Moving Right Along – Warming Up My Body (and My Voice!)

Okay. Last Summer, I did yoga. I signed up for a yin/yang (that’s “yin” – for joints & connective tissues – and “yang” – aka “hatha”, for muscles) yoga class at the studio down the street and learned how to do a bunch of poses, and then did them pretty-much every morning at my own house after a couple of weeks.
And then I went a got myself a temporary day-job and that meant that I basically dropped yoga like a hot potato.

And now here it is, barely a week away from March, with (Maple) Sugar Moon starting to grow (new moon was yesterday, iirc), and I’m basically going “Okay, self. Time to get back into the routine of things.”

Which means doing yoga again every morning chez moi – even if it’s only 20-30 minutes (though I’m aiming to work up to about 45/morning) – and doing vocal warm-ups at the same time.

This is a big deal for me.

I can feel myself expanding when I do it.
And, yeah, maybe part of that is because the weather’s been ridiculously warm the past week or so, which has had my body craving yoga (rather than craving curling up in a ball under a blanket with hot chocolate, for example) – specifically downward dog, for some reason. I don’t even like downward dog (so I dunno). Or maybe it’s because I spent last night having A Conversation with my sweetie about getting my sadistic groove back, which seriously helped me out – I’ve been feeling crunched up and squashed and coiled up inside myself (like I’ve been making myself small and unnoticeable or similar) and, when my Ghost asked me what I want to get out of S/M and what I enjoy about it, and basically a lot of “Use Your Words Luke Miz Syren” plus a chance to be all me-me-me[1] about a type of play that typically gets preached as being all about the bottom, not the top.
It was really good.
However.
I also think that I’m breathing more easily and and feeling more open because I let myself sing, let myself go through the decades-familiar work of arpeggios and scales and other simple warm-up exercises, filled my lungs all the way and didn’t worry about (a) bothering the neighbours[2] or (b) staying within what I currently feel are my “limits”[3].

I need to watch myself, because the frequent up-and-down of yoga often leaves me feeling a little light-headed. That combined with the deep-breathing, long breaths, and more-intense-than-I’m-used-to vocal activity, means that I need to be careful.

So, for now, I’m doing about 20 minutes of yoga + vocal warm-ups (mostly at the lower end of my range). As I get back into the swing of things, I’ll be able to yoga for longer periods, hold poses longer, and get myself into the upper end of my range without feeling like I’m damaging myself.
By the time Actual Wedding Season hits (June, maybe a little earlier, around here), I should be in Good Form (vocally and physically) and, with any luck, on track with practicing Actual Repertoire as well as doing daily warm-ups.
One can dream act, right? 🙂

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

[1] Do not even get me started on how hard it is to actively and healthily be all me-me-me rather than doing it silently and full of resentment. I’m just saying. Seriously. Half of Syrens is all about that stuff.

[2] I spent three years – the last three years in-which I took singing lessons – getting harrassed by neighbours (who were everything from indifferently-clueless to actively, nastily hostile) about my singing. Because I practiced at home. Which apparently drove everyone in the building(s) nuts. I moved three times. That’ll do a number on a gal.

[3] I’m trying to be “gentle” with myself on this. There’s a gap between what I could do ten years ago and what I can do now and, while it’s not actually as wide as I originally feared it was (I still have my high b-flat! :-D) it is still a gap. I get tired quickly, because I haven’t done warm-ups like this in years (with the exception of when I learned a piece for my cousin’s wedding last summer), and I don’t want to push myself so far – which, really, isn’t all that far – that I end up having to take a day (or two, or three… you see what could happen there) off to recover.

Maple Walnut Coffee Cake

Okay. So it’s one week into the New Year New You “phase two” course (which you can sign up for here) and I find myself wondering what to write about, now that I’m not blogging on weekly NYNY topics.

That, combined with the fact that I have about 2C of sour milk to deal with before the end of the day, has prompted me to pull together the following recipe (and write it down, so you can try it too).

