Little things mean a lot.

       ty

Strange how for some people small places have a special charm. Like my sheds, I couldn’t live without them, one in the garden, one on the allotment. I used to travel a lot in Variety when I was younger, a different theatre every week.  We all seemed to make our dressing room our ‘home’ put photographs and even ornaments in front of the make up mirror.

If we did a summer season, we often gave each other a tiny momento at the end of the season. It was the time of ‘whimsies’ little china animals so I received several of these. I once went to Janette Scott’s 21st birthday party (the late Thora Hird’s daughter) and we were given tiny china dutch clogs, so off they went on tour too.

I had never met Thora Hird but wrote to her once asking about the party. She was on the phone to me next day cheerful and chatty as a cricket.

In and around Green Park ready for the big day.

          

          

          

                                     

Sir John Major and Lloyd Scott crack open the bubbly.

                                   

Lloyd Scott suddenly appeared in Green Park when we were walking back to Victoria Station from the RA.  He had just completed a marathon in aid of the The Queen Elizabeth Jubilee Trust. Lloyd had worn a 13o lb diving suit with a huge helmet, crossing the finishing line on The Mall at 14:30 BST.

While Sir John Major, chairman of the trust, waited patiently for Lloyd’s arrival,  he chatted to bystanders and obligingly posed for photographs, what an old smoothie he is. Then of course it was back to the official business welcoming Lloyd and cracking open a bottle of bubbly.

                                               

Saltdean celebrations!

We think this was the best of the three that we could see!

RA Summer Exhibition tiny taster!

I love the Royal Academy as loyal blog followers will know and being is a friend is my favourite indulgence. This year the exhibition is particularly wonderful and there is plenty of small sculptures, too, which are a delight.

I’d be wary of looking out for the pieces that make one think ‘Why on earth did they give that wall space!’ because it can distract from all the interesting work on either side. We buy the price list and guess how much the pieces we like or even detest cost, simple pleasures! The RA boasts having more affordable prints this year and that’s true, one woodblock a bit bigger than a credit card cost a mere £15 but bear in mind this would be unframed.

The whole point of being a friend is that one can take another person  and go as many times as one wants to.  So much to see and enjoy I shall be heading there again this summer.

     

      

                             

      

I am not too sure about the empty plinth or the musically orientated film show in the Western Room, surely they know by now we all prefer it to be overcrowded, that’s half of the fun!

Dear Tracy Emin was on form claiming to be UPSET

goodness knows why,  her prints were selling like hot cakes.

Fun on the allotment…

       

                        The more incongruous the better…

          

             but then our first crops

                         

             and new ones planted

                

         and elderflowers for free …

         now where is my recipe for elderflower champagne?

 

Octavia Hill’s Geranium

This is an Octavia Hill geranium. She was one of the the founders of the National Trust and died 100 years ago.

Octavia Hill was born in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire in 1838, the eighth daughter of James Hill, a prosperous corn merchant and former banker. Her mother set up an infants school, which also opened in the evenings for adult education.

Unfortunately her father eventually went bankrupt and suffered temporary insanity. As a result of this she moved with her mother to Finchley where her love of the countryside developed.

Octavia became known as a conservationist, social reformer, writer and teacher.  She organised a window box campaign for urban areas and created the first large scale inner city housing estates near the Elephant and Castle, among other notable achievements.

The geraniums are from ‘Delamore’ who will be donating a small percentage of the sale proceeds to both the National Trust and to Octavia Hill’s birthplace in Wisbech’s South Brink. It is a Grade II listed building and of architectural and historic interest. It is now a museum run entirely by volunteers.

The geranium itself is a very intense red and hopefully it will encourage others who have access to plants and gardens to share their good fortune as well as to support the National Trust.