Morning all - early start to the day for us as we've both been awake since 5am. Always takes a couple of days to get our body clocks right.
Forecast to be dry and about 17C so we're going to rent a couple of bikes for the day and cycle to Granville Island for brunch and then round to Kitsilano Beach and back. A total of about 12 miles on mainly flat terrain round the sea wall - nice and easy.
We stayed on Granville Island on both of our previous visits to Vancouver. It's a lovely buzzy place with nice little crafty shops and a foodie market and lots of boats. Plenty of casual eating places with nice views.
Rubee - how lovely to have your grandmother's fountain pens. OH rescued a couple from his dad's loft which date from the 1940's or 50's. He's got them both working again which is nice. If you need (and want) to get your pens working again do get in touch - I may be able to recommend somebody to help.
LB - my favourite pens are a Lamy Pur and an Online Vision - both modern German fountain pens. I prefer a medium nib for everyday writing but use a calligraphy nib for birthday cards etc. Using a fountain pen definitely slows my writing down so it tends to be better formed and tidier - less easy to scribble with a fountain pen. Love the Japanese coloured inks especially the blue-blacks, smokey greys, green-blacks and shades of dark teal.
Inks are nice to paint with as well - you could try those if you do watercolours @Yviestevie - great for washes. The brand 'Diamine' do a huge range of colours and their little bottles cost less than £2.50 each online.
Chive - sorry - meant to mention your mum the other day. What a difficult decision she has to make. Best wishes for you all.
Heaven is ... sitting in the garden with a G&T and a cat while watching the sun go down
Sounds as though you are enjoying your trip @Topbird, I hope you enjoy the rest of it.
After church we went to visit gardens in Hingham, their open gardens day. Some very pretty but very small cottage gardens and a couple of big wild lifey gardens. Had coffee in one and the dryest fruit cake we've ever tasted. It was a warm sunny day. Hingham is where my grandfather's ancestors are buried in front of the altar of the huge church.
Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
Good afternoon everyone. I have had a very productive day in the garden since returning home. pruned my sarcococca as it was starting to take over; blitzed the thuggish Japanese anemones and pulled up lots of nettles and goose grass. I had just decided this afternoon - round about 15:50 - that I had done enough for the day and started to gather all my stuff up when down came the rain - looking forward to next week Biglad!
T'Bird, you sound to have had a super day getting around on the bikes. I will have to Google your favourite pens as I have never heard of either of those two makes. I have always loved ink pens. from the ones that had a little lever on the side that you had to raise, presumably squashing an inner 'bladder' and then collapsing it allowing ink to be drawn into the bladder. The next one I had had a rigid strip on the 'bladder' which acted in a similar manner to the side lever but when the 'bladder' perished through old age the pen became defunct, unless you used it as a dippy pen and then, as mine is now, sealed cartridges that just push into place. I miss my bottle of Quink!
Busy, it sounds as though you had a nostalgic day today. I don't think I would have been keen on dry fruit cake either!
Cacoethes: An irresistible urge to do something inadvisable
BTW, I meant to say, Yvie, join the blood club! I have a rose like New Dawn - its a beast and grabs me when I am least expecting it. It always draws blood.
Ruby, I read with interest that you are another stylophile! I need to collect all my old ones up, they are all named after Lady Penelope's chaffeur apart from the favourite I mentioned early.
Cacoethes: An irresistible urge to do something inadvisable
Funny you should mention the inks @Topbird I've just ordered some for the summer term. We are doing seas and trees using inks. I'm looking forward to it.
Evening everyone, LB Sounds like a good productive day in the garden and just finished in the nick of time before the weather moved in 😅 Topbird Thank you for your kind message, hope you’ve thoroughly enjoyed the day cycling to Granville Island,
Yvie I hope the blood test all went ok and you managed to get the jobs in the garden done afterwards, Busy Sounds like a very interesting afternoon visiting different types of gardens, Hazel What a transformation you’ve made to that border it looks fantastic, you’ll get so much pleasure from looking at that now, Achieved very little in the garden today just a trim of some new patches of grass & some watering. Signing out for the day, Goodnight all.
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Forecast to be dry and about 17C so we're going to rent a couple of bikes for the day and cycle to Granville Island for brunch and then round to Kitsilano Beach and back. A total of about 12 miles on mainly flat terrain round the sea wall - nice and easy.
We stayed on Granville Island on both of our previous visits to Vancouver. It's a lovely buzzy place with nice little crafty shops and a foodie market and lots of boats. Plenty of casual eating places with nice views.
Rubee - how lovely to have your grandmother's fountain pens. OH rescued a couple from his dad's loft which date from the 1940's or 50's. He's got them both working again which is nice. If you need (and want) to get your pens working again do get in touch - I may be able to recommend somebody to help.
LB - my favourite pens are a Lamy Pur and an Online Vision - both modern German fountain pens. I prefer a medium nib for everyday writing but use a calligraphy nib for birthday cards etc. Using a fountain pen definitely slows my writing down so it tends to be better formed and tidier - less easy to scribble with a fountain pen. Love the Japanese coloured inks especially the blue-blacks, smokey greys, green-blacks and shades of dark teal.
Inks are nice to paint with as well - you could try those if you do watercolours @Yviestevie - great for washes. The brand 'Diamine' do a huge range of colours and their little bottles cost less than £2.50 each online.
Chive - sorry - meant to mention your mum the other day. What a difficult decision she has to make. Best wishes for you all.
Sounds as though you are enjoying your trip @Topbird, I hope you enjoy the rest of it.
After church we went to visit gardens in Hingham, their open gardens day. Some very pretty but very small cottage gardens and a couple of big wild lifey gardens. Had coffee in one and the dryest fruit cake we've ever tasted. It was a warm sunny day. Hingham is where my grandfather's ancestors are buried in front of the altar of the huge church.
LB Sounds like a good productive day in the garden and just finished in the nick of time before the weather moved in 😅
Topbird Thank you for your kind message, hope you’ve thoroughly enjoyed the day cycling to Granville Island,
Busy Sounds like a very interesting afternoon visiting different types of gardens,
Hazel What a transformation you’ve made to that border it looks fantastic, you’ll get so much pleasure from looking at that now,
Achieved very little in the garden today just a trim of some new patches of grass & some watering.
Signing out for the day, Goodnight all.