I have some fun news to share with you all! (followed by a small favour to ask!)
Taking Smock of the Situation, my project to embroider and embellish Mum’s old fisherman’s smock has been shortlisted into the final three for the Creative Fundraiser of the Year Award!
It now goes out to a public vote, and I would be forever grateful if you could take a moment and click through and vote for The Smock (well, for me, Loïs Wolffe).
This all started as a bit of a whim, as something to focus my mind while it was trying to hold on to my stuff, as well as Mum Stuff, when her mind was getting increasingly confused with dementia. It was never really intended as a fundraiser, but it felt like the right thing to do, to try to help Alzheimer Scotland make sure no-one has to live with dementia alone. So, it feels like I am an absolute winner already just being shortlisted as a Creative Fundraiser of the Year.
So please, could you click here and vote for me? If you have a spare few pennies this month, I would be forever grateful if you could also make a small donation. Also, next time you see someone struggling in a shop, a café, or on the bus, wherever… think dementia, think they might not always have been like this, and with a bit of time and reassurance, maybe a gentle word from you, they might get through the day more easily.
Thank you, forever thank you.
***
Mostly on this blog I write about trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia, which nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching her old Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches.
If you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
Next element to be embroidered on the Smock of Love is a cape logo. I’ll get started on it this evening.
Your bonus is a close up of the label on a suitcase that went back and forth to South Africa a few times.
My Grandfather’s suitcase
As I wrote this, a new colleague had joined our team at work, in the role that I had applied for and failed to get.
I was still angry about how it had all been handled so very badly, and also, I guess, angry with myself for not having been “good enough” to be offered the job. My friend, J, reassured me that I was collateral damage in a shit situation, and I see that more clearly now. I also now adore my colleague who had joined us a week before, so all has turned out ok I guess.
The contents of that suitcase are still un-read, though I have dipped into it with my brother just to see what it contains – mostly letters to my Gran, from a variety of people, but mostly from her brother, Walter. I love how she had the closest of relationships with her brother, and as an echo down the generations I have a similarly close relationship now with my elder brother.
***
Mostly on this blog I write about trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia, which nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching her old Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches.
If you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
Did you think my wee swallows were finished in that last post? Well no! The one on the left needed a few wee extra stitches on his head… but now they are done and you see them in all their glory!
Tomorrow I will soak off the plastic that I use to keep me on track with the designs so we’ll see what it really looks like. We’ll also see if the embroidery threads are colour fast. Or not. Eek!
I haven’t told you how Mum describes my arrival in her memoirs have I? I was born at home and was 2 weeks late. Mum makes it clear that she was Not Happy that she’d had to feed the nurse who had been staying with us doing nothing while we awaited my arrival. Then the nurse had to go to another job, so off she went pretty much straight after I appeared.
I think I’ve written recently about being late. Yes here, if you’re interested.
I got some good news the other day, which I’m still smiling about. I’ll share it with you soon, but for now all you need know is that it took me entirely by surprise and it makes me see myself in quite a different light.
My main focus at the moment is this year’s #100DaysProject, which is a knitting project that I am designing and knitting day by day. It’s soothing in the way that knitting just is. And it’s also quite fun to see what it looks like – it feels a bit like gardening. When you plant something you know, in theory, what will appear, what will grow. But when it actually happens it feels like such a miracle. The same is true of my knitting project this year – it feels like an absolute miracle that I am creating this thing, that it starts as 8 individual balls of wool, nice wool, but just 8 balls, each containing 105m of delicious Shetland wool. And now it’s A Thing, full of pattern and coziness. And it will be wear-able. Eventually.
Anyway, off I go to do some more knitting. Or designing.
***
Mostly these days on this blog I write about my relationship with Mum as she developed dementia. Gentle meditative stitching her old Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me when I nearly broke, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches, instead of her deteriorating brain.
If you want to read more about this, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
I was going to see Mum today, but visiting is cancelled at the home this weekend (yes, Covid related), so we spoke on the phone instead, and she was sad not to be having coffee and cake with me and my brothers. I was sad too, to be honest.
