Woke and walked Mix. David arrived and continued with some of his last minute electrical operations. I had other things on my mind.
When I had gone to upload my diary entry last night I discovered that my web-page was down and in its place was a notice to say that it had expired. I discovered too that not only had my web-page expired but my email address as well, because it was tied-in with my web-site, had also ceased to function. I tried to make contact with the hosts of the web-page but it seems that they only work Monday to Friday during office hours and, in any case, their literature led me to realise that they would only deal with the person who took out the initial contract for the site and that was Andy my friend from Luss. So I emailed to Andy using another email address. In the morning (this morning) I was reassured to have a message back from Andy saying that he would be in contact with the hosts on Monday to have things reinstated. For now I will just have to wait – but I was grateful to have Andy on the case.
I went off to Duns to buy light bulbs for David, sweets for tonight, dog food and Mum’s Saturday morning paper. Then, once the courtyard was completely clear, I drove into Berwick to replenish my coffee and biscuit supplies.
Back home, David set off for his home to get ready for the evening and, I should have mentioned earlier, I got a call from my friend Peter to say that he now had a Dalmatian puppy which he was out walking. I’ll look forward to meeting Mungo soon.
By now everywhere was a hive of activity. Olive and Digger were at work on the food for the evening, Rachel and Anne were deep in planning their kilt-making and teaching project, Cathy was still reupholstering dining chairs and I was making sure that everything was ready for the evening. We all met together (‘we’ including David and Tom and our all-star cast) at six and folk started to arrive about twenty to seven. In all we packed around eighteen cars into the property and there was still room in the courtyard for quite few more.
The ‘event’ as I have been calling it, had as its official title ‘Folk for Gavinton Church’ and it fulfilled a number of purposes. Back earlier in the year our congregation was each asked to invite a couple of folk for a meal and make a donation to the Church. Tom and I decided that we would wait until we had a useable space and would fulfil that obligation by having an event. The second purpose was to declare the loom up and running in its new base in The Stables – and finally we wanted a deadline to make us get everything done so that we could then move on. In the event our evening fulfilled all of these criteria.
Our two hour programme started with the Jute Mill song (how appropriate) and led into a medley of Beetles’ songs (words supplied so that folk could sing along) performed by Tom and David. Next, introduced by ‘If it wasnae for the weavers’. Dorothy gave a spinning demonstration (complete with wheel and everything) and this led into a three song sequence by a real live Yorkshire folk-singer, Martin Heaton. It was really good.
Forty-five minutes into the evening our ‘resident band’ (Tom, David and Mark on violin) gave us half an hour of music for Morris dancing – Tom had moved from guitar to accordion – while we got everyone fed on stovies followed by trifle with custard and cream. Given that the Stables was heaving to capacity with close on forty people present, this was no mean feat.
The second half got underway with Mhari’s wedding and led into a sequence of songs in which everyone joined – and sang with great gusto: Wild Rover, Jock o’ Hazledean and Will ye go, lassie, go. Rachel and Anne were on next, introducing the loom and describing their plans both for it and for kilt-making in the borders. Of course, now that the loom has moved from a tartan area to here, it will start to weave Border Tweed as well. The final fifteen minutes, up to Auld Lang Syne, were in the hands of Martin and everyone enjoyed not just his singing but his playing as well.
But the evening didn’t end there. Informal chat (around the loom and between friends) continued for more than an hour, the musicians continued to play and soon some folk were dancing as well – a real testament to the floor we built just a short time ago. Then we had the cars to ‘unpack’ from the courtyard (we were glad of David’s lighting) and finally, after eleven, we turned off the lights, walked the dogs and went to bed. It had been a grand evening which, as we later discovered, had raised £352 for church funds. Fabulous even if I didn’t have my diary through which I could broadcast it to the world!
Just before I went to bed I popped my head into the Bothy and discovered that our four little birds were all back in their nest -- they obviously are not ready to leave quite yet.
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