{ Archaic }

My garden is a treasure trove. Really. You can find anything there. Our bonfire pit is piled high with old floorboards and bed slats, a hedgehog’s nest (don’t SOS, I would NEVER let my father make a hedgehog pie on the bonfire…never…I’m a vegetarian!), chipped ceramics and who-knows-what-else. Because I certainly don’t! We have pear trees, blackberry bushes, a hoarde of bluebells and grape hyacinths in spring, a small colony of brown-eyed Susans and a whole orchard to keep me happy. Plus a shed filled with paint cans of every hue under the sun, that smells absolutely gorgeous – of turpentine mixed with fading lavender. My favourite smell in the whole world!

 So yesterday my friend M and I were sitting in the orchard reading and just chatting really when we happened to gaze upon this old desk that has been sitting on the bonfire since we moved to our house, in 1994.  This desk goes way beyond 1994, however. According to the writing scrawled on the underside it belonged to a Miss Molly Cordelia Gilfitt (Cordelia obviously came back to haunt me!) in 1919. Can you believe it? Old is sad, and sad is happy for deep people, apparently…and I can see what that means. Knowing that Miss Molly is probably long gone now, but her desk lives on, made me feel so delighted.

The desk was chipped and bare and needed a good sanding, but there’s *nothing* a good lick of paint can’t fix. So M and I, we decided to give little Molly’s desk a tidy-up. We spent the whole day sanding and painting, careful to avoid the historic scribbles of Molly and friends on the bottom of the desk. And it looks lovely. Really. I can just imagine sitting in my beloved orchard with Miss Molly’s desk, doing my homework. I think it is Molly’s gift to me. So, of course, I just HAD to take pictures. Here they are.

And the desk itself, which I think looks wonderful…I can’t wait to find a little girl willing to pose with it for me. :) Miss Molly’s great-granddaughter? Anywho, I was just excited to find such a beautiful antique archaic little desk with such historical value – and with a STORY – and to be able to paint it and give it a little extra shine. I wish I had taken a ‘before’ and ‘after’ photograph but I neglected to. So.

Thanks for reading! Love Miss Lulu…and Miss Molly. ;)

{ Summer’s End }

Hello! How are you all? I was so delighted to read all your comments on my last post: glad to see you have not deserted me! Summer is almost over here, if it ever started. I love every season: spring for the hyacinths and bluebells and newborn lambs it brings, summer for the long hours of golden sunshine and the happy carefree feeling that comes with it, autumn with its crunchy red and crimson leaves is beautiful and I love the feeling of starting up at school again …. a fresh start. And winter - my favourite – for its snows and frosts and beautiful barren trees, and for that Christmas feeling that is like nothing else in the entire world!

 This summer has been an odd one here in England, with floods galore and politicians calling for aid for those affected, and ministers labelling my generation as the epitome of moral breakdown – especially with the shooting of beautiful little Rhys Jones last week. My heart just aches for his dear family. Yet this summer was a sacred one. This summer was the summer we have waited for for our whole lives – the summer after GCSEs, after those huge looming exams, when we would have nothing to do but laze in the sun and get up around noon. Now that always sounded terribly boring to me; I am a morning person through and through, I always feel as if I am missing out on life if I sleep too late! So it’s been a busy summer, with day trips here and there, and visiting museums and galleries all alone by myself whilst my friends sleep until 44 minutes past noon, and visits to the ocean and our wonderful trip to Canada.  38 books, 73 newspapers, thousands of images later: here I am. School starts on Monday and I could not be happier. Much as I love holidays, August makes me restless. There is not much news for all the important people are on holiday, the weather is too hot or too rainy for much and parliament is not in session so no interesting laws are being passed. I cannot wait to be in Year 12 – to be learning again, making new friends, meeting new teachers and walking through those halls again where my heart is at its most content. Yet as much as I want to go back, I have loved this summer.

