Changes

October 25, 2025 sareenmclayLeave a comment

Education, salvation and *damnation.* Aberdeen with the beautiful gardens below.
(Central Library, St Mark’s Church and His Majesty’s Theatre.)

Recently I was asked to take a photo which would represent Aberdeen. Where to start, the imposing tower of the Marischal College, the miles of beach, the bandstand at Duthie Park? (Not to mention Old Aberdeen, Footdee/Fittie, I could go on …)

The photo is for a writing group.

I have been the local volunteer co-ordinator of The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI – or Scooby as it is known!) these past few years.

Our group encompasses Aberdeen and the Northeast but truly, it has members from around Scotland. It is a wonderful group of writers who support one another and provide insightful and helpful critiques as well as a whole host of encouragement and bookish advice.

Recently we made the decision to open the group to all, so you no longer have to be a member of the SCBWI to belong. Scooby has also been going through a lot of changes recently, hence the need for a photo of Aberdeen so our group can be mentioned on the website. I hope this photo does Aberdeen justice.

New members are very welcome and if you would like to join, please feel free to DM me on my Instagram or Facebook page.

The same morning I took the photo of Aberdeen, I nearly missed my bus. I was distracted, taking pictures of the clouds because, why not? I am always trying to remember the names of the different types of clouds, not very successfully, I admit, but it is fun trying.

Standing at the bus stop cloud spotting seems a good use of time, craning my neck to look up rather than down at my phone. The other day, when I began to think about what I would write in this post, I knew I had to include these two photos.

Today, I am on the train writing this up, trying not to be too distracted by the sheer variety of white puffs in the sky (one looks like a giant zeppelin!).

By chance, I bought a magazine for my journey. This time it was Prima and inside, guess what, you’ve got it, there is a whole article about skygazing. Gotta love a coincidence.

Positive psychologist, Paul Conway has coined the phrase ‘Skychology’ for the ‘practice of intentionally looking up at the sky for a few minutes a day to improve your mental health’. Love it. I didn’t really need a name for it, but it is clever and apparently the science behind it proves my sky gazing instincts were worth acting upon. I’ll need to do more!

Those of you who have seen my few and far between posts on Instagram, FB or Bluesky, may have seen these pictures.

For a few years there, I wasn’t too keen on the arrival of Autumn. Not that I could do anything about it, perhaps I just wasn’t looking forward to the colder days.

This year, I am embracing it. How lucky to be able to watch the trees and plants change colour.

The thought of time spent inside as well, being cosy with the opportunity to carry on with (yet another) crochet blanket, fills me with joy. Bring it on!

Wishing you all a very Happy Autumn.

I am reading ‘All Adults Here’ by Emma Straub (although by the time I post this, I will guarantee I will have finished it. It’s compulsive reading!) I bought it in my brother and sister-in-law’s fabulous bookshop, Book Moon in Easthampton, MA.

I am watching ‘Oak Tree: Nature’s Greatest Survivor’ on BBC 4 with Gavin McGavin.

Flowers · Garden · Hope · Latin names · Nature · Photography · Reading · Seasons

Spring Flowers, Sunshine and a Love of Learning

March 18, 2025 sareenmclay

A quote I read recently by the late Stephen Hawking made me stop and think. Then it sent me on a spiral of thoughts.

I wondered if there is a word for a collector of quotes? So, off I headed, straight to you know where to look it up and yes, apparently I am a ‘quodophile’. There you go then, who knew. Another label to my box.

Perhaps not a box, perhaps I am, as we most probably all are, a whole index card system of labels. I can’t after all complain, as I love to learn the collective nouns for animals and birds, or the Latin names for Flowers, Plants and Trees or to discover the names of butterflies, damselflies, anything really. A name is a starting point for discovery.

I digress.

The quote from Stephen Hawking was about intelligence being the ability to adapt to change.

Change is difficult, it is exciting, it is opening a new file in your life.

As I thought about the quote, more and more, I decided I would add an extra part, for myself.

Intelligence is also the ability to create a routine thereby when changes come, you have the energy and the reserves to deal with it, knowing there is a safety net already in existence.

Spring is a time of change. The lighter days bring us hope and energy. We wait in anticipation for the first signs of flowers peeping through the dark earth like little bursts of sunshine.

