Why marriage is like chutney and oatcakes.

I recently bought the River Cottage Everday cookbook because I love everything about River Cottage and Hugh-Fearnley Whittingstall’s approach to food and lifestyle. I didn’t expect to get a meaningful, philosophical insight into my marriage from it, but that’s precisely what I got. This is one inspirational cookbook!

As I’ve just stopped work to have our second baby, I’m keen to really revert more to my natural inclination towards living frugally. We have two professional incomes but my soul properly sings when I can grow food, reuse things and hunt for second hand stuff. It just makes me happy.  It just costs a little more time that can sometimes be snaffled during a working/parenting week.

I was looking through Hugh’s cookbook in a browsy way, wondering if I could make something nice for our 11th anniversary on Saturday. One recipe caught my eye as it said “perfect with home-made chutney”.  Richard had just crafted a delicious batch of home-made chutney last week with our plentiful supply of green tomatoes.

The recipe is called Bill’s Rona Oatcakes, and when it dawned on me that this was from the Isle of Rona near Skye, I had to know more. With a quick search online, I found out that the recipe was from Bill Cowie who is the only permanent resident on Rona.

After reading the Isle of Rona website and seeing Bill’s  Images of Rona collection, I was besotted with the place. Next time we travel to the UK (which we do every few years) I feel determined that we’ll have a family holiday there. I feel drawn.

Richard and I have spent lots of time in Scotland and have a deep love of the islands, and they form a large part of my mystic/romantic dreams of the ideal place in terms of the natural world.  Growing up with Scottish parents probably sowed the seeds of my love for that wild landscape, but now having also spent time in Scotland, that feeling of awe and love is so easily conjured. When I listen to celtic music, memories of all the times we’ve spent in the highlands and islands flicker throgh my mind and fill my heart – so brim full. Sometimes I can so vividly summon up the landscape, I feel like I can go there anytime I need to. My favourite holiday of ours was cycling and camping some of the Hebrides, and I have a soft spot for Sutherland on the mainland, and love the islands I’ve so far visited which are Iona, Mull, Skye and the Orkneys. But not Rona yet….not yet…but I can dream!. .

Rona sounds truly like the idyllic wild holidays that Richard and I love. No shops or roads, one permanent resident and only a few holiday cottages – a place where you can walk in rain and sun showers, catch fish and cook them on an open fire, relax by the fireside in the evening with whisky or heather beer, gaze at the clear night sky, eat kippers for breakfast while watching a rainshower, look for plants and wildlife on land and sea – generally just adore feeling little in nature’s big beautiful vastness.

Suddenly, this oatcake recipe was just not about biscuits for chutney  - it had leapt off the page into my dreaming mind – and the oatcakes became symbolic  - little oaty tokens that represented a taste of a future ideal – a family holiday on Rona.

It wasn’t long before I was  infusing the kitchen with some delicate tunes from my celtic playlist –  and the mood was well and truly set.  I had decided to make some of these oatcakes for Richard as his wedding anniversary present!

A well-baked tune -click to listen

Click to listen

Oatcakes made with love

I accept that in terms of gift-giving, some little oaty cakes might sound a bit cheap, and like my frugality has gone a little over the top – but we don’t generally do anniversary presents anyway. Also, being just a week away from giving birth means we’re not really up for going out for a meal anyway, and are planning to have a normal Saturday together with Fionna – and have something with chutney for tea!

Yes, a first attempt at baking oatcakes are probably going to turn out to be imperfect, and experimental as I’ve never made them before – but homemade gifts appeal to my quest to use money for living experiences – like holidays to the Island of Rona!  Lets just hope Richard doesn’t mind a few half-baked biscuits instead of something made of stainless steel for 11 years of marriage! (I did after all make him a minature cosmos for our 10th!)

Anyway, cheers to Shug and Brian for putting this recipe into a cookbook and consequently, mixing all the ingredients in my head into a hearty, wild family holiday dream.

