April

Malham Cove

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Easter Monday 6 April 2026

Well there’s a walk to get your step count up!

The spectacular 230 foot limestone cliff of Malham Cove is our destination for a ‘nice Bank Holiday’ walk!

Golly – that looks steep!

Up to this point I am having the loveliest of days. A leisurely lie-in. Chauffered through the Yorkshire Dales by my favourite person. A tasty lunch of soup and sourdough at a trendy Skipton cafe. Blue skies and a rare bit of Spring sunshine and then… one very sheer cliff to scale!

Happily, in an apt analogy of life, climbing it isn’t actually as bad as thinking about it the trek ahead. Yes; there are dusty tracks and around 400 stone steps and yes; I do stop, at least once, feigning interest in ‘the view’ to catch my breath, but before too long we have reached the summit and the famed ‘Limestone Pavement”, resplendent in the April sunshine and a far cry from atmosphere of eerie desolation when it featured in the Harry Potter ‘ Deathly Hallows’ movie. Today by contrast, this maze of eroded limestone blocks is a lively scene of walkers gathering sit and chat, eat and drink and enjoy the view.

As readers of my blog will know, I love a Bank Holiday. Something about the communal day off, just fills the air with shared happiness and joy. Family time, friend time and a seemingly endless length of time. We wend our way back down, find a pub garden for a cheeky beer, before finally heading home.

Good times, good company … what more does anyone want from a day?

I was looking for a job…

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Saturday 22 April 2022

” … and then (they) found a job”

Heavens knows I’m Miserable now: The Smiths

As we move into the second half of April, two of my offspring find themselves on the payroll…

In the Scottish capital, Prom-dress daughter secures a job in a trendy cocktail bar and closer to home, in the pretty village up the road from our house, Small Boy is taken on at a local coffee shop. They are both very excited, well for my daughter, struggling to stretch a student loan to cover living costs, there is also a lot of relief.

Is it wrong, however, that I feel a little concerned?

Of course, I understand the attraction of some extra funds for a teenager and I also accept that I have never experienced the financial challenges and worries that today’s University students face. Nonetheless, I also know that one route to real financial choice and security comes from a decent set of qualifications and my question is this; can you have both? Can you get the best grades if your time is divided between work and study?

I’m not the only one to wonder. Oxbridge continue to actively discourage term-time work. But, in a landscape of spiralling costs, many students find that they simply have no choice because loans frequently fail to even cover the basic rent. Sir Peter Lampl, founder and chairman of the Sutton Trust, highlights the additional pressures on students from less affluent backgrounds,

“For many, wages from part-time work are the only way they can make ends meet …. It’s tough and it’s often the students’ academic work that loses out.”

Others point out that it is not only studying time, but also social time that is squeezed by the addition of a job into the student schedule, which can lead to isolation and stress. One student, in the Guardian Article, ‘How much part-time work should I take on while studying?‘ reported “getting really run-down and ill” and being “always envious of friends who could just concentrate on their studies”

Well ‘heaven’s knows I’m miserable now‘, that all sounds rather grim, so what of the benefits? Clearly there’s the cash, but does part-time job have any other advantages?

Reassuringly UCAS, in the article ‘Balancing work and study’ point our several plus points,

“As long as it doesn’t take up too much study time, finding a part-time job is a great way to gain more money, less debt, and new skills for your CV“

The cite a range of generic employability skills such as: communication, team work and time management. And, dependant on the nature or the role, point out that students can also learn various technical skills and that ‘above all, employers will want you to display the same skills in fresh thinking and systematic working that make you a success academically‘ . This positive view of part-time employment is echoed by several other Universities too, as well as, less surprisingly, most employment agencies.

The key seems to be the balance and two pieces of sage advice ring in my ears as I read through the various pieces of guidance in this area. The first is the recommendation from most course providers that part-time work, during term time, is kept to a maximum of 15 – 20 hours per week. The second is not to lose sight of why you are studying in the first place and to be prepared to lose the shifts if your grades or health start to suffer.

