Fun and a Little Frustration.......

 
Dog sitting started Saturday off, while Daughter and O took the train to Norwich so O could attend a college workshop for their open day, as he's thinking this might be his next move from home education. 

Saturday evening we drove into Essex and joined friendsN&T together with two friends of theirs to make our team for the WI fundraiser quiz night. At the half way break our team were in the lead (think there were 12 or 14 teams). FriendN had made all the ploughman's suppers which was good. We had a good second half to the quiz but ultimately was overtaken by just two points at the end so finished a very respectable second place. 

On Sunday I had been invited to a surprise baby shower. The baby is now actually three months old but it had been a difficult pregnancy, with a very premature and complicated birth. So the baby's mum's best friends left it till now. The surprise went really well, the weather was perfect, the two main organisers had decorated up and organised games. It was a lovely afternoon. 

We got up Tuesday morning and found two areas of the garden covered in feather carnage, guess the sparrowhawk had hunted a good breakfast. I know it's what they do but I was glad not to have been up early enough to have witnessed it this time.  

Hubby had done lots of gardening whenever it stopped raining and needed a run to the tip on Wednesday with a full car. He'd also helped Daughter on Thursday do a lot of garden clearing, including breaking down R and E's 20 year old garden playhouse which was now beyond repair, so did a second tip run with a full car. Think Daughter has enough for another tip run! 

Gotta have a little grumble too as my doctor's surgery is letting me down, which I have to say has been unusual. I phoned Monday of last week, in the afternoon as the lines wouldn't be so busy and my problem wasn't urgent. I was told they are now a day surgery and I must call back at 8am. Wednesday calling at 8am after being in a long queue for about 40mins I got through and told reception that I wasn't urgent but complex and explained why, and it had to be dealt with by a doctor. Late that day the surgery pharmacist called me. She discussed it all and made suggestions but needed to run it by a doctor before adjusting my meds and prescribing. She rang on Thursday, told me the doctor's suggestion and I agreed..... then she noticed that the new drug wouldn't suit with one of my other drugs, so she needed to go back to the doctor. By this Tuesday afternoon I'd not heard back so Daughter suggested I should fill in the econsult form on the NHS app (not used that before). Wednesday morning a call again from the pharmacist who said the doctor hadn't realised what else I was on.... HADN'T REALISED! I was horrified and told her so. She has now requested I'm given an appointment with a doctor, but it's now Friday and I've heard nothing! 

Sorry to offload but this is my diary so you get my moans as well, but as you know my life is mostly good which I'm always happy to report on. 

Enjoy your Bank Holiday weekend.

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It Needed Watering..........

 
We are checking the new(ish) rose bed daily as more and more buds are opening up. The plants are all looking strong and healthy, great eh? 

Hubby needed to clear the excess plant from the pond. He always leaves heaps of wet stuff on the side so hidden frogs and insects can escape before it goes into the compost bin. Unfortunately the netting has a large hole in it now, so another job on his to-do list. 

Saturday afternoon-evening we were dog sitting. Fortunately the day before I asked Son what time he was coming and he'd forgotten all about it. They have tickets for Twelfth Night performed in Regent's Park open air theatre and a speedy rearrange meant their tickets weren't wasted. 

Monday another hot and sunny coffee morning outside. 

Our evening was meeting friendsL&K and friendsL&M for dinner in Chelmsford (sort of half way between us). The pub had their quiz night going which thankfully wasn't too loud to spoil our conversation but unfortunately just loud enough to hear bits of questions which were distracting hahaha.

Tuesday lunchtime the xBT team from work met in our favourite pub. Just three team members this time (we were only five but L died almost a year ago and R was unwell) B and I brought our spouses so a table of five and lots to chat about.  

Thursday and the second day of almost constant rain. I didn't bother getting dressed till nearly lunchtime and while up there managed a token bit of ironing, but really it's a good day for reading a book. This was passed on to me quite a while ago

Interesting but it's slow going as it's printed in a tiny font. I'm on page 206 of 307 so a few more rainy days will help. 

