Pictures, from Scotland to Cyprus, via Birmingham and Derbyshire...

My mother had several pictures hanging in her house in the UK, but there were a set of three prints which she was particularly fond of. As far as I remember, they had previously belonged to her parents who lived in Scotland.

They hung over the fireplace in my mother's living room in her house in Birmingham for some years. I found this photo which I've cropped to show one of them, although the glass was reflective and the image isn't very clear.

When my mother died, at the end of May 2013, our son Tim, who had lived with her for five years, said that he would very much like these three prints. However we had no easy way of getting them to Cyprus. So one of my brothers took them to his home in Derbyshire, and put the pictures away in a cupboard in a guest room.

In the Summer of 2014, I spent a couple of days with my brother and his wife. I wasn't certain that I could remember which pictures Tim wanted. We found several that were from my mother's house, and I took photos. The ones Tim was keen on seemed a bit faded to me, although that hadn't been obvious when they were on the wall. The frames were quite strong, but there was some staining on the white mounts around the pictures. They were quite large, and of course the glass posed a problem. I had no idea how we could ship them to Cyprus.

Apparently the original artist was one of the early French impressionists, Alfred Sisley. One of the pictures shows a tree-lined path:

One of them shows this view of a canal:

And this one, the one shown at the top of this post, shows a view of a house through some foliage:

Tim confirmed that these were, indeed, the pictures that he wanted. However, he felt no attachment to the frames or mounts, and agreed that it would not be a good idea to ship them with the glass. There was nothing I could do at the time, anyway, so we put them back in the cupboard.

Then Richard and I were in the UK again at the end of February, and spent a few hours at my brother's house while travelling North. Richard was planning to send a shipment back to Cyprus, so we got the pictures out again, and he carefully extracted them from their frames and removed the mounts. This was not a simple process, and took considerably longer than he expected; in one of them we found an old newspaper which was dated, if I recall correctly, from the late 1920s. Evidently the frames had lasted nearly 90 years, so it wasn't surprising they were looking rather tired.

Richard packed the pictures with strong cardboard and, several weeks later they arrived safely in Cyprus. We took them to Tim's flat, and he put them behind a chair, still in the cardboard... and there they remained for another six months. Then I suggested that we might get them professionally framed as our birthday present to Tim, and he thought that was a good idea.

So we took them to a local art gallery that has a framing service, and chose white frames (at Tim's request). The woman who dealt with us showed us several options, and we realised that an outer card mount improved the appearance although we didn't choose one anywhere near as big as the previous mount. We also opted for non-reflective glass.

Tim was pleased with the result on his birthday, and today we took them to his flat so they could be hung in place. He has a long wall in his living room where they look great:

The effect is, unsurprisingly, more modern than the previous style of frames, and goes nicely with Tim's white furnishings.

I'm glad that these pictures are, once more, on display. And having discovered images of a couple of the originals online, I think I like the blue faded effect better. 

Dixit

We were given the game of Dixit by some friends, who brought it from the US although it's available in the UK too.

Dixit is easy to learn, and we find it ideal to bring out after a meal with friends who would like to play a game, but can't decide what to play. The game consists of a set of 84 large cards with brightly coloured and somewhat stylised images on them. There are also voting cards and little rabbit scoring markers. It's not a game we want to play every week, but when we do get it out, people usually enjoy it - particularly if playing for the first time. It's best for 4-6 players.

The easy part is choosing a colour (I have yellow if I can) and placing the rabbits at the start of the board:

Each player is dealt five of the large picture cards, the others being placed face down on the table to form the stack. One person is allocated as the first ‘storyteller’. Not that they tell a story - the idea is to select one of their cards, without letting anyone else see, and then say a word or phrase that is in some way connected with the image.

The aim is for some - but not all - of the other players to guess correctly which of several cards matches this phrase. So the storyteller must choose something which is neither too obvious nor too subtle. As the storyteller says their phrase, the selected card is placed face down on the table. Then each of the other players selects a card from their hand which they feel is also, in some way, connected with the word or phrase, and places it face down with the first one.

The storyteller picks all these cards up, glances at them to see what has been chosen, then lays them face up (including the original one) in a row on the table, without comment - other than numbering them from 1 to however many cards there are.

All the other players then try to guess which card was the storyteller's. Which might sound easy, but it’s surprising how often there is at least one card which seems to fit the theme rather better than the original. I don't recall what the phrase was for this particular set, but - as usual - everyone had to ponder awhile before using the little square cards to cast our votes.

Here's a set from a different game, on a different occasion, with mostly different people. One card (the centre one in the lower set) happens to be the same as one in the top set - but was evidently selected for a completely different phrase.

Scoring is the most complex part of the game, in my view; we refer to the scoresheet almost every time for the fine details. Basically, if either everybody OR nobody guesses the correct card, then the storyteller gets no points. If just one or more (but not all) of the others guess it, both they and the storyteller score. Also, if one of the other players has their card chosen by another player, they also score.

Each player’s coloured rabbit is then moved the relevant number of spots along the scoring track:

Everyone picks up another card from the stack, so that they have five to choose from. The next player, counting clockwise, then takes over as the storyteller, and the game continues until all cards are used up. This means that in the final rounds, players will have fewer than five cards, and in the last round each will only have one. It’s amazing how often even that final card will somehow have a connection with the storyteller’s phrase.

I’m not a visual person, and I find it difficult, sometimes, to come up with a word or phrase that suits any of my cards - usually I either make it too obvious, so that everyone guesses, or too subtle, so that nobody gets it. But it doesn't matter; I'm not particularly competitive and it's a fun game that only lasts about half an hour. I do quite enjoy the guessing part which often prompts discussion, once the story-teller's card is revealed. Of course. each player must be careful not to indicate in any way which of the cards they have played so we tend to stay quiet until everyone has voted.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes board games, although it might not appeal to those who tend to be literal in their language, or to people who only like strategy games. It’s ideal to play at a small, relaxed party, or for a bit of socialising with good friends.