really........that was it.

Well that was summer . all done now. today it is drizzling and building up to full blown rain. i have a day off and I am just on my way out to find atmospheric things to photograph. That will not be very hard me thinks. Lee asks what I am doing?
well going to Ilkley to buy halloween fabric and when we return sort out all the Halloween dolls and decorations......er silly
"oh silly me..." stated Lee "or course I should have known....er hang on...We already have loads of stuff. We do not need te spend on it!"

I do indead have loads of stuff. So Halloween here we come.

August bank holiday 2017...then suddenly it is Monday!

Saturday 26th August 2017. August bank holiday is in full swing. People everywhere. The last bash at summer before real life sets back in for the autumn. Leeds festival this week end. like I say people everywhere! buying enough food for armageddon and the excuse to be overbearingly rude, arrogant and drunk.

Very excitable . Kids screaming, coaches full of tourists, fishermen. radios, yelling, drinking, neighbours all out in the gardens drinking and yelling over the barbeque and load music. The last bash of summer.

Shorts tattoos and orange flesh all out to greet the sun. Everyone seems to have tattooed arms and legs.....every where I look there are tattoos.....

 Sunday 27/8/2017. up and out to photograph the sun rise...The old guy who sits by the boat club was already out as were the fishermen and dog walkers. It is early yet...but coach loads are expected.

 The ice cream van was setting up as I headed home. I am at work....I expect the customers will be excitable and in a rush as they were yesterday......where the hell have they got to go that needs to be in such a stressed rush!?

No Idea!. But I can tell you this...all my years in retail I have never been yelled at by five people all at once before.
Still it will be over soon. Looks good though does it not!? people will be along to ruin it all sadly.

Soon it will be September and all the ratty musical tree huggers will have gone back to their teaching posts and stop patronising us locals, and the screaming kids will be back at school giving some one else a head ache with their melt downs. yep life will return to beauty and calm come the Autumn, which is just a matter of hours away now.
The sun is actually out, though I am confident that it will rain....as it is after all August bank holiday the last ditch chance to be a "cool " and show the world the foreign tan and pretend this is how life really is..... for another few hours. then suddenly it is all over. Summer is gone. work has to be faced and Christmas decorations go up in retail!

Monday 28/8/2017.

Just adding these Monday bank holiday pictures......

 i was out just after 5am. The same Pyjamas and flip flops as usual and a different Bratz doll. The fishermen were all still in their igloo tents and I only saw one runner with her dog.

 The dog was far more interested in trying to sniff at the funny old lady holding a Bratz doll than he was on the run.....a grey hound. I expect when he got going he really gave her a run for her money.

 Monday bank holiday of the August ending of Summer. very very different light to yesterday...and still very quiet. It is early yet.....

 This is one of the Bratz dolls I was given for my birthday. I bought them for myself from a local charity shop!

 The sun was not yet up.....the ducks and swans were.

 I contemplated going as far as the old grave yard as I would not get to go today with Monza dog as I have to work...Monday is now my day. So bank holiday or not I work!

 I headed home as it was still quiet and dark. I thought I will go home before every one starts to arrive.

 Lee and Monza were still asleep. I made tea........

Then some more tea.

I then started to relook at some reaserch I started about five years ago...maybe even longer i can not remember.....I keep coming across other "clues" when looking at other things and am drawn back to it. It is a family that emigrated to America in 1600s. They became Quakers and left for the new world. Parts of my family were Quaker too, even in the same meeting houses but at a later time in history. There is Bland's Cliffe in Scarborough which was named after a Quaker merchant who built the road down to the beach, for horses to transport goods. The same family also built the cliffe lift just by there. It is now an art gallery completely covered in murals by local artists. I was looking at Quakers history in Scarborough and there again was the family who emigrated to America.....it seems from meeting notes at the time that this family was chosen to go to America by a decision from the whole group. I had wondered how they managed to afford this, and now I see how it came about. I know this family were destitute as they  had been evicted from the castle they lived in by Scarborough. The lady and her daughter had been left homeless and destitute after the death of her husband of TB. From the notes of meeting I can gleen that they were looked after by the Quakers and a marriage was arranged for the lady. I have yet to find where they lived before the Emigration...as The Quaker  lady married was a chemist......I still wonder weather he helped look after the dying man and was perhaps a friend who was entrusted to look after his wife after his death. He died of TB. this takes time...so he had time to make plans. Just me and my thoughts this morning.
So off to meet the public on this Monday bank holiday.

Chippy....or Chip-in-Dale.

 The Otley visit this week . We went somewhere different this week. We did all the junky shops including one this week that we do not usually visit....it was too junky and piled high and not too cheap either. The owner has had a rethink and it is now gorgeous. I did not find anything this week but I am confident that I will. There were some wax head dolls...the creapy kind that I do not buy....even so I was tempted. If they are there next visit......te he. Then over to the old Grammar school building.

 Thomas Chippendale was born in Otley.in 1718. Did you know that? well I did and have photographed this statue before......so here he is from my new camera . standing outside his old school.
There is a plaque outside which reads Thomas Chippendale world famous cabinet maker born Otley 1718. Which just about sums it up. His old school is now a posh kind of wine bar.