And then the sun came out and Hubby is already mowing and bagging what won't fit in the compost bins to take to the tip. 

I'd better show some action too, so I'll sign off for now.

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Helping When We Can.........

 We never plan to do too much on a bank holiday weekend as often the traffic is really bad, the venue is crowded and the weather can be bad too. So we were around for Doggy Day Care, Friday into the evening, Saturday morning and Monday afternoon while Daughter and O are being Tudors, R had her theatre group performing for the first time (I read a great review) and M was teaching. 

Hubby watched the Ipswich Town v Huddersfield football game. The Ipswich win gave them promotion to the Premier League and after waiting 20+ years the crowd went wild, in fact Ipswich wildly celebrated all weekend. 

Sunday morning Son called in, we haven't seen him since our holiday. While we were chatting I asked how his fitness and sponsorship were going for the Scafell Pike charity hike he's about to do (less than three weeks time), he said the fund could do with another push so I posted it again on my Facebook page and two of my friends donated, which was so kind of them. Jake, the founder, is fiancé's nephew. 

Monday morning we had coffee morning in the garden for the first time this year. It was warm enough most of the time, chilly a little of the time and trying to rain a couple of times. It was nice though not to be so many in our dining room as it gets so noisy. It did rain for some of the afternoon so we definitely were lucky. 

NeighbourA brought over her husband's jumper that he had splashed with bleach to ask if there was a way I could repair it. I do have fabric paints but told her they didn't seem to do well over bleach. She said she'd try to sew over the stains with a dark grey thread. 

Tuesday morning I pulled out all my old kit to see what I still had. You might think it odd that I needed to check but I had been a Tri-Chem sales demonstrator/teacher in 1983! It was run as party plan so I worked evenings after Hubby got home from work. I did really well and during my four years with them I rose to their second level manager and recruited quite a few into my team. As a craft person I was doing a job I really enjoyed. 

I popped over to friendA's who had already tried stitching it all but as that wasn't successful I said I'd give it a go. 

It took me quite a while to unpick her tiny tiny stitches. As well as embroidery scissors and tweezers I needed to double up my specs and use the magnifying stand with the spot light on. I managed to get the tips out of old paint tubes (they should work like ball point pens but don't anymore)  and had to mix two to get a reasonable colour match. 

I'm quite pleased with the result. Now it will be a wait and see how it survives being washed. 

I hope you've had the really good weather we have had as the rest of our week had been a lot of garden, Hubby gardening (needing two tip runs) and me mostly wandering round, fish watching by the pond, and generally relaxing.

Strawberries and cream anyone?

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Stupid Blip Amongst The Good.......

 
It was only last week we called out the British Gas engineer as the water wasn't heating up. He fixed it by replacing a worn out part (Hubby did tell me details but I can't remember what) he was at the boiler, up in the loft and in the airing cupboard and while he was here he did a service on the boiler as that will be due soon anyway. This Sunday morning I found my box of pills, which sit under the boiler and thankfully in a sealed plastic box, had a huge puddle in the lid. Hubby called British Gas and an engineer came the same morning. It turned out to be a small pipe that needed replacing and not caused by the previous engineer just coincidence. 

Lovely sunny Wednesday and Hubby took advantage by cutting back the hedge. Nice weather also brings out neighbours to chat. 

I had a lunch date with friendM and we never run out of conversation. 

Local election day Thursday. Not an easy decision this year. We always try to agree so Hubby and I vote the same, otherwise I feel we just cancel each other out so no point even going. 

Arrgghhhh I've lost count of the times I've said "if it looks too good to be true then it probably is" however I stupidly got caught without doing all my usual checks. It was an ad on Facebook that looked like it genuinely came from amazon and it was only £2 so if it turned out to be rubbish I haven't lost much. After doing all the order form and placing the order it told me a different name would appear on my statement. Amazon sell for all sorts of companies so I wasn't immediately suspicious but a bit later I was curious so went to Google....... it was definitely a scam, I'd get no product at all and they have my credit card details! Stupid! I've now cancelled my card and waiting for a new card to arrive (which was also a long story I won't bore you with).