As you know bob, it’s February. Late February, even. Which means that we’re just coming to the end of Hungry Month and (as of tomorrow’s New Moon) starting into Maple Sugar Month. Which is just dandy (I can feel Spring in my body, even if everything’s still covered in ice. I can tell because I keep wanting to do Yoga instead of just huddling under blankets all day long). I opened a bottle of my summer cucumber pickles today (holy moly are they ever salty! Next year? Somewhat less salt, I think…) and we’ve been largely relying on root veggies and the occasional handful of frozen broccoli or (sometimes) raspberries for our vegetable content. Which means that, at this time of year, most of my baking is of the all-dry-goods variety. Not so much with the pumpkin puree or the fresh sliced apples landing in the mix (although we can do that around here). As such, the following recipe is all about the stuff that is easily available.

Chocolate Spiced Coffee Cake

In a large bowl, stir together:
2½ C flour
2 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt

In a second bowl, blend together:
½ C maple syrup (you can use 3/4 C brown sugar if you prefer)
½ C margarine
2 eggs

Add to the egg mixture:
2 C sour milk
1 tbsp cassis OR cherry brandy (you can use vanilla extract here, too, if you want to)

Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and blend until (reasonably) smooth

Stir in:
2 tbsp Walnut crumbles
2 tbsp dried currants (raisins or diced dried cherries will also work)

Pour the batter into a greased cake pan (9″ square should theoretically be fine for this, but ymmv)
Bake at 400F for 30 minutes (more or less), or until it passes the Fork Test
Remove from oven and allow to cool most of the way (or all the way)

Serve and enjoy. 🙂
(You could also use this cake as the “bread” in a kick-ass bread-pudding. I’m just sayin’).

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

What Have I Learned [New Year, New You]

So. Miss Sugar’s final (public[1]) prompt for the New Year, New You Experiment is the What Have I Learned prompt.

So. What have I learned?

Hrm. Okay, thing one, I’ve basically confirmed that I don’t like doing Special Stuff every day. I feel guilty about that, but there it is. I’m more likely to spark my altars once every ten days and do light offerings (and honey-pot feeding – more on that shortly) that way than I am (currently) to do water offerings on a daily basis. I feel kind of guilty about that. But I also feel like trying to push myself in a direction that is clearly Not Working (presently) is kind of a waste of energy that I could be directing elsewhere. Like working on my “novel”[1] or tweeting about queer and trans health-related stuff or promoting my poetry show or blogging about my Cosmology, whatever[2]. I’m not thrilled about my lack of stick-to-it-ivness. However, since I’m Sticking To a whole freaking heap of (often scary) other stuff – my Wedding Singer business cards came in the mail yesterday, FYI. They are spiffy and I’m pelased with them – I’m at least slightly willing to cut myself some slack here.

On the plus side, I’ve learned that I make really good[3] honey pots. Which is a serious boost. It’s like, hey, guess what: You are actually capable of doing magical work. That functions. As expected. Rock on! 😀

From this point on… I’m not sure where this is going to go. Miss Sugar’s NYNY Experiment will be conituing outside of the blogosphere (alas, as I quite like blogging about this stuff – I’ll probably keep using the tag for things that relate to my own Radical Transformation, even if I can’t blog about actual Deb-provided topics, be warned), so I don’t know what to expect on that front.

I keep feeling like “Must Get Organized” – which is shorthand for “must tidy workspace so that it’s functional and inviting again” and “must establish a routine that is easy to maintain and includes things like vocal warm-ups and yoga” (both of which are tied together, as doing yoga chez moi involves having enough floor-space in the living room to set up the yoga mat) – needs to be my mantra actual task, because, right now, I don’t feel like I’m there (yet).

It’s funny (sort of) because, this time a year ago, I was just starting my Freelance Everything work, and I had far fewer things on my plate. Writing, yes, and VoV, yes, Spring Fling, yes, modeling, yes (though not nearly as much – go me for getting more clients!) and a little bit of crafting (levels actually remain the same on this, much as I keep trying to up them. Blah). I didn’t have my health outreach job, I didn’t have VERSeFest, I didn’t have a new singing business, and I didn’t have multiple blogs to maintain. And, while the combination of those only adds (so far) about an extra 20hrs/month to my schedule… that’s still and extra 20hrs/month that I need to figure out how to adequately and efficiently work into my day-to-day schedule without getting overwhelmed or in over my head.

Anyway. That’s kind of where I’m at. I’m still not totally sure how to use magic to Radically Transform myself. But, hey. At least I know I can use magic at all. 😉

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

1] We’ll see if I actualy write a novel. It might be a novella or a short story, or it might be some weird thing that never goes anywhere. But I seem to have the beginnings of a plot and characters, so go me. YAY!

