Aylsham Quakers

	Aylsham Quaker Meeting

Quaker Week 2020 Gallery
2-11 October

Pictures and thoughts for Quaker Week

From Mike Goodwin:

Our Farmers' Market Refill and Recycle stall which we have been running each first Saturday of the month since June. The project has been very well received and we have sold about £1000 worth of goods (washing up liquid and laundry liquid are our best sellers) and had the opportunity to engage with the community and be a Quaker presence. Good outreach we think!

From Vicky Mijnlieff :

Spotted on a recent walk past the allotments in Aylsham, these recall the sunshine we enjoyed during the months of lockdown. A strangely dreamlike time, in which days slipped by almost unnoticed, each repeating the one before it. The light though, in late September/early October, is different, low in the sky and diffuse. Gentler. As social distancing continues I feel that the world too is at a distance, in a state of suspended animation.

Quaker week. The beginning of autumn, the end of summer. The harvest gathered, harvest thanksgiving time. The nights draw in, but the earth still provides. 'Rejoice in the splendour of God's continuing creation.' (Advices and Queries 43)

Lockdown Gallery

Some pictures of things that friends have been doing during lockdown, or before. You are most welcome to contribute; contact Criss - email address in the Book of Meetings.

From Annie Blunsden

Well, lockdown was an opportunity to declutter. Reader, I failed. So, I had to go about it in a more creative but not necessarily exciting way. Every knitter knows there is always a “stash”. I have knitting yarn in at least three rooms in my house. I started to try and thin this out by making hats and socks for the Mission to Seafarers. Then I had a look at my fabric remnants and did what everyone has been doing and made masks. On the even more boring side I had a sort through my linen cupboard. I am making pillow slips from an old worn out sheet and wash mitts from an old towel together with a good few cleaning cloths. I'm not much of a gardener but Daisy's childminder gave me some tomato plants and I made space for them. Apart from eating them in salads, I have been making chutney with a good amount of chilli in it. Then I went foraging and more recently I have made jams and jellies from sloes, crab apples, blackberries and damsons. My house isn't decluttered by I have laid up plenty of stores for the winter.

From Jenny Vickers:

My singing group The Samphires met in gardens to rehearse and have since managed some open-air concerts. We love singing together and it has meant so much to still meet and make music.......

From Mike Goodwin:

Our "lockdown" was pretty full on with various children and the grandchildren deciding that our house was a good place to be for the duration, but we know we have been so much luckier than most. We had a lovely ten days away in our little van in glorious September weather, though the trip was cut short when Voky was hit by a car in Monmouth. Her wrist is broken.

Bob Ward has contributed these pictures:

The rainbow hangs permanently over the huge waterfall Dettifoss in Iceland. We went there in the 1980s. It's a fascinating country, though somehow we've never gone back. More water pours over this fall than any other in Europe.

We came across the ‘Have Fun' figure in Switzerland. Someone had evidently been running a sculpture workshop making use of natural materials

The lakeside is in the Bayfield estate on the edge of Holt. The lake is part of the River Glaven, our short but special local river.

We love seeing the banded damselflies there.

Iris grew in our garden.

The bluebell wood is along a walk quite close to home.

These are pictures from Annie Blunsden

Me and Tilly in the sea at Overstrand. She said it was her best day. I hope there will lots more best days.

A custard squash that I grew in my garden (I don't usually do veg) it was delicious in a ratatouille.

Our caravan pitch at Graffham Water. The tree trunks look like a piece of ancient coppicing.

Anne Marsden's lockdown pictures:

Food and flowers for 2020

Painting the shed (The Gnome of Aylsham)

Just helping

Unable to get to the shops - painting own birthday cards

Social distancing

Some pictures taken during lockdown by Criss Sandom:

At the end of our loke is a field, which this year has been planted with barley and rape. It has also presented a variety of wild flowers: poppies, wild violas, scarlet pimpernel and others I can't name. We have walked across the field many times over the last few months, watching the crops appearing, growing, ripening and then being harvested. It has been home to many skylarks, whose song has accompanied us as we walked.

The barley still green, the rape just beginning to flower, and Lucky leading us back home.

The barley beginning to ripen ...

.... and the rape

An evening walk - some amazing sunsets

The ripening barley and poppies

We're also lucky to live near the River Bure, and lockdown has given us the opportunity to explore the footpaths along the river and its tributatries:

Swans on the Mermaid

Trees near the Bure at Oxnead

Cows paddling near Mayton