But, as James reminded me, I have long history of not seeing Mum on my birthday. On my 10th birthday Mum was in hospital. I think it was for her back, or possibly pleurisy? Anyway, she remained in hospital and I made my own cake. The following day she discharged herself, so she could hand over a petition to a Government Minister on behalf of the A75 Action Group (which campaigned to improve the road, and therefore the communities along it). I was a petulant child, and never let Mum forget how she discharged herself from hospital the day AFTER my birthday. I haven’t forgotten, but I forgave her many years ago.
I miss her today as much as I did when I was 10.
In other news… LOOK AT THE SWALLOWS ON THE WASHING LINE!
I read this little slice of my life from nearly 2 years ago now and I realise how little things change. And how everything is different.
When I was still at school, I remember being miffed that one of my brothers had a summer holiday birthday, and the other a birthday just before Christmas… but me? My birthday was generally usually in that first week back at school. Oh the injustice! The more I think about it, the more I sense that as a child I thought the world was against me.
Being the youngest of three I was ALWAYS trying to catch up – either physically by toddling after my brothers, or in some other skill, like playing the piano (which I quickly realised was not something I would ever catch up on, so I gave up altogether despite still being forced to go to piano lessons).
One of my refrains was “Wait for me, wait for meeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” which I would wail from the back of the pack of Wolffe cubs.
I have an early recollection of then saying to Mum, one day, “Life’s not fair”.
Mum glanced over at this sulky child of hers and concurred, “Yes, Life’s not fair.”. In my memory she also said “get used to it” but perhaps I made that bit up.
These days I shout the loudest when I sense an injustice.
Because as was confirmed to four year old Loïs, “Life’s not fair”
The three Wolffe Cubs dressed as the Three Blind Mice. And our cousin Caroline as the Farmer’s Wife
Having said all that, I have thought for years that it was totally fair of Mum to discharge herself the day after my birthday. It was so entirely Mum, to believe that her world should not revolve around her children, and also to know that we would have other birthdays that she would be there for. But Dumfries and Galloway is a different place because of her campaigns for the A75 to bypass the towns it went through. And if she had not discharged herself that day, to meet the Minister for Transport, who knows? Perhaps it wouldn’t have happened.
This newspaper clipping suggests that it was my 14th birthday, and not my 10th!
The last birthday I had with Mum was in 2019, and actually I’m not sure exactly how we celebrated that year… but we weren’t to know what was coming, so I’m so glad that whatever we did, we enjoyed it for what it was, and not because it would be the last. We seem to have got so conscious of ‘lasts’ in recent years, and I don’t think it has enhanced any situation.
***
Mostly on this blog I write about trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia, which nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching her old Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches.
If you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
Regular readers may remember that I’ve participated in the 100DaysProject for the past few years.
In 2020 I created a large crochet blanket, with #100SquaresOfColour. And Mum drew a painting each day, until Day 83 when she JUST STOPPED. You can see an online exhibition of her Not Quite 100 Days here.
In 2021 I started embroidering meaningful designs on Mum’s old fisherman’s smock with #TakingSmockOfTheSituation. This continues to be a work in progress – I never reached Day 100, but when I do, I will keep going further. There is so much more to embroider, but I will only return to it when my head is in the right space to enjoy it.
In 2022 I again embroidered, this time adapting other people’s designs, with #100DayStitchUp
This year I’m both pushing myself into uncharted territory and falling back on familiar ground. For 100 Days (starting 1 June 2023) I am knitting colourwork with Shetland wool (one of my favourite crafts), but I am making up my own design, which I have never tried before. You can follow along on Instagram via #100DaysPlayingWithColour if you want. I’ll also occasionally post on here. Probably.
The colour palette I’m starting with is inspired by Carrick Shore, which is the place I go to (physically if I can, or in my mind if not) when I need rejuvenating. Carrick is balm to my soul.
Last year I used an image of Carrick Shore with words to create a collage. The poem Everything is going to be all right by Derek Mahon spoke to me at the time, though I know I could hardly say it out loud, without breaking at the line ‘There will be dying, there will be dying,…’. I imagine there will be more days to come when I cannot recite these words without breaking a wee bit.
***
Mostly on this blog I write about trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia, which nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching the Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches. I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
And if you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might imagine.
