

“Allo Henri, what have we got planned for November 2019? Nothing? Sacre Bleu! Who is next on the rota? Channel ports? Excellent, a perfect match for le Brexit.”

Whether the French transport unions handily give out a list so that you can avoid travelling or so that you can pack up your picnic and sit on the sidelines and watch is not clear. However, on Sunday 1st September there was a big blank spot next to French air traffic controllers. Why then, I wondered, were we sitting on a Ryanair plane at Edinburgh airport while the captain patiently explained that due to an issue with French air traffic control we were going to be sitting on said plane for at least three more hours before take off. 2019-09-01 07.01.53

On this occasion the French air traffic controllers got a bonus in their holiday chaos bingo game. It was a technical fault. Whilst we were bemoaning the fact that we had had to get up at silly o’clock to be on a 6.55 flight, in the long term it worked in our favour as I gather that many of the flights after us were cancelled.

So it was that we arrived in Santander a little later than planned, but we arrived nonetheless. Car hire sorted and we were on the road to Hondarribia in the Basque Country. Rolling green countryside (it is the wettest part of Spain earning the nickname of Green Spain) made the somewhat longer journey that we had expected quite pleasant.

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Lo and behold we had arrived at the start of what is transpiring to be a never ending festival! When confronted by hordes of happy celebrating people dressed in green we did a bit of internet searching and found that Sunday was the culmination of a Pelota cup and it would seem that Hondarribia had won. The band marched around town (several times).

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Led by a young lady spinning her fan and protected by two burly but grinning chaps!

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So we settled down in a bar with a glass of Txakoli (Basque sparkling wine) and a few pintxos (a sort of tapas unique to the Basque Country of which more in another post) and soaked up the atmosphere under the red geraniums.

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The following evening we headed back into town and the joint was jumping again. This time, the brass and drums had been replaced by pipes played by young men and women in the red beret of the Basque Country.

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Clearly the celebrations were continuing, which was fine by us! This time a rather good glass of red and some baked camembert and garlic.

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Twenty four hours later as I write this I can hear the pipes again. I think it may be another lively evening in Hondarribia.

Love Gillie x

dog days with a dog

August 28, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ 4 Comments

In the early toddler days of summer I took you on a photographic tour of my garden after a couple of days of heavy and relentless rain. Despite, or perhaps because of the downpour there was unexpected beauty to be found everywhere.

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I love this leaf. Has it arrived, or is it about to embark?

The toddler is now grown and the musty, earthy smell of the early morning indicates the arrival of autumn. So before the season fully turns please join me on a wander around the late summer garden.

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Fuchsia, or as I called them when I was a child – Dancing Ladies.

2019-08-26 15.26.26 The last of the summer lettuce.

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Waiting for the grapes to ripen.

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Green, grassy-smelling hops.

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The sunflower hedge, heads up and soaking up the rays.

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Peppermint in flower.

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Not long now.

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Hawthorn berries bring colour to the hedges.

2019-08-28 09.46.08 Teasel head

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Wild Carrot, open and closed.

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Blowsy dahlia.

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Agapanthus dancing in the breeze.

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The beginning and the end of the roses.

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Peppery nasturtiums.

2019-08-26 15.29.34 Francine and Mylie waiting for me to move out of their way.

Enjoy the dog days of summer. Maybe even with a dog …

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Love Gillie x

much mushroom mmmmm

August 26, 2019August 26, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

Summer took its time, yesterday I wore my first sundress of the season! But who cares about sundresses when we can have mushrooms? One of the advantages of lots of damp weather followed by the glorious warmth of the past few days is the massive growth in fungi in the woods.

The first was the chicken of the woods (Laetiporus sulphureus), one of the few edible bracket fungi.

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Then the boletes (Boletus sp.) and puffballs (Lycoperdon perlatum)

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As with all foraging only collect what you know and can positively identify. After many years of foraging there are only a handful of mushrooms I will pick unless I am on a formal course/led walk. These are boletes, chanterelles, jelly ear, puffball and shaggy ink cap. There are plenty of others I am fairly confident in identifying but it is too easy to be confident and wrong so I leave them be. The most useful advice I have ever been given, by a professional forager and chef, is to learn one mushroom at a time. Learn everything you can about it until you can identify it and explain why you can identify it and distinguish it from any other potentially inedible or poisonous mushroom and then, and only then, start to learn about another one. The same advice works well for any plant you might forage from aerial parts to berries to roots.

Many of the boletes have been sliced and popped in the dehydrator for use throughout the year.

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But when there is an abundance of fresh fungi then you can be sure it will be on the dinner table.

The boletes and puffballs were just sliced and fried in seasoned butter with lots of garlic.

