Angel Jem's City Cottage

It's my birthday, one of those big birthdays with a 0 at the end. At my last one, 10 years ago, I was teaching, a mother of three aged 10 and under and swept along on a wave of business and busy-ness. My life has altered so much since. I'm no longer teaching, but working as an Office Ninja. I have time to write, and miss it when I'm not writing (I'm between books at the moment, trying to do a proofreading qualification. I miss stringing my own words together, rather than marking up other people's words) so I have the plan in my head for the next book, just gently simmering away at the moment. I'm more confident. I won't take things quietly, and I'm inclined to speak out on the issues that I feel strongly about.  I'm the mother of three young adults. That gives me a degree of freedom and a level of concern that I haven't had for ages. I'm aware that I have lost a degree of control over their lives and decisions even as I have gained back ...

Whatever else you do today (hello! I'm writing this a day late on Thursday: better late than never) go and vote. I don't care who you vote for, just vote. And if there's nobody you want to vote for, go and spoil your ballot. Spoilt ballots get counted as well, and can be a form of protest. On to Wednesday Wind Up. I've had a bit of a slow wake up this week, I think I either have a water infection or a cold, I find it so hard to get out of bed and into work. Or perhaps the sunny mornings just make me wish occasionally I was still a SAHM. Oh, the things I could do with a few days at home now! Never mind, that's not my season. I work 9 to 4 most days, so that's what I do. What am I reading this week? I finished reading Gone Viking by Helen Russell. It was funny, and touching, and all the things I wanted it to be. A good happy read, so that was fun. I also finished Happy by Fearne Cotton. It was interesting: while I was reading it, I could hear Fearne...

Wednesday is usually a good day in the office. I get in early, after dropping David off at the station at 8 for University at 9.30. I can clean, run backup, get the first cup of tea in and be writing at my desk, all before 9am. I leave by 4, to tutor a child, so the day is even a shorter day than usual. I think my early morning quiet session will be a good time to do my weekly round up. So here I am, only a week later than I thought! What am I reading this week? I had to mostly read Reservoir 13 for bookclub on Monday. It did not go well. I know it's won all sorts of awards and been raved about by people,had prequels on Radio 4 and all the things that meant I should have liked it.... but I just didn't. I don't know whether part of that was I was reading in very short bursts and often late at night in an incredibly busy few weeks, or because the style is deliberately disjointed, with no identifiable main character. I didn'y have sympathy for any of teh character...

Wednesday Wind Up :  How glad am I that I started these posts, a couple of years ago? I have been rereading some old ones and it's such an easy way to keep tabs on life. I'd forgotten buying a watch for playground duty (that watch, like the rest, didn't last). Or how many books I used to read. Any how, I'm back, and this time it's personal. As in, this is my personal blog, my online diary. I'm still hyggering away with How To Hygge The British Way, but that's not a family blog. I can't share things at a whim, I find it more of a thinking space than a chatting place. I need both. I have missed you all, and after I posted on Monday I had two beautiful replies saying welcome back. Thank you. I have been to the Emerald City, and it was all very well, but there's no place like Home. So my plan is, even if only on a Wednesday or Thursday for the Wind Up, to post regularly over here. Just for me. I don't expect people to follow or comment, a...

I've been busy the past few months again, writing a book on happiness. And when I've not been writing, I've been crocheting, decorating, cooking, cleaning (a lot of cleaning) and all the other detritus of a woman's life that takes up the time and makes one tired. I'm fully expecting nobody to be reading this blog by now. Taking almost 6 months off does rather lose one readers, doesn't it? I can understand. I find I rarely read blogs now, being seduced by the quick posts on Twitter, the picture heavy Instagram or the cosy companionship of Facebook groups full of hygge-loving people, or readers, crafters, makers. I think I have ignored myself in the form of Angel Jem. This was never about relating to people, but a diary for me. A diary of my life, and the issues in it. So, here's an update: 1. Christmas came and went. It was lovely, and we had a quiet family Christmas before leaving the day after Boxing Day to visit Salisbury. I will never go away over Ch...