I did some different sewing today, if only so I could dress MaDolly. MaDolly is my early birthday present from The Captain and I absolutely love her!
My sewing project is a bathrobe which I’ll finish tomorrow, and I’ll give you all the details then.
The next picture shows you The Captain’s project – a barrel converted into a table with a fridge! It’s off to a new home though so I’d better not get too fond of it.
Weren’t we productive in those balmy late summer days of 2021?
Occasionally as I write this blog I go back and look at WhatsApp (other platforms are available) messages from the time to remind me what I was talking about, as well as what I was taking pictures of. Those pictures are the curated version of my life. The WhatsApp is more the real me.
I was going to go down to Gatehouse that coming weekend to see Mum, but a member of staff at the home got Covid so the place was in lockdown again and no visitors were allowed. I told my friend, J (who has a difficult relationship with her own mother).
Me: I’m not going to Gatehouse now, as no visiting due to Covid
J: Oh that’s pants
J: I wish I could gift you my Mama time (J had plans to spend time with her mother that week, though was considering cancelling it)
Me: It’s ok. I have mixed emotions about seeing her these days so I’m partly relieved.
Me: I wish I could gift you my relationship with my Mum
J: I wish this too
Me: there’s been enough goodness there to share around
So, there we were – J was going to cancel seeing her mother with whom she had a difficult (and that’s me being generous) relationship. And I wasn’t able to visit my mother with whom I’d had a very close relationship. If only we had been able to share the good bits of each of those situations. I so wish this was possible.
I’d forgotten about the time when I had such mixed feelings about seeing Mum. My brain has chosen to forget that bit, for which I am grateful. But as I think back, I can recall how it felt that each time I left Mum I knew I would come back to a ‘lesser’ version of her next time. I often cried after seeing her. Sometimes only momentarily, sometimes great big oxygen-sucking sobs and gulps. I guess it was good to let it out. And then that anticipation gnawed away at me, like some hungry tapeworm inside of me. And during this period Mum was not only random, which I found remarkably easy to cope with, but also frequently upset and sad. Sometimes this was caused by a UTI, but there also seemed to be times when part of Mum was genuinely struggling with her situation. It was difficult to know, as conversation was already somewhat limited.
To this day Mum has always recognised me, for which I am endlessly grateful (see the wee crumbs that we are thankful for!). But there were certainly times in those first months when Mum didn’t always immediately trust me, in that she seemed not to trust anyone any more. There was a lot of talk of certain people being ‘on the other side’ which may have referred to the war, but not necessarily. We tried not to analyse the content of Mum’s conversations too much – it was more important to get a sense of the essence of her when we visited. And there were, as ever, good days and bad days.
Let’s hope that today is a good day – I find the criteria for good and bad have changed dramatically in the intervening months… I have grown to appreciate a couple of hours of quiet sleeping, with perhaps 5 seconds of waking up and smiling that it is me, her favourite daughter (as I tell her).
***
Trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching the Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches. I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
And if you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
Blocking is the final stage of making something lovely out of yarn.
And today is a day for blocking on the terrace. This was a delight to knit and will be deliciously warm this winter.
Pattern- Sycamore by @harveyknits Yarn – DK from @newlanarkspinning Colour – copper green. (It’s more goosegogs to me but I love it)
I was nearly there, nearly finished this shawl, which was happily gifted to my big sister.
As a reminder, we’re selling our house. So if you, or anyone you know, wants to live this lifestyle where it can feel like you’re on your holiday every evening, sitting on the Terrace enjoying the sun going down, then take a look here, and get in touch with Fraser.
It’s been quite a big decision to move from here, but in the end it’s not been the most difficult decision to make. We’re both excited about the new life we’ll lead in Galloway, and we’ll always have the happiest of memories of living here.
So, we’re nearly there; once our house is sold we will move to Galloway.
I was in Gatehouse this weekend, which was hosting The Gralloch, which I might write more about another time. The wee town was absolutely buzzing, with around 1,000 cyclists (including an Olympian, a world record holder and a F1 driver) starting and finishing their gruelling 100km gravel race almost outside our door – the town population is only around 1,000 so it all felt quite busy!
