Sneaky proof........

While the others are back in Tudor land R is living with us.
Two things R is reluctant to do is outside physical activity or posing for a photo, however, I wanted proof that she was helping me with gardening.

And in other news........

Lots has been going on and I've not had much time to blog so here's another condensed catch up.

Our beautiful granddaughters R and E have had another birthday, they are now 14. How did those years fly by so fast?
This is my favourite photo and favourite memory ever

And we tried to recreate it but R ran away hahaha

Out for a lovely lunch together then back for desserts with candles

I was out with my usual Wednesday friends in our usual pub. Normally I would bring friendDJ but he'd had a fall the night before and although unhurt was still feeling wobbly. He text me Friday to say he was in hospital. He'd survived prostate cancer and over a year ago he was told his lung cancer was terminal, they've now discovered a tumour on his brain and can not offer any treatment! So very sad. I've been visiting him in hospital as often as I can. 

Met up with friendAN for lunch. She lives way up in Norfolk so we each drove for an hour to meet half way in Framlingham. We haven't had a proper catch up for about two years so lots and lots to chat about. Time whizzed by and I had to leave as it was the same day I took R to theatre in Woodbridge so lots of driving. 

FriendsL&K suggested we visit Kentwell Hall for their Multiperiod event. It was great weather and so lovely walking around the beautiful estate talking to people from stone age to Victorians to WW1 soldiers, to punk rockers and all eras in between. It was odd Daughter and children not being there as Tudors (they are on holiday) but I was told to introduce myself to "Terry in the 70's" as he knows daughter well when he has a different name and Tudor persona. When I found him he gave me a huge hug and congratulated me on giving birth to Daughter who he said is wonderful but totally mad! Lots of photos here!

There's also been lots of gardening at every chance as the weather had been quite good. Takes a lot to keep on top of it! Unfortunately my clever strawberry planter wasn't so clever as we came home yesterday to find it had fallen over, rescued all the pots and the plants all look ok but I'll have to rethink the stacking. 

On a positive idea I'd planted a few tomato slices (a tomato had gone a bit soft and I couldn't use it quick enough) and today I need to prick out these lovely new plants

Fruits of my labour........

This weekend I've made a multi-story strawberry planter 😆

Phew it's hot. ....

But you knew that already!

Last Sunday was warm too but unfortunately it turned out to be a very wet day and in great British tradition we had plans for watching a band live in the park and starting with a picnic.

We couldn't change our plans as E is a percussionist for the South Suffolk Youth Orchestra who were the ones performing, so we went and got a bit wet and mostly sheltered under a tree, but were rewarded with a great concert and this xylophone duet which made me a very proud grandma as granddaughter E is only just 13 years old.

Buggar it won't let me put the video here, says it's too big,

and I'm not sure how to link to it either, but you can
 find it on my Facebook page if you're a friend. 

Please let me know if there's a way I can do it! 

I think this is a link!

Monday I met friendJ (we go back some 40+ years) so a very long lovely catchup lunch, and she got me back in touch with another friend from our youth ☺

Tuesday hubby and I met friendsL&K at Audley End, which is an English Heritage manor house and we did the garden tour before a lovely lunch.

We've been trying to do a little gardening as early in the day as possible before it gets hot and I've been taking my sewing outside but staying in the shade. Our pond is really overgrown but as it's shade for the fish Hubby won't thin it back just yet.

I have to share this.......I showed Hubby my friend's daughter's yoga pose photo and he proved he could do it too. Not bad for a 63 year old man eh?

It's a bit awkward in our Close this week as the gas board are replacing old pipe work with new, so lots of hole digging with noisy drills and lots of lorry road blockages but thankfully not causing too many inconveniences and they do keep letting us know what is happening when. Think they are messing up our drive and possibly having to lift a lot of our patio next Monday. ...fingers crossed it all goes back ok.

Last night I cleaned the oven, you see life isn't always so glamorous!

================

As an extra note all bloggers love getting comments, however, occasionally I comment on other blog posts and they never show up because for some reason their filter hadn't liked me. So may I suggest all bloggers regularly check their spam folder incase I'm caught in there desperate to be set free.
.

He's off again.....

Hubby is away again this weekend, it's the annual walking weekend that he does with a big bunch of blokes. This year they are going to Swanage in Dorset.

Next door friendA is driving a full car and they are setting off at 9am tomorrow so his wife friendP and myself will stand on the drive and do the ritual waving until they are out of sight then celebrate with her coming in for a coffee.

After that I have Saturday from 8am-ish to about 4pm being entertained (and exercised) by R and O while Daughter and E are at Kentwell for meetings relating to Tudor stuff next month. Us three will be at R's drama for two hours (she acts we wait while I convince O that he really doesn't need all that stuff in the tuck shop that will be having a huge magnetic force on him and my purse). During Friday and Sunday I'm hoping to fit in some baking, seedling planting out, finish photo sorting that has been ongoing for too long, serious bathroom cleaning, ironing and cooking a dinner for Hubby's return. In reality it could be a little too much playing scrabble online and reading a book!

If I achieve a lot you'll see it here first, so you'll know what's happened if it's silent hahaha
.

Testing the memory.....

