Pretty things

I have been buying beautiful new quilt covers online to put in the camper van when it is finished.

I discovered a Chinese retailer called Ali selling splendid things that I have never seen anywhere in the UK at all, and they had lots and lots of gorgeous cotton bedcovers in an amazing range of really fantastically bright colours that made me instantly besotted.

I chose a lovely orange stripes and camouflage one for Oliver, and a beautiful pink-flowered and purple one trimmed with ribbons and lace for us, which is illustrated above, and then invited Lucy to come and choose one for herself.

She looked at the ones I had already bought and laughed so hard that I thought she might wee, and said that they were hideously tasteless and had I not wondered if I ought to check whether they would be a good idea with somebody else first.

I hadn’t wondered, because I have long ago stopped minding about not having taste, which, as Lucy pointed out, is why the house is full of dreadful tat.

She said that she really didn’t mind which she had as long as I made sure it was dark when she went to bed and she didn’t have to look at it, so I chose a powder blue and apricot frilled one that I had quite liked the look of for us, which made her laugh all over again.

The camper van is going to be beautiful when it is done. I have bought some china for it on eBay, we had got to do that now because of having to build cupboards and shelves the right size to put it on, and Mark wanted to measure it. It is lovely china, with gold edges and roses all over it, and I have asked Mark to build a rack for it so that we can display it, which is not very easy as of course it will have to hold it still when we are travelling.

Mark has been working on the camper van all day again today. He isn’t doing anything interesting yet, he is just doing things that he thinks are important. I am not sure what they are but I know they involve the chassis and a gas tank and I am just being patient.

I very badly want him to build the exciting things like new bunk beds and a plate rack for the pretty china, but if I don’t let him get on with it in his own favourite order he will get grumpy and start telling me detailed explanations about why it really needs a chassis more than a plate rack. I know that this is true really, but it is a very dull thing to be doing, and I just wish he would get on with it so that he can get to the things that will be really nice to have.

My parents have spent the day visiting Oliver at school, it has been the day of the Grandparents’ Tea Party. I was jolly grateful to them for going because of not wanting Oliver to look like a foundling, and also they are very good at looking like proper respectable people which might offset our appearances in the camper van a bit.

They telephoned on their way there to tell me that they were lost, and then on their way back to tell me that they were lost again, but in between exploring different junctions of the A1 they managed to squeeze in a visit to school, and Oliver was very pleased to see them.

My mother said that they finished up being served tea alongside somebody who was probably Lady Crawley from Downton Abbey who wanted to know how many generations of Oliver’s ancestors had attended the school before him.

My parents thought it politic not to bother trying to explain that Oliver’s parents were just opportunistic taxi drivers, and my mother thought that my father might have resolved the problem by turning his hearing aid off. I thought this was an excellent idea and will remember it for my own later years.

In fact we are on the taxi rank now. It is Friday night and the weekend lies excitingly ahead, full of opportunities for earning cash to pay for new quilt covers.

I have got my fingers crossed.