TARDIS Tuesday- Face the Raven

 Is it really 6 years since I last shared this cosplay? I'm staggered I've not shared it if so!

It was worn by Clara Oswald in her 'final' episodes (actually- she made two more appearances after her death, but in both, wearing this jumper!)

The jumper is an all-in-one from Topshop, her jeans, Topshop probably and her trainers from Ash.

Image borrowed from BlogtorWho

And here is my 2025 iteration:

I wore this for school today (with different shoes!) and realised I had a twin- one of the girls was wearing an identical outfit and her hair is pretty similar to me- not sure why she was wearing it as it's not our school uniform at all! It's actually a really comfortable outfit to wear and quite smart too as well as easy to wear given that the shirt and jumper are all in one.

It's not been the best day for various reasons.  But, I got through it.

I am grateful for:

1. Having made a big vat of veg stew out of the mouldering things we had in the house yesterday, it meant we had dinner ready for tonight (plus some garlic bread and new kale) and already put some in soup flasks for tomorrow night too.  

2.  Got back from Northumberland and realised that, because the Milk and More website wasn't working on Tuesday, hadn't cancelled the milk. It sat out on our doorstep from Tuesday to Saturday night (plus Saturday's milk) and DIDN'T GO OFF! 

3.  Lovely old colleague came back to help me take the choir to our concert rehearsal today. I love her- she's so fun and positive!

4. My choir got a shout out for confidently singing our harmony part in the No Worries mashup- was super proud of them.

5.  I have a warm home.

6.  Nice stranger put my chain back on to my derailleur on the train.  He got his hands all covered in grease doing it. He was nice to chat to.

Sometimes, you have to just try and make your own sunshine. Even if it's a vague bit of brightness through a fog. 

xx

Night Terrors

 This week's prompt word for my poem was 'Kid'.  It was another one which took a few days of thinking. It was written in the car on the way to walking on the Roman Wall on the Sycamore Gap stretch of the journey (RIP tree) and on the way back to get changed to visit the Glasshouse for a concert with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.

Night Terrors 

"I kid you not, it's terrifying!

I hear a monstrous dragon flying. 

Malevolent with fangs so long.

Please stay with me, you are so strong!" 

"I see no dragon, no need to hide. 

Your imagination's in overdrive!" 

"I do not jest, I'm over-awed, 

I hear a mighty wolf, sharp-clawed, 

He's watching me with evil eyes, 

Please stay with me, you are so wise!" 

"I see no wolf, no provocation, 

You've got a vivid imagination!" 

"I do not joke, I start to quake, 

I hear a fearsome, massive snake, 

He wants to squeeze me in his 'arms' 

Please stay with me, keep me from harm!" 

"I see no snake, no need to fear, 

Your brain plays tricks, there's nothing here." 

"I do not fabricate, beware! 

I hear a snuffling, growling bear, 

Massive, mighty, he wants to bite!, 

Please stay with me and hold me tight!" 

"I see no bear, no cause to fret, 

This room is bare of bears, my pet." 

"I tell no lie, my nerves are soaring, 

I hear a dangerous lion roaring, 

Hungry, surely he wants to feed. 

Please stay with me or he'll succeed!" 

"I see no lion, real or other, 

It seems the sounds are all your brother!"

I had various ideas for this one, one, something based on the Billy Goat's Gruff and the other, using the phrase, "I kid you not!" which CBC kept telling me for ages was not a real phrase until he kept hearing other people ALSO say it.

I went with the second idea and it was going to be a poem about a child being scared with a vivid imagination (ME!) and imagining all sorts of things under the bed or outside the window whilst trying to sleep. Originally, it was going to be a 'Boy who cried wolf' situation where the child tells one lie too many and then gets eaten  by something but then the poem didn't feel like it wanted to do that so all of a sudden, it felt like that child was being gaslighted by an older sibling to who was making convincing sound effect to genuinely terrify the younger, more impressionable one.

I feel like it ends a bit abruptly, but to fit with the repetition and the length of the other stanzas, it had to be so.  Do you think the parent sounds too unsympathetic in their response?  I think sometimes there is a fine balance between building resilience and genuinely supporting a terrified vivid imagination. What's your take on it?

Sababa Southend

 Sababa is a new restaurant/bar/cafe that has opened in Southend. It is Vegetarian and Vegan. 

The food has middle - Eastern influence with Falafel, Hummus and feta. 

 I have now been twice. It is about a 2 minute walk from Southend Central Station. 