Friday evening (while Hubby was home dog sitting) friendKK and I went to our local John Mills theatre. 

When we arrived there was an Irish band playing in the bar and we were told there will be a Ceili/Ceilidh after the play. 

The play was brilliant, two actors that worked so hard to bring so many characters to life for us. Humour and sadness together. 

And afterwards friendKK danced getting overheated with a roll neck jumper on and clomping a bit in her riding boots. I found watching very entertaining. 

I'm back.......

 
Did you miss me? 
Sorry couldn't post last week, technical hitch, I'll try to catch up soon, meanwhile this week....

Sunday seemed an endless day of washing (took four machine loads) and although it was dry and looked sunny it was still very windy, and to be honest I wasn't in the mood to fight with the pegging out and bringing in on a windy day, so it all went upstairs on the clothes horse in my craft room. 

Busy Wednesday started early with a visit to Specsavers. Hubby received his new specs and spent time having them fitted. I went straight to their hearing centre. Still too much wax in my right ear and their pad test showed some loss so continue with the olive oil spray and back in three weeks if clear enough I need the full test, if not they will clear it. As Hubby was waiting for me quite a while it gave him a chance to look around a lot and decide the peripheral vision wasn't as good as his previous pair, so back to see someone who checked everything and thought it was down to the curve in the frames, so she adjusted that, hopefully that's done the trick. 

Just time for cuppa at home then out again to meet friendsN&T and friendsV&N in West Bergholt for lunch. Food was great though we both tried not to eat too much. Really good to have a long catchup. 

We tried not to eat too much because we were out again in the evening. Our usual Prezzo which was almost empty, then The Grosvenor where we had trouble finding somewhere to sit as it was their open mic night. A few people are worth listening to but lots of them are dreadful. 

As with every year The Red Rose Chain Theatre Company are putting on their Theatre in the Forest for July and August. This year it's 

I will be going with Daughter&O and Son&fiancé in the first week. I'd mentioned it to some friends who were happy to come to Suffolk to see it, so I've booked six tickets (that even includes Hubby who is not a Theatre/ Shakespeare fan) in the third week and they will be sleeping over here afterwards. 

Hubby got a call from Daughter saying she'd lost a windscreen wiper blade while driving on the A12. She came over Friday morning and Hubby sorted that for her while we drank tea and enjoyed our chat. 

I received a hospital letter saying I'm due for my annual CT Scan so I've booked for a blood test next week as requested. I'm so grateful they are still keeping a check on me. 

And so another week has flown by. Hope you can pop by next week as, fingers crossed, I'll be here.

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Enjoying Cheerful......

 
I promised a more cheerful post so let's start with our garden which is very cheerful at the moment. 

Birds are enjoying the new water feature with its little solar pump. The rockery behind it is now planted up and hopefully they will soon fill the space. 

The apple tree is blossoming (why did that pic load sideways?)

There is the promise of a large display of my favourite Lily of the Valley. 

I'm always reluctant to pull the rhubarb early as the large leaves look great, almost tropical, beside the pond. 

And lots of spring colour everywhere. 

Saturday evening we had Son's dog for the evening as Son and fiancé celebrated their 20th anniversary with a meal and theatre performance here in Ipswich. 

Pleased that at coffee morning quite a few of my "ready for the charity shop" books were taken by some neighbours. 

Wednesday we both went to Specsavers for eye tests (didn't seem two years since last time but it was). Hubby needed a slightly different prescription and ordered one pair for collection in two weeks. My prescription hasn't changed so I saved a lot of money not needing new specs, but a little disappointed as I had fancied a change of frames but couldn't really justify the huge cost just for a change. It was pointed out to me that the Macular Degeneration has got a little worse but still can't be treated. I was told to stay aware of any vision changes, eat plenty of green veg and possibly to take vitamin supplements specific for macula care. I'll need to check those with a pharmacists due to having CKD and all the meds I'm on. 