Romancing the oatcakes

Let’s hope Rona oatcakes and chutney turn out to be a marriage made in heaven. But it’s not just about chutney and oats –  there’s more to enjoy – these oatcakes go well with cheese and marmalade too!  This is how I came full circle with my great insight (bear in mind, I have a crazy pregnancy brain) to  think of our marriage as being just like chutney and oatcakes too: we compliment each other, both mature with age, and yet, are equally and individually enhanced by some lovely condiments…er…children.

In my experience of marriage, it’s just as  romantic being a mother and father together as it is a husband and wife. Now to me, that sounds like the right sort of ingredients in a recipe for happy times ahead.

Fairy Fionna turns 3

Even after a huge afternoon birthday party on the beach, little girls still have a bit of fairy dust in reserve for a late afternoon garden romp.

The fairy turns 3

Fionna’s first book recommendation: The Secret of Moon Castle

I sometimes ask Fionna, “Where do you live?” and for the last few weeks she has sometimes replied with the same sentence: “I live on adventure. I live in a moon-castle.”

I have no idea where it’s from, but I am soooo intrigued that I googled it, thinking it might be a song. I found a book called ‘The Secret of Moon Castle’ by Enid Blyton which is of course an adventure book by *the* adventure story writer.

Maybe this is this Fionna’s first book recommendation to me?? I like it.

Baby Fionna arrives at the farm…

Today is Fionna’s 10th day in the outside world. I went into labour on 4th October at 18:15pm and Fionna Gillian Brown was finally born on 5th October at 13:50pm, weighing 3.5 kg or 7 lbs, 12 ozs.

After four days in hospital, I was really ready to see our farm and all the animals again, although from my hospital window I had the most beautiful view of maple trees and I passed most days staring at Fionna and the spring sunlight through the maple leaves beyond. As the room was on level 4 of the hospital, it felt as though the room was literally in the canopy of the trees. It’s something I will always remember in terms of bringing her into the world.

This is a photograph of us waking up on our first morning back on the farm as a family. I am still in my pjamas and Tara the goat managed to sneak into the photo which is quite cute.

All of the animals have either bonded or ignored this latest little addition, and the farm is a strange place, resonating with the usual cries of roosters, chickens, goats, cows and now a human baby girl too.

Being gluttons for adventure, we have managed to take Fionna out three times already in the 10 days of her life. Once to the local supermarket and post office, then to the local Saturday morning farmers market and a half-day trip today to Victor Harbor.

I have to admit that I was slightly anxious about taking her out initially and this was why I so badly wanted to do it. The first expedition out saw me not being able to concentrate on anything but her and nor could I really relax. I felt extremely conspicuous with our newborn accessory and as everyone is drawn like a magnet to tiny babies you stop every few steps to answer questions and admiring sighs from friendly strangers. It’s lovely but a bit disconcerting when you are trying to blend into the crowd. After I got over that weird initial feeling, it’s better and today I even breastfed her on a bench in the main road in Victor Harbor and felt calm about it. Any niggling doubts about not having the confidence to feed and settle her in public have nearly gone now as I know I can manage to do it at this stage in a state of complete inexperience and first born clumsiness with her.

Physically, I am still recovering myself (stitches & tiredness) but moving is so much easier when you don’t have 3.5 kg hanging off the front of you and it feels great!

The spelling of Fionna with a double n is deliberate. Sgurr a’Fionn Choire (The Fair Corrie) is a mountain in the Cuillins on the Isle of Skye. Fionn in Scottish Gaelic means fine or beautiful. Richard climbed this mountain in the 1980s and we spent time on Skye together in the 2000s. Scotland is our favourite place in the world. When I was in labour I thought of the most peaceful place I could think of which was camping a the foot of Marsco on the Isle of Skye which is part of the same area. I also found out from my mum that her mum had wanted the name Fiona for me thirty years ago when I was born, so all in all the name really suits. Her second name Gillian is named after Richard’s sister.

After dark: Fins & plants, ladders & rivers, prostitutes & castle walls

Since June, my strange dreams induced by what must have been a psychedelic cocktail of early pregnancy hormones did settle down a little. I perhaps remembered a few each week, but most were fairly run of the mill stuff. I felt normal again.