CBC had the Main Couscous which he had olives with. It was delicious! 

I had 3 small plates which we both ate. 

The cauliflower wings are utterly delectable - the outer layer is super tasty. 

The Courgette Salad is zingy and full of flavour. 

The loaded fries had olives and feta and were, again, full of exciting flavours. 

I also had a side-salad which included 4 different elements 

I chose a Frozen Limonata Mocktail which was full of fresh flavour. 

We were lucky on Saturday night, it was quite quiet. Downstairs, they have just opened an intimate red velvet curtainef area. 

For dessert, CBC had a berry Puffin (puff pastry muffin). 

The staff are friendly and nice and the place has a great vibe. It is my new favourite restaurant. I ate so many delicious vegetables with my meal which is what I like best and everything was delectably fresh 

The food was excellent on all levels so us worth a visit if you are looking for a good and healthy veggie choice in Southend. 

Natural Disaster

 This week's prompt word for The Toy Press poem was 'Clumsy'.  It takes a few days for me to write my poem. I get an idea and start it and then I have to subconsciously think about it for a few days before I am ready to write or finish it. I am in awe of those who write and post it within a day of the prompt!

Hope you like this one!

Natural Disaster!

She’ll tread on your shoe,

She’ll trip on thin air,

She’ll stomp with two left feet

She’ll fall off her chair

 

She’ll stub her/your toe,

She’ll get in your way,

She’ll bump heads with you,

She’ll speak and spray.

 

She’ll knock your sandwich,

She’ll spill your drink,

She’ll confuse your chatter,

She’ll muddle your ‘think’.

 

She’ll snap your pencil,

She’ll break your toy,

She’ll rip your work,

She’ll always destroy!

 

She acts without malice,

It still drives me spare.

She’s just VERY CLUMSY,

Approach her with care!

The poem is dedicated to my childhood friend Leanne who used to play clarinet in Windband with me.  I really liked her but she was SO clumsy- she was always treading on me, knocking things over etc- I could almost foresee what she was going to do but was never able to stop it from happening!!!

TARDIS Tuesday- Into the Dalek- the final outfit winterised

 In Into the Dalek, Clara spends most of the episode wearing her creepy eye-shirt (which I last cosplayed in September 2024 but just at the end, she changes into an alternative outfit.

I last featured it here in November 2022, so that's over 2 years ago, so I thought I'd feature it again

Let's have a look at it:

• Topshop red ladder-stitch red cropped jumper
• ASOS reclaimed Check jacket
• Topshop black Scallop shorts
• Topshop 'All Mine' boots
• Black Deena and Ozzy satchel
• UO double circle necklace

For this February iteration, I decided to go less accurate and dress for the weather!

I had no desire to root around for tights or even less desire to wear them OR shorts so I decided to substitute the black shorts for a pair of my black ASOS trousers (not the cycle-ripped ones, but the other, baggier pair).

I also decided not to wear my more accurate, vintage jacket, but the Urban Outfitters cooperative bomber jacket that has the same print.  It's a lovely little cosy cardigan to wear (I wore it with 2 coats over the top to cycle!) plus my Topshop All Mine boots.

I forgot how cosy this red Topshop jumper is 

The final touch are the two gold ring necklaces which I bought from eBay a long time ago.

I felt very satisfied with this outfit.

Today and yesterday, I have done quite a few things:

Saturday:

Washing, 

Reading

Booked train tickets for Northumberland

Started packing for Northumberland

Marking (I marked about 400 pieces of work yesterday)

Went to Cinema to see Bridget Jones

Had dinner at Sababa in Southend (review to come soon)

Typed up some poems.

Wrote 2 new poems

Sunday:

Church

(Got chatting to lovely couple who have recently started coming to our church, one of whom used to work with CBC)

Drew tabards for World Book Day

Watched a lot of Classic Dotor Who

Marked about 450 pieces of work- FINISHED all my marking

Made an 80th birthday card for my Godmother

Made dinner of Crispy tofu

Put washing in.

Hung up washing.

Put away other washing

I've got about 540 report grades to get done this week so I've got to take my computer and assessment sheets with me plus a few other bits of admin work to do but I hope we can have a nice break in Hexham too.

xx

Valentines cards from the recycling

I mentioned to CBC that it would be nice to have a Valentines card this year (I ended up not getting one last year due to him skiing and then realised I should probably get on and make one.

I decided I would like to recycle one or two elements that I had saved for the card. I ended up making two.

