BRRRR!

Still November and life out here in Glasgow's 'burbs is getting colder and colder. Fortunately we now have this super deluxe igloo in our garden should any guests drop by and require a room for the night! Derek? Shall I kit it out for you, Amanda and the boys? ;-) I also learned today that by -6 degrees wellies are too cold even with socks and tights, and snow boots that have started to leak leave your feet cold. But with a little ingenuity - things can turn out ok... yes I did go to ASDA with a pair of tights, a pair of socks and a plastic freezer bag tied round each of my feet inside my snow boots - that way I looked quite presentable as well as feeling borderline cosy :-) Though I have to say lying in bed now in a fleece nightie, drinking Glühwein (purely medicinal, of course) with the heating on full beats the lot. Now I just need my man (who's busy in the dining room wrapping home-made advent calendars for the kids) to join me for a cosy hug.

EASTER FLOWERS

We were sent a pretty Easter card by Thomas's mum. I have had a vague notion though, since we received it, that something was odd about it.
Suddenly today it struck me. It was the juxtaposition of snowdrops and Easter. To me in Scotland (with the obvious exception of this year) snowdrops are a January, or February at a pinch, flower. Easter is hyacinths, and maybe the tail end of the daffodil season, but definitely nothing to do with snowdrops!
It is funny how our climates are very slightly different despite the geographical proximity. After all the west Scotland is an area where you encounter dozens of palm trees - and I'm yet to bump into one of those in Denmark!

ASDA

This is the mother and child row of parking spaces at Newton Mearns ASDA today. Needless to say when I did find a parking space, I also found the shelves of the supermarket fairly empty. I guess the delivery trucks were having trouble negotiating the weather conditions. So we're having a bit of an improvised dinner!

OUCH

I hadn't managed to get out all day, not even for the school runs but with the rain on, I decided to attempt it at 3pm. The blue car was the obvious choice, being heavier and more powerful. I jumped in, turned the key and bang, the car sunk. I jumped out and saw I'd blown a tyre. I found that a bit odd, given I hadn't actually moved so couldn't have run over anything under the snow. The thought of jacking up such a big, heavy seven-seater didn't appeal, especially in the snow so I checked with Tesco Breakdown and was pleased to hear that my policy covered someone coming out and changing it for me. Within the hour a bloke with a jack knocked my door. He said it'd take ten minutes. Of course, he then rang the doorbell to say he'd found the wheel spring had snapped bursting my tyre, so firstly my tyre couldn't be changed, secondly I would need to be towed to a garage for repair and finally he couldn't get the tow truck down my street until the snow had melted. That was Thursday. The street and car are still in the same state and the seven of us are wondering how to walk as far as Silverburn to go birthday shopping for both Mum and Amanda. I am considering going out with my hairdryer on an extension cable if it hasn't gone before Monday. Thomas is going down south next week so I am trying to work out how to drive five kids and myself to school, not that five need to go to school but I can't really leave Anna home to babysit Amaia while I do the school run! It's going to be another fun week.

DECAPITATED SNOWMAN

I went out into my garden and found this sitting on the garden table. I have to say it reminded me of many of the old Calvin and Hobbes snowman sketches. Should I be worried about Charlotte's psyche?

A PROBLEM WE DON'T SEE OFTEN IN SCOTLAND

Since the end of the cold spell that lasted from the week before Xmas till Amaia's birth, I have started to notice a problem we don't often encounter here in the west of Scotland. Our little Scottish 'palm trees' are dying! These more exotic trees usually survive our winters that don't often go below -6°C, but this year we hit -9°C and all these poor trees are starting to droop.

FROZEN WATERFALL

I have been housebound for about a week, unable to drag this baby anywhere other than ante-natal appointments. That and the raging hormones are turning me into a crabbit basket-case, so today after sleeping most of the morning again, I decided that I couldn't completely miss this stunning weather. Unsure as to whether I could actually manage it, I set out with the intention of driving to Rouken Glen, walking once round the pond, checking out the snowy waterfall and returning home. On arrival, I was surprised to find no pond. I have often seen it frozen over the years, but never so frozen as to be covered in snow and footprints. When I finally arrived at the waterfall, a stunning sight awaited. For only the second time I can remember since first visiting Rouken Glen in 1973, the waterfall was 90% frozen, as if trapped in motion. This was well worth the physical struggle, and actually cheered me up for the best part of the afternoon.

A WEATHER RANT

I know I'm hormonal at the moment so please make allowances... Why are people so crap at driving in the snow in this country? I guess for the first few days the odd, inexperienced driver might have had an excuse, but three weeks in, I still can't even do the school run without seeing numpties coming out of every other junction revving so fast their wheels are spinning on the ice and their back ends are zooming at your face at some crazy speed. Add to that the 4x4 drivers who assume because they have the right tyres for the job, it is fine for them to sit on your tail leaving only a ten centimetre gap. Gimme strength! It isn't hard - just do everything in slow motion, and at a distance and you'll get there (numpties permitting, of course)!