“Remember that you’re paying to be at uni and get a degree, so don’t waste that by running yourself into the ground”

Sound and sensible words indeed. I’ll keep it in mind as we enter the new world of the teenage workers …

Osma in Prestwich…

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Thursday 13 April 2023

In the late 80’s, a university boyfriend who’d travelled to visit me, in my home town of Prestwich, insisted on a pilgrimage to the house of Mark E Smith, sadly now late but ever irascible frontman of the Fall. Two weeks ago, another uni friend calls to say that we must ‘do lunch‘ at a great Prestwich restaurant that is featuring on The Great British Menu. Yes, all Prestwich, my childhood stomping ground, … who knew?

Is there no end to the eclectic mix of fame and fortune in this small Mancunian suburb? (Prestwich also boasts, to name but a few: Victoria Wood, Elkie Brookes, Arlene Phillips, novellist Howard Jacobson and Godley and Creme!) Well, clearly not; indeed I could be forgiven for feeling quite the serial underachiever as a local of these parts! But enough of my life reflections, what of the latest star on the Prestwich podium?

Requests from old uni pals aside, we have already been once, but when I frantically text my fellow diner with the exciting news that chef Danielle Heron is indeed now on the TV, we decide that we have to go again. So let me tell you our latest trip to Osma…

What can I say but… an outstanding evening!

Our waiter is a delight. Knowledgeable, attentive and fun. He also gets full marks for navigating the hilarious confusion my friend causes when mistaking the wine prices for the alcohol percentage. (Oh yes, it will be a while before I let this one drop!) And then comes the food. We share five small plates and each is sensational, I mean I write my fanciful adjectives now, but at the time after one dish I just have to tell our spirited server,

“That was bloomin’ fantastic!”

Influenced by the chef’s time in Oslo, the plates have a definite ‘Scandi-feel’; fresh and light but utterly full of flavour. In short, each serving appears crafted to make your taste buds sing. It also looks beautiful. What’s not to love?

The atmosphere is also friendly and relaxed. It is one of those evenings when 7pm becomes 10pm before you’ve even noticed. We are having such an amazing time, that we also share a desert and dawdle over coffee.

So would I recommend? I definitely would. In fact, I cannot wait until my other uni friend visits is the Summer to try out the ‘Lunch Menu’. Whilst the evening is all about , “small sharing plates … accompanied by wines and cocktail” the midday menu promises

“open Scandinavian sandwiches and hearty salads – using seasonal ingredients from local British farms and producers – alongside fresh juices and great coffee.”

Sounds delicious!

So for this evening a fond farewell to Osma, a definite reason to feel even prouder than ever to come from Prestwich, but be assured, I shall be back … it might even become a compulsion with me …

Easter by the sea …

beckyjo1252 Comments

Saturday 8 April 2023

Easter Saturday dawns and we hop into the car for our first family holiday since Gran Canaria in 2019. Llyn Peninsula here we come…

It may only be for a long weekend and it may be to a part of the world we are all very familiar with, as my family has had a caravan in this lovely corner of North Wales for close to 5 decades. Nonetheless, there is just no beating a family trip.

With my offspring now marching confidently into adulthood, this getaway is much about nostalgia and and the delight of rediscovering old routines. We breakfast, on the road, at our favourite faithful diner. Upon arrival we dig out the flipflops and sliders and head straight for the beach; beautiful Blackrock Sands and 2 miles of sandy coast.

The weather is glorious and there is much laughter and fun. Moreover, strolling along the beach and paddling in the sea with ice-creams feels a millions miles away from the urban sprawl of Greater Manchester we left only hours earlier.

We don’t escape the Mancunians entirely however as, to revive our legs after the walk, Small boy and I find ourselves watching a Manchester City (City, I know and to make matters worse they are spectacular) match at the rowdy caravan club with several bottles of much needed Peroni. Meanwhile, the girls have re-united with some old ‘caravan friends‘ and are catching up with drinks in a quieter part of the complex.

