Nothing better than family hugs........

Tuesday late morning was friendDJ's funeral. Wow there must have been about 150 people at the crematorium service, trouble finding somewhere to park and definitely standing room only inside the chapel and flowing outside for those that couldn't even get inside. His coffin was a guitar case with stickers saying "this way up" and "now on tour" etc. The service had many family and friends personal contributions and once outside we all hugged and chatted friends and family together. The wake was supported by many musician friends performing on stage for him. He was such a kissing cuddling person himself I hope he was looking down.

I couldn't stay long at the wake as I'd already made other plans for sisterS, nieceV and my latest great-nephewC (he's now three months old) to visit and sleepover, they live about three hours drive away and I'd already missed some of our visit by telling them not to arrive till after 3pm.

When we were finally all here together we had a great time and sisterS was very generous (he's her first grandchild) so I had many many gorgeous baby cuddles!

Wednesday Daughter and O joined us for lunch too, so lots more cuddles all round. All to soon they were on their home!  

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Pigs, Plays, Parenting, Presents and new Projects.........

And obviously procrastination as it is taking me sooooo long to write this post!!! Now in panic as tomorrow we go on holiday so I'll have to start the next post!

Yet another busy week (edit to say I'm talking over a week ago), Daughter with E and O are Tudors again for the whole week so as usual R moves in with us.

Last Saturday Daughter was home briefly with O for drama as it was their final rehearsal day, then they left to return to the year 1593 while I stayed to watch R's performance. It was very good, especially as they had lost many of the cast, had very little rehearsal and were tackling The Tempest to just an audience of four! Starting the play telling the story with shadow puppets was very clever.

That Saturday afternoon was our street party to celebrate the Queen's 90th. Thank goodness for large gazebos as it got wetter and wetter the tables and chairs got closer and closer under shelter, but everybody stayed and we had a great time.

We didn't do a great deal all week but did go out every day. Wednesday R had her college induction day ready to start September. She loved it.

Another day we went into town as pigs had invaded our town centre along with yarn-bombing

Just a few of the 69 pigs.

I've been busy crafting for babies. NieceVJH received her parcel by post

Now I'm busy working on the baby gift for my friend's newest grandchild who caught me out as she arrived five weeks premature (no photos until they've received it). And there's another family baby due in September I need to craft for next.

The following Saturday was O's first drama group performance, thankfully to a larger audience. Here he is in costume

Amazed at these flowers that were bought for me a month ago. I had them a week then as we were going on holiday (that was the Wales Holiday) I gave them to my neighbour to enjoy, when we came home so did my vase of flowers, and today, four weeks after they were bought, they look like this

We fitted in a visit to nieceVJH (long drive to Surrey and even longer drive home) but all worth it for lots and lots of cuddles. Big boy just four weeks old and so snugly! 

Hubby had decided to fix the shed which is letting in water by recladding the outside, and he decided to do it six days before we go on holiday. Monday we had our usual coffee morning so he lost half a day. And our trip to Surrey lost him another whole day. He removed the planks from the front to discover lots of the frame was rotten making twice as much work! I didn't get close enough to take before/during/after photos as I was a bit peeved he hadn't waited till after our holiday so I didn't have so much to do by myself, like setting up garden coffee morning (beautiful sunny day) which means moving lots of furniture etc, and all the washing ironing and packing, which then took on some urgency when I discovered we were going on holiday Friday and all along I'd thought we were booked for Saturday. So lucky I noticed in time not to keep our friendsN&T waiting on the drive while we frantically packed lol

Also today we had a lovely lunchtime meet up with friends

Hubby finished and secured the shed 10 mins before leaving home for this lunch and tomorrow we go on holiday! This evening Hubby is out on a bloodrunners fundraising event and I've finished packing, charged up and packed all our gadgets, emptied the fridge and all the bins round the house and put the wheely bin down the drive for the morning, watered the house plants and spent a little time with Daughter when she came here to teach a recorder pupil....and write this. 

Phew, think I've caught up at last. 

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Time for tea.........

Thankfully no headache after pills at 4:30am and was feeling well enough for meeting family in London for something we had arranged weeks ago.

Afternoon tea was booked in a place near Charing Cross station for 1:30pm, however, afternoon tea takes a lot longer than you may think hahaha. I drove round to collect Daughter at 10:30am and she drove (to save my head) in my car  (to save miles on her car which does oh so many) to London (to save very expensive train fare). As usual we decided to park at Newbury Park (endish of the main A12 before hitting city traffic) and use the underground for the rest. As it was raining and because of the time we tried the station car park first (also expensive but convenient) but there were no spaces so we found a space in a nearby side road. Parking around there is a little complicated if you're not familiar with it as you can park on single yellow lines during the day but not between 11am and noon unless inside a marked white box. We parked but not in a white box,  just as another car parked in front of us, but it was 11:50am so we decided to sit in the car for 10mins in case a traffic warden was nearby and laughed as the people in the other car didn't get out either so we knew they were having the same conversation as us. When we all eventually got out we had a little chat as we'd obviously developed a parking bond lol.

Newbury Park station on the central line to Tottenham Court Road, changed to northern line for two stops to Charing Cross. We were actually about 30 mins early so even though it was raining a little we went for a walk and found some gardens and looked at the statues. No sign of any geocache nearby (Daughter always checks) but we found a tap dedicated to Henry Fawcett by all his grateful women (snigger/smirk/giggle)!

Daughter and I were the first to arrive at the pretty little tea shop (straight to the loo of course) very quickly joined by SisterS and sisterP and not long after that by nieceV who is beautifully pregnant at 32 weeks. 

Lots of non-stop lovely chat between us all and lots of yummy food as you can see

SisterP had to leave just before 4pm as she needed to get a bus then get her commuter coach back to Kent but we stayed chatting nearly another hour then all walked together a little way for different journeys home to Middlesex, Surrey and Suffolk (that's why meetups are rare and special).

So for us back on the northern line at Charing Cross changing to the central line at Tottenham Court Road (disappointing lack of buskers in any of these stations). By now the trains were sardine packed and after a few stops I was getting far too hot so off at Bank Station hoping to walk a bit to cool off but it was raining quite hard so we jumped on a bus (number 25 that I used school days and when I worked in the city in my former life) and got off at Mile End (where I lived from age 6 to 20) and there is now a large park built right across the main road which we decided to investigate as Daughter was convinced there'd be another geocache there but unfortunately not. 

Back underground for the tube Mile End to Gants Hill for a very quick visit to our favourite Biegel Bakery and loaded up with enough to eat fresh and more for the freezer, back down for one more stop to Newbury Park and to the car. 

I was finally home about 9:30pm needing another cup of tea and my bed :-)

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