However, now in the last few weeks of pregnancy, some new chemicals must be mixing around in my neurons because the frequency of dreams each night and the strangeness of them is now way beyond what it was back in June. I’m feeling like a real mental case again.

This week alone (keep in mind it is only Tuesday) I have dreamt:

Dream 1
I had to swim across the gulf to the Yorke Peninsula at night with an old couple to help them carrying something. I’m not a strong swimmer but reasoned that I could help because my belly would act as buoyancy and keep me afloat. Half way across there was a jetty but it was too cold to stop so we had to keep swimming. The water was jet black and turtles and fish kept swimming under us from beneath and it was difficult to tell if the sharper fins brushing our bellies were sharks or dolphins.

Dream 2
I worked in a huge plant nursery as an expert in succulent plants. I had my own greenhouse and customers were asking me questions about the plants. They were thanking me for my expertise and I felt really proud that I’d worked so hard to learn about the plants which were incredibly beautiful.

Dream 3
Our real half a kilometer steep dirt unsealed driveway was instead an immense cliff with a huge aluminium ladder embedded into the cliff. I had to park at the bottom and climb the ladder. I was wearing one of Richard’s jumpers and my mum was at the bottom yelling “You’ve got bird shit on your jumper!”. I said “Yes, it’s all over the ladder” and was trying to concentrate on getting up the ladder and wondering why she was distracting me with this minor detail.

Dream 4
Another dream, again on the driveway, I reversed to the side, out of the path of a small truck belting towards me on the drive which only takes one way traffic. I realised I was reversing onto the bank of a large fast flowing river and as soon as I remembered that the bank was incredibly soft, the soft ground gave way and the Forester sank backwards into the river. It floated for a few seconds and I thought “It’s ok, don’t panic, I just need to open the door and get out and swim to the bank”. Then I realised to my horror that I wasn’t in the drivers seat, I was in the back of the car and it was a 2 door only. To get out I would have to push the front seat forward, open the front door and step over to get out. Then I realised that the baby could also be in the capsule beside me. I didn’t dare look to my side to check, instead I thought “I can’t do this, can’t handle this, wake me up” and I woke up. My heart was hammering and waking up felt terrible because I hadn’t even tried to assess the situation, I’d just given up and had chosen to opt out and not try to save either one of us.

Dream 5
Richard and I were in a futuristic city. We were in a hotel and going out for a meal. I wore a red dress (which I don’t own) and people were giving me weird looks. Richard went to a cash point to get some money and a man made a lewd comment and grabbed me by the shoulders and tried to walk me away. I shook him off thinking he was drunk or weird. Richard and I walked on a little further and I realised that I was the only person getting singled out for this kind of attention and that people hated me. I saw a kind looking young Japenese girl and approached her. She looked wary of me. I pleaded “I’m not from around here, I need to know why people are being horrible to me”. She said “You are wearing a red dress – no one wears those any more, people think you are a prostitute and they are illegal here now”. I was mortified, so we went back to the hotel and I changed.

Dream 6
Richard and I were in an open-topped castle barracks and trying to shelter from bombs being dropped from planes at night. Someone else fleeing threw their cat into the shelter with us (the cat was our cat Gandalf). The bombing stopped a little and Richard scaled the castle wall down to the ground. I followed, but first told the cat to latch onto my back, which it did with some help. I scaled the wall and then used someones back to stand on and get to ground level which got us into the a castle hall type of area. There was a large open-fire in the room so I made the cat comfortable there. I walked around and the room was like an empty marketplace with closed stalls. A few people from work that I don’t know well came up to me and I felt reluctant to talk, but they insisted on an explanation as to why I was still pregnant. I was holding a long pillow and I explained that I was carrying it just in case I got admitted, and they said that it was dirty and needed a new pillow case. I looked at it, and is was covered in dirt from the castle walls, but I couldn’t believe how rude they were being about it because I’d just scaled the castle wall with a cat on my back! No wonder the pillow was dirty! I was pretty annoyed and just wanted to go home.

Who needs psychedelic drugs?

