My dream Glastonbury line-up ✨

So I've never been to Glastonbury, let's just get that out of the way. But I do like watching live shows from the comfort of my own home. I used to get so into Glastonbury aged 16/17/18 and  I'd go through the line-up and write a list of all the performances I wanted to watch on iplayer and go through and tick them all off. Wild times. Ed and I were watching a bit of the virtual Glastonbury 2020 on tv last night and I got a bit hyped watching Florence and The Machine throwbacks and the idea for this blog post was born. Just a bit of fun looking at some of my favourite Glasto performances. Grab a beverage and get ready to enjoy some sweet tunes, I'll make a playlist of all the videos and leave it at the end of the post 😌

So to kick things off we've got to have Florence and The Machine there, ya know, because they're my favourite band and all that. This performance is from when they headlined the festival in 2015, fun fact: Florence broke her foot during the set and carried on like a trooper. My festival definitely needs that barefoot, glittery power suit, gazelle energy.

Next up we've got some Imogen Heap! This video is from 2010, at the tender age of 12 I was not aware of Imogen's existence but have since become a big fan. There's something magical about this song live (there's a version on youtube from the Royal Albert Hall as well and it is just *chef's kiss* excellent)...and who could resist the keytar and sunglasses combo at the end?

Every festival deserves some Wolf Alice I think. Giant Peach was the first song of theirs I ever heard back in probably 2014, it's so epic. I was studying Angela Carter's short stories in English Lit and one of them is called Wolf Alice so this band caught my eye in my youtube recommendations. Thanks algorithm (for once)! Anyway this performance is from 2015.

Now here's one that was definitely before my time, I wasn't actually born in 1994 so definitely wasn't watching this one on iplayer. But we love some vintage Björk! Human Behaviour was also the first song I ever heard by her so it holds a special place in my heart. There are some iconic and bouncy dance moves in this performance, if you can see past the 240p video quality lol. Enjoy!

Warning: flashing images! Up next we have Grimes with a chaotic n energetic performance from 2016. Oblivion is a classic (and also the only high quality vid I could find lol) but I remember Venus Fly being super cool live as well. I love Grimes, that's all.

My festival is looking a little female-heavy so we'd better introduce some male vocals. (I mainly listen to female musicians, not a conscious decision it just happened lol. Soz men.) So next we've got some alt-J, love these lads. For some reason hardly any of their Glastonbury videos exist on youtube so this one from 2013 will have to do, I remember loving their 2015 set though if you happen to stumble across it anywhere! 

Time for Of Monsters and Men, this 2013 performance has some joyful, summer vibes which will be perfect for my personal Glastonbury. (I'm excited just imagining it, hit me up if you want to come.) They did an amazing set in 2016 but it's not on youtube, you can find a highlights clip on iplayer tho! 

Here's another flipping great band, Haim!!! This video is from 2017 and I love the song Right Now. What gets me so much is the drumming sesh, it's GOLD, definitely want some of that at my festival. I first discovered Haim in 2012 when we saw them supporting Florence and The Machine, literally had no idea who they were but was very pleasantly surprised! Now they are big!!! Buzzing to listen to their new album which came out yesterday I think.

Up next in our dream lineup is Sigur Rós. This video is from 2016, Glósoli is probably my favourite song of theirs (very cool music vid I recommend you go find!) and I'd love to experience it live. My festival definitely needs some of that Icelandic magic.

Finally, PJ Harvey. Ok first up, I LOVE her outfit, secondly, The Words That Maketh Murder is one of the best PJ songs in my opinion. Very boppy. This is from 2016 too (what a great year that was??!) which simultaneously was the year I wanted to go see her at the Eden Sessions but was too scared to go by myself sad times.

Ok so instead of going on all day I'm going to leave the rest of my fave Glasto performances in a playlist for you to peruse at your leisure...some good stuff from FKA Twigs, ELO, and Sigrid + lots more! I might keep adding as I think of them. Hope you enjoy some bangers from back when we could get really close to other people in a big crowd and dance together. Hope you enjoy, pls let me know who you'd invite to your dream Glastonbury!💃✨✨✨

Lockdown week 13 - the one with all the fish 🐟

Days 86-92 (17th-23rd June)

This week has gone by extremely fast and I can't even think what I've done to make it pass so quickly. Good job I can look back through my journal and photos to remember. All I know is that we had some heavy rain earlier in the week and for a moment it felt almost wintery, but we have now returned to hot and sunny weather 🌞 It looks like the end of the lockdown blogs is somewhere in the not too distant future after Boris's big announcement yesterday...but the good news is that after months of waiting we can now start to plan our wedding again! 