I haven't posted here or on How to Hygge since last Monday. Last Monday. Golly, around about 9.30pm last Monday, what a peaceful, innocent time that was. Let me say right now that none of my family were anywhere near Manchester Arena last Monday night, but several friends and acquaintances were and several friends of friends, including a girl whose friends go to Sarah's school. I've taken the week to think how to frame a response, how to express my thoughts and.... I don't think there are words to say, no neat twist of phrase that can capture the emotions. Anger, sadness, concern, hope, thankfulness, love, empathy, pain, worry, hope again, relief, anger at someone else, guilt, happiness, love and finally hope. Manchester has been through hell and back this week, although for some people they may well still be in hell. What has given me hope this week is the response of people from across the world to the atrocity. I am especially proud of my home city, Liverp...

So I sewed up a pair of slippers instead. As displacement activities go, it is one of my best. A couple of hours stitching, a couple of hours watching 15 to 1 (my quiz show of obsession at the moment) and a good rest. It would, after all, be what the Doctor ordered, if I ever got to see a Doctor. Unfortunately, and I guess I'm not alone in this, my surgery has a new system of appointments so that you can no longer book ahead an appointment unless you stand on one leg in a thunder storm for an obscure hour between gleaming and gloaming on a night that may or may not be a day as well. Or you have a telephone consultation with a doctor who may or may not want to see you that day. But if you do that, you must ring at 8am promptly to join the queue and talk to the rottweiler who may or may not pass your number on to the medic. I am not cross. I am not at all cross. I just hope that I actually never need to use the service until it has collapsed and recovered again. Back to...

I have been busy over the past couple of weeks. I think life (for me) seems to get faster the older I get. Certainly, I look back at the days of at-home motherhood with a yearning I didn't expect to feel. When the most I got done in a week was 2 or 3 days supply, and they weren't guaranteed. Work is pretty full time, of course, so I find myself trying to fit a life into 2 days of the weekend. And since I love me a good bit of downtime and solitude, I find I'm fighting the urges to rest and relax or to get up and do. So I feel very Jekyll and Hyde. I'm either calm efficiency and getting the house cleared well, or collapsed on the sofa, remote control in hand, guinea pig on stomach and bewailing the days when I was able to watch daytime TV alone. I have no idea how full time workers fit in housework. I know that possibly before I began full time work I should have cleared the house, so that I could now consider getting a cleaner in to do a bit for me. As it is, I ...

It's been so long since I posted a wind up!! I can hardly remember the categories. I'll make them up for today. Reading I'm reading ... well, nothing in particular. I was supposed to read Ben Elton's Two Brothers for Book Club on Monday, but I missed it due to the funeral and didn't have to admit that I hadn't actually finished it. I like it so far. Next month's book is The Alchemist by Paul Coelho. Fortunately I read that a few years ago, and it's short, so I might just quickly read it and then finish the other one. Making Apart from a mess, I'm still supposed to be making the hygge shawls from the Scheepjes CAL this year. Time in the evenings seems to have been at a premium, so my CAL sits in a corner, unloved, unwanted and undone. This weekend, I promise, I'll get my mojo back and go for it hell for leather. If I could just catch up with the embroidery part.... Watching On TV we're still watching Game of Throne...

Yesterday we went to the funeral of one of Mr AJ's cousins. She was called Paddy, although she'd been christened Irene, because her Dad had wanted a boy. Now, Peter's family are a dying breed. We had six cousins in total there yesterday and there were only another 3 or 4 missing. At our wedding, my family could have gone on forever: his was distinctly smaller. And 24 years have only made it shrink more. I'm rambling. Yes. Back to my point. My point is that her true family actually weren't the relatives. There were 5 or 6 neighbours there, many of whom had known Paddy for the 40 years she lived in the house, who talked about her with such love, and sadness at her passing, that it made me smile. They had given her food, took her out for drives, been there for her when the closest family were almost an hour away. Two of them even had power of attorney at the end, because of the closeness and the proximity. I wish we could all say that we had neighbours as clos...

Happy Mother's Day so far. I hope if you have children, then you've organised them rather better than I have my own. So far I have made my own breakfast, bought my own present, written the shopping list and even read an Improving Book. I'm feeling weary and wondering what to do with the afternoon. It's a good job there's no football on this afternoon or I'm sure the pressure to watch it would be the last straw. As it is, I've been told that I will not be able to Finish Off the Bedroom Clean that I was doing yesterday because there is Important Work for DH to do. So my list for the weekend has sort of gone South. I think I shall alter it. The sun is shining, and the meal I'm going to make for my parents is an easy slam in the oven one, so I may set off for a walk in the woods to clear my mood.And any spare time I have left, I'll get on with my Hygge CAL. I'm well behind with it. The idea of crochet with embroidery was irresistible, but ...