Anything But Ordinary
ISSN 2631-326X
MAY 2020
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MAY 2020
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Contents 03 10 Anything But Ordinary … Page
Up Where the Air is Clear … Page
Email us at: info@tinylivingmagazine.co.uk
On the cover, Sinead and Matt’s Anything But Ordinary narrow boat. Read more about them on Page 3.
Published by: Tiny Living Productions Ltd Editor: Pamela Palongue Design by: Gilmour Graphics Email: info@tinylivingmagazine.co.uk
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Anything But Ordinary
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Sinead leads an inspired, romantic lifestyle, living on the water and creating mystical creatures such as angels and mermaids. Her life and art has its roots in a childhood that was filled with magic and wonder. Growing up near Edinburgh in Portobello, Sinead was both fascinated and terrified by the sea at her front door. “The water was cold and tempestuous, but full of the most amazing creatures”. Besides seeing puffins, catching crabs and swimming with
jellyfish, there were other strange creatures which her mother related of smugglers and pirates who once lurked in nearby coves. Her family didn’t have a lot of money for entertainment when she was a child, but Sinead’s mother was an artist, and her creativity extended to her unique ability to keep her children’s imagination open and engaged. They visited art galleries, museums, castles and dungeons in Edinburgh, where she and her brother learned the fascinating Scottish lore, which could sometimes be quite dark.
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“I longed to live a magical, mysterious life as a child, and still to this day I love to lose myself in tales of history…surrounded by the magic of nature.” Later Sinead lived in Sweden by a lake, and then in her 30s, she made her home on the River Kwae in the exotic setting of Thailand. It wasn’t until she was 40 and met her husband, Matt that she rediscovered her longing for creativity. Her school studies had been more practical, and didn’t necessarily include artistic endeavours.
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The matchup between the pair proved to be synergistic, awakening a desire she had to create that had been lying dormant for decades. Soon after they met, he painted a huge tableau of Alice in Wonderland for her. It was quite simply, the most romantic thing anyone had ever done for her. There were long discussions between the two of them about how to make things. Matt was living in a converted bus at the time, and the process of it drew Sinead in and lit a creative spark. One day, she decided that she wanted to make a huge set of angel wings from wood.
Her husband cut out the base of it, and it was as if a world opened up. She began to fashion them into an ethereal set of wings by hand, and then proceeded to paint them with various finishes. She posted photos of them on Facebook and was inundated with requests for them!
Originally launched in 1974, it had been a hotel boat for 35 years known as the NB Unicorn. The gentleman who owned it, Jeremy Scanlon, had written about it extensively before selling the boat. There were even newspaper articles written about it. When Scanlon learned it was being restored, he was delighted.
She makes each set to order so they are often used as gifts, and sometimes as a sweet remembrance of a loved one. But each request usually has a personal story behind it, making the work all the more special. They’ve gone to people all over Europe, Australia and North America.
For those of you reading who know nothing about boats – take heart! Sinead and Matt knew nothing about boats, or building them. -But they were committed to trying. Although she freely admits now that they must have been quite mad!
At the time she started making the wings, she was working at the County Council, and the angel wing crafting had provided savings sufficient enough to buy a narrowboat. They found an abandoned wreck by the side of a mill, which had no engine, a rotted cabin and the propellor was missing. To say the least, it was not “seaworthy”. But this seasoned traveller made of wood had unmistakeable character and an interesting past.
To get the dilapidated boat to their home, it had to make a 54 mile journey through 96 locks – not an easy task without an engine and a boat that was falling apart. They were discouraged not to attempt the journey on the Severn which was swelling its banks from heavy rain by a local man who said, “it will be thrown about like a match down a plughole” to be exact. They towed the boat to a safer part of the river and the whole journey was slow and exhausting as Matt even dragged the boat by hand towards the end.
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Not to be deterred, they began the build in September 2014, using nearly all recycled parts to rebuild it, including huge amounts of pallet wood. Matt had to live on the boat since there were thousands of pounds of materials and tools stored on the boat for rebuilding. There was no running water and no insulation with winter coming. He slept on an old mattress on the floor
under a tarpaulin. Two nights a week, Sinead would go down to the boat with a couple of bottles of wine, in her alluring purple thermals and wooly hat. They would fall asleep watching ‘The Twighlight Zone’ on her laptop. It was romantic, despite the cool, damp sleeping space. Matt rebuilt the whole cabin in sections, creating a different scene around each window.
