Advent#19

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home Towns

It’s serendipity again that leads me from the surprise experience of Dragon dancing kites in Plymouth yesterday to home via another tradition that also has its roots very firmly in Chinese Culture.
https://theoldmortuary.design/2019/12/17/advent18/

It’s a busy time in Christian churches in December. School Carol services fill the mid-week evenings. theoldmortuary overlooks a church. Last night’s school Carol Service had a lantern lit path leading to the church.

Lanterns of the paper sort have had a rise in popularity in Europe over the last fifty years. The type that are lit with a night light and float away like a balloon had a rise in popularity and then a meteoric fall when the effects of their ultimate descent was highlighted by a series of accidents caused to property, livestock and the emerging awareness of the environmental impact.

Lanterns as part of celebrations started in China 2000 years ago, the earliest lanterns held captured Fire flies. The lantern habit soon spread to South East Asia where they continue to be popular throughout the year rather than the more European habit of winter time lantern activity.

Korea

Hong Kong

Vietnam

Home.

Advent#18

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home Towns, Serendipity

The advent series of blogs started as a way to make a daily step towards the festive season. It could equally be called the Festival of Light. It is a way of marking the days towards the shortest day, the Winter Solstice and then on to Christmas Eve and Yuletide. For ease I started on 1st December, the day when chocolate advent calendars start and for completion it will continue until 2nd January the end of Yuletide 2020. Nothing is planned, this is after all a blog of serendipity and chance. For busy or truly uninspired days I do have some nuggets of ideas tucked away.

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Firestone Bay, Plymouth.
Today was another where the light element of Advent was provided by beautiful midday weather. It also turned out to be truly serendipitous giving me a quite different story to the one I thought I would write. That story has joined the nuggets for a later day.

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The tidal sea water swimming pool at Firestone Bay.

Firestone Bay is my favourite winter walk with dogs. It is entirely possible to walk for several miles, avoiding mud but still allowing them the freedom of running off the lead on the small beaches or in the non traffic areas of the Royal William Yard. Winter gives ever changing conditions and these two pictures of the tidal swimming pool were taken ten minutes apart.

Tidal pool at Firestone Bay.

Our turning point today was the last accessible beach walking to the east. Since I was last here someone.has given the beach a graffiti sign and named it Tranquility Bay. I have no idea if this is official but it is the perfect name for this lovely place of quietude.

Tranquility Bay.

We retraced our steps but as we approached the car park red fabric blowing in the wind caught my eye.

On turning the slight corner I saw the unexpected sight of two men flying Chinese Dragon streamers, accompanied by familiar Chinese classical music.

It takes immense strength to get these flying so extravagantly.

Three styles of dragon took to the sky overlooking Drake’s Island.

Adding to the atmosphere was a gently drifting smoke haze.

Not what I expected to write today but very definitely serendipitous.

Advent#17

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home Towns2 Comments

This week the Festival of Light has been supplied by the sun in the early morning. Rust is one of my favourite textures, coupled with winter sun the effect is dramatic.

These photographs were taken at Queen Anne’s Battery in Plymouth. They are all bits of fishing gear that were being stored on the harbourside.

The manhole covers were also getting in on the act.

Advent#16

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Advent, Food ( but this is not a food blog)

Christmas comestibles.

Today the long walk in the sunshine took us back to the location of Advent #1
https://theoldmortuary.design/2019/12/01/advent-1/

Our visit to Jacka today was enhanced by festive baking. We weren’t exactly early birds, but were lucky enough to get there in time to get the last available slice of Stolen and one of their lusciously deep mince pies. Coffee drinking at Jacka this morning was hugely sociable . The coffee hounds Hugo and Lola were treated to snippets of delicious bacon from a generous benefactor while everyone at the various tables were talking to one another.

As this is a second Advent visit to Jacka I thought I would share some of the bakeries history . Gleaned from a 1985 published article displayed on the café wall .

