http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog Just another WordPress weblog Thu, 04 Dec 2008 08:27:20 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I opened up my last firing this year today. packing and glazing was a rush job on Sunday, but the firing went well, was about two hours quicker than usual, and less trouble. I kept the gas on the same pressure all the way up from 1000C and reduction was ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/12/03/last-firing-this-year/ this morning was sparkling with frost and a bright blue sky. we went out early and avoided the snow and sleet which arrived a couple of hours later. the sun on our backs gave us giant shadows across the stubble and the leaves sparkled and crunched underfoot. in Cakes Lane we met ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/12/02/sparkle-and/ today everything is watery. this morning first thing I was in the garden lighting the second burner on the kiln for my biscuit firing. the wild geese seemed to be coming in over Bale from all directions, some in long single skeins like lines of embroidery, others constantly reforming their ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/29/water-and-sky/ a turn around in the weather today - by lunchtime the sky was blue and the temperature soaring into double figures, just. my car said ten degrees. we went to the beach at Wells. at 2.30 pm the sunshine was very low and very yellow, casting huge blue-purple shadows, and there ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/26/sunshine-at-the-beach/ five inches of snow in the garden today, after yesterday's inch or two, and then three hours of snowfall this morning. this is four and a half inches more than Tilda has seen in her life.  her verdict - fun but too cold. I realised that she needs a coat to ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/23/snow-in-the-garden/ today I took sixteen pots to Ely, to Angela Mellor's gallery. set in this pretty cathedral town, which was an island in the wet wilderness of the Fens in the Middle Ages, the gallery is an exquisite restoration of a sixteen century (or maybe earlier) building, and has a wonderful ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/19/a-nice-little-group/ we walked through the wood instead of along the field for a change today (trespassing). dry and crisp leaves underfoot are preferable to soggy stubble and the soupy mud produced by the machines working on the new track. the wood is separated from the field by a steep-sided ditch of running water ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/15/in-the-wood/ the ground is sodden and slippery with all the rain. my new water butt is simply overflowing. I took a bucket out and ten minutes later it was overflowing again. yesterday we went into the wood to visit the beech tree. the beeches are the most beautiful trees in the autumn, ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/10/888/ this past week has been traditional November grey, but the leaves are at their brightest, which offsets the gloom somewhat. the hazels are a little behind the rest, this one is along the edge of Bale wood. one sycamore stands out; it is translucently yellow amongst its naked neighbours - ash ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/11/08/more-yellow/ it seemed to be preying mantis season last week in Spain. first there was one in the house, then there was one on a rock in a beautiful finca we visited. I had never seen one before. this place was high up on the other side of the sierra from Al-Manzil, ... http://janewheeler.co.uk/blog/2008/10/30/mantis/