My Month in Numbers: November

Hi there.

That noise you hear? That's the sound of November exiting into the chilly air and swishing by ... on skis ... Which can only mean that [a] it's a touch snowy out there and [b] that it's time for another round up of my month ... in numbers, so here goes ...

Minus 5 = the temperature in our garden [in N.E England] last Saturday afternoon: 7 = the number of days in a row ... so far, that it's been snowing, which is why the hills out my window [my 'nab view'] looked rather like a Swiss ski resort yesterday afternoon:
One 4X4 = the vehicle which had to transport the clothing and craft supplies of 3 crafters for a 3.5 day retreat PLUS enough food for 3 meals per day for all 7 crafters attending. With all of that to fit in, is it any wonder that the boot looked like this:
Getting everything in the right place, without crushing anything was like a challenge from the Krypton Factor! However, there is 1 item I wish we'd left behind ...

Somewhere, in amongst all of that luggage there lay, darkly and sharply brooding, an evil smelling cheese. Being in the back seat for the journey, my nose sensed something odd from the offset ... but to be honest, I was too polite to ask the others what the smell was.

Cut to two hours later when, after returning to the car after a break, I was the first to open the door ... which led to my being almost knocked clean off my feet! While we'd all been eating lunch, the car had turned into a missile fuelled by vile gases! It was like a wall of stench.

Inexplicably, once we reached our destination, rather than throw the offending item in the bin, it was left on the window ledge for our entire stay: Perhaps it was to ward off evil spirits? Speaking of which ....

12 = the number of days after Halloween which we were hosting our own Halloween-themed crafting weekend away. Here's a small glimpse of how we transformed the charming cottage interior: And here's what we did to the outside:
What with that banner and the 7 skull embellished goblets we were storing on the inside window ledge ....
... it did cross my mind that the guests in the adjoining cottages, who had to pass by all our ghastly trimmings to reach their front doors, may just have toyed with the idea that they were holidaying in the vicinity of a cell of devil worshippers ...

All-be-it highly creative devil worshippers, here's a sample of what we all made:
2 x '12 Days' = November saw the second time Kirsty [Neale] and I ran our online workshops '12 Days'. And, although it feel like forever ago ... 9 = the page in the newspaper supplement in which 12 Days was featured and 2 = the number of years I've been blogging! All of which I wrote about in an early month-in-numbers post here.

12 weeks = approximately when we'll begin our next class! [Which seems scarily near - I think I really ought to be making samples instead of talking to you about cheese and snow ... but nevermind ...] For a hint at the theme of our Spring class you can have a peek here. We've had lots of guesses as to the theme on the secure 12 Days blog, none of which quite hit the nail on the head, so feel free to speculate!

100 = the number of blog followers I've reached - a kind of 'oh someone out there likes me' - milestone I was hoping to reach! My 100th follower even took time to leave me this lovely comment:I know we shouldn't measure ourselves by things as arbitrary as blog followers ... but we do and I'm grateful for those little signs that I'm doing something right over here some of the time!

So, seeing as how the batteries on my blog-follower-confetti-machine must be flat let me just say thank you to you Irma and to the 99 before you ... maybe this can make up for the lack of confetti:

And, last but not least ....

Tens of 1000s = the number of roosting starlings we saw on a guided walk, offered by our local RSPB reserve, to see the 'murmurations'! Isn't that an amazing word?

The murmurations are where the roosting starlings all flock together and sweep and merge across the sky ... and give you goosebumps and make you grin like a child ... you know the ones:

20 items of clothing = what I bundled myself in preparation in for the 2 hour-outside-in-the-snow escapade! This isn't the most glamorous photo of me I've ever shared here: But I really don't mind. It was necessary. And so worth it, for views like this across the frozen water alone:Even though the extreme weather made the starlings less fond of giving us a full display, we did see thousands of them flocking in, merging and them plummeting down into the same area of the reed beds until you couldn't believe they would take the weight. And the snow made the whole experience extremely magical.
So 'Goodbye November', with your cold,cold days, dark afternoons and freakishly early snow fall and 'Hello December' ... with .... your even colder days, darker afternoons and oh so heavy snow fall [I can hardly hear myself type it's blowing so hard against the window!].

Here's wishing you all a safe and warm run up to Christmas. I'm off out to measure the drifts in the garden ... just getting a headstart on my December Month in Numbers!

Julie x

p.s: As always, do feel free to share your own numbers with me, so I can see how your month added up too. :-)