[2] Miss Sugar, I swear, I don’t have a clue how you do this. How you work a Nannying job AND craft like fuck AND write enough short stories to actually submit to places. In a timely fashion, no less. O.O I am in awe of you, madame. 🙂

[3] Okay, yes, I’ve only made two of them and, yes, both of them have been for me. But they’re both working. I’ve been getting heaps of modeling work (so far – here’s hoping it keeps up) and, like, see above re: having a the beginnings of a plot and characters for an actual NOVEL. Woohoo! 😀

Flowchart of Creating Change

Also, there’s this:

Good ideas, yes? 🙂

Cheers,
Meliad the Birch Maiden

Magical Activism – Advice?

Okay. So, long story short: I’m really distressed by the direction my current government seems to be taking my country, but I don’t know what the fuck to do to stop them. While I’m still doing letter-writing and petition-signing and awareness-raising type activism, it feels somewhat futile given the current balance of power and where the majority-party’s priorities lie.

Consequently, I also find myself turning towards my old Starhawk books and her definition of magic as Changing Consciousness at Will. I don’t know how to cause an egregor (I’m not even totally sure what “egregor” means, honestly) to Stop This, to turn this appalling tide back the way it came and bring about the changes I deeply want. But I find myself turning towards the magic that I know how to work – the stuff that bound up with “women’s work”, with the kitchen and the distaff, and the things I know how to do.

I woke up this morning wondering how I could do a powerful enough banishing spell to get him-and-his-bunch off the hill and well-and-truly gone, while still managing to avoid the blowback that could crop up because of it.
My Ghost suggested that spinning something positive – the mother of all honey-pot spells to empower everyone else and make us stronger, louder, more powerful – instead.

I’ve spent the morning developing a plan BUT I need some help/advice from other spell-workers: How do you rig a spell to get fed with “attention” rather than “light”? I want to do magic-as-guerrila-art-project. Things that can be fed by people looking at them – everything from [noticing the bright colours and shiny bits] all the way to [actively examining the beads, charms, twigs, and such-like that are bound up into the piece(s)] – things that can be fed by the wind playing with them (incorporating bits of metal or wood that make a noise when they get blown together? Bells/chimes?) or things that catch the light, that make humans, crows, the sun, various other jays and corvids, notice them and pay attention.
Can this be done? Is this doable?
Please Advise!

High Stakes Magical Gambling

Asking for Help. That’s the theme of Miss Sugar’s latest NYNY writing prompt.

That’s a funny one for me. My SO is the other half of my D/s dynamic. Her being my help-meet and general-dogs-body is built into our relationship. (We actually spent a chunk of yesterday having a Big Relationship Discussion about that, as it’s our 2-year dynamiversary and all – go us).

But that’s not what I’m going to talk about here.

I’m going to talk about… my realtionship to encouragement, actually. There’s a line in my head where someone going “you can totally do this!” goes from feeling like encouragement to feeling like someone is demanding that I step desperately and radically far outside of my comfortable-and-compentant zone under seriously high-stakes circumstances.

And, at that point, I basically want to curl up in a ball and make All The Things go away.

Which does nothing.

The whole point of this Radical Magical Transformation experiment is to do just that. To fight dirty, as Gordon puts it, and to stop being in denial about how high the stake really are when you’re doing it.

So here’s my confession. Denying how high those stakes are? That’s how I get myself to do any of this stuff. My sweetie and I were talking about Things I Can Do from an arts-and-kink-for-income PoV, and my girl was overflowing with encouragement and suggestions for workshops I could run for youth-and-poetry, erotic poetry and/or prose, 24/7 D/s, sharps play, and all sorts of other things[1]. Which is great, but it’s also… It’s also me going “No, see, if I do any of this stuff when there’s money on the line[2], the (increased) risks invovled literally paralyze me into inaction!”

Which, y’know, totally isn’t her problem to deal with.
I’m aware of that.

Moving along: What does this have to do with Miss Sugar’s injunction to Ask For Help?
It means applying for grants – for my poetry show, but also for me (if I qualify).
It means sucking it up and making an indigogo campaign for my poetry show that would, if successful, let us pay 1/4 of our artists Rate without having to rely on grants (or, if the grants don’t come through at all, it would allow us to pay ALL of our poets a small honourarium – $50/show – and still have a little bit left over to cover off some of our venue fees).
It means getting in touch with the chicky who runs the pansexual play-parties in town and finding out where she host them, so that I can get on with booking a venue for Spring Fling.