I have been baking more this week, firstly I made some cow coat cupcakes (inside they have blobs of chocolate and vanilla sponge like a spotty cow 🐄 but I forgot to photograph that bit!). I also made another loaf of sourdough, and a rhubarb cake! I've never had rhubarb in a cake before but I had some to use up and I wanted to make something other than crumble again. It's very yummy!

Why do these look like a 7 year old made them for the school cake sale lol.

I spent ages trying to stake up my syngonium which has gone crazy and massive. I thought it would help to make it grow upwards but I didn't have a moss pole so attempted to make one out of bamboo and string. It looks quite ugly but we'll see how it goes.

Dad went fishing again this week and we had some mackerel for a lil Father's Day lunch with 3/4 of the siblings. You can't get much fresher than that, as my dad says: "these were swimming around this morning!". Mackerel have really pretty blue patterns on their backs.

I was tidying the bookshelf this week and found Of Mice and Men, I'd never read it before so decided to see what I'd been missing. After that I started rereading The Great Gatsby which I studied for A Levels. I've been out of the habit of reading for a few weeks because I put down a book which I got bored of and then lost my motivation, but reading some short books is getting me back in the game! On a rainy evening this week Ed and I had a reading sesh in the conservatory, it was very cosy with the rain drumming on the roof.

The snails had a nice spa treatment in the sink, I like rinsing the dirt off their shells to make them all shiny every now and again ✨✨✨

What else happened this week...my sister came round for a bike ride, Ed and I rewatched Little Women (and cried), we mowed the lawn, and tried (again) to make nice pancakes using sourdough starter but they always taste vinegary lol. We decided to just stick to real pancakes. My monstera is growing a new leaf, so that's the third this year! I am blessed. Also I watched The Truman Show and made this collage.

Bike ride views

As we mowed the lawn we realised our garden is a hot spot for grasshoppers.

Speaking of collages, I finished a few this week that I have been slowly working on for a while. I used cut-outs from Nat Geo, some fashion mags (including a 2012 Company mag RIP), and that nature book I found a few weeks ago. Now I look at them I think they may not be finished and I might add some text...we'll see! ✂️🐋 🎈 🐜

My dad built a pond this week! And we have some new fish friends! Their names are Hector and Salvador and they are very lovely fish. They enjoy many activities such as swimming, moving, splashing, staying still, eating, etc. I am attached to them already so I hope no neighbourhood cats or random herons eat them, I made them a little shelter so they can hide from predators.

Tom is their guardian.

Hector is more orange and Salvador has a little orange blob like a beret on his head.

In other news, I had my first McDonalds in many months. We had a spontaneous family gathering in the garden to consume burgers in the (boiling) sunshine amongst my mum's rainforest of fruit and veg plants! I tried my first ever Big Mac, a momentous day indeed! One to go down in history.

Al fresco fine dining, 10/10

In the past couple of days I have become a bit addicted to looking at second hand clothes on eBay (the charity shop withdrawals are getting to me again hElp). Partly because I never feel like I have comfortable clothes for summer, and partly because I'm bored of the same 3 t shirts I have been wearing throughout the whole of lockdown oops. On the topic of clothes, here are some pics I took this week...turns out the major theme of this blog post is fish (I DIDN'T PLAN THIS). This fish isn't real though obvs. These trousers were one of my best charity shop finds.

Last night Ed and I went for a 9pm prayer and cats walk. The sun was setting and the air was nice and still and not warm or cold. I love the summer evening light!

We saw 19 cats but only got to stroke about 3 of them, our favourite was this adorable black cat which was just the smallest cat we'd ever seen. It's hard to explain, it wasn't like a kitten but just a miniature cat!!! It's head was tiny and it had tiny ears and tiny legs and a tiny tail, it was so cute and honestly I nearly cried. And it purred!!! These pics just don't do justice to how small and special it was.

Then we came home and did communion with sourdough and some juice in egg cups. Sweet times.

A geranium cutting from last summer, flowering again.

Sparrows on a branch.

Bathroom magic.

🤖

Ed dressed as a Twister.

Zoom house group times.

A big thank you to everyone who reads this and extra thank you for when you leave comments of appreciation and encouragement 💛 it means a looooot! Hope you're all safe and well and enjoying special moments amongst all the crazy.

I'm now thinking about fish and Salvador Dali so I'll leave you some juicy paintings right here!!!

Still life with Scorpion-Fish, 1922

Tuna Fishing, 1967

Hang on! I can't finish without some more pictures of the best boy Tom. Earlier in the week he had a mucky face and Ed said he looked like a little child in Oliver Twist haha. 

Sleeping on my crochet.

Sleeping on my mending pile.