Often when I am considering what to write for a blog post, coincidences occur. Such as the primroses popping up in our garden just as I have been delving into The Brief Life of Flowers by Fiona Stafford to you guessed it, learn more about flowers.

Now, here is a book for those who love to learn. One which is filled with so many information trails I have to stop and search for them. For a knowledge collector like me, a book like this is heaven.

There I was scurrying off to look up John Clare’s poem, ‘Primroses’, and John William Inchbold’s, ‘A Study in March’.

Then off I went down another rabbit hole to research women who were botanical painters.

The primroses in our garden have been returning year on year. Time and again I have split them. What began as two plants have given me many, many more. Now, all around the garden, there are bursts of small yellow flowers contrasting with the size of their large, floppy green leaves.

Is it with a gardener’s eye I look at them now? Noticing not only their beauty, but when they appear, which plants are flowering and which ones will need dividing. For of course, is that not the role of a gardener, to be constantly thinking to the future. There, another label for me, a gardener. Definitely a label I would pin to my lapel with pride.

Thoughts of the future have also drawn me to the past. It was after all, on a trip to our local garden centre with my parents that I bought the original primroses. There are many plants in our garden that were gifted to us by my parents; sedum (Hylotelephium), anemones, a tiny lilac tree. On occasion I will find myself talking to these plants, memories drifting back of my parents’ visits and although I know I have adapted as best I can for the moment, to the changes that have taken place in our lives, as I see their flowers emerge, the routine of the garden is of great comfort to me.

Being perhaps foolhardy, I have sown some seeds, teasel and sweet peas. Very early for here but, the sun is shining and there they were. Fingers crossed!

One final note:

A lovely friend sent me this article by Susie Dent. As a logophile, I love learning new words (okay, I know, I have already said, I love learning full stop) so this made my day to learn that I am a librocubicularist – I thought perhaps I was just lazy! Yet another label, and I am okay with that.

So, there we go, some random thoughts on learning and springtime. Wishing you all much joy as the spring flowers appear.

Do you have a favourite word or springtime flower?

I am reading: (so many books, you wouldn’t believe it – and yes there is a TBR pile on the bedside table!)

Wind Swept: Why Women Walk by Annabel Abbs

The Wonder by Diana Evans

The Book of Tree Poems, an anthology edited by Ana Sampson

In The Hedgerow by Nathalie Tordjman, illustrated by Sylvaine Perol

It would be lovely if you would like to pop over to www.mybookcorner.co.uk where you can read my reviews of books for children. There is the opportunity to sign up for the newsletter there as well, providing you with great recommendations sent straight to your inbox.

Birds · Flowers · Happy · Hope · Inspiration · Nature · Trees

Forest Fauna and Flora

July 8, 2024 sareenmclay

Sometimes you are lucky enough to find somewhere magical. Where you feel transported to a time and place of tranquility. In those moments, all else can, surely must be, forgotten to fully embrace the experience.

Black Spout waterfall and wood at Pitlochry is, for me, one such place. It left me filled with wonder and an amazing sense of peace. Perhaps it’s the lushness of the greenery this year. So much rain followed by days of sunshine.

To walk in the forest was to feel the softness of the paths underfoot. To listen to the birdsong: chaffinch, coal tit, grey and white wagtails was to smile at those wagging tails. To feel the soft, velvet of a hazel leaf and to admire tiny newly forming hazelnuts.

To my delight, there were oak trees of every size and shape. I thought of how their burls may be labelled as an ‘imperfection’, and yet their many layered beauty was undeniable. Useful too, they are often sought after by those who work with wood. No two burls are ever the same, with their layers and patterns. How wonderful that, in nature, we celebrate individuality.

There was no way I was going to miss the opportunity to hug a tree. To feel the smoothness of the moss on one side as opposed to the rivulet-like bark on the other. How amazing to consider its lifetime as I stand in silent awe.

It made me think of ‘birch tapping’ where the sap of the birch trees is collected to drink. I thought of all the water running through the tree. Of course, it could have been the water running over the Black Spout waterfall that made me think of this! An excellent viewing platform has been built and, if you carry on further up the path, you come to a beautiful section where there are large flat rocks above the waterfall.

When not hugging trees, I was using my phone to identify birdsong and plants. Wood avens, speedwell as well as cow parsley to name a few. What a complete distraction from everyday life. My visit to Black Spout wood, in such good company too, was a joy.