This first one utilised a circle that held a Patisserie Valerie cake which CBC had brought home - it was virtually clean so I snaffled it away- it immediately said POCKET WATCH to me so I then cut some hearts out of the Patisserie Valerie box which I had also saved which has some heart-patterned gold card and serendipitously, held exactly 12 hearts around the edge. I then added some  silver outline stickers for the numbers and then made hands out of a bit more of the packaging. In retrospect, I wish I had mounted the hearts on 3d sticky pads so they stood out a bit more.

Here you can see the heart patterning a bit better but not the numbers so well.

I then wrote the wording freehand and added some little hand-drawn hearts.

The second card made use of some patterned insides of envelopes I'd saved to make some more kitty cards as well as some spotty paper from an old card insert. I mounted them with their heads floating and hand wrote the greeting.  I also used a corner cutter on both cards.

Which one do you like best?

xx
 

Hydrangeas and rainbows

Hi there! 

When will this Winter end? Sorry to have a moan but agrfhhhhh!!!! I haven't had the best day. Got into trouble at work for something that is very irritating. 

But, my year 3 kids were good, my year 2 were OK (chatty but OK), year 1-some v annoying, some lovely. After school, I held a one-off workshop for the more able musicians for year 3-6 which was sweet- they seemed quite positive. My orchestra rehearsal was good - absolutely love my second flute-positive and joyful which I really needed - just need to sort out my head as it is a bit of a mess at the moment. Need to learn to be less afraid and more communicative. 

Anyway, I thought I'd share a couple of colourful outfits that made me happy. 

There are, however, many 

Haven't worn my Monsoon coat for ages it's v jolly. I like teaming with a jolly beret. 

Underneath - the technocolour dream skirt and my granny square waistcoat with leggings and black top and DMs. 

Added a secret cosplay piece - Paul Smith rainbow scarf! 

Here's a Whitestuff Hydrangea  dress - black cashmere cardie and the old leggings. 

The sheepskin coat of joy! 

Here's what I wore for my orchestra concert on Saturday. Black velvet jumpsuit from New Look via Vinted in lockdown. 

I add a sparkly star brooch to keep the V modest. Rieker shoes and Esoteric London star necklace and earrings from Vinted. The entire outfit is 2nd hand! Even my hair clip was left in lost property at music camp! 

Even if I feel sad, I can look happy! 

Xx

 

Eyes

I cut open a Kiwi fruit a couple of weeks ago and it struck me how particularly beautiful this fruit was, it almost resembled a pair of eyes. 

 

A hairy mess!!

 Here's this week's Word of the Week poem.

The word to include was 'fix'.

I thought I'd use it in the context as an Americanism!

Not sure about syllable count of line 2- should either lose the 'right' or edit to 

'It's constantly a right nightmare'. 

What d'ya think? 

TARDIS Tuesday- Yaz Khan from Can you Hear Me?

Today, we are starting back to my main orchestra, Kensington Chamber Orchestra.  I'm looking forward to it but not the very late night! I don't get home until around 23.45! 

This week is a bit busy with 2 rehearsals, watching Frozen at CBC's school then I have two performances. Balinese Gamelan at Battersea Arts centre in London on Friday and an orchestra concert on SAturday.

Anyway, for TARDIS this week, I have  pretty niche outfit. It's worn by Yaz Khan in Can You Hear Me? in a brief scene where she has a flashback to where she ran away from home.

She wears a grey tiger print hoodie, blue jeans and lilac trainers.

https://custardcreamsandstripysocks.home.blog/2022/08/07/yazs-costume-in-every-episode-series-12/

I am not super into animal print but I really like this hoodie. I have seen it over the years but never bought it as I didn't want to pay much for it if I did. The RRP is £135.

Anyway, as you can see, I did find it:

I saw it on Vinted for £5. I made a cheeky offer of £4 as it had apparently been on there for a while and it was accepted.  It's quite cropped which I really like.  I didn't bother to make the rest of the outfit accurate as I didn't have time to look at photos. I thought it might be blue jeans and trainers but I just decided to throw these black trousers and boots on. It was a comfortable outfit for orchestra.

Sending you hugs!

xx
 

January Books

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I have resolved this year, to post my books each month, even if I don't review them properly (I like reading books,  cannot be bothered to review, particularly as I have Book amnesia). In addition, I have resolved to read and clear some books from my bookshelves so they aren't groaning at the seams. I expect this resolution to do monthly reviews will go the way it has the past few years and this will be the only post, but we can but hope!

