A is for Autumn

Hello beautiful readers and friends,

I am sorry I have not written in such a long time...
The reason is a mixture of travels {campervanning in Cornwall, tenting and car boot sales in the New Forest, exploring the Isle of Wight, Barcelona, Lisbon and eating Portuguese pastries on the coast at Sao Martino da Porto}, lots of freelance design work, working on Scout and Rose, having a rest from being online in the after hours. This weekend we went to Reading to play Scrabble, eat scones, drink good coffee and cycle along the Thames Path to Henley. Oh. My. Goodness. Autumn arrested me in all her honey-coloured and sticky-toffee-pudding glory... again this morning when I went for a run along the Thames Path near my home, it dawned on me: I absolutely love Autumn.

Especially:
the Toast Autumn collection caramel apples,
wearing a snug scarf again,
getting the knitting needles out,
capes,
oh, the leaves and all their colours,
a pint of ale in a warm pub,
early morning sunshine and chilly air,
hot soup,
Hunter wellies on long walks through puddles,
the colour of the sky,
runner beans from the garden.

The Autumn palette makes me want to paint, crochet, knit, go shopping for gorgeous vintage finds at early morning, chilly markets where I can indulge in a tea and a bacon bap, and bake yummy pear sponge with warm custard. I am reading through Sophie Dahl's Autumn chapter and feeling very inspired. Have a peek at Design Seeds for snippet palettes to inspire you this season.

Standing on the Rooftop

I am listening to Madeleine Peyroux's latest album, Standing on the Rooftop.
It feels like the perfect album for the end of my week...
Her dusky, grainy voice that stretches beyond the notes.
This week has been a mixed bag:

Steve's birthday on Monday so he took the day off and we went on the London Eye {whoop!} and ate at Pieminster for lunch because he has been wanting to try it for ages. We had a bbq in the river garden and then we huddled in the living room to eat the ultimate chocolate cake...it is gooooood!

We had a fun home group dinner on Tuesday night with Rosie Lovell vanilla cupcakes to celebrate some more.

We have had nourishing rain falling in London so that the farmers can rest and not worry and grow us some yummy produce.

I had my first telephone interview for a dream job, which was an unsettling experience because I need to SEE who I am talking to! I want them to know that I am a GOOD THING, and I will work my little heart out, but somehow in interviews I get a little lost on how fabulous I should say I am and end up eating humble pie.

Anyhoo...happy Friday!

Cross stitch class

I think I might just sign up to this Make Lounge Cross Stitch class...it sounds like such fun! While at uni, my close friend Courtney and I went to a haberdashery shop and bought all the threads and things we needed for a poppy cross-stitch before we went on holiday to the Transkei. It took me years and many winters near the fire, but it is framed and hanging on a room in my Mum's home {she absolutely loves red poppies}...and I am relieved that no-one can see the BACK! Ooo. Mess. But the front looks pretty darn smashing. So yes, cross stitch is cool, as you can see in some brilliant ideas on this blog post. Anyone in London want to go with me?

Community and allotments

"Community" is something that completely and utterly fascinates me. Different communities, what it really means, how it is lived out by different people, biblical shows of community...I have written endless notes on it and could read about it and study it and observe it and be part of it to my little heart's content. This afternoon, when I wanted to watch a film, one popped up called Grow Your Own, and at first I really didn't think anything of it. The write up: "Comedy drama. Given ground in Liverpool allotments, troubled refugees meet with mixed reactions from the existing plot holders." Well, we just finished watching it and I am moved, so, so moved. A slow moving British film that will leave you thinking. Thinking about what "community" is and what it looks like.

It made me think of a book I have mentioned before, called Belonging by Jeannie Baker: "Together, children and adults plant grass and trees and bushes in the empty spaces. They paint murals over old graffiti. They stop the cars. Everything begins to blossom. 'Belonging' explores the re-greening of the city: the role of community, the empowerment of people and the significance of children, family and neighbourhood in changing their urban environment . The streets gradually become places for safe children's play, and community activity and places
for nature and wonder."

Having grown up in a farming community, I am beginning to see how working the land and cultivating beauty is often something that brings a community together. I have been tempted to apply for an allotment in London, but the waiting list is l-o-n-g, I have been told, and now we have moved into a beautiful little place with a garden so really should leave the opportunity for someone else...hmmm...I wonder how our landlords will feel about runner beans and pumpkins and having all the neighbours over for a party in the front garden?

If I weren't...

If I weren't made with ginger hair and fair skin with some freckles...
Would I have been a fair blonde with a braid?
Or a black lady with lots of gold rings?

Austin Kleon

Yesterday I was in tears, about to give up. Literally head down on my desk sobbing, tears staining papers around me. Pen strewn aside and computer banished. I have an incredible husband who bought me strawberry Haribos when he came home from work. We ate pesto and butternut pasta with red wine and we built our Ikea daybed together. For a few hours I forgot about creative block. Today, I checked my emails and Cherie, my art fairy godmother from South Africa had sent me a link to this post by Austin Kleon.

I am inspired! I have copied large portions of his article and will be sticking it up above my work area. Brilliant, absolutely inspiring and down-to-earth and encouraging. Do yourself a favour and read it with a cup of tea.