A trip to the fish and chip shop sorts out tea and after a little more beer and a hilarious rummage through the old caravan board games, it is time to turn in… and full of sea air and a little bit of alcohol we sleep like logs.

Next day, with our caravan friends we set out on a walk over the beach and across the hilltops to Porthmadog, the nearest town for lunch. It is a fabulously sunny day once more and the scenery is stunning. It is also quite a trek and legs are weary and faces wear the blush of exercise, as well as the first spring sun, as we toil back, feeling pretty proud of ourselves.

We round off our Easter weekender with a drive to Llandudno, which is actually a new destination for us all, before heading home on the M56 once more.

What a terrific few days away. I realise I’ve missed family holidays. There really is nothing quite like them for building bonds and memories. I’ll have to accept that, for my young adults, 3 days away with their mum is probably the limit now so …. here’s to the next mini-vacation…

Goodbye old shed …

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Saturday 16 April 2022

I am blogging today, glass in hand, from a deckchair in the sunniest corner of my garden. It is a lovely spot but it has come at an emotional price… we have had to dismantle the shed …

I mean the battered old beast needed to go! The roof felt blew away a couple of years ago, the timbers has sagged so that the roof frame itself was hanging on by … divine grace and the interior was a jumble of cobwebs, damp rugs and other decaying detritus that no-one had dared to investigate for half a decade. Nonetheless as it taken apart, beam by beam, it feels a little sad and, as the children’s ‘Secret Club rules’ re-emerges on an inner wall my heartstrings are well and truly tugged …

The Shed; my very first purchase as we relocated from our ‘down south’ life back to the Northwest. Our rented property had a huge garden and whether out of guilt, panic or sheer hysteria, I decided to seal our move with an idyllic garden house for the trio of toddlers I had dragged over 200 miles to ‘start afresh’.

At the local garden centre, this wistful honeysuckle of a notion quickly descended into the typical tense scene most shopping trips with under 7s become. I located the shed that fitted my budget, a charming little house with windows and a latch door…my offspring had other ideas. As I reeled around wondering where on earth any of them were, they kept appearing inside the more deluxe end of the garden building market

“We need to get this one mummy, it has turrets and a slide… wheee!”

“This one has two floors and lots of rooms … look look mum I’m upstairs…ooh we could sleep in it“

I grabbed and yanked them back into line to show them ‘our little house’. Well, to say they were unimpressed is a complete understatement. Tears, shouting, accusations and, from Small Boy, a full on tantrum, lying on the ground screaming with fury and refusing to move until I relented and bought the ‘one with the slide‘!

I vaguely recall bundling them all back into the car, arranging delivery of my chosen shed and driving home …for a whisky!!

Fortunately parents, as we all know the small people have very short memories and when my ‘reasonably priced’ garden shed arrived, the household rejoiced and they spent hours in there, their own little house, the perfect setting for getting lost in imagination and make believe. Indeed as we resume the final farewell to the trusty shed timbers, we do uncover and even hang onto several treasures. Plus I finally solve the mystery of where my washing line pegs disappeared to all those years ago!!

But the truth be told, it is several years since any adventures have taken place in the old shed. As toddlers grew into teens, no-one took their tea out to the little garden house anymore, nor spent hours in there hatching plans and scrawling important ‘rules’ on the walls. No, it was relegated to a dumping ground for odd bits of garden equipment and a delivery drop-off for parcels. So, whilst always in my heart as the venue of some happy times and laugh-out -loud memories, it is time to move on.

So I sip from my glass and raise a toast to new ‘good times’ in what is, after all, a beautifully sunny spot in the garden…

Edinburgh…

beckyjo1252 Comments

Tuesday 12 April 2022

“Whisky with your porridge Madam?“

It may be 9am, but I am on holiday, so “Och aye the noo – don’t mind if I do!”

