A little haven of peace and calm

May 25, 2019November 5, 2025 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)23 Comments

In the depths of winter, when dusk arrives just after 3pm, my favourite place to sit and knit is snuggled up by the fire. But once the days start to lengthen and warm I’m itching to get outside and sit in the shade of the tree, with the touch of a warm breeze on my skin and the spring song of small birds in the tree above. The first outdoor knitting session of the season is always to be savoured and I am enjoying mine today.

It’s been a bit of a tough week here. As you may know if you’ve visited me here before, my son Toby is severely autistic, non-verbal and has extreme behavioural and learning difficulties. Any change to established routines can cause him (and therefore us) a great deal of distress and due to factors outside of my control this has been a week where routines have been firmly out of the window. Today he has gone for a respite short break and so I am sitting here quietly re-charging my batteries with some gentle sock knitting and lots of tea in my beautiful new mug bought from the very talented Makiko Hastings. Such small things bring great pleasure here and by the time he comes home later today I will be feeling calm and refreshed and ready for the challenges of the school half term break next week.

I am deeply grateful that Toby currently has somewhere to go for occasional short break respite that is safe and caring. Though sadly only until he turns 18 in October, as after that he will be under adult services, and the thought of what may be available to him then is quite frankly terrifying. Here in the UK this week the current affairs programme Panorama has exposed abuse and violence at yet another facility ‘caring’ for autistic people. If you have a moment and feel that vulnerable individuals should be safeguarded from such torturous abuse, please could you sign the National Autistic Society change.org petition ?

Thinking about what the future holds for Toby and other young adults like him is frightening, and we will do absolutely everything in our power to keep caring for him here at home for as long as we are physically able to. But for today I am choosing not to think about that. Today, I am here in this moment with my tea and knitting and a little cheescakey treat 🙂 I hope your day is full of peace and pleasure and that those you love are safe and happy x

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Sock pattern: Wildflowers and honeycomb sock by This Handmade Life, details of the yarn and needles I’m using are here.

my foxy friend

May 10, 2019November 5, 2025 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)18 Comments

Earlier in the year I posted a picture of the fox peeking through our garden fence and she’s been a fairly regular garden visitor ever since. When I first got a good look at her she seemed quite sleek and almost plump but more recently has seemed thinner, and thinking perhaps that food might be a bit scarce I’ve been offering her a meal whenever she turns up – she seems particularly fond of leerdammer cheese 🙂

She mostly visits after dark, but for the last few weeks she has been arriving earlier in the evening and sometimes in the early morning too (much to the disgust of the chickens). When she arrives in the garden I open the back door and throw a little food then stand very still and as a result she has come to tolerate me being there, only a few feet away – though always with a watchful and suspicious eye on me as she eats and tensed like a coiled spring ready to run if I make any sudden moves. I’ve no wish to tame or inhibit that wild instinct, it is a well honed survival mechanism and she needs it, but I will offer a small meal now and then to share the privilege of her company.

This morning she visited early and was content for me to take some pictures and while editing them on the computer just now I had a light-bulb moment. Can you see what was spotted in the last blurry picture there? The outline of swollen teats on her belly is a giveaway sign that she’s was fatter and then thinner because she’s just had a litter of cubs!

I’m under no illusion though about why she visits – she’s very clearly focused on the plump and juicy feathered meals strutting up and down my chicken run. But if she’s thrown a little food she graciously leaves them alone for the rest of the day and the chickens remain safe, though unsettled. They only get to forage under supervision now and the rest of the time are safely enclosed in the brilliant chicken run that H built – still predator proof after 10 years. There are definite signs though that the chickens are not happy about the interloper – I’d call this a protest wouldn’t you? …

We also have a lot of small garden birds visiting our little patch at the moment and on occasion larger ones too – I’ve had the pleasure of seeing this heron ungainly balanced on the roof opposite – I think one of my neighbours has a pond that he’s eyeing up. It is such a privilege to have wild creatures as a regular garden visitors and I’m hoping that in a month or so that the fox might bring her little ones along to frolic on the grass – I’ll try and have my camera ready if she does 🙂

Well, I have had a nature filled week and am off to fill my weekend with knitting. Hope you have something nice in store for your weekend x

countryside · in the woods

A time of greening

May 7, 2019November 5, 2025 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)23 Comments

It’s amazing how quickly the countryside changes as Spring takes hold. A slight rise in temperature, a sprinkling of spring rain and suddenly there are bright green leaves everywhere. It is a time of blossoming too – Spring brings many beautiful floral colours but my favourites are the frothy white blossoms that so many plants both big and small have at this time of year; hawthorn (May blossom), horse chestnut, wild cherry, apples and pears, white nettle, cow parsley, daisies and ramsons all are looking their beautiful best right now.

I headed to Hobby horse wood near Hertford Heath in search of woodland anemones, but was too late to see them at their best – I shall have to visit earlier next year. But at the orchard nature reserve in nearby Tewin the woods were carpeted with wild garlic and the fruit trees were in full blossom and buzzing with bees and trilling with bird song – I managed to get a picture of the elusive tree-creeper, though his head is out of focus because he never seems to keep still as he spirals up trunks in search of small insects.

Spring is in full glory out there and as I’ve been wandering and enjoying the white blossoms on my walks, I’ve been hearing the words of this poem and appreciating its sentiment,

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough,

And stands about the woodland ride

Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,

Twenty will not come again,

And take from seventy springs a score,

It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom

Fifty springs are little room,

About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.