AUTUMN

I quite like autumn really. From a colour point of view it is the prettiest season... when you are somewhere further south than Glasgow anyway. Until I lived in France I didn't really notice autumn. In the Glasgow of my childhood autumn had always seemed to last just one weekend. The leaves turned brown and were blown off the trees in a gale within 24 hours, 48 at the most. In France I watched in amazement at 20 as autumn (a fairly warm and sunny season) lasted weeks and weeks. Since then I have tried to be more aware of Scottish autumn. You have to start watching out for it the second week in October, with the first weekend in November usually being the optimum photo weekend. This year must have been windier as the trees had already reached week two of November stage when I was in Glasgow today with my camera - bummer. But the colours on the ground were beautiful, even if I had missed the best tree stage. Anna wasn't too sure whether she liked her feet disappearing under the leaves and I think she'd have felt more comfortable kicking them about if she had been wearing boots. The only unfortunate thing about autumn is the inevitability of winter following it.

A LOST BUG?

 A Scottish grasshopper Originally uploaded by PhylB

Sitting in my garden yesterday in Glasgow I was surprised to hear a sound I more often associate with gardens around Cassis or Antibes. I have only twice heard the sound of a grasshopper in Scotland in my life (once last summer, once yesterday). I looked around to see if the sound was coming from the grass and was even more shocked to see the little lost French bug sitting on the outside window ledge of my coffee room. I was scared to frighten it so shouted to Charlotte to rush in and throw me out the camera. It sat and waited on me taking its photo, instead of jumping off and hiding. And I was more than pleased with the clarity of the result!

UNUSUAL WATER

I decided to take the kids down to the coast today to make the best of this nice, unScottish weather. Marcel of course decided it'd be cooler to hang about at his friend's house so the three little ones and I set out for Ayrshire. Given both Anna and Léon wouldn't care where they landed as long as there was a sandy beach, I decided the obvious choice was Prestwick given it has free parking and is less than half an hour from the house. We arrived at 1-30, spread out the picnic blanket, made sand castles and collected shells. After an hour or so Charlotte noticed her swimsuit had been left in the buggy from a previous trip elsewhere. She asked to go for a swim. Believe me it isn't too common to hear your child ask to go for a swim in Ayrshire... in fact the last time I went for a swim in Ayrshire myself was on a trip in 1980! I still remember it was bloody cold! (And that was years before I became accustomed to my beloved Mediterranean!) She seemed to skip in like we were on the South coast of Spain. Léon took off his shorts and followed swiftly. Puzzled, I picked up Anna and waded in in my skirt. The water was noticeably warmer than it usually is in Cannes in July! I stand amazed.

CHILLY PASSION FLOWER

This poor plant is wondering why it's so damned cold. I can't imagine passion flowers are overly used to the ice. And why is it that ice comes as such a huge shock to us here in Scotland? I mean, obviously ice can be coped with - otherwise there wouldn't be such places as ski resorts, but this morning I woke to find that overnight it had thawed, rained and frozen quickly. The result of course was very thick black ice. I couldn't actually get up my garden path to the car - that took more than ten minutes carrying Anna, poor Pudge looked like Bambi on ice and resorted to lying on his front on the path crying awaiting rescue. Once I got to the car (to take Anna to the doc for an emergency appointment for a chest infection and conjunctivitis) I couldn't get in. The door was iced shut and I could hardly lie the sick baby on the pavement to pull it open so I tugged with one hand while trying to keep my balance, hold Anna and keep Bambi upright. Then of course my de-icer couldn't penetrate the 2cm of ice on the windscreen, I kid you not. When I finally got going, ten minutes after I was meant to arrive at the doc, the road had NOT been gritted so it was the people carrier doing the Bambi impression frantically flashing the dashboard's ABS lights at me. Why exactly had Newton Mearns not been gritted last night? I expected the main road would be ok, but again that was doing its impression of a championship slalom ski run all the way to the Ayr road. We got to the doc and survived the drive. We even watched a few less fortunate cars pirouette past us on our way up Capelrig road, missing us by millimetres! When I lived in a ski region in France the gritters simply passed my front window every 15 minutes pouring out salt, just in case. Maybe we should try taking a leaf out of their book.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE METEOROLOGISTS IN THIS COUNTRY?

I mean how hard can it be???? Fair enough - predicting the weather 10 days from now might be borderline tricky, but when you are talking about tonight overnight or tomorrow morning it really can't be that hard, can it?