I’ve read on more than one occasion that pregnancy causes vivid dreams. Now, I know the word vivid can be a bit subjective. What is “vivid” for one person may be just a hazy pastely smudge for another, but the word vivid just doesn’t cut it recently. My dreams aren’t just vivid – they are the stuff of lunacy, fuelled by what must be a truly psychedelic cocktail of hormones and emotions.Sure, I had a few odd dreams during the first trimester, for example, I barked like a dog in my sleep because I was dreaming that I was trying to convince my dogs to bark at a baseball-wielding psycho trying to get into the house. Instead they were just staring out through window from the house at him so, naturally I barked. You can imagine how funny my husband found that as he lay awake next to me hearing and knowing nothing of the story unfolding, except for the final part where I “woof” like a dog.

Yes, the odd bizarre waking-dream I can handle, but recently I have been bombarded nightly by mad stories and visions. In the last few weeks they have been progressively escalating in craziness and leaving me feeling like a nutter on waking.

I have now decided to note these here so that I can seek professional help in the near future if needed

Some examples from the past week

I dreamt I had to sleep at work because of our workload, but not wanting to sleep under my office desk like my colleagues, I was trying to fit into the small wall mounted bookshelf above suspended above my desk. I was convinced I could fit and be more comfortable on the shelf.

Then, a few nights later I was back at work in my dreams and my colleagues and I were making and hanging curtains for a lecture room in our corridor at the University (in reality we produce print and online study materials). I came back to our office and there were a few other colleagues from different departments using our office for a meeting. They invited me to sit at the table and share a curry. I ate with them but felt guilty that my colleagues were still making curtains. One of my curtain-making colleagues came back and it unfolded that we had just heated and eaten her lunch from the fridge. The others denied knowledge of the food source, leaving me as the fridge raider. She was angry at me in particular. I was mortified that I had stolen her lunch, absolutely ashamed.

Then, in the same week, in another night of mind-bending story telling, I had to hand up my last Masters assignment (which was in reality a year ago). So of course I took it to the local supermarket! The supermarket was closed, so I knocked on the glass doors and asked a tradesman if I could put my assignment paper in his wheelbarrow. He said that was fine, and that it would get there fine, so I scribbled my name and subject onto the front and put it in his wheelbarrow with his paints and tools! I came back out into the supermarket carpark and noticed a huge bus of Indian people. They were all sitting on top of the bus chewing what I assumed were betel nuts and spitting them into a built-in rooftop spittoon-type hole in the bus. I smiled and thought how great it was that there was a bus load of Indian people in town (in reality, I have been thinking about one of the things I miss most about living in the UK is the Indian culture within the community). However, I was so distracted by how happy I was to see them as I walked across the carpark , that I didn’t notice a taxi speeding towards me. I saw it just in in time and narrowly missed being run over.

I yelled at the taxi driver ” You &$&*£*£ idiot, I’m prengant!”. I was fuming. The taxi pulled over and a huge man got out and gave me some backchat, but I was up for a fight and felt overwhelmed by a protective feeling towards my belly – so much so that I started throwing a few punches (this is not me in reality, I am a very calm quiet person). I was like a crazy woman.

I continued to have a go at the driver willing my fist to connect with his face. My husband came over and started to try and fight the taxi driver. I was frightened that my husband was going to get bashed by the taxi driver (in reality he’s strong and would probably put up a great fight, but is also not a person inclined to fight). I put myself in between them both while they tried to get to each other. I got even angrier with both of them because they continued to try and fight knowing that I was in between them with a baby.

Then, last night, my husband and I were living in an old spooky mansion with a group of friends and had lots of house staff (maybe the household chores are getting to me?). Everyone was going on a pirate ship sailing adventure and we were due to leave – everyone was packing up bags and assembling by the door, the huge boat was moored up outside.

Then a doctor came up to me and said there had been a bit of mistake and that although I was pregnant, they’d missed an earlier pregnancy, and that although I had three months to go until giving birth, that would be my second child. My first was due any day now. I could not go on the pirate ship. I was in shock. He showed me the ultrasound showing a big baby which I hadn’t seen before and then a smaller baby which I recognised as being due in a few months.