Spending time with Mum was mostly peaceful – she again slept through my entire visit on Saturday, so I chatted a bit to her while I knitted, and reminded her how much I love her; I stroked her hair and held her hand as she slept on; I felt grateful that she seems so calm, so untroubled by the world and her inevitable transition out of it. I sense that Mum is nearly there, wherever there is. But the flipside is that she is now only nearly here.
On Sunday she opened her eyes briefly as a carer gently tried to feed her breakfast. It was both beautiful and sad to watch. There is such genuine care being given by the staff, such kindness; and it gives Mum such dignity. But I found myself unspeakably sad afterwards, having seen Mum so frail and hardly able to eat even the softest porridge as it is spooned into her mouth.
I know there will come a time again when I am able to remember Mum as she was, but I seem to have blocked off that memory for now, having found it too impossible to hold both her as she was and as she is now. The contrast is too cruel.
Mum (standing up) with her sister, Joyce
***
Trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching the Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches. I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
And if you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
This wee dude is nearly done and although I have one more swallow to stitch I’m already thinking about the next design. It’s going to be a cheeky wee quick one. And I’m already excited about it.
It’s been interesting today, just letting my mind wander. I was thinking how creative all my family are, and how I don’t consider myself creative at all. At least not musically or visually… but I know I am with food. Give me some random ingredients and I can create you a tasty meal. Today I made pita bread (there it is, puffing up in the pizza oven) and brought a selection of salads and cold meats and cheese and boiled eggs to the table so we filled our pitas then filled our faces. The pita recipe is from Ripe Figs, the most beautiful celebration of food, migration and a world without borders by Yasmin Khan.
Mum is an artist. She can pick up a pencil, a pen, a brush and draw whatever is in front of her. Well she could. The optician confirmed she has macular degeneration which explains why she’s being saying “I’m blind” for over a year. And I think this combined with her dementia means we will never see her draw again. I hope she doesn’t miss drawing, but I think she maybe she does, when she remembers it was a talent she had.
Mum never did draw again. And these days she sleeps most of the hours of each day, so I know she never will.
Thankfully I don’t think she ever did regret that she could no longer draw; she seemed not to know that she ever had that ability. So, while I feel sad at that loss, Mum never did.
We had hung one of her pen and ink drawings in her room in the care home – it’s a charming picture of her lush green veg boxes, overflowing with abundance, and surrounded by small creatures – swallows, a snail, a wee mouse, a spider.
In late August 2022 I was sitting with Mum as I embroidered – the design was adapted from a pen and ink drawing I had found in one of her sketchbooks, of silver birch trees in the Autumn. I showed Mum and let her know how much I loved stitching her drawings, reminding her what a talented artist she was. She did her funny wee scowl, looking puzzled, and with disbelief asked “Am I?”.
I talked some more about the ease with which she could draw anything in front of her.
She had no recollection of this aspect of her life at all. And what surprised me more, was that she had no curiosity about it, and no disappointment that she could no longer do it. It was as if I was talking to her about someone she really didn’t care for and certainly wasn’t interested in.
She hmmmphed at me, as an indication that she’d like to move on to other topics.
By this time Mum had lost all her curiosity in the world around her. And with that loss of curiosity, comes a loss of interest in almost anything. This was so very different to the Mum I had known for most of my life, who showed interest in everything.
I don’t say this in any critical way at all, or even with sadness, though I’d be lying if I pretended I wasn’t grieving for Mum. It is just a statement of how I perceived Mum, and how our relationship was at that time. In some ways visits with her became easier for me (I know, I know, it shouldn’t be all about me, but my experience is all that I can write about with any confidence). When she was losing her ability to communicate so well, there were visits when she would be distressed but was unable to articulate why. This distress was rare, what was more common was that we struggled after a while to communicate about anything much at all – Mum would tire, and fail to find the words she was looking for. Previously, when I was living with her I could finish every sentence for her when she lost a word – we existed as a team together. After several months in the care home this was not possible. I sometimes could not fathom what she was trying to tell me at all. So, more recently, when she lost the inclination to talk much at all, I took my embroidery or knitting with me and after a short chat I would tell her that I was going to get on with my knitting (or whatever) and that I’d just sit quiet as a mouse beside her. I often told her she looked tired, and she agreed that she was … essentially I gave her permission to snooze.