Could I be in Scotland? I certainly could and after a fantastic few days in the capital city I can only conclude that having offspring studying at far-distant corners of the UK certainly has its advantages when it comes to planning a weekend away …

Edinburgh; the perfect venue for a short city break. The 4 hour-drive on a chilly Saturday morning, is quiet and clear. Upon arrival, we find Prom-dress daughter and grab a quick lunch before .. and here is the genius move parents … we wave farewell to Small boy and his sister, who joyfully head off to explore student life without their mum in tow. Meanwhile, my friend and I check into a nearby B&B and from there step out to indulge in a couple of days of teen-free time and … it is glorious!

Edinburgh is a city of two halves, the Old and New Towns. We dive into the Old Town and, in the short time we have, never really make it out again! (I suppose there is always ‘next time’ for the Georgian splendour of Princes Street and the Waverley Gardens). We wander the famous Royal Mile, with its cobbles, colour and many wonderfully named adjoining streets; Fleshmarket Close, Candlemaker’s Row, Cowgate, and Circus Lane. In St Giles’s Cathedral, we find the choir mid-rehearsal and pause to marvel as the beautiful voices and organ chords float through the gothic columns.

We join the ‘Dark Side‘ tour to walk the streets as night falls and learn more. The two hour experiences takes us as far as Arthur’s Seat and through several graveyards and dusky alleys as we are regaled with tales of poor Mary King, treacherous Burke and Hare and tales of witchcraft and fairie folklore.

It makes quite an impression and inspires us, the following day, to delve further into some of the objects and stories at the excellent Surgeon’s Hall Museum and the Edinburgh Museum. And all of this walking and sightseeing is mighty thirsty and tiring work, so we are also delighted to to find plentiful refreshment stops and use these to sample the local food and beer. My ‘vegan-haggis’ pannini is not an experience I’ll ever repeat but, as the wise sages say, ‘nothing ventured…’

On our final evening we do reunite with my two younger children at a trendy eatery is the Grassmarket area. They have also had a great time and as I still have … well half the city to explore … I raise my final whisky cocktail to , ‘the next time…’

April ends…

beckyjo125Leave a comment

30 April 2021

We survive 30 crazy days. I’m trying to fathom English Summer exam regulations as a teacher. Prom-dress daughter is stuck in the middle of it as a stressed and strained A level student. The goal posts change daily, the assessments seem never-ending. But we keep going and, out of the blue, we get our reward.

I am driving home from work on Thursday when an excited voice bursts through on the hands-free

“Mum …I got into Edinburgh!”

Its her top choice and they have certainly kept us waiting! The UCAS form went in before Christmas, tomorrow it is May. But I push all this aside because they have finally given my little super star a (reduced) offer and she is over the moon.

We celebrate with wine and chips. We spend a joyful evening browsing Uni accommodation. And the change in my lovely girl’s spirits: her smile, her radiance, the light in her eyes…it is just beyond compare.

So farewell April 2021. You will ever have a place in our hearts…

Flowers…

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Sunday 25 April 2021

Flower,  they have become my weekly treat

It all began in Lockdown 1. As people, fearful to leave the covid-safety of their home and fortress, flocked to sign up for online grocery shopping, I, a confirmed devotee of the doorstep delivery was forced off the schedule for the first time in about 10 years.  Yes a decade of  whipping through the weekly food shop with a swift half hour of laptop clicks from the sofa … came to an abrupt end. It was simply impossible to get a slot unless I could foresee fluctuations in the food cupboard at least a fortnight in advance.  So it was farewell to the time-saving lifeline my brother had signed me up for the week I became a single parent, and … hello to the supermarket shelves once more.

Was it terrible? Can I be frank; it really wasn’t. Let’s face it, there wasn’t much else to do! But, as I was often the only person to leave our house for an entire week, I found myself feeling duty bound to return to the homestead with treats to boost morale. We stocked up on alcohol, we groaned under the weight of endless snacks and I bought flowers. And long after, the unhealthy options have dwindled away the beautiful blooms have stayed, because…who doesn’t love flowers?

Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, Monet’s Water Lilies, O’Keeffe’s White Iris; artists have been drawn to the beauty and evocative qualities of flowers for centuries. In poetry Wordsworth immortalised the daffodil and the poppies of Flander’s Field, so fragile yet so resilient, are honoured as our symbol of remembrance in John McCrae’s poignant verse. Flowers are woven into popular culture too, from the ‘Flower Power’ of the 1960’s to  Portugal’s Carnation Revolution; today, in fact, marks the anniversary, in 1974, of the peaceful overthrow of the Estado Novo dictatorship, where carnations, placed into soldiers’ rifles became the enduring image of the movement.

As I wander happily around Tesco’s flowery displays however, I think I am mostly drawn in by my own fond memories of flowers? As gifts go, they are hard to beat! Its is many years since I turned eighteen and I do struggle to remember much about the day, but I can still picture my boyfriend appearing at the door with a bouquet of 18 red carnations. I know that I got married with white roses. The flowers on my desk the Monday morning after I dropped my eldest child off at university made me smile .. and made me cry. Because, of course, flowers are beautiful and it is undeniable that bringing the loveliness of the natural world into our home never fails to lift the mood or brighten the room.  But I think flowers are even more than that. They say , ‘you’re special‘  ;  they say ‘I’m thinking of you‘ ;  they say ‘you matter‘.

And, during the craziness of this pandemic,  that’s a message it’s been important to being home every week from my trip to the Tesco aisles. In fact, even as we thankfully start to return to normal,  I think I might hold onto our new floral tradition. A lovely lasting legacy of this strangest of covid-years…

The great outdoors …

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Sunday 18 April 2021

Week 2 of the Easter Holidays; the sun shines, at times the snow even falls, but the big news is that pubs and cafes re-open for outdoor hospitality. Our politicians and leaders caution us to be careful and ‘take this next step safely’, but it is hard not to feel just a teeny bit giddy…

In our household, we all get out to meet our friends! Lunches, brunches, take-out picnics, shopping trips and alcoholic tipples. Gosh it does feel great …. even though it is all in the fresh air. Because, I had previously dismissed the notion of ‘outdoor hospitality’ as a terrible concept when it was first muted in February. How happy I am to be proved wrong! Sitting outside – I’d venture that it actually adds to the experience.  But why?

Here in the bracing North of England, we are a perfect stomping ground for your ‘good muddy walk’, but are not traditionally associated with alfresco dining, so is it just the novelty? Very possibly. Re-thinking, re-invention and innovation are very much part of our 21st Century world and the phenomena of falling a little bit in love with the pandemic driven pavement culture has been seen in other urban areas too.  In December 2020, in his Guardian article “Outdoor dining has been a Covid bright spot. Let’s make it permanent”, Gene Marks reports on the decision to extend outdoor permits in New York and the drive to address some issues so that this can be replicated across other US cities too. Marks recognises that eating outdoors isn’t actually new, rather,  like ‘like work from home, e-commerce and virtual meetings‘ it is a trend that has been accelerated by lockdown restrictions. Additionally,  it offers cities a chance to re-invent themselves as we emerge into the ‘new normal’

“As we begin a long-term recovery, we’re proud to extend and expand this effort to keep New York City the most vibrant city in the world. It’s time for a new tradition.”

City Mayor New York City

In an era where we have been drilled to ‘follow the science’, the glad tidings are that scientist too support the benefits of the outdoor culture. Countless articles suggests that being outdoors boosts our mood, our creativity, our vision and our immune system.  It makes us feel better and also be better! The Huffington post, in its article ‘Here’s proof that going outside makes your healthier‘ finds that exercise feels easier and is proven to be more motivating when outside.   An ‘Ask the Scientists‘ summary by Sydney Sprouse, claims that it can even help us to live longer!