 A very lovely spot for one too. I had a quick look at the menu......Stew and oyster it is called and this is the food they serve too. It looks totally fabulous. I was very very very tempted to stop for a glass of wine and lunch. I do not drink....tell you I very nearly did start again. who needs to be healthy and live a long life anyway!....I was good. though I have the option still!!!!  Back in the old days when I had money and my health this would have been a delicious hang out for lunch...and probably dinner some weeks  with a taxi home.too. times have changed alot since then. still...I can look. This building was an art gallery up until very recently and we went inside a few times. A lot of very interesting local artists. The interior as been kept as a kind of art gallery with spiral staircase in the centre. Have I sold it to you yet?

any way...back to Thomas Chippendale.  Just about every stately home and big house in Yorkshire that I have visited has a Chippendale piece of furniture...if not more. Bolling Hall my favourite has one in the great hall by the stained glass. 

There was a fish and chip shop in Otley called The Chip-in Dale, it sadly closed but the name is still on the back door. Thomas Chippendale learned his trade from his father as did his father before him. Thomas moved to London and became famous. His furniture is worth a fortune now.....his son took over from him when he retired....

He was the first to come up with a catalogue to order from and offered a complete interior design service. He was from Otley and he stands just by my favourite building.

 This is the Black horse. A victorian favourite building. This is a hotel stuffed with original features.....

 The white house on the Otley Chevin.....

and old square that houses all the antique shops (not the junk shops! these are very different) and cafes....

So day off this week is over. We went and bought some new dog bowls,and some pillows today. Lee is recovering. Even the sugestion of spending money sends him into a spin so it is just as well I am off for an evening shift now.

On the rocks

Armscliffe crag. North Rigton. between Leeds and Harrogate in North Yorkshire. It is a Millstone grit outcrop of rocks in the middle of no where . Very popular with rock climbers and campers.

So we walked Monza dog first in the old grave yard, as I knew that there would very likely be either sheep or people at Almscliffe and Monza does not respond well to either.
So we all set off in The Fonz car and headed out through Huby, in the mist and muggy day. The views were slightly obscured by mist...but good anyway.
I decided "hang it" and pox to the weather. It would inevitably rain at some stage so I wore flip flops and my white skirts.....and yes I did climb up to these rocks in flip flops. When I was a kid it would have been bare feet...so I have improved a little with age.

 As it rained most of the night I was careful of muddy puddles. I also managed not to fall into the cow pats in the field up to the rocks.
Monza and Lee stayed in the car. I could hear people up by the rocks as soon as I got out of the car, so I went up to the path on my own with just a camera.
I climbed all the way and at the top I could see two teenagers camping. How did I know they were teenagers? well they were climbing the rocks in socks. No trainers.....just socks. And I do mean just socks.

 So I passed them. " hello" I said and kept walking around the rocks. I passed them on the way back as well, but kept quiet the second time.
IT was just as well Monza was in the car, I do not even want to think about what would have happened had he encountered the two in socks.....

So I took loads of pictures of the rocks and the views even though it was misty   and the sky really did have a pink tinge.....

 

 

 Once back down as far as the Fonz car, an estate car parked behind us stuffed with two more guys with camping gear....and as we set off on the route to Otley there was a group of old people with rambling sticks and backpacks heading to the rocks as well.

 So I was just in time.

We got to Otley just in time for lunch. We went to all the junk shops and then bought sausage rolls to eat in the market square.

    I had a good find in the 20p shop of a Disney animator doll. Her hair is in a very bad way....I have just been trying to sort it out with some fabric conditioner .

I also bought...this is a new thing.....a slow cooker.....and a dog brush. I bought both these things new. I know this is very unusual, but it had to be.

 It did not start raining until we put the washing out at home.
We quickly bought dinner and some chocolate eclairs and headed home up the Chevin eating the Chocolate eclairs.

I looked out .And there it all was.

 I looked out and there it all was. light reflected through the windows and onto the bedroom walls. I got dressed ....after the fashion of funny old lady in a hurry....and went straight to the sun.

 A lot of people had beaten me to it....

. I had to dress quickly and run before it all faded.It was one of those mornings when the colour poured through the windows and reflected on the bed room walls if I was still at home when this happens I am late..

 I was late. I nearly missed the whole show. The swans ducks and moor hens were up and ready. The old guy who sits by the model boat club house was in place having walked the Tarn circuit.

 The swans had launched.....dog walkers were about, and joggers. I really was late!The fishermen were packing up. Monday morning! time to go. The weekend fishing over for another week.

 Planes taking off and people everywhere. I took some quickies and then headed home .

 I have hours today and am expected at 9am. so I need some kitkat yogurt and a banana for breakfast,,,,

Once home I had a very quick tidy...it still looked like an old curiosity shop with spiders and dolls everywhere...but I put all the bills in the bin. much better.

made lots of tea and proceeded with my hair.
Now...the hair! this has gone wild..... platinum wild bush it is. ....mornings are never good for hair. this morning it is doing the usual of sticking up at a right angle. teamed with pyjamas and flip flops .
the batty old bag look. do you think it could reach the cover of vogue!?? no? Perhaps if I sort the hair out maybe......
So I am working today and then two days off. I am now getting over the disappointment of my birthday.....and going all the places with my new camera that I hoped to do last month.  What I wanted to do was go to Whitby and have a fish and chip lunch followed by a good root around over the bridge then to the Abbey ruins. What I got was a walk around Yeadon Tarn and an ice cream.....And I had already been around the Tarn that day anyway.
What about Harrogate on my day off. I have not been there for a bit..........and there are Atkinson Grimshaw paintings of Yorkshire in the art gallery which is free........

Atkinson Grimshaw. Painter of moonlight.

Whitby. I do not think I will get there this week either.