One night in late April last year I was visiting the bathroom in the early hours and thought I’d developed tinitus. There was a kind of high pitched throbbing sound in my bathroom. The window was open and sticking my head out to investigate I realised with relief that firstly the noise was not in my head and secondly that it was some kind of natural sound. I recognised it too, but couldn’t quite remember where from. The noise was there again the next night, just before bed. I eventually realised what it was - a nightingale, and it seemed to be in the wood behind my house. This seemed quite unrealistic as I knew nightingales were endangered, but then we live quite near to Wicken Fen and I found this information to confirm that it must be true.

I’d heard them once or twice in Italy with Mr P. It really is an amazing birdsong, sometimes likened to the sound of running water - here’s a sound clip if you haven’t heard it, although there’s a snippet of it at the end of the BBC Springwatch titles. The nightingale sang every night until 13th May and I really missed it when it stopped. Looking up their singing habits on the internet I realised Mr N must have found Mrs N as they tend to stop singing once they’ve done a bit of wooing, built a nest and have a brood.

So, did Mr nightingale sing in our village wood this year? I stuck my head out of the bathroom window from mid April onwards, but no! So disappointing. Perhaps he moved nest to the main Wicken Fen site, perhaps he didn’t manage his journey across from Africa. Perhaps he’ll be back in 2009…

While I’m on the subject of singing, Jessie for Nancy.

I’m afraid I’m not a fan of Gillian McKeith. Don’t get me wrong, healthy eating most of the time is obviously a great idea, but quinoa and ming bean casseroles and woven lentil stews every day of the week is far too hairshirt/hessian-knickered for me.

I am a fan of UKTVFood though and enjoy Market Kitchen when I can - a cookery programme really focussing on using seasonal produce and local ingredients. I just caught a fantastic episode where as a fairly obvious jibe at Ms McKeith, Matthew Fort was cooking a chocolate souffle with Mars Bar centre and Nutella icecream. As the moment approached for any polite guest worth their salt to tuck into the carefully executed recipe and sing its praises, Gillian decided instead to heckle from the sidelines about gout, wind and heart disease! The dish was completed and all present (including the unexpectedly dishy Tom Parker-Bowles) clearly enjoyed it, whilst Ms McKeith insisted on eating ravioli made with twigs, or similar, and refused to touch the chocolatey goodness. Quite rightly, Matthew Fort countered with the potential health benefits of chocolate, but was met with self-righteous derision and more jeering about flatulence. Brilliant television.

It’s a tricky choice, but I think a bit of this now and again is a very good idea:

I have been making a wider variety of silver fingerprints recently. This is my favourite - a double print pendant with aquamarine and amazonite and a large flat facetted aqua quartz. The prints are from a 3 yr old and a 1 yr old, are engraved with names and birthdays and move independently. The quartz acts as a little magnifying glass for the engravings at the back - an unexpected bonus for the design.

Mr P is waiting for his fingerprint cufflinks until Miss P#2 arrives - he’ll have one print from each Miss P.

As requested by charlie p, monkey has decided to appear for one post only. We believe he is a kind of chimpanzee, rescued from Wyken vineyards giftshop. He is now around 2 1/2 and looking a little craggy - perhaps he would benefit from some of that Boots face serum.

He sometimes finds toddler company a little too much and drowns his sorrows with several banana liqueurs.

Back in March, inspired by a living willow tunnel at Burwash Manor, an episode of Gardener’s World and this book I decided to make Miss P a wigwam out of living willow. When planted whilst dormant between November and March, freshly cut naked willow will set roots and grow, and because of its pliability, can be woven into some great garden structures. Some neighbours were pruning one of their willows and kindly gave me the results. I topped this up with some more from Windrush Willow near Exeter. The results aren’t too bad, although the top is a bit freeform. It’s now regularly used for tea parties held by Miss P for monkey (a very important member of the household) and his friends. She also makes ’soup’ (leaves, flowers and water - tasty).

The willow’s leaves have now filled in the holes a fair bit and although it’s not exactly shady in there, given a couple of years it will be better for hiding in. Living willow sculpture is full of great projects including a fantastic living chair that sprouts its own arms and looks as though it might walk off by itself. Next year I might try a living willow archway.

Myself, Miss, and Mr pebble recently came back from a short break in Norfolk - a fair few pebbles there so appropriate for a first post. The treasure to be found at the beach has always been inspirational in my jewellery making and I certainly found a few things to inspire, as did Miss pebble.

The sea had filtered out the cockle, mussel and slipper limpet shells and deposited them in enormous piles, along with seaweed and bits of driftwood - gorgeous. Mr Pebble has a beach hut-like office in our garden and it was so tempting to shovel the lot into a bag and bring it all home to make a bit of beach but, of course, this is illegal nowadays. I found what I think were the delicate filter fronds from sea worms, used to catch plankton. Attached to them were the tiniest shells I’d ever seen.

It was a really relaxing break and we’re now back and waiting patiently for the new Miss pebble to arrive - only four weeks to go! I’m currently dividing time between remaining commissions, gardening projects and sorting tiny baby clothes. New ideas for silverwork keep popping up though - especially since being to the seaside. More on all these projects soon!