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There is an Alice in Wonderland-themed surround, and another with bullrushes, and still others with toadstools. Sinead bought second hand chairs and painted them in bright, cheery colours. She was lucky to find an ornate cocktail cabinet from a farmhouse to which she added a copper sink and repainted the cabinetry. The bed frame was fashioned from four tree trunks and a scaffold plank base. The kitchen hob was fitted into an old pine chest of drawers from a charity shop, and the floor is old scaffolding planks that have been sanded and waxed. The tree in the living room functions as a wine rack. Besides recycling, the theme of the renovation is nature. For Sinead, nature is home.
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They wanted to create a feel of bringing nature indoors as if you had fallen down the rabbit hole. And the whimsical result is that people become very emotional when they step inside, as if they’ve found a long forgotten dream from their childhood. It’s a happy place where you can see the love that’s gone into creating it. They moved into the boat in June 2015 and have never looked back. Sinead acknowledges that boat life involves a lot more planning than life on land. They store 1000 litres of water in a tank, which lasts around two weeks. They have two solar panels for electric which is enough to power the TV, charge phones, and small appliances. They use a generator for power tools and heating water.
In the winter, they have two small wood burners which keep the whole boat snug and warm. In summer, having plenty of windows helps to ventilate the boat with cool breezes. They do not have a refrigerator, although many boats do have them, they have managed without one. And it has probably helped encourage them to eat more fresh rather than processed food.
“ I am hugely inspired by nature…
the luxury of falling asleep listening to the rain on the roof, barn owls calling to each other and the moon shining through the porthole next to my bed. I wake up to mist rolling over the fields, and visiting swans… I feel like I am in the fairy tales that I loved to read as a child. I never wanted an ordinary life and I am so thankful we managed to find a way to create a life that is anything but ordinary.
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Though sometimes the batteries fail, and provisions have to be carried up the muddy towpath in winter, Sinead feels it is the most rewarding way of life. “I have never felt so alive or close to nature…Listening to the birds and animals and really experiencing the seasons has made me feel like a different person. The joy of exploring new places and being dependent on yourself, has fulfilled my sense of adventure and wanderlust in ways that I could only have imagined”. In addition to her custom woodworking, she has taken up crocheting two years ago, becoming “hooked” on the process. She took a two hour class and now even designs her own patterns. She highly recommends Ellen Decker of bypollevie.com, who teaches freestyle crochet courses all over the world, and has been an inspiration. You can see some of Sinead’s handiwork on these pages in the bedspread and pillows in the sitting area. You can purchase her work at her shop on Etsy at www.etsy.com/shop/AnzisWood
Photograph by Frankie Morini Visit Sinead’s blog at www.anziswhimsicalworld.co.uk And her Pinterest site with photos of the renovation at www.pinterest.co.uk/anziswood/ unicorn-rescue-now-know-as-nb-recalcitrant
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Photograph by Juan Rojas
Up Where the Air is Clear It’s a short walk between the health of our planet and the health of all humanity. This year, our forests and wild life took a massive hit with fires in Australia, the Amazon, Greenland, and the southwestern U.S. Millions of hectares of forest were destroyed, which means less trees to clean our air and provide oxygen. This is especially serious for any respiratory illness, exacerbating the problem. Though many things have to change at the global level to improve our air quality, there are some things we can do as individuals which will make a huge impact when combined with the efforts of millions of others.
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There is a wonderful sense of independence that comes with owning a car. But would it be possible to leave the car parked at home all week, and take the bus or the train to get to work? Bus and train fares are generally less expensive than petrol and many insurance companies offer discounts for lower mileage use. Trips to the supermarket could be combined with neighbours to reduce the amount of driving. Groceries can be paid for online in advance, making it easy to pick up your neighbours order,
Photograph by Govind Krishnan
while doing your own shopping. If you take turns, it will also save time as well as money.
order to reforest the land and improve our ecology.
When it comes to the garden, hand-powered tools are much better for the environment, but there is also the option of battery-powered and electric tools.
Fresh clean air is not a luxury, it’s a necessity for all human life, especially vulnerable populations. Helping each other is actually helping ourselves. We can do this together!
If you have access to a small garden, would it be possible to plant a tree or two? If not, is there some derelict land in your community that could be improved with the planting of a few trees? There are tree conservation societies which have volunteer programmes for planting trees in
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SPRING PRINT ISSN 2631-3251
SPRING 2020
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- according to the Canal & River Trust, 26% of the UK’s 33,000 boats are used as primary residences? - thousands of people in the UK are already embracing small-space living in studio flats, student accommodations, and small terraced houses? - there are over 80 shepherd hut building companies in the UK? - prices for a well-designed tiny house fitted with kitchen and bath starts at £26,000? - according to Popular Science, human beings are hard-wired to like tiny things? www.popsci.com/why-do-we-think-tiny-things-are-cute
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