Lockdown week 12 - french knots and lots of photos 📸

Days 79-85 (10th-16th June)

Today is one month until my birthday which is weird because my birthday is in the middle of the year and that means we're almost at the middle of the year. We have spent more than half the year so far in lockdown, that's really weird.

Since last writing I have now been into town twice (after not going for 3 months!), it was like seeing an old friend after a long time. It wasn't very different, apart from being quieter and there being queues in unusual places. I miss the charity shops though, I only saw one which was open and it's just not the same browsing in a one way system and feeling like you're being watched. I am looking forward to a future where we can rummage care free again. My first venture into town was on market day (unplanned) and to my surprise my favourite market stall was there! It's like a jumble sale, tables piled high with books and trinkets, and all the toys were 20p so I couldn't resist these two (don't worry I disinfected them).

Some passion flowers in town.

Ed and I made a great sourdough loaf, possibly the best yet (each new one is the best), and one day we ate it with mackerel freshly caught by my dad (very posh breakfast). I made yaki soba this week and also tried gnocchi for the first time. It was quite stodgy but not unpleasant. Also I made more bacon and cheese bread! Speaking of food I have started watching Bob's Burgers because I got a free trial of Amazon Prime. I used to watch it with my siblings so it has good mems. It's very silly.

I'm a food blogger now.

On Saturday it was supposed to be the March For Life but it was obviously cancelled due to lockdown, so instead they had a day livestreaming different talks and activities from their website. I tuned in to what I could and heard some amazing testimonies and felt very inspired. Whilst watching I started this piece of embroidery based on their theme for the year (still a work in progress).

I love doing french knots.

This week has felt a bit more social, with family garden visits and a zoom hang out with uni friends. Boris made the announcement about people being able to form a "bubble" with someone who lives on their own so now my grandma is bubbling with us and we had a sleepover!

Ed and I went to a garden centre on Sunday, it was nice to be out and about somewhere colourful and fragrant. Except I got a splinter when I was admiring the cacti and I had a struggle to get it out. The next day I went for a run to the lake and saw some sweet ducklings.

My snails laid MORE eggs and then literally a few days later I saw them mating for the first time (go and research snail mating, it's equal parts fascinating and gross) which I didn't want to look at but also could not stop looking at because it's so weird. I realised that I think the reason why I've had so many clutches of eggs is because when they mate they can both carry eggs and then lay them at different times? Not sure but seems legit.

Eggs buried deep but visible from outside the glass!

I've got a story of a traumatic thing that happened to me this week...I was just sitting, reading and minding my own business when I felt a tiny pinprick feeling on my upper arm. I reached and felt what was there and then instinctively squished it (sorry) and there was an audible popping sound and liquid oozed out (just typing this is causing me to have disturbed flashbacks). I ran outside and shook out my top and eventually found this squashed bundle of spider on the floor. It was horrific, truly horrific. I kept reliving the popping sensation for a good while afterwards. What made it worse is that a week or two ago I found a tick on myself and so now I'm just wondering why do all the bugs want to eat me?! Is there a bug on me now? Who knows! 

Sorry for that. Look at these pictures of Tom and forget all about it. He still loves sleeping on my crochet and I don't have the heart to stop him even though it's getting a bit hairy. It warms my heart, this must be how it feels to make something for your child and then see them using and appreciating it. Tom is our child, even though he is 64 in human years.

Did anything else interesting happen this week hmm...we started studying the book of Job in our house group which is exciting! There's nothing quite like tackling the big question of why is there suffering in the world. Also Ed and I watched The Salisbury Poisonings drama/documentary that was on in three parts, very gripping. I kind of forgot that happened, life really do be crazy recently.

I've got more photos to share this time round because I've given up instagram for a while so haven't been posting there. It's been a nice break. I go through phases of wanting to delete it completely but the main thing that stops me is thinking about if I ever wanted to build a career as an artist then I need a "platform". Anyway, that's a whole other conversation. As you can see I have been enjoying the huji app to pretend I have a disposable camera.

My hydrangea baby! So proud, and very happy it's pink!

We explored the forest and found a scary tunnel where Ed was worried we might find a dead body.

Fancy porridge.

My mum's garden looking luscious.

My cactus flowered again.

The conservatory plants had some fresh air whilst my dad cleaned the carpet in there.

My sister's dungarees perfectly matched her bike!

Tom being a long boi.

Still sewing my way through lockdown.

Welcome to my jungle.

This is my work station (the floor).

I received a card this week. Happy days.

I will leave you with this adorable local cat which we recently discovered has only three legs! But we saw it jump and climb over a fence which was really impressive and reminded us that you mustn't let having three legs stop you from achieving your dreams. Be encouraged.