But it also means helping myself. By breaking down all those scary-but-probably-doable suggestions into non-threatening bite-sized tasks that I can do until I get to a point where I can try my hand at pitching a workshop idea or similar and actually feel competent about doing so.
Magically speaking, this might include things like creating some kind of a “come to me” perfume oil that has specific components for luck, money, and charisma. Or similar. Or running myself a magical bath involving components for confidence, courage, and empowerment.

So least that’s where I’m at right now.

Onwards! 😀

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

[1] … That I don’t remember because around that point I basically put on my mental headphones and went “LALALALALALALALALALA!” until I could move to different area of the house and get my breath back. Cowardly, I know, but that’s totally what I did.

[2] When I’m renting a venue, making a Lovely Parting Gift, or when my own livelihood and/or the continued financial survival of my poetry show, are going to be effected by whether or not any of these new Things To Try succeed.

Bat(s), Dreams and Candle Magic (initial prep)

I have a tealight holder. It’s one of those black, dollar-store things that show up around Hallowe’en – in this case, shaped like a bat.
Yes, a bat.

Kind of like this, but on a long, narrow pedistal/stick stand instead of two little feet.

I picked it up in my early twenties when I was setting up my first (disasterous) apartment and was very much trying to do Gothic Miss Martha on a budget of $0.00. (There were a lot of fairy-lights and Pre-Raphaelite prints involved as well). I go back and forth as to whether or not I should get rid of it, and it’s landed in my “to the thrift store” bag on more than one occasion, only to be pulled out again for one reason or another.

Most recently (as in: this morning) I rescued it from my latest good-will bag because it occurred to me that, given my nervous interest in trying to get in touch with Big-B Bat (is this a date, or is this Just Coffee?), it might be an appropriate tool for doing so.

What I’ve done:
1) Lit up all my altars + lit candles on my two honey pots. (This is not strictly necessary, but it lets everyone else know I’m thinking of them – and, hey, feeding the honey pots is always a good idea, particularly when the Hustle is on and I’m also trying to write (another) steampunk-erotica story).

2) Cleaned up my bat-shaped tea-light holder.

3) Sprinkled the inside of the tealight cup with coarse salt and set a (very small) bay leaf inside it.

4) Added a tealight and put the whole shebang on my nightstand.

5) Had a quick chat with Bat using the candle-holder’s “face” as a sort of telephone receiver, letting hir know that (a) I’m under the impression that some kind of contact was being made, and (b) if zi’s got something helpful or important to say to me, that zi’s welcome to come have a chat with me in my dreams but that zi’s not to bring anyone else along with hir. (… I’m so trusting…)

6) Lit the tealight.

It’s currently doing its thing in the other room, and we’ll see what my dreams bring me, if anything, over the next little while.

We’ll see what happens.

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

Glamour(y) and Loving Your “Look”

This is not the first time I’ve tried to write this post. It also feels kind of weird to be posting it here since I’m talking about appearances and What They Mean – and that’s more in keeping with the themes I get into on Syrens than it is to Urban Meliad. Still, let’s dive in, shall we?

Miss Sugar has a New Year New You prompt about “Glamour and You” from weeks ago and, every time I try to respond to it, I end up complaining about social expectations of body shape (I have a hips-to-waist-ratio that would make Marilyn blush but which, in the last 15-25 years has basically been on the “non-existent” list – clothes are built for nubile, boyish bodies or they’re built for post-babies brick-shaped bodies, and either way, my bone-structure is read as having disappeared with the 1950s) and how hard it is to find affordable shoes when you are (a) broke, and (b) very tall – in a “closer to 6’6″ than 5’11” by a considerable margin” kind of way. Or else I end up spending three hours drooling over boots and shoes and even socks that I can’t afford and wish that I could.

The closest thing I’ve written to adressing Glamour(y) is my NYNY Prompt Response to Things I Hate Doing, where I talked about taking the time to do makeup, shave my legs, and wear perfume (Hi, I’m Femme. Nice to meet you) in order to make myself feel more powerful and more myself and so on.
And that stuff does work. I’ve been doing it of late in an effort to rock my awesome in a way that is visible to the unknowing eye.