I am reading ‘Why Women Grow’ by Alice Vincent.

Big Butterfly Count begins on July 12th!

I do love a newsletter. Here are a few I’ve been reading:

Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet Zine

People’s Friend and so exciting for me, they have bought two more of my stories!

Eleanor Mills – Queenager

Stuart White – Write Mentor

Podcast – Dacher Keltner The Thrilling New Science of Awe

Thank you for reading! Is there a place that is special to you or a newsletter you would recommend?

Books · Happy · Hope · Inspiration

A Special Memorial: Betty’s Reading Room

September 12, 2022September 13, 2022 sareenmclay5 Comments

I wondered whether to post this blog but on thinking about it, I think it is the perfect time to think about how we celebrate the lives of those we have loved.

In this busy, busy world of ours, amidst all the hustle and bustle, we are encouraged to take time to slow down. We should stop and just ‘be’ for a moment. Use our senses to take in the world around us. Sometimes that can be so much harder than others. However, if we are lucky enough to physically be in a place that lends itself to that, then surely it must make this challenge easier.

Of course, we can’t always be physically in such a place but we can use the wonderful power of our minds to take us somewhere else. (Perhaps a bit of a ‘Beam me up Scotty’ sort of a moment!) If I need a picture in my mind of a place that is calm and peaceful, then I can take myself back to sitting on the cliffs at Marwick Bay on Orkney. I can remember the smell of the fresh sea air, almost feel the brush of the wind on my face and hear the seabirds calling as I watched a group of four puffins bobbing on the water below.

On our way to the Bay, we spotted a hare standing in a field. Its long ears pointed skyward in the sunshine. Another day we saw four more hares – more than I’ve ever seen in my life. That was until we visited a place that not only offered me peace but hope.

I write of a little cottage in the small village of Tingwall on mainland Orkney. A cottage donated to a couple who had the wish to create a special and unique memorial.

Betty Proctor was a very good friend of Craig Mollison and Jane Spiers. When Betty passed away after an operation, Craig and Jane decided they would organise a memorial with a difference. The result is the wonderful, ‘Betty’s Reading Room’. A tiny cottage filled from floor to ceiling with second hand books. There are comfy sofas, one covered in a specially handmade beautiful blanket, fairy lights strung from the rafters, lanterns, a stove and everywhere, hares. There is a lovely photo of Betty holding a hare, she must have loved hares!

Every visitor is invited to spend time in the reading room and, if they would like to, they can choose a book to take home with them. If it’s possible, they are asked to pop a little into the next charity box they see. For each book there is a label that the visitor can stick inside and, when they have finished reading it, they can pass it on to someone else. And so the chain of kindness spreads.

On a table lies a book for visitors telling the story of how the reading room came about and all who helped to make the vision of Craig and Jane come alive.

Look out for the stain glass window and also the mermaid sculpture by Frances Pelly

To have inspired such an outpouring of love, Betty truly deserves to be in our thoughts. Once again it is the kindness of others that I love and appreciate. The fingers of joy that are spread when a hand is held out to help others.

So I would like to say thank you, to Craig and Jane and all the others who created this wonderful room but also to Betty Prictor. What an inspiration to us all.

I am at the start of ‘A Long Petal of the Sea’ by Isabel Allende and have just finished ‘The Penguin Lessons’ by Tom Michell which I would thoroughly recommend!

Books · Flowers · Friendship · Happy · Hope · Inspiration · Nature · Writing

A Six Step Starter Plan / Winter Warmers

March 18, 2022March 21, 2022 sareenmclay1 Comment

I don’t know about you but 2022 , well, I can’t decide if it got off to a slow start or is just flying on through.

I wrote this post a couple of weeks ago but had a few technical issues (the format of the photos changed and I didn’t know what to do!), anyway, I decided just to post it. After all, so much of it can apply at anytime. Hope you have a good day!

Sometimes I think I have magpie tendencies. I like nothing better than to gather together bright shiny strands from all parts of my life. This then, helps me to build a sort of collage picture of hope.

I don’t think I’m alone in finding January and February a bit challenging but this is the recipe I’m using right at this very minute to help me and I hope that in some way it may help or inspire you too.