I am having my garage (that's the broken, ugly big garden hut in the photo) demolished today and replaced by a real garage. You know - one where when you park the baby's buggy in it overnight it doesn't disintegrate, eaten by mould.

Anyway I checked the weather forecast when I was tidying it out on Saturday and it told me I'd have a whole week of sun. Sceptical, I checked it again last night at 6pm, given I have left 2 wooden bookcases in the garden for the 2 days the reconstruction is meant to take. They were still offering me 5 dry days. What luck!

So what the hell is that falling from the sky this morning when I open the blinds???? Am I seeing things? It is bloody raining. I go on to BBC weather and it assures me it is currently dry - silly me, what was I worrying about?

Now, I write dictionaries for a living. If I spell all the words wrong, I get fired. Why do these useless gits get away with getting it wrong every day?... Hmmmm that's a thought. I wonder if meteorology pays well? I'm sure I could do it just as poorly as them and from home with no need for childcare costs. I'm away to send my CV to the BBC...

SNOW!

fun in the snow
Originally uploaded by PhylB

I woke up in the middle of the night to feed Anna and noticed it was snowing heavily. By 3 hours later, I was assuming it had been part of my dream. Wrong!
Anna fell asleep mid-morning so Léon and I went out and made a snowman. I thought I did reasonably well - my back is still sore from the pregnancy but I did manage to roll three balls of snow around the garden. I found a carrot, a plant pot and various accoutrements to make him look like a snowman rather than a pile of snow and felt quite pleased with the result. Pudge was pleased too, even giving him a hug. As the day went on, we had warm periods, blizzard periods and generally changeable weather, so by 4 hours later, he had unfortunately become more the leaning tower of snowman, than the upright soul we had created in the morning. I guess we don't get enough snowman-building practice here to perfect it.

OH SHIT!

A little wet
Originally uploaded by carolclarinet

It's raining in our living room! The weather in 2008 has so far been rather gruesome - we lost a dozen roof slates 2 weeks ago and today, during yet another nasty gales plus blizzard storm something must have blown off the front of the house above the living room window because around 6pm a bucketful of water poured in above the window frame and then stopped as suddenly as it started. I guess the insurance company is going to be sick of us by the end of this winter - what with a break in at our other house the same week as the last storm damage claim :-\

A NEAT PLAN

 

 

We had a neat plan for the afternoon. Marcel was invited to a friend's house for 2 hours to play and the sun was just coming out when we dropped him off, so we drove to Newton Mearns, parked the car and went for a walk through the woods eating the beautiful ripe brambles from the bushes, following the little stream to the swing park. It was idyllic - the rain had stopped, the woods smelled wonderful, the kids were happy. We were less than 10 minutes from the car when the first raindrop hit, no problem...Then the rain got so heavy we were soaked through to our underwear, the road flooded so walking back to the car necessitated a wade through a shin-height puddle. We couldn't go anywhere in that state so had to pay an impromptu visit to my parents and sit in our underwear (not a pretty sight at 6 months pregnant!) on their couch while they dried our clothes over their radiators! Not quite the afternoon we'd been expecting!

A MILLION MILES AWAY?

Every time I have turned on the news for the past week, all I have heard about is flooding and disasters. Half of the BBC news front page is taken up daily with tails of communities cut off from civilisation, whole towns with no water supply, no electricity. I must admit I feel like I am reading reports about what is going on in America or Australia, it seems so remote. Still today the photos of doom and gloom keep coming while we in Glasgow seem to be basking in a heatwave. Today we were having a whale of a time in the Botanic gardens. It's a million miles away from down south, no?

SPRING IS IN THE AIR

Is it just me or have we finally turned the corner out of that dreadful, deep, dark part of the year I so loathe? The past few days have been glorious, the smells are different, the warmth from the sun is finally penetrating our clothes and there are buds on all the trees and flowers everywhere - what a breath of fresh air. And I so glad we´re finally back on summer time - I love the light evenings and crisper mornings - it truly makes me feel happy to be alive.

SUNFLOWERS

I love sunflowers. I was out for a walk one day last summer in Southern France when a huge thunder storm hit - while everyone else ran for cover I decided the best thing to do was to run into a nearby field of sunflowers and try to photograph their beautiful yellow heads under a grey and menacing sky rather than the stereotypical blue one. And of course now we use digital rather than film, there was nothing to stop me taking over 50 photos in the hope I would actually catch a fork of lightning above my beloved flowers. As it happens I only caught one, here off to the side - but it is real - there was no cloning involved here!

THE BBC AGAIN

Today they are running this. I guess it is so we can all see the effects of the 6 degrees and rain yesterday morning! ;-)