But trying to write a post about it – at least trying to write a post about it here rather than on my more personal, deliberately-limitted-readership, blog – always leaves me feeling like I’m being a Bad Earth Mama. Like caring about Appearances and, more to the point, wanting to present a certain Look to the world[1] means I’m shallow and materialistic and bourgoise and self-absorbed – even when, as a totally-freelance Everything-er (model, singer, poet, pornographer, tarot-reader, crafter, event-planner, blogger, outreach-worker), I need to project “cool-and-collected” and “cool-as-in-awesome”, “sexy and mysterious” and “approachable and friendly”, ” “fey, bohemian artist” and “down-to-earth, competent” “non-threatening and accomodating” and “in-charge and calling all the shots”; Even when, in some of those situations, it’s actually part of my job-description to care about that stuff.

So. Let’s take a different tactic.

What is Glamour(y)?
Glamoury is the art and craft of making people see you the way you want them to see you. And I find that most people don’t know how to do that. Like what I was talking about, above, we get tangled up in the “personality trates” we associate with certain Looks[2] – including the looks we already present[3] – and the advice offered in magazines (like, haha, Glamour) are more about how to present the look Other People (“men”, “women”, various cosmetics companies, Sean John, etc) want you to look like, than getting said Other People to see you the way you want to be seen.
Meaning that there isn’t necessarily a lot of “help” out there if you don’t already know (a) how you want people to see you, (b) how that matches up with the look you’re actually presenting[4], and – most importantly – (c) how to get there from where you’re at.

Miss Sugar asks us “In [your] New World Order, how will you LOOK like your Best Self?”
I remember trying to figure that one out around this time of year in 2009 – when I’d been out of Retail for a year, and was reading my poetry (at open mics) around town, and was trying to figure out what My Style was when I wasn’t at my temp job.
At the time, “neo-burlesque librarian dominatrix with a side-order of all-natural fibres” was probably my best guess – and, by and large, it still is – for where to aim so that my work-a-day clothes were/are (a) me, (b) comfortable, and (c) aesthetically pleasing.
More to the point, aiming for this lets me take my “dressing like myself” clothes into an office-type environment and “look professional” while hinting strongly at my actual reality.

But.

(You knew that was coming, didn’t you?)

But: Since I am trying to distance myself from “office environment” type work (not that I won’t take it if I need it, but a big part of the point of this Experiment, for me, is to NOT need it), I would like to be pulling my day-to-day (non-bathrobe-based) Look somewhat further into the Dita Von Teese meets leather femme meets Emilie Autumn spectrum.
And, granted, right now I feel awkward just wearing fishnets on an ordinary day. So I have a ways to go in this vein – including learning how to do my own hair in easy-but-elaborate-looking ways, finding some proabably-pinup-inspired lingerie that fits and flatters my figure, and figuring out how to add Glitter Goth to my appearance without looking like a refugee from my own early twenties – but that’s kind of where I’m aiming.

Anyway. Moving right along.

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

[1] And wanting to drop close to a grand on the shoes, boots, and vintage-pin-up-inspired cotton dresses – not to mention perfume and potentially jewelry – that would get me to a point where presenting that look is easy – as easy as grabbing something clean out of the closet and throwing on my shoes before I leave the house.

[2] think of the Geek who “doesn’t care about clothes” because caring about clothes is for herd-following trendies (or whatever), but who actually cares about clothes a lot – and, as such, makes a point of wearing jeans, sneakers, and the t-shirts that announce his (or her) fanish aliegences, gaming preferences, and con history.

[3] I got a haircut in 2007, after not having cut my hair in more than 10 years. Every time I looked in the mirror, I’d see my actually-quite-awesome super-long-layers haircut and go “I have ‘Beyonce Hair‘. Boo.” because I felt like the look I was presenting had gone from “Obviously Pagan Countercultural Chick, Badly Disguised in Corporate Drag” (my hair had been below my waist, pre-cut) to “Gangly Chick in Ill-Fitting Suit, Trying to Redeem Bad Look with Trendy Hair”. Or similar.