Taking a look around the garden and spotting this sedum popping through.
Lighting candles and then taking time to read.
Going to the Zandra Rhodes exhibition – an absolute explosion of colours, pattern and inspiration!
Listening to a podcast. At the moment my favourite is Viv Groskop’s, ‘How to Own the Room.’
Writing, of all kinds.
Going for a walk.

At times like these, when the dark winter days are slowly, slowly changing to the brighter days of spring I remind myself it can be a good thing to think small to get started with. Progress doesn’t have to be big to be effective. So it was interesting for me to read the title Anya Hindmarsh chose for her autobiography: ‘If In Doubt, Wash Your Hair’. In fact it made me laugh as, over the years, I’ve developed my own wee routine for those days of doubt.

So here it is, my six-step plan. For the days when I wake up and don’t know where to begin.

Any order.

Brush my teeth
Have a shower
Go for a walk
Do the dishes
Make a pot of soup and then eat a big bowl of it!
Phone a friend/ family member.

These indoor hyacinths had an amazing fragrance

Is there something you would add to make it super-duper seven step plan? (Or should that be ‘souper-duper’?)

Bonus soup recipe – with thanks to my Mum and most, likely, the Woman’s Weekly.

2 mugs red lentils – rinsed
1 onion – diced
5 carrots – peeled and diced
2 pints of water
2 tins of Heinz tomato soup

Optional: fennel seeds, celery – any old vegetables you have to hand.

Put everything in a large soup pot except for the tins of soup. Cook for 45 minutes, add in the tins of soup and heat through and it’s ready to serve! This also freezes very well.

Book: ‘Do One Thing Every Morning to Make Your Day’
Poem for Every Night of the Year’ Edited by Allie Esiri.
‘Hawkeye’ by George MacKay Brown.
‘The Moon Sister’ by Lucinda Riley.
TV: BBC iPlayer: Around the World in 80 Days
Song to dance to: Madonna – ‘Hung Up’.

NB. Please note that there are many great organisations out there ready to help. There is a really helpful list

here.

bees · Hope · Inspiration · Reading

Chunks of Positivity

February 8, 2021February 9, 2021 sareenmclay3 Comments

I’ve heard people say ‘Monday washday, Friday fishday’ or similar versions all my life. Now, I am a person of routine. I like a routine, I like knowing what I’m going to do when I get up in the morning.

With that in mind, I’m not the only one in our family who looks forward to January for the start of the new series of ‘Death in Paradise’! All those bright colours on our screens in the midst of winter, heaven. Not only that, it means on a Thursday night at 9pm I sit on the couch with a cuppa and know I’ll have an hour of escapism and sunshine and probably a laugh or two.

That’s not to say I can’t change or adapt but there’s a real security in a routine and more, there’s the possibility to get things done, to achieve. Timetables, there’s a reason we have them and it’s been hard having that taken away from so many of us.

So, even if I’ve have had to make a new timetable for these days, I’ll give it a good go and try to stick to it.

In saying that, last week’s routine went slightly to pot (still made the Thursday night slot though!) but hey, tomorrow’s always another day.

Exciting news for me is that I’ve signed up to take an online course about beekeeping run by our local beekeeping association – watch this space! With that in mind, and my love for collecting collective nouns, here’s a link sent on by Rae Cowie – thanks, Rae!

Looking for a great idea for a gift, can be tricky at times like these, hope you don’t mind me saying but we’ve loved the gift vouchers we’ve been given for Kiva over the years – it is definitely the gift that keeps on giving. Big shout out to all at Book Moon for starting us off on this.

My final link for today is from The Novel Points of View Blog with practical advice on keeping going, a little at a time. I’m going to try not to say my favourite line here -‘chunk it’ – ah well, had to be done!

If you’ve got to the bottom of this post, thank you and sending warmest wishes to you and yours for staying safe and healthy.

I’m reading ‘Muriel Spark, The Biography’ by Martin Stannard, ‘The Boy with the Butterfly Mind’ by Victoria Williamson and ‘A Poem for Every Night of the Year’ edited by Allie Esiri.

I’m listening to the Feel Better Live More podcast with Dr. Rangan Chatterjee talking to Joe Wicks about positivity.

Picture Book Review

Head over to my Picture Book Review Pages for great recommendations.

Latest Review – ‘My Nana’s Garden’ by Dawn Casey and Jessica Courtney-Tickle

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