My husband and friends went on the ship and I was left in the mansion with the housekeeping staff who were all really nice and made me some soup. I felt completely in shock at the prospect of now having two babies on the way and couldn’t work out what to do next.

These aren’t like normal dreams though – when I wake up at 4am on the dot after each one, the baby is kicking and I lie there feeling mentally exhausted from creating them. I love writing, but have nearly had enough of this sleep-writing.

Times are a changin’

I was looking around for some medieval woodcut clip art (I know, my interests are a little eclectic) and I felt drawn to this one which depicts medieval woman taking a urine specimen to her doctor. Perhaps this is a depiction of the earliest pregnancy test? The doc looks a little scary in his little booth in his fancy robes and scary tools hanging on the wall, scrutinising her flask of wee. She waits with her little basket to get her wee wee returned. I think 21st Century pregnant woman has it ok so I now know not to complain about my recent visit to a disinterested doctor – it could be worse!

Woman visiting a doctor, who examines her urine flask; from the Mer des Hystoires, Paris 1488-89.

Source: http://www.godecookery.com/clipart/clart.htm

Bend it like Beckham

For at least a week now I have been feeling unmistakable kicking movements from within. I’m at 20 weeks. At first, they were quite subtle and I wasn’t too sure if was the baby bending it like Beckham, or my digestive system making waves.

Now I quite clearly have the occassional five-a-side-football game going on and can even get a wriggle by request by lying on my back. Driving to work listening to Wolfmother caused the little one to mimick a mosh pit. Glad to see the newbie leans towards having an indie taste in music.

I also relented to the belly and went into a maternity clothese store today. It felt like entering a masonic hall (masonry is very big in my family tree so I get grew up with the vibe). There were other new initiates there – girls who had bellies too. I was not alone! At first, it all felt alien. I meekly touched all the fabrics and wandered around feeling lost, wondering if these special ceremonial robes were meant for me.

The helpful assistant must have seen my lost look and took me under her wing. She was very kind to me, and never once laughed at my newbie questions. She even showed me how to operate the special garments.

My initiation was complete when I entering the changing chambers with my three sacred extendable garments. I put them onto my body, stepped out and was immediately converted into a state of ancient comfyness. I heard equally jubilant cries from other change rooms as we all exclaimed about how lovely it was to have something that didn’t maraude the belly like a clawing tiger – and instead, was like a soft fluffy cloud cocooning the midriff.

I am still size 8 which helps with the psychology of not knowing where to begin with selecting clothes for my metamorphosis. I tried bigger normal sizes and ended up with a builders bum crack look every time I needed to reach ground level. I now know the secret of the extendable trouser – it is the gateway to eternal comfort.

The Grand Lodge Mistress (the helpful assistant) passed on some ancient knowledge, obviously passed down from a generation of wise crones. It was the startling revelation that my upper body half had grown all it would. What? I’ve only just migrated to a ‘B’ cup after a life of ‘A’ and I’ve still got space to fill in those B size chambers. I thought I was going to progress through the ranks of sacred cups, finally filling the largest of holy chalices – being award a temporary ‘bosom’.

My ideas for writing a PHD thesis on the age old question: “How does Lara Croft run and crawl through tombs with those bazookas?” seems all but lost.

The Divine Comedy

I’ve added a new category after a friend suggested that I should keep a pregnancy diary for recording all the weird bits of this strange transformation of body and mind. I’ve already missed providing you with the gory details of how many times I was sick, what made me sick and so on, (lucky reader!) so instead, perhaps I can share with you my over all description of the journey.

It’s what I like to call: Angela’s Divine Comedy – a first pregnancy

Although pregnancy is sectioned up into three trimesters known as the 1st, 2nd and 3rd, I like to be a little more descriptive in my naming. If you are familiar with Dante’s epic poem, ‘The Divine Comedy’ you’ll know that it is composed of three parts – Inferno (Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory), and Paradiso (Paradise). I liken this experience to the three trimesters of pregnancy. Let me explain:

Inferno – Hell (1st trimester)

The shock of the news so early puts you in the first circle of hell, a state of limbo. Am I pregnant or aren’t I? The shock was particularly evident for me as my plan of “becoming a mother in my 30s” was realised 3 days after I turned 30.