Seems ages since I've written, probably because I still can't get blogger to work on my playbook and the phone is just a tad too small to make it comfortable....so I've given in and now on the pc at a desk rather than curled up on the sofa! Hopefully I can remember back to what's been happening!

Hubby has had a lot of on-call nights for the blood running volunteering he does for SERV Suffolk and Cambridge, he's done a few late night call-outs but mostly it's just on standby. He's also had another full training day with them which I think happens yearly.

Hubby has also continued with the "getting our trees into good order" project. If you look carefully you can see two men up very high into our beech tree (top monkey is hubby). This tree is under preservation order so lopping has to be done discretely (*wink*)! 

On the third Thursday of every month my neighbour holds a crafters gathering. This time I took along the baby ugg-style-boots and ball I'm making for my friend's first grandchild due imminently.

That night was also our art night and I'm attempting to paint some tshirts with products I used to sell but are now about 30 years old....amazed they hadn't dried up completely! The painted designs will hopefully cover up the greasy marks that won't wash out, so if the painting works I've upcycled some tshirts if it doesn't I haven't lost anything as they'd have hit the bin anyway. So if you never see a finished photo on here you'll know why ;o)

FriendsA&K made a flying visit as K had an appointment at my local hospital and live an hour's drive away. So I made them lunch which was nothing compared to what they had brought with as my belated birthday present.....a huge sponge cake and two large foil trays, one with Dauphinoise Potato and the other with Jugged Hare. Hubby and I had half that night for dinner and froze the rest for another night. Neither of us had eaten jugged hare before and it was delicious, probably due to the amount of red wine it was cooked in!

Last weekend we took advantage of the surprisingly warm-for-September weather and joined Daughter and children for a walk by the River Orwell. Unfortunately the walk started badly when O knocked himself on the car and hurt his tummy and then ended abruptly when it started raining, but it was lovely to get out even for a short while and the cars were parked at the Suffolk Food Hall so O got a quick bounce on their outside giant inflatable pillow and then all inside to choose nice things to take home for lunch.

(O holding his waistband away from his sore tummy but he soon forgot about it)

On Monday BFriendM and I enjoyed a spa day, we had bought it months ago when it was on special offer but found it really hard to fit in a day we could both do, so this was finally the day. We spent the whole time there in our swimsuits covered by towelling robes and made good use of the pool, sauna, steam room(too hot for me), jacuzzi, aromatherapy room(neither of us could feel the point of this one) and sun loungers, add to that the luxury of a facial each, teas and coffees and a lunch. Felt really spoilt and both agreed we must look out for future offers. Sadly Hubby didn't have the same sort of day as he had a funeral to attend of someone he had known for a long time at bowling.

Tuesday evening BFriendM and I ate out again, this time at the Mexican Chiquito as I had a £10 voucher. Should have been three of us but FriendH couldn't make it. And Wednesday night I ate out with BFriendM yet again with our usual Wednesday gang at our usual table in our usual pub in Felixstowe.

Wednesday afternoon we had O here while the girls went sailing for the first time, he has a cold and he's too young for the sailing so would have to hang around a lot and he was definitely not in the mood. He spent lots of time making drinks for himself and tea for us, I'm only allowed to pour the boiling water and he has to do the rest himself.

Thursday Daughter popped over so that Hubby could fix E's laptop which was misbehaving which he did by just giving it evil looks I think. So E spent the rest of the time on her laptop! When R arrived she was a few pages into a new book that she needs to read for a book club they are about to join. She snuggled down into her Granddad's side and read, we hardly got a word out of her, she read, and left here with just a few pages left to read less than three hours after she'd started! O wanted to do any science in a jar, so Daughter popped out to buy cream (and cakes for afternoon tea) then showed O how to make butter in a jar (she had to do most of the shaking) and I showed him how to make a tornado in a jar. And last night I went to the theatre as previously blogged.

Phew, think that's about it and a busy few days ahead so must get back here more often!
.

Burnt sugar is smelly.....

O came over to use my bath and asked to stay while Daughter did some taxi-ing. He also asked to pop corn and cover it in toffee. I had the toffee recipe I used to make for toffee apples so I know it works but I halved the quantities and O wouldn't let me put vinegar in and I think I was nervous of boiling sugar with a five year old.....and it caught on the bottom of the pan just a little. We poured it over the popcorn anyway, I ate some, Daughter ate some, we bagged some for him to take home for his sisters, but O was not impressed. That was yesterday afternoon and 24 hours later the house still smells of burnt sugar :-(  I didn't bother taking a photo. 

On a more successful note, I've been gardening. Needing gloves over gloves I've cleared away a very spikey berberis and just as spikey rose bush suckers. I've also bought new and planted a dozen plants adding a bit of late summer colour, all inspired by our trip to Bressingham.

There's also been quite a bit of procrastination, especially when watching this beautiful spider work so hard creating this huge web for the second time.

Add to the successful list lots of ironing, bread making, having relatives over, meeting up with old friends, playing lots of scrabble online, and completing some crafts which I can't post a photo of or describe in case a certain person reads this before they receive it.

So now I think I'd better go look for another toffee/caramel recipe, maybe a foolproof one :-)

.