A year ago...
...we graduated!
Congratulations to the Aber crowd following the same route this year.
Llangollen 2011
There was a huge level of excitement and fantastic performances. The standard in the Chamber Choirs class is reportedly higher than most and, although Ostinato scored a handsome 82, The Adventist University of the Philippines Ambassador Chior won. These guys went on to win the overall Choir of the World Competition.
Billed as "the unique international festival" the Llangollen Eistedfodd started shortly after the end of the second world war in an attempt to bring countries together in peace. Its pretty good fun, though mysteriously ignored by nearly everyone outside Wales. The main tent houses formal choral performances of an impressive standards with competitors from all over the world competing in their own language and traditions. Other stages have a different vibe: the S4C stage included smaller bands from a variety of backgrounds, including folk and a local school brass band. There are stalls and shops selling crafts, clothing and food from across the world and everywhere groups of people (usually in matching clothing) rehearsing or singing just for fun.
After all the hard work the choir relaxed with some drinks to plan out their programme for next years concert, plotting how many competitions they could fit into and testing their tuning against a guitar tuning app. And watched their performance on telly (with full subtitles in English).
We stayed at a beautiful site next to an Abbey with cottages for rent, a home-grown butchers, coffee shop, and camping facilities (including tent pods).
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| Joe and I were the unofficial Official Ostinato WAGs |
Every year for a week in July the festival totally takes over this village and from what we saw the locals made all the festival goers very welcome. Its a stunningly beautiful place though, so I reckon its worth a visit when the crowds aren't there. There's beautiful scenery, historic sites, a steam railway, a canal with famous aqueduct and a good chip shop (we recommend the kebab shop at the top end of the high street).
pimms lolly
Jeffer's Birthday Picnic
Los bebés
Last week the two of us travelled to Suffolk to visit Nom's aunty Bibi. She and uncle Joff were moving to a bigger house just a few minutes walk from where they'd been staying. This sounds relatively simple, but added to the equation were two four-month-old twins, two young, boisterous Labradors and the fact that Joff was away moving most of their stuff from their previous home in Derbyshire. You can see, then, why we were drafted in to help. Fortunately for us Bibi cooks a wonderful Spanish omelette and, as you can see, the babies are ridiculously cute.
Joff and Bibi's new home is in a small village surrounded by ample stretches of greenery. The dogs and babies take regular walks past a farmhouse that keeps some interesting pets: chickens, geese and Norfolk pigs, which have recently been revived from extinction!
The new house is very quaint: it has old crooked door frames (low enough to bump your head), a thatched roof, an enormous fireplace, and a vegetable patch. We'd happily swap pads with them for a while, and we're sure they'll be happy there.
The Barton Arms: The Vaughns' Birthday
We headed to the Barton Arms for an impressive birthday feast with Mr & Mrs Vaughn and a collection of laughing, gobbling friends.
Plaster Party
It was my sister's 18th birthday today. She had some people round for food. My parents are having a load of work done on their house and the most convenient available party space was a room that's recently been stripped down, knocked through and freshly plastered. I think they were a bit embarrassed about it, but I thought it looked pretty suave in a continental, unpolished, minimalist sort of way. I told them not to bother with the new floorboards. Here's the birthday girl by the way:
Enjoy being an adult Vanessa.
Hair today...
...gone tomorrow
Hurrah for a holiday!
We hit the Grand Union Canal with 7 lovely people and 69 feet of Narrow Boat Joy and took on the wild waters between Weedon Bec and Great Linford. We played bananagrams, ate cooked breakfasts, pulled off some amazing manoeuvres, read books, got sunburnt, held baby animals, moored up, fed ducks, ate out, ate on, ate in and ate ate ate. And Malc navigated all 2,813 m of the Blisworth Tunnel with just one little bump.
Between busy times of intense relaxation we found time for a spot of food experimentation in the form of: lamb and mint kebabs, stewed strawberries, lavender champagne and some more elderflower cordial.
We hit the Grand Union Canal with 7 lovely people and 69 feet of Narrow Boat Joy and took on the wild waters between Weedon Bec and Great Linford. We played bananagrams, ate cooked breakfasts, pulled off some amazing manoeuvres, read books, got sunburnt, held baby animals, moored up, fed ducks, ate out, ate on, ate in and ate ate ate. And Malc navigated all 2,813 m of the Blisworth Tunnel with just one little bump.
Between busy times of intense relaxation we found time for a spot of food experimentation in the form of: lamb and mint kebabs, stewed strawberries, lavender champagne and some more elderflower cordial.
Elderflower: Mission Accomplished
So bottling stage two is now complete and the 5 day brew proves very popular. We bottled almost 10 litres in total, and one bottle was drunk within hours by 4 of us over dinner.
N+L The Preview
Just a glimpse of Nay and Luke's beautifully elegant and fun wedding from South Wales last week. More on that coming soon.
No spend month update. The End
So No Spend Month is up and we over spent... by quite a lot. Even taking off a number of the grey area spending items from our final total we went £16.27 over our £120 limit. In reality we spent £253.57 plus bills. And we got away with other things, such as eating for free at our parents.
Still, we must have made some positive changes because it feels odd now to spend "normally". We have increased our awareness of what we spend. And there are very few things saved on our "to buy as soon as we're allowed to spend money again" list (they are: fresh fruit and veg, garlic, socks and bleach).
We've been away...
Nay & Luke
Steeping in Process
Having lugged home a large quantity of lemons (for a very small price), tripled the recipe, hunted for citric acid and then had citric acid and a vast amount of sugar delivered by my mum, the cordial is now steeping. We'll see it in 24 hours.
It'll all be worth it
We collected a load of elderflower heads today, with the intention of using it to make cordial. Unfortunately, greenfly like elderflower even more than we do. Having recently washed all our potted herbs to prevent an infestation we didn't want these newcomers to ruin all our hard work, or our cordial for that matter, so we rinsed the whole lot, stem by stem, in the bath. Fortunately the debris looks pretty (see above) and our bathroom now has a pleasant floral aroma.
*Nom & Malc's photostream
*Nom & Malc's photostream on Flickr.
Pip & Monty's page is now bursting at the seams in our portfolio section.
Pip & Monty's page is now bursting at the seams in our portfolio section.
[Menu Thoughts] Breakfast
[Menu Thoughts] Tajine
Take 2: our second attempt at this chicken tajine was much more successful (the first attempt ended in a broken tajine and the meal being finished for our guests in a casserole dish).
Basic recipe: coat 8 chicken drums in flour and spices, brown off in tajine on the hob (use a heat diffuser!). Soften some sliced onion with garlic and herbs, then add chicken stock, chicken, some veg, lentils and any herbs that you fancy. Bring it all to the boil and shove in the oven at 150ºC for about an hour.
Serve with slices of preserved lemon, olives and rice.