Dated currently back to 1597, Jacka is the oldest working Bakery in Britain. It is said that it supplied Ships Biscuits to the Mayflower in 1620. Ships biscuits from this bakery were still famous worldwide well into the twentieth century.

Todays festive bakes were tastier than any Ships biscuit. Time to roll out the the word ‘ moist’ . The festive season is known for its traditional foods. In Britain moistness is demanded of Christmas cakes and Turkey. Today we added a third moist festive eating experience.

Bakery made Stollen , as far removed from the supermarket stuff as it is possible to be. A generous core of deep yellow marzipan surrounded by jewel fruited,doughy loveliness , gently dusted with icing sugar. The mince pie, no less lovely, had a deep, golden pastry case filled with dried fruits, quenched to plumpness and topped with a pastry star.

The coffee, as is usual at Jacka was made with great beans by a skillful barrista.

This may not be our last Advent visit.

Advent#15

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Advent, Garden Design, Serendipity

Foraging.
Last year I was gifted a beautiful Christmas wreath. It lasted more than a month and when I came to throw it away I noticed it was formed on a very substantial frame. The frame went into the garden shed along with all the other really useful things we archive for an undisclosed moment in the future. Today, our morning dog walk was also a foraging trip for winter greenery. We didn’t particularly plan to break any rules or trespass but secateurs on a dog walk do give a scintilla of being up to no good. It’s a good thing we hadn’t planned anything bad as we met some friends, Mike and Shirley, as we set off. They were dressed as proper walkers, it would never do to implicate bona fide walkers in sculdugery.

The nature reserve where we walk is beautiful, so we just talked and walked for a while.

Soon enough though, a lovely bag of greenery had been harvested and as luck would have it, on our return journey, we also found some thrown away bits and pieces from old flower arrangements that had become virtually dried. It was all gathered together in the kitchen and something festive was created, fueled by tea, naturally.

I’m not sure how much this resembles a traditional Christmas wreath but it cost nothing and will brighten up our home for the last seven days until the Winter Solstice.

Advent#12

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Advent, Art for sale

Baubles and Fish. Today was all about catching up with bauble chores, after yesterday’s bauble debacle. There was also a painting commission to be completed .

The commission has to be based on fish, painted, printed and divided into three separate canvases that will look abstract. I’m struggling a bit .

Here’s the first image.

Then I desaturated it but picked out the eye.

Finally I selected portions for abstraction.

I’m not entirely sure where I’m going with this, but I’ve got another week to work it out.

Advent#11

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Interior DesignLeave a comment

Today has mostly been about untangling strings of baubles, the strings of baubles hang in our windows. Usually they hang on fishing thread but today’s untangling was monumentally unsuccessful. After a couple of hours of success, followed by abject failure and swearing the new regime is to have them hanging on ribbon . Only one window achieved instead of 5 .

The shadows are also quite interesting.

Advent#10

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity

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December night and the Cornish year-round bauble.

Eden project rose out of Bodelva Quarry , near St Austell in Cornwall, around the Millenium. A fantasmical dream of one man, Tim Smit, brought to reality by architect Nicholas Grimshaw, structural engineer Antony Hunt and constructors McAlpine.

https://www.edenproject.com/

It opened to the public in March 2001, 18 years on it is settled into the Cornish landscape and psyche. As with any big new development there have been rubs and chafes but plenty of good news too. Eden has been showing significant profits since 2012.

The Eden effect on Cornwall has been immense, by 2009 it had brought £805m into the local economy.

With a ‘locals’ pass Eden has become a year round destination for theoldmortuary. We can avoid the busy tourist-heavy days and use the outdoor spaces for dog walks and gardening inspiration. At Christmas time we use the shops to buy environmentally friendly gifts that are often locally produced. Walking the cool biomes during the late-opening evenings is a wonder of plant architecture and illumination. As ever with an oldmortuary outing there is always coffee and cake, and on this occasion a kangaroo too.