1. Hamnet  Maggie O'Farrell

William Shakespeare, had twin children, one of whom, Hamnet, died aged 15.  This account is a fictional account of the life of Shakespeare's children and wife.  It is set in 1596, and Judith, is taken ill with a sudden fever. Her twin, Hamnet searches for help but cannot find anyone to help at home. Mother, Agnes is away in a medicinal herb garden and father in London.  The book leads up to the death of her son with accounts of young Will (never referred to by name but inferred from the start), his wife Agnes and the children. It is brutal in places- life is very dirty, difficult and unloving for much of the family but what shines through is the love of the extraordinary mother for children.  The supposed description of way plague reaches the family is wonderfully clever and evocative and the death is devastating and how it results in a play called Hamlet very intriguing! I've never read any of this author but I really enjoyed this. I give it 4.5 out of 5 just because I find the grit of historical accounts a bit distressing.

2.  Escape to the River sea- Emma Carroll (after Eva Ibbotson)

This was a wonderful sequel to Eva Ibbotson's Journey to the River Sea.  The setting is WW2 and our main character is a Jewish/English girl, Rosa Sweetman who travelled to England on the Kindertransport, is now, in 1946, waiting for her family back in Austria to call her back home. However, her wait is interrupted by the arrival of Yara Fielding who has come to seek something in the library and soon she finds herself in the Amazon rainforest in search of Jaguars and something else.  The writing describing the settings is beautiful and the adventure that Rosa finds, unexpectedly includes danger from unexpected sources.  Without spoiling it, this was a worthy successor that kept you guessing. There is a great respect for the indigenous people in here too. I give this 5/5

3. The Case of the Gilded Fly -  Edmund Crispin

Robert Warner's theatre company is in Oxford to rehearse for his new play. Yseut Haskell, spoilt and unlikeable actress has enemies at every front and soon faces her demise in a college room close to the room of eccentric, amateur detective and Oxford don, Gervaise Fen's office.  Anyone had the motive  but who had the means.  This story is bonkers in places. I love the vocabulary of it, you can tell E.C (real name Bruce Montgomery) is erudite. Gervaise Fen is highly likeable, but also deeply frustrating through his eccentricity and smug knowing of who things but not really giving you a clue how he knew. There is a lot of red herrings. Entertaining and great setting of Oxford writing but I found myself getting distracted at times. I give it 3.5/5

4.  The Moving Toyshop - Edmund Crispin

Another Gervaise Fen  mystery, which I have read before, begins with poet, Richard Cadogan arriving in late at night in Oxford for a holiday but as he trudges along the road from the Headington roundabout, he ends up inside a toyshop where he finds a dead woman's body.  He is then knocked out and locked in a broomcupboard.  When he comes to the next morning and runs to the police station on Ifley road, when they return, there is no longer a toyshop but a grocers instead and certainly no body!!!!  Bemused, he turns to friend, Professor Gervaise Fen to solve the missing body and toyshop crime.  There is a lot of chaos and capers and wrong turns until we find who murdered who and why! This was more entertaining than the previous book and I enjoyed it! I give it 4/5

5.  Orbital - Samantha Harvey

I took a brief break from eccentric whodunnits to read this Christmas present I received which CBC had read before me. He spent the whole time telling me, "NOTHING happens, you will hate it!"  This book, shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2024, was a very imaginative and descriptive account of cosmonaults living aboard a space station. Written in the Present Continuous tense, it has a timeless feeling.  Not a huge amount happens in it, CBC is right but it is very celestial and beautiful if not the most exciting book to read. You could also say a bit boring. I give it 2.8/5.  Lovely, but not my cup of tea.

6. Holy Disorders -Edmund Crispin

In this fen book, we start on the train with organist and composer Geoffrey Vintner who has been attacked and threatened against going to Tolnbridge where he has been asked by his friend, Gervaise Fen, who is on holiday there, to cover the duties at the cathedral of Brooks, the organist in residence who has gone apparently mad after poisoning. The evening they arrive, the organist is then murdered and another member of the church murdered.  This complicated and convoluted case involves espionage, witchcraft and a Nazi plot. I found this book harder to stick with again, though as always Fen is irritating and funny and it's quite hard to work out what is going on! I enjoyed the church music references and I liked Geoffrey Vintner as a main character (Fen always has some sidekick who helps him solve the crime, alla Dr Watson.). I give this one 3.5/5