Thursday 22 December 2011

Digging in drawers



I ran out of wrapping paper.


This is lining paper 
and some old Christmas ink stamps
which I found in the art drawer 
 in a huge oak plan chest which now serves as
a base for a spare mattress.
It's full of reminders of past projects -
lino cutting, collage, scrapbooks,
watercolours, charcoal drawing,
stencils, reams of coloured tissue paper,
hand made papers, acrylic paints,
calligraphy equipment, badge making,
wallets of glossy photographs, origami papers,
picture frames, sugar paper, mounting boards.
Like my kitchen drawer,
it is as revealing as an archaeological dig.

Speaking of which. 
We received planning permission for a small extension,
but it must be carried out under a watching brief
from archaeologists while the ground work takes place
in order to record any items of historical interest.
This is simultaneously rather exciting,
(visions of Time Team digging
exploratory trenches, bring in geo phys equipment
and whisking me into a helicopter to survey the emerging
Iron Age settlement)
and bloody annoying because this spells extra expense
and further delay.
I once worked on a rescue dig in what is now Milton Keynes.
We scraped very, very slowly with our tiny trowels,
and washed and bagged up countless shards of pottery
before the diggers were allowed to tear the ground up.

10 comments:

  1. I do hope the dig does not impede the work needing to be done.
    Happy Christmas. Thank you for your blog, support and comments.
    Helen xx

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  2. Exciting! Keep us posted on the dig. And I love your paper.

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  3. A fascinating combination of themes, Lucille, but I admit to just a little disappointment in the photos. The title of your post had me envisaging something rather extraordinary!

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  4. All my papers and equipment are stored under beds getting covered in dust, waiting for the chance to be freed again......... I envy you your plans chest, something I have always lusted after.

    How exciting re the excavation thingie, but can understand that it will be annoying.

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  5. There'll also be the expense of feeding the archaeologists, notoriously hungry people; I guess it comes of all that standing round in the cold. Crumpets and buns on the hour or else they threaten to find stuff that requires further investigation.

    I see you are in the lead carriage of the trend train with your stripy twine.

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  6. I must confess Mise I am in the guard's van with my twine. It was everywhere but I knew I had to comply.

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  7. Scraping very very slowly with tiny trowels sounds like my idea of Hell.

    But I did have a tremor of envy when you mentioned the huge oak plan chest.....

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  8. When you were digging here in MK, did you find any of the Tesserae that make up our Mosaic?

    I do hope that nothing exciting will be found so that the extension can go ahead quickly.

    I wish I had a plans chest...

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  9. All sounds very exciting. And I love your artistic posts. Your life seems to be very ordered and tidy and productive. Or do you too have your wasted days?

    Happy Christmas anyway.

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  10. Toffeeapple I was based at Wolverton and I think it was the floor of a medieval church that was being uncovered. We also had to sort through the spoil from ground that had already been scooped up by a digger.

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