[4] The number of pictures of me in high school where I was trying to look like this but fell so short of the mark that this cartoon looks considerably better and more put-together than I did… Oh, dear…

Shoulder to the Grindstone [New Year, New You]

So, further to Miss Sugar’s latest prompt, I finally got off my ass (or onto it, as the case may be) and designed some freaking business cards. I decided to take my friend’s recommendation and go with vistaprint, as they’ll do 250 cards for you for free in exchange for logo space on the back of the card. And free is a lot less expensive (and less work) than DIY on my home printer.
I’m pleased with the design I went with, and I’ve made a point of mentioning “handfasting” and “commitment ceremony” on them. I’ve also started yet another blog (since wordpress is free, I like to write, and Web Presence Is Important).

My business cards should arrive in two weeks. More than enough time to have them set out at the craft-and-business fair I’ll be working in mid-March.

Also on the singing front: I went to city hall yesterday, where they have an interactive sound-sculpture installation. The doors to the gallery were locked, so I stood outside and sang through the crack in the doors. I made the sculpture dance (to my tune, so to speak), and gathered quite the little crowd (it was opening day of Winterlude here – you should have seen everybody with their embroidered mittens and fur hats and general winter-wear finery) in the process.
Go me. 🙂

Anyway. It’s after 11pm, so I’m going to head to bed. Tomorrow is soap-making, singing, and working on what might be the beginnings of a new story.

TTFN,
Meliad the birch Maiden.

Winter Pork Stew (om nom nom)

So a few days ago, I cooked a pork shoulder roast in the slow-cooker. It was thorougly tasty, but – as is frequently the case – it was also very large. Which means we have a lot left over.
This is fine, and even good. Left-over veggies, I’m terrible with (but am getting a better feel for how little to cook in order to feed the two of us on a given evening), but left-over animal is great.

So, when Idly wondering what on earth to do fo dinner this evening, I looked in the fridge to see what I had. And, oh yeah, I’ve got several pounds of already-cooked shoulder roast available.

So. I typically think “beef” or “beans”, and sometimes “lamb”, when I think of stew. But I wanted something simple and hearty and very, very Comfort Food since both my Ghost and I are feeling a tad under the weather. Something hot that wouldn’t result in too many dishes. And I had (and still have) roast pork available. So. I looked to the internet (shocking, I know) to see what typically gets thrown into a pork stew. The ketchup and the allspice in the below recipe are courtesy of a cream-based thai pork-and-parsnip dish, but the rest of it was born from my usual “what have I got in the fridge” method of ingredient-sellection.

~*~

Pork Stew

In a large pot, over medium heat, combine:
1-2 tbsp butter (melted)
½ C apple juice
2 C cubed left-over (roast) pork
1 small onion, diced
1 small white turnip, peeled and diced
1 parsnip, peeled and diced
1 small potato, (peeled and) diced
3 dried figs, hard stem removed , cut into eighths (roughly – they should all be in the area of ¼”)[1]
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
½ tbsp each: ketchup, grainy mustard, wheat flour (scatter the flour very lightly over everything, be careful not to let it clump or it will be gross)
½ tsp each: rosemary, allspice, black pepper

Sautee until onions are translucent, then add:
1 C apple juice
1 ½ C vegetable stock (I use the cubes, but do what you will)

Bring to a boil, making sure everything mixes well. Then cover and reduce heat. Allow to cook, simmering, for ~2 hours. Serve and enjoy.

~*~

I might have thrown diced fresh apple (or dried apple, or dried peach) into this instead of the dried figs. I could use white wine or sherry in place of some or all of the apple juice. Mushrooms would make a tasty addition, as would cubed or purreed winter squash, or a couple of cubes of frozen spinach (tossed in part-way through). If I wanted this to be gluten-free, I could use corn-starch or potato-starch in lieu of the flour. Switching out the pork & butter and using (well-rinsed) tinned romano beans and some sesame oil would make it vegan without much difficulty. It would probably lend itself well to left-over turkey meat, as well.

So there you go. I’m currently considering making a batch of savoury tea biscuits or similar to go with it. Not sure what to do for dessert, though. Probably custard. It’s becoming something of a fall-back. 😉

On an unrelated side note: Here. Have a link for how to unravel a sweater in order to re-use the yarn.

TTFN,
Meliad the Birch Maiden.

[1] Not local, I know. Not by a long shot. Though I know you can do black mission figs in a pot. I’m looking forward to having the space (indoors and out) to have my own fig tree in future BUT for now I break my own rules[2] and use the stuff that’s imported from Turkey.

[2] Sort of. Non-perishables are technically okay.