I also went to their hearing department. Lots of questions to answer first, then she looked in my ears and said the left ear has a little fresh wax but the right ear has a lot of hardened ear wax so they can't do the full test. I came away with olive oil ear spray to use till Hubby's next appointment in two weeks then they will check my ears again and make another test appointment if they are clear.  

Wednesday afternoon we had Daughter's dog here for a few hours. When Daughter came to pick her up she stayed for a cuppa. She told us that O was having his birthday party on Saturday evening for about 10 teens and they were all sleeping over. M was nominated as the responsible adult to stay at home and Daughter said she'd come here with the dog and sleep over night too. She says it's to keep the dog out of the way, however, 10 teens would make me want to escape too. Hahaha! 

Looks like it's going to be a warm and sunny weekend. 

Enjoy.

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Mostly About the Jab........

We enjoyed a lovely Easter Sunday dinner with Daughter, R and O. Sadly M has a dreadful cough so stayed home and Son and fiancé had other plans for this weekend. Dinner was a joint effort as Daughter doesn't eat meat so we bought and prepared the lamb joint and provided the gravy and custard, Daughter did a fancy potato dish, the veg and the apple and rhubarb crumble. Daughter also made a yummy dark fruit loaf for afternoon tea. They didn't stay late and all took a plant each when they left. 
 

As it was a bank holiday on Monday we had a very full and noisy dining room with our neighbours for coffee morning with three of them bringing extra special treats, mini egg Easter cupcakes, ferrero rocher chocolates and the yummiest home made ginger biscuits. I cannot deny eating far too many of those biscuits! 

Wednesday morning I had the first (of two) shingles jab. All was fine until going out that evening my arm was quite achy. I mostly sleep on my left arm which was fine but even the weight of the duvet on my right arm was painful so my arm came out, got cold, went back under, hurt, came out.... you get the idea. Up very early Thursday and had a lazy tired day. Back in two months for part two! Hubby and my friends only had one jab so guessing this two part vaccine is relatively new. Thursday evening I couldn't get warm, sitting in the lounge with two blankets and two hot water bottles and still shivering! 

Friday morning and my arm still hurts when I move it, so I'm not moving it unless I have to. I took two paracetamol before bed so slept much better. 

We met friendsL&K for a pub lunch, food was good as was the chat as always. FriendL has also had this two part shingles jab (her second part is next week) and said her symptoms were the same and horrid, she'd spoken to friendBR who said it had been the worst she'd reacted to any jab. So I was actually reassured that what I felt was normal. Still horrid though. 

I'm sure my arm will all be back to normal very soon, but sometimes it's good to have a little moan. I promise to find some cheerful stuff to share next week. 

Hope you have a cheerful weekend.

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Weather For The Ducks........

 
It's mostly been a sorting week. Trying not to just put everything back into our bedroom without thinking if we still need it or if it still fits etc. One big bag went out for charity collection so far. 

Between all the showers Hubby has done a bit more towards the new water feature. Those rocks and dish are large and incredibly heavy and he did so well to move them from the other side of the garden. 

Easter takes on a new focus now the grandchildren are too old for egg hunts (have been for years), everyone prefers a healthier diet too so no longer want chocolate eggs..... apart from Hubby that is! 

So this year I decided to celebrate spring and Hubby and I bought a collection of plants to give the family instead. 

They can choose a plant each and any left over will go to start off our water feature rockery garden. 

Lovely lunch meet up with dear friendsR&S. We went to The Ship Inn at Levington and it was really busy but the staff were all super efficient and all the food yummy.

I hope you all enjoy this Easter weekend and the two Bank Holidays (although that doesn't really benefit us retired folk hahaha).