Shortly after, “the signs” start to become apparent. Lustful food cravings for roast chickens and evil fried foods take you into the second circle of hell – gluttony – and the third circle – revenge where you eat your husbands food portions to get back at him for all those times he offered to “share” your dessert and then ate the biggest portion.

You start to push your great weight onto others, bouncing off your husband’s beer belly when hugging. You have entered the Fourth Circle of hell. Here you start to want for useless baby paraphernalia and stare eagerly at personal Doppler and other prenatal devices where you can email the sound of your foetus’ heart to your friends. The mere shreds of common sense that remain are the only thing that stop you spending money.

The fifth circle now – hell of the slothful, – you lie on the settee, dozing in and out of what feels like an eternal sleep, waking only to press buttons on the tv remote control or consume more roast chicken.

Next, you get a hot at night and feel trapped in flames, Dante’s sixth circle of hell becomes a searing reality. You sweat – and not like a sexy model – like a cow in calf.

The seventh circle, the hunger peaks and you turn violent if anyone tries to intercept your passage to food sources. For the first time in your life you may find yourself grabbing for the last edible item in a shared food situation, where previously you would have politely left the last morsel.

The eighth circle, you feel you belong here along with the fraudulent as you sip water from beer bottles and make excuses for your growing belly and frequent toilet trips. You skulk around under baggy shirts and hide under your desk so that you will not be spotted.

Finally, the ninth circle of hell, bodily chaos ensues as freezing jelly is rubbed onto your belly and your bump is examined before hopefully getting the all clear to make the transition into the second phase – purgatory. You no longer keep secrets and finally can let your belly hang out.

Purgatory (2nd trimester)

Congratulations, you have survived the depths of hell and now face Mount Purgatory which is literally growing where your flat belly used to be. You start becoming attracted to overly sentimental music and take advice on listening to Mozart to increase your baby’s intellectual power. It makes sense.

You reach the gate of purgatory and meet your first midwife, an angel who acknowledges that your bump is becoming a mountain and people start to label you with a ‘P’ for pregnant. You are told not to look back and that the purgatory will be better than hell. The sickness will soon stop.

You find that purgatory purges you of many of the sins of hell:

1. Carrying your bump teaches you not to be too proud and start to wear anything at all that is comfortable, whether stylish or not.

2. You stop rebelling against maternity clothing stores and enter one, rejoicing in the feeling of elasticated waists.

3. Your wrath is purged as you no longer glare at smokers, but avoid pubs altogether because you can’t even drink beer.

4. You purge your slothfulness as your energy returns and you find that you can still almost run in a girlie pregnant way.

5. Avarice and lust is purged as the cravings cease and you wander into the gardens of earthly delights and pick fruits instead of burgers.

But yet – purgatory brings new lessons:

1. Your pelvis starts to move, not in an Elvis way, but it clicks in a wrong sort of way

2. You get fat ankles and your wrists decide that carpal tunnel syndrome is the best way for you to enjoy and appreciate your pregnancy

3. Brain cells dissipate entirely. Simple understandings like the difference between traveling clockwise and anticlockwise elude you; making even the tiniest decisions become epic choices.

4. The most intellectual stimulation you can manage after work is deducing whether the motion in your belly is wind or baby movement.

As I’m still in purgatory, you’ll have to read subsequent posts to find out what happens next on the journey towards the promise of the third phase – paradiso. It does exist, it does!

Cats that hug bellies

So far, Gandalf has been the only farm animal to react noticeably to the growing lifeform in my belly. I’m not sure if he can feel/hear the heartbeat movement (something which I have only faintly felt so far) or whether he just likes the comfort of a squashy pillow-like mountain that’s appeared suddenly in my lap – but either way, he likes to hug it and sleep against it quite a lot.