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Delicious, but not quite as utterly yummy as the chicken of the woods. A solid and meaty fungus with a strong, very chickeny flavour, it is one of my favourites. Today I chopped it into large bite sized pieces.

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Dipped into beaten egg and then seasoned flour with lots of paprika. Fried in butter it is hard to stop sneaky fingers stealing it straight from the pan.

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A friend also suggests frying larger pieces without the egg and flour coating and then covering with grated cheese and popping under the grill. It also pickles very well, holding its shape and flavour (use a lightly seasoned vinegar with with additional sugar and maybe some thyme and oregano).

Love Gillie x

professor smellie sprout

August 23, 2019August 24, 2019 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

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I have several nicknames, my husband endearingly calls me the Septic Ferret, this has nothing to do with my personal hygiene but was a result of his response to me calling him a lazy old goat at precisely the moment during an episode of Blackadder in which Baldrick had clearly done something unspeakable. Such billet doux as we send each other (please remember to feed the dog/electrician arrives at midday/we are out of milk) are invariably signed off sfx or luvlog. Beat that Cyrano de Bergerac.

However, it is my most recently acquired nickname that is relevant today. Professor Smellie Sprout. Again this has nothing to do with overcooked Christmas vegetables. This name was given to me by my knitting group on hearing that I had recently completed a certificate course in Herbology at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh. .

[Oh and I got a distinction by the way]

Much mirth ensued until I cured a very swollen ankle with my sore muscle salve , and offers of beatification followed. Sainthood is not my thing, I couldn’t keep up the good behaviour for a start, but herbs most certainly are.

[Did I tell you I got a distinction?]

So in October 2020 I start fours years of training to become a fully fledged, officially registered Smellie Sprout at the School of Plant Medicine in Cork. In the meantime I need to keep my hand in so I have been writing up my Materia Medica. I imagine most people write up theirs electronically. I don’t, not least, because come the apocalypse when the internet is but a dimly lit memory my Materia Medica will still be going strong.

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Even its box is a thing of beauty, and apparently an office appliance no less.

On one of the first mornings when I could wander around the garden without the need for wellies and waterproofs I began to take photographs to attach to the notes. It’s surprising how much medicine you can plant in your garden.

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Verbena officinalis Vervain. The subject of my first monograph. One of the oldest sacred herbs for the Romans, Greeks and Druids. Useful for tension headaches, migraine and may also have a role, in conjunction with some antibiotics, in the control of MRSA.

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Hypericum perforatum St John’s Wort. Well known as an antidepressant it is also an important external wound healer.

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Tanacetum parthenium Feverfew. Best known for the treatment of migraine (and its ability to self seed with gay abandon) it is also an anti-inflammatory and is used in the alleviation of arthritis pain.

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Borago officinalis Borage. One of my favourite garden herbs, so pretty and a delicious addition to summer drinks. A cooling herb it was once called “cool-tankard”. “Borage for courage” is an oft-quoted expression indicating its ability to restore life and vitality to the downhearted and those weighed down by mental exhaustion.

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Artemisia verlotiorum Chinese Mugwort. One of the many medicinal Artemisia, one of the digestive bitters and strongly linked to the female reproductive system.

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Artemisia absinthium Wormwood. Forever to be linked to the era of Toulouse Lautrec and the apparent hallucinations brought on drinking copious amounts of absinthe. The hallucinations were believed to be the result of the high levels of thujone in the plant, although that has now been debunked. Today its extreme bitterness makes it a valuable member of the digestive bitters group of herbs and may also help the body cope with infection and fever.

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Verbascum thapsus Mullien. Unsurprisingly also known as Aaron’s rod, it provides dramatic structure in the garden both when flowering and as a dry autumnal stem. Primarily a respiratory remedy, reducing inflammation and increasing fluid production. During a long and nasty viral infection this summer I drank mullein tea every day and can confirm that it is an excellent expectorant and soothing plant.

2019-08-23 08.45.08 Leonurus cardiaca Motherwort. A member of the mint family, the clue is in the common name, motherwort has a long association with the female reproductive system and motherhood. Its Latin name indicates its use as a cardiac tonic.

2019-08-23 08.45.30 Foeniculum vulgare Fennel. Almost ready to harvest the seeds. A carminative, aiding digestion, antispasmodic and often used to relieve colic.

2019-08-23 08.41.17 Matricaria chamomilla Roman Chamomile. This isn’t doing quite as well this year since the husband “weeded” my original plants earlier this summer. These are the replacements and with only two flowers thus far my harvest will be very low this year!

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Lavendula sp Lavender complete with friend. I’ve been cutting and drying all summer, we have about six bushes which have been very productive this year.

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And here it is drying in the kitchen.

Time to write up all the notes now.

Love Gillie x