A 2015 study followed 108,630 American women to determine the relationship between nature and longevity. Women who lived near parks, lawns, trees, and forests had significantly lower mortality than women living far from nature. 

And it doesn’t have to be about venturing far or extreme physical challenges, bringing nature and the outdoors closer to us, via gardens plants and even views of the natural world from a window will also bring benefits. Essentially there seems to be no right or wrong way to get outside, so as it is currently our only way to start re-connecting with all the people we have missed for so long I say what better combination than fresh air and… delicious refreshments?

Yes, chinwagging over an alfresco latte, can be a touch chilly at times, but for me it’s a big thumbs up to digging out the layers and popping a pair of mittens into my handbag. Feel a bit continental! Feel the outdoor glow on those cheeks. Feel a frisson of excitement as you balance those sunglasses on your head once more. Outdoor hospitality – I am a definite convert…

DI …just whY?

beckyjo125Leave a comment

Friday 9 April 2021

Lockdown – it does strange things to a person who likes to be busy!

Week one of the Easter Holidays and I make it my quest to sort out the mess with my daughter’s covid-19 vaccine. I reach the first step of the complaints procedure, for our GP practice, receive a very nice call from the practice manager and we have a Pfizer clinic date in the diary before tea-time on Tuesday. And that leaves the rest of the week free. Dangerously free. I am very tempted to start on a mountain of paper work for school, but sternly tell myself that I need a break. And thus, for reasons I can only attribute to Locked-down madness, I find myself tottering up the stairs towards my bedroom … armed with rollers, tins of paint and dust sheets. Why did nobody stop me?

The daring ‘feature’ wall is painted without incident and I move confidently onto the rest, sloshing generous amounts of ‘Magnolia’ into a fresh tray. In my defence, how was I to know that there was a hole in the thing? I do wonder why there seem to be growing puddles of paint on my expertly strewn dust sheets, but put it down to a little initial over-enthusiastic pouring and roller on with vigour, blissfully unaware of any issues. It is only as I move the tray from ground level to the top of my ladder, in readiness for those final tricky high bits, that the leaky tray is unmasked. Paint drips from the bottom of the tray onto my hair, my surprised face and my long suffering ‘painting shirt. In the blink of an eye, albeit not my gunked up lashes, I am a Magnolia mess!

Fortunately I do have a spare tray and use it to stem the flow. Less fortuitously, alas, in all the confusion, I have failed to register the fact that I am also standing in sticky, spilled paint. I’ll be frank, the paint-covers are now so sodden with the stuff, it would have been impossible to avoid. As I potter off to find a sink to clean myself up, I leave a trail of magnolia footprints in my wake. The rest of the afternoon is spent in the company of ‘Dr Beckman Carpet Cleaner‘ scrubbing the floor and stairs! I decide to abandon my decorating for the day in favour of a very large glass of red!

Next morning I am up early and back on the case, with waning enthusiasm but a stoic acceptance that there simply is no way back. It’s the wall behind my bed. There is limited space to pull the bed into and so, for the higher parts of the wall, I cast aside my step ladders and elect to balance on the bed itself. Within moments, my left leg is slipping through the gap between the bedding and the headboard. I grab onto the top of the board, and wrap my arms around it to stop the slide but then I am completely stuck, jammed in by the mattress, pillows and several slightly soggy dust sheets. It is not at all dignified. It is far from my finest hour, but I am unable to move and left with only one option,

“Help!” I call into a silent house of sleeping teenagers

After 3 minutes which feel like a lifetime and several plaintive cries, a groggy Small Boy arrives, looks appalled, deals with the mattress and I am yanked unceremoniously back to freedom.

Tonight, I am recovering with at least one full bottle of wine. My leg is very sore. My back aches. The room is, thank the Lord, all but finished. Any final touches can, I vow, most definitely wait until 2022. I have paint in my hair, all over my feet (and my knees?). There have just got to be better ways than this to take a break from work… even in a national Lockdown!

“Zoom coffee anyone?“