Speed signs

Not so long ago one of those signs appeared at the side of Weston Road that tells you how fast you're going.  Originally they put it up in the middle of some trees so it was really hard to see your speed let alone feel prompted to slow down if you were going too fast.  Recently tho, someone has turned it around so that it faces the other way and is not obscured by the trees.  I find it very useful; when I went past on my bike the other day it told me I was going 10mph, and when I walked past it, it told me I was going 3 miles an hour.  

It is much better than the one they have in Shardlow.  I drive past that one, speedometer dead on 30, and it flashes 30 at me like I'm going too fast.  Considering that most car speedometers are set 3mph too fast to help avoid speeding, I think this sign must be set wrongly.  The fact that when I go through Aston at dead on 30, the sign says I'm doing 27 seems to back this up.  So in other words they want people to drive at 25mph through Shardlow despite it having a 30mph limit.

Well dressing

I walked around the village with the children and we looked at the well dressings and pointed out the bits we had done on each one. I wish I'd got a photo of the Charles Dickens one too, as that was really good.

The post office were giving away free ice tea, which was very kind of them.





We saw the black pig morris dancers outside the white hart.  They are morris dancers who do the traditional dances in non-traditional clothes.  The costumes were fantastic.  The photo doesn't really do it justice.  It was the attention to detail with the costumes that I was particularly impressed with, things like the flowers and feathers in the hats, the pig in the baby carrier and the bag with the vote monster raving loony party rosette sewn to it.  I overheard a young woman saying she wanted to be a morris dancer after watching a performance and that's not something you hear very often from anyone under 50.

Some youth workers had been working on a well dressing with the youth in the area and at the same time working out what the youth in the are need.  They heard a lot of complaints from locals about them hanging around in the lych gate so they have plans in place for this amazing pod thing that they can sit in.  Apparently it has a handle they can wind up and it generates power for some lights.  Also it's blue tooth compatible so they can play music from their phone in there.  It sounds great but the only problem I can foresee its that it will be on the rec which is right on the edge of Aston and maybe some people won't be bothered to walk there and still hang around the lych gate.  I guess time will tell.


The weather managed to stay mostly dry apart from a few quick downpours towards the afternoon.  We sheltered in a phone box and it's a credit to Aston that it didn't smell of wee, as most phone boxes do.

There were loads of other things happening, but that's enough writing for one day.

Build up to the well dressing

The well dressing is probably the biggest event on Aston's calendar and it starts tomorrow.  People come from all over Derbyshire to see it.  It seems a bit bizarre that Aston would have a well dressing when it doesn't even have a well and more bizarre that it isn't something that has been happening for years and years which started when there was a well, but was revived in the late 1990s (I think).  Anyway not that I'm complaining, as it's a great event and fun for all the family.  There are several stalls and also shows from magicians, pinxton puppets, black pig border morris dancers as well as well dressings made by several local organisations.  There are many local organisations and in fact it's a standing joke in the village that if you see 2 people talking in the street, they're probably talking about forming a committee.

The bunting went up a couple of weeks ago and the all the groups in the area have been working on them this week.  They have to be made completely from natural materials, so there's no leisurely making them over a long period of time, they're worked on intensively the week before or else stuff will go off.  Any flower petals used are put in a day or 2 before the event.  It never ceases to amaze me the variety of things people use to make a well dressing, anything from leaves to coconut to curry powder to berries, wool and stones.  The church has also been decorated by various groups doing little displays all around it.  The whole village has been a buzz with preparation and I'm sure many people will be up early in the morning to set things up.

Lets just hope the weather is ok and there's no rain left in the clouds after we had a whole months worth of rain in one day today.