Spring Bank Holiday edition

 

Goodness, it's a May Bank Holiday and don't you just feel like spending all that free time going down the country lanes, in the woods and along public rights of way with the sweet smell of fresh spring flowers on top of fresh air.

I cannot think of anything rather do to be honest on good day.

Some places have Bluebell walks where you can see and photograph them , planted in an ordered way rather like amateur gardeners often do which I have seen around here and yet others may grow in a very organic way in the woods. 

Of course in more normal times it wouldn't be spring without maypole dancing either in town and village centres or at spring school events such as fairs where as girls and boys we'd spend time practising the plait to music.

Surprisingly I wasn't bad at that given my co-ordination and ability to keep in time with others.

May Day 2020 round up

Hi. Today is May Day, which normally is a "bank holiday" but because the groan ups decided they wanted to mark V.E. Day which was seventy-five years ago instead decided to cancel May Day bank holiday and make Friday the V.E. Day  a bank holiday in its place.

They were somewhat late in doing so so many diaries and calendars are not actually correct and not as much of was planned for that is actually going ahead anyway.

 From my point of view then I'm running with what we'd normally do such as holding events in town or village greens and schools such as Maypole dancing which I loved for the music and dancing  spectacular it is as illustrated here by the girls in lovely blue dresses.

Unfortunately like with most things this year Covid-19 has been a party pooper spoiling to such events so in many places we've not been able to do this but I insist on holding to the tradition and the memories.

 While I was out exercising under the current restrictions this weekend I came by this lovely specimen and captured it with my Sony compact camera with the air much cleaner than usual so I could hear and smell the countryside rather than car fumes and the roar of the motorway nearby.

 I was pleased to see the return of Holly Hobbie on CBBC in the second series last Tuesday following the story of the teen schoolgirl country singer her friends and trying to "be the change" in her small country town.

The series has a good heart, does raise some interesting ethical points along the way but above all is entertaining with well drawn good characters avoiding stereotypes.

I seldom watch groan up television cos it does nothing for me .

May Day edition

After all that talk about going out temperatures got a little lower and we are entering May Day bank holiday over here which means schools shut and public services such as transportation shut down even though events will be taking place across this district and beyond.
Fortunately we've stocked up and I have enough spare minidiscs to continue copying some records onto and if I remember to record a half hour reading on Radio Four, the BBC spoken word channel of a Just William story which might seem odd given it's centred on an eleven year old boys fanciful adventures with much comedy but I loved those stories as a kid.  
They had me in stitches, laughing.

 One thing that will be happening in many communities is traditional Maypole Dancing  for those whose memories include applying polish to your footwear and having to have co-ordinating socks as we wove the ribbons to music forming a cross-cross pattern.
As is almost a tradition on this blog, here's a picture of Year 5 and 6 children this time  from the mainly Girls only Granville prep school performing it in style.

Mayday edition 2017

Over here in Great Britain, it's an official holiday so the banks and government offices are closed even though many shops will open not that in my district you'll be able to get to them as the buses are not operating!

 One things I do associate with May is Maypole dancing which is an ancient country tradition around much of Great Britain, sometimes performed by adults but often by children especially in Junior School (8 1/2 through 11+) where set to music we weave the individual ribbons together, at least in theory, as anyone who did only to find one person was out of step soon found out!
This is a lovely countryside animal drawing that shows the technique rather well and where I had my 8+ through 11+ education was in the country so we often went on nature rambles bring bits back with us for the teacher to lead a discussion of our findings and do some project work.
Before I forget, thanks for the 21st follower for doing just that and for other people that started to read this blog for the first time.

Maypole

Yay! A bank holiday over here so I'm able to relax a bit  read and yes write today's blog entry although the idea came to me a few days ago so i just jotted down the initial thoughts cos my short term memory isn't good at all.
Seeing it's May Bank Holiday I was starting to think about what kinds of things I used to around this time of year and one of the things that stuck in my mind was school maypole dancing

While that  picture wasn't taken it my school, it was taken at a school in Gloucestershire, England actually, it is very very similar to how we did it.
Those who had two left feet were selected as 'ballast' to hold the maypole down, the uniform was similar except the boys nearly always had shorts on and in alternate boy/girl pairings we'd dance weaving in and out creating the plait you can see from the top of the pole downward.
One difference is we have what in England you'd call 'Pumps'  a cotton with rubber soled gym type shoe that you had to clean and polish before the public performance with matching three-quarter length socks.
I use to take me ages to polish and whiten mine!
I was pretty good at it actually having a good ear for the tunes we danced to so we kept in time with the music as well as each other. Well it kinda helps, eh?