Perhaps we all need to be given permission to snooze some days.
***
Trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia nearly broke me on a number of occasions. Gentle meditative stitching the Fisherman’s Smock probably saved me, giving me a focus and forcing me to carve out time when I could let everything go and just concentrate on those tiny stitches. I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
And if you want to read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia, then you could start here at Taking smock of the Situation. Or just dip in. After all, if I’ve learned anything this last few years it’s that chronology and time are less important than we might believe.
This is fun! I’m sitting in the sun, mindlessly stitching and feeling my whole self begin to relax.
This wee swallow is beginning to take shape but I need to go and make lunch so you’ll see the rest of him later. Yes, since there have been so many days with no updates, I decided you can have double updates some days. Watch this space later.
I have just re-read something else I wrote at this time, illustrating how much I curated my life on social media to suit the world I wanted you to believe I live in.
My friend Juliet had asked me that simple question, “How are you?”
And I don’t sugar the pill with Juliet, I am able to be entirely open and honest with her. I said, “I’m not sure really. I say everything is ok, because it’s not awful. And I’m sitting outside sipping coffee and eating madeleines. And embroidering swallows. So it is ok by most standards.” And, honestly, by most standards it was.
But then I went on to say, “I’m sad. OK but sad”
And when Juliet responded with “I think sad is very acceptable”
I knew this to be true, “It is. Indeed. And I have madeleines”
So Juliet added, “And love”
And because it was on WhatsApp and sometimes you get out of synch, I then replied with, “Orange and cardamom flavoured if you want to know” and “An abundance of it”
I hope that wherever you are and whatever is going on in your life that you, too, have an abundance of love. And also that you have people around you who you can say how it really is when they ask how you are.
***
You might want to dip into other posts, or understand how we got to this point? This series of posts starts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; as her memories were being thrown around like so many pieces of jigsaw in a big box.
It’s glorious weather here today. And I’m on holiday from work this week, so after a lazy start and a walk with the dogs I made some madeleines. Oh my good god they are delicious!
And this afternoon I pootled a bit, then had a coffee break on the Terrace and did a bit of stabbing.
I called Mum late afternoon and talked about flowers for a minute or two. That was fine.
Now might be the time to state that I have never read any Proust. And it seems likely that I probably never will if I’m honest (and I like being honest).
But I had a desire to understand about the whole madeleines Proust thing (which is no doubt impossible to fully understand if I resort to Wikipedia instead of actually going to the primary source). Anyway, I now know that in A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, or In Search of Lost Time if you want the English translation, the madeleines are used to demonstrate involuntary memory, and how it differs from the partial memory of voluntary memory.
Basically, when the character in the book tastes a madeleine dipped in tea it brings forth a forgotten memory of his aunt eating madeleines dipped in tea on a Sunday morning. And I guess a whole lot of other associated stuff with that memory.
I get this. I had this involuntary memory experience a couple of years when I saw Mum spooning the froth off the top of her cup of hot chocolate in a café. I realised I do this whenever I get a frothy drink. I also find myself sometimes involuntarily ordering a black coffee with a wee jug of cold milk on the side, because this is exactly what Dad used to order, and sometimes his words just come out before I have thought about the fact that I prefer a flat white. I wonder if Dad might have liked a flat white, if they had been more readily available in his lifetime?
Anyway, memories.
Memories of memories.
And shadows of memories, ghosts of memories.
I’m interested in what we remember, and what we lose. What we notice at the time, and what we hold in our memory banks so we can revisit them later. I hope I always remember the woodpecker that had breakfast at the birdfeeder just 2 feet from my desk this morning. Will it come back to me, unbidden, if I see a woodpecker again when I am old? Will I always remember that moment it first landed on the birdfeeder and I held my breath, lest I disturb it? And how when it had its fill, it flew back up to the telegraph pole and clung on, in classic woodpecker pose, but this time not so close, so I couldn’t see the detail of each and every feather.
Also, I do love the photograph (above) of the ghosts of madeleines, created by the dusting of icing sugar.
***
You might want to dip into other posts, or understand how we got to this point? This series of posts starts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; as her memories were being thrown around like so many pieces of jigsaw in a big box.
Shewolfinthevalley 