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Sweet Dreams.......

 
Still talking about our bedroom and now onto our very large headboard. I'd rescued it once by adding this stripped fabric but that's looking scruffy now. 

I had an image in my head of a quilted vinyl/faux leather that would be comfortable for Hubby who sits up every night for a short while watching TV and would also be easy to wipe over....... but couldn't find anywhere local that sold it and I really wanted to feel it first so reluctant to buy it online.  

I settled on these two fabrics because I couldn't decide which would work best and they were cheap enough to be temporary as I'm sure I'll keep looking for what I really want. I made it as a slip cover so not wipeable but can come off to throw in the washing machine. 

Daughter came over and with Hubby they gave her car a complete valet inside and out. She needs to find a newer replacement before this one completely dies and hoped this may give it a slight chance of some part exchange value. 

These two boxes are in my craft room and were originally part of our bedroom suit in the previous house but not needed in our bedroom here. They make great storage and one is our laundry box, ideal as it's directly opposite the bathroom. As there's time before the new carpet is done and it's too wet for gardening Hubby has revarnished the tops and did a base coat on the rest. While we were thinking about what colour to paint them I thought as they are in my craft room I should try and do something a bit arty. 

It will be sometime after our bedroom is done and all the stuff is out of here and put back so watch this space as I'll share success or failure when they are done. 

Thursday and the carpet was fitted

Then we moved the bed and side tables in first. I was pleased with the covered headboard that matched in really well with the curtains. Bed made and ready for sleeping in. 

Hubby moved in the rest of the furniture but I'll take a bit longer bringing everything else back as it's the ideal opportunity to sort and not bring back anything we no longer need. 

A really good night's sleep was had by us both (especially me).

Lovely to report a successful week. Hope yours has been too.

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Achieving.......

 
Work in our bedroom is in full swing but I'll not bore you with each detail, hopefully there will be plenty to update you with by the end of the week. Meanwhile I'd like to share our beautiful camellia now in full bloom. 

And the beautifully scented hyacinths. 

A long time ago I'd found a crochet pattern for a more modern looking granny square that's tiny, so I thought I'd give it a go to help improve my very basic crochet skills. I'd made seven semi-successfully but found them quite tricky so was reluctant to do lots more to make into anything substantial, so the project got put aside. 

Recently I saw a small bag using squares and decided that I only needed to make three more pansy squares and three plain squares and all together they made this little summer bag. 

For the handles I made a cord from old jeans-seams to cover with the crochet which gave them structure. I'm always pleased not to have past efforts wasted. 

Lovely Mother's Day. Daughter came over with R and she'd bought me this great jug that's a really useful size. A friend of her's has opened her new pottery shop so Daughter and M had supported her by buying a mug and a jug.

Son and fiancé arrived soon after with my gift of shower gel and the Pandora heart charm. They also brought a vegan chocolate cake for us all to share. Later the four of us shared a yummy Chinese takeaway.  

Thursday Daughter's dog was here while she was working and she kept me company when Hubby met the guys for some snooker. Daughter finished work a little earlier than expected so she had time to fit in her run and then stay here for a cuppa and chat before taking the dog home. 

Bedroom update....

All the cracks have been filled, all the emulsion on ceiling and walls done twice each. All the gloss done on skirting, door frame and built in wardrobe frames. Almost odour free, then a quick sand down on the window sill and that coat of varnish was a nasty pong that filled the whole house and lasted for days! Curtain pole back up and the curtains too after they'd been through the washing machine and thankfully a dry sunny day so they went out on the line. We had a quick shopping trip and bought a new duvet cover and fitted sheet, 

but couldn't get a bed valance or ceiling light shade I liked or the coasters to go under the casters. I was also looking for some padded quilted vinyl to recover the headboard with but was disappointed there too. Hubby found the coasters at our local Wickes but I'm still looking for the rest. 

Nothing more we need to do in there until the carpet is fitted next Thursday. 

Enjoy your weekend.

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