It has been a rather lonely summer. My mother and father work full-time, and blessed are we that they do, for they work so hard to send us to the school that they do and provide for my sister and I. I am incredibly lucky in our world today. My sister spent two weeks in Scotland, nine hours away, with a friend and I was left to my own devices for those 15 days. I picked blackberries in our garden, sat in the orchard and read for days, I wrote poetry, and started up on my novel again, and I took countless pictures. I would sometimes take the tube to the end of the line, just to see places I hadn’t been before. It felt so incredibly independent. The girls at my school I saw sometimes, but not too often, and I was happy to do my own thing. I like being by myself. I always have, although I savour company as much.

So this image really represents my summer – just my flip-flops, me by myself and alone, yet happy (hmm does that gorgeous F/1.4 bokeh signify happiness? *sigh*). I love it, taken with my new 50mm F/1.4 lens that is divinity itself!

Thanks for reading my ramblings. :P It makes me so happy :) sad as that may be! Have a fab evening (and rest of summer), love Miss L.

{ Tagged! }

So. I’ve been tagged by the oh-so-lovely and amazing photographer Brenda, and the equally talented and so sweet Leah, AND wonderful Mrs. Angie Penrose! I have to list eight interesting things about myself, if there are eight (!), and then tag 4-8 (it seems to vary) photographers to do the same. Sounds fun! So, here goes. : )

 1. My favourite colour is white. I love its purity, and cleanliness - and its connotations with angels and so forth. I always thought it was a very… honest…colour. If you can have such a thing.

2. I sometimes think my life would be easier if I was named Cordelia. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely adore my name, and I don’t know anybody else named Lulu (do you?), but still. We always wish for what we can’t have, I guess!

 3. I sleep with a St. James edition of the Holy Bible (a Bible, basically) under my pillow at night. It makes me feel safe. The only way that could get any more interesting is if I was an atheist, LOL…I’m not. : )

4. I have a 50mm 1.4 on the way!! It should arrive on Wednesday and I am so so excited!

 5. I love school. Okay, you probably already knew that, in retrospect. Umm, well, I love it because I get to do all my favourite things there – read, write, learn, meet new people, see my friends…stuff like that. It’s my second home and I never ever ever want to leave.

6. I am completely COMPLETELY completely addicted to ice lollies. Yum. I find them so so sooooo delicious. How could you not? I don’t care what flavour, what shape, what kind – give me an ice lolly and you are my best friend for life! I don’t actually eat them that often because I am atrocious at making them myself (lol, how hard can it be? but, nope, I can’t) and my mum never ever buys them because she knows they will have been devoured in ten seconds flat!

7. My favourite thing about my appearance is my hair. It’s naturally very blonde and curls at the end. I used to have a whole head of ringlets, hence my nickname Curly Mop-top (don’t even ask!), but then it went straight. But now I am older it is curly again, just loose ringlets, and I couldn’t be happier. I love it!

8. My absolute all-enduring hero is Robert F. Kennedy (1925-1968). His triumph over moral evil, his courage, his belief in his duty to do right…I just find his message so inspiring. I think, had he lived, he would have won. I think he would have won.

 How was that for interesting? I hope I didn’t bore you toooooo much. : ) Now I’m tagging lovely Jeanette, beautiful Ellen, sweet Lottie and amazing Amanda! Until next time (and I promise to have a Canada post for you, Miss E, who knows who she is, this week sometime) !! ; ) I’ll leave you with a favourite, although old now, shot of mine. Your loving friend, Miss Lulu : )

{ Welcome }

Hi, and welcome to my new blog! Isn’t is pretty exciting? My old blog (which can be found here) was playing tricks on me, and has been for a while, and I am busy as banana jam, getting ready for the new school year  – picking up textbooks, and stationery shopping (my favourite!), and all that jazz – so have no time to sort out the craziness of Blogger blogs and folks. So I hope you won’t all desert me now I am officially a Blogger traitor! I’ll leave you with just one that I love…my funky lomo lavender : )