Long Lost Project

The number of times I have needed a little bag this size! I remember now that it was specifically for carrying my pocket-sized camera that is just a bit bulky for an actual pocket. So that, when Pete and I are out exploring (I can vaguely remember us spending two and a half years doing just that, bliss), and we've parked up next to a field with a hunebed or monolith, or "pile of old stones", I can just pop in the camera and car keys and go.

I had forgotten all about this poor abandoned little bag until Carole reminded me of it last week. I retrieved it from the depths of my half-finished project bag and just got on with sewing up the sides and attaching the strap. That's all that needed doing. How insane. And I am completely over the moon with it. I now feel the need for one in each colour.

Also handy for trips to the pub; money, keys, phone, lippy. I might have to turn this into a blog about the combinations of essentials that will fit into my handy little crocheted bag.

Prototype

It needs a bit of work. I think it needs a chunkier yarn. But it's a start.

Dabbling

We seem to have slowed right down. While Pete has been dealing with some rather annoying shenanigans on the UKAirstreamers forum I have managed to read a couple of books and dabble with my knitting. I'm trying out a cup cosy to keep my tea warm while I'm sitting outside. It's like a little cardi for your cup. A bit daft really, but I just feel like experimenting. I must have unravelled it at least four times so far.

Perhaps I should make one to fit around my glass of red wine as well. It was getting a bit chilled as we sat around the campfire last night.

Borger

Axel kindly took us out a couple of times to see some of the hunebeds (stone burial chambers) which are numerous in the Drenthe region, and around some of the lovely neat villages, as well as for a walk in the woods. Apart from spending a couple of pleasant evenings which were topped-off beautifully with sitting around the firepit, swapping traditional alcoholic beverages, it also helped us to get our bearings.

One drizzly day we took a drive to the village of Borger where there is a very attractive and informative museum about the hunebeds. The tour started with a rather hypnotic and atmospheric film, without commentary, showing simply with images how the large stones (glacial erratics, I love that term) came to have arrived here from Finland after the ice age.

In the museum I especially enjoyed its large collection of reconstucted, decorated pots, and a series of dioramas demonstrating how the landscape would have changed with the advance of agriculture and the introduction of the canal and drainage systems. Although I was baffled when some text explained that settlements would have been built on higher ground. I haven't seen any yet, but the concept is more subtle here than we're used to.