I particularly like these pieces of advice:
"Be boring. It’s the only way to get work done. As Flaubert said, 'Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.' Take care of yourself. Eat breakfast, do some pushups, get some sleep. Remember what I said earlier about good art coming from the body? Stay out of debt. Live on the cheap. Pinch pennies. Freedom from monetary stress means freedom in your art. **Get a day job and keep it. A day job gives you money, a connection to the world, and a routine. Parkinson’s law: work expands to fill the time allotted. I work a 9-5 and I get about as as much art done now as I did when I worked part-time. Get yourself a calendar. (And a logbook.) You need a chart of future events, and you need a chart of past events."

I love love LOVE his calendar and logbook. I love my morning pages but don't always time to get to write them and this is a new way of recording, writing, seeing your days.

Thank you, Austin.

** Still working on this one. Any help or suggestions welcome. I am a mixed bag: media studies, teaching, design. Available.

Picnics and Boat Race

I love London in Spring. The daffodils are blooming; bursts of yellow to cheer us all up...and the trees are laden with blossom. It is truly beautiful. And time for picnics! We had friends over for picnics to watch the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race on Saturday...it was freezing but we still decided to spread our blankets and picnic in our garden to watch them speed past, with Oxford well in the lead, yeah! Afterward we huddled inside for hot tea and Hummingbird Bakery blueberry cake {I decided to bake something with an element of dark blue, to celebrate the winning team...}. I am dreaming of warmer days and many more picnics in the garden...

www.shelleyjaneahrens.com

Hello readers and friends,

Now that it is 2011 and my blog is almost three years old, it is time to move!

I am moving shelleysherbet.blogspot.com to shelleyjaneahrens.com.

With love,
Shelley

Beer goggles for books

I mentioned that I am attending a literary salon this Friday evening. I don't know about you, but I had never heard of one of these before. "A salon is a gathering of intellectual, social, political, and cultural elites under the roof of an inspiring hostess or host, partly to amuse one another and partly to refine their taste and increase their knowledge through conversation." I don't know about 'elite' but I think you could say 'privileged', as people who attend these salons are educated.

I miss my Cape Town book club terribly, especially lately. Isn't it funny how the universe works? Just last week I was missing my book club, so I took myself off to Waterstones and bought four new books...then the very next day I met a woman at my TEFL course who runs literary salons in Paris and London. This Friday she is looking at Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which I had never read before. The evening is a 5 hour intensive course discussing the book, with dinner. Okay, so admittedly our book club in Cape Town ended up being more dinner, wine and gossip than deep, meaningful literary discussions...but what I loved was that we were all like-minded in what was a "good read" {largely} and introduced each other to new books every month.

Last night, on the tube home from Central London, the Evening Standard had a really interesting article entitled Binge Thinking. Caption: "Hip brands Dazed and Confused, Diesel and Aubin&Wills are pouring money into intellectual debates for the under-35s." Apparently in London, being cerebral is now sexy, and lots of festival organisers and club promoters have sensed the need for a new kind of night out - "one that involves our brains rather than our beer goggles." Jack Roberts, who organises talks at a bar called The Book Club in Shoreditch {which is ridiculously cool, anyway}, says "From our experience, there is a genuine thirst for discussion of intelligent subjects." I see that the place itself calls these "mock" lectures.

The article mentioned literary salons, which caught my attention as I had only just heard about this concept. "Salons are thought to be middle-class, middle-brow, Middle England and dominated by women" but there does seem to be a moving trend toward a younger, more diverse audience, who genuinely want a bit of think rather than drink.

These are the books I came home with this weekend. You'll notice they are all 2010 publications except for Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, which I never really got into on previous tries, but after reading The Lacuna, I am going to start reading it again.

What are you reading?

Breaking down 'em walls

This weekend was really long but so, so interesting. I signed up for a TEFL course at Regent's College in London. I was dreading spending a weekend in a classroom with intense hours...but on Saturday when I walked through Regent's Park to get to the venue, the sun was shining, the blossoms out and the canal in the Park was full of ducks and lined with early morning runners. It was so, so fresh and beautiful. You know how courses are when you start out, a bit quiet and awkward. However, my TEFL group turned out to be the most mixed, most amazing mixture of people! A mix of British, Scottish, Latvian, Hungarian, Japanese, Polish, Mauritian, Nigerian people...all different ages, tastes, dreams, accents, mannerisms...and somehow we all just got ON! What a lovely weekend {despite sitting in a classroom doing course work!}. Yesterday I had lunch with some girls at a cafe in the park, today I went walking with an older American lady in my class, and later this week I will be going to my first literary salon experience! I met a BBC journalist who has been to Timbuktu twice {for pleasure!}, her journalist husband who has had tea with Yasser Arafat, a woman who has fought ovarian cancer, a real East-Londoner and a real Nottingham lad...and I loved them all. Look at this for a way of celebrating our nationality and individuality. It's brilliant.

After the end of the course, we all walked over to a pub called "The Globe" opposite Baker Street Station, and I sat thinking "how appropriate". The bunch of us from all over the show, planning to go all over the globe! I just chose some pics that remind me of my weekend {don't you love this blackboard idea...and the way we can break down walls to enjoy each other...and how Regent's College is nestled in so much green? I do.}