Limping Along.........

 
A quiet uneventful weekend. Sunday and Daughter sent a WhatsApp message early to wish me happy Mother's Day, she couldn't come over as she was performing with The New Cambridge Waits 

Although they actually looked like this

Son had planned to come over but instead he phoned to wish me happy Mother's Day as he was coughing a lot and decided to keep his germs to himself. 

I told them both that as I'm their mother every day of every year they don't need to spoil me on a specific day, I'm happy to be spoilt any time. 

Not the best week physically as my right foot started to hurt and rapidly got worse making it hard to walk and painful to sit in the chair and disturbing my sleep. Four days in and Thursday I gave in and phoned the surgery. Got a call back from a nurse practitioner who listened, made some suggestions and said I had to do a self referral to physio. Here in Suffolk the NHS outsource physio to a company called Allied. I filled in their online questionnaire which gets triaged and I've now a couple of exercises to do while waiting for my appointment on 20th April, and they said they will bring that forward if they get any cancellations. 

Some very ripe bananas to use up so limped round the kitchen and made chocolate banana muffins. Mmmmmmm

Friday evening and we joined a cousin's 80th birthday celebration. We had to drive to East Barnet in North London which is two hours on the road there and back. But it was worth it. Family and friends we haven't seen for ages, lots of hugs and great buffet with lots of cake. 

Birthday girl really enjoyed her celebration. And we had a very full and noisy table. 

I was trapped behind all the tables so a very good excuse not to get up, so Hubby brought buffet food to share and sisterS brought back double cake to share. More people now as my Facebook friends and we have another family messenger group, so no excuse not to stay in touch. 

Till next week then, stay warm and keep your umbrella handy.

.

Social Scoffing......

 
What a lovely start to the week, our two wonderful children had included in their Christmas gifts an afternoon tea for the four of us. So rare to have our children all to ourselves! 

They had booked The Swan at Lavenham a beautiful old hotel and restaurant filled with character. Good service and really lovely food, we all had little take home boxes and needed them. I couldn't eat another thing for the rest of the day. 

Monday morning was our usual coffee morning and the neighbours bring various contributions for the table, this week there were seeded cheese straws and shortbread biscuits. 

Almost immediately afterwards friendM picked me up and we went to The Belstead Brook Hotel (locally we all still call it that although it's changed owners quite a few times who all tweek the name each time). Two course lunch and lots of chatting. Again I ate nothing else for the rest of the day! 

Tuesday, I fancied something hot and tasty for lunch and made this really good cauliflower cheese. Lasted two lunches as Hubby doesn't eat it. 

Yes I eat mine with ketchup, don't judge! 

Our normal Wednesday gang ate in Prezzo this week then headed to the pub so the guys could play pool. 

Thursday I was dog sitting for Daughter all day (she brought homemade biscuits yummy) plus we had organised for Son and Fiancé (with their dog of course) to come over while their new extension got knocked through into the upstairs bathroom, the new downstairs shower room isn't fitted yet, so they were escaping here for a fully functioning loo. I'd plenty to feed them already in the freezer which is where it stayed when they had to cancel as Son had woken unwell and put the builders off till next week. 

Friday we ended the week with us and 10 of our coffee morning neighbours going out for brunch at a local pub. That was fun we all agreed needs to be repeated. 

Thankfully I've just found mince and chicken in the freezer to thaw as I'm back to cooking for the weekend. 
Take care everyone.

.

Marching On.....

 
Well lots of carrots sitting in the fridge needed making into cakes right? 

I'd written our next street party invitations and printed them. Last time some neighbours said they'd misplaced or thrown out their letter by mistake so this time I'd printed the backs too, hope that helps. 

Thought it time to put them out, so coffee morning I handed out to those that came and asked if anyone could help me do the letterbox drop, they all took a few and in the end I didn't need to do any. We've lovely neighbours. 

Hubby has now finished the loft, a mammoth task of moving stuff, sorting stuff, lifting boards, adding more cross bars, filling with more insulation, boarding on top, repositioning the ladder fixings and then arranging the stuff neatly. Phew!

I needed photo proof as I don't do the loft ladder. 

Seemed like the whole UK this week had snow but here in East Anglia we got off very light. We've had some very light flurries during the week but not enough to settle. Friday morning it was wildly windy and very wet until about 10am-ish then it snowed really heavy enough to settle on such wet ground. 

A lot heavier than this photo but I was too busy to take another pic in time, as about 11:30am-ish it stopped and the sun came out and it all melted away. 

An amusing thing to share (well it amused me). Lying awake in the early hours one morning with a painful right knee, I started thinking how most mornings something hurt or was really stiff before I got my body moving. From that came Old/Middle Age Bingo

Leaving you with that thought I'm about to reluctantly do some exercise. 

Have a good week and stay warm.

.

Remember When.........

 
As technology has changed so has how I use it. Now I photograph so much to have as a record and I add pics to this blog to put them into context. 

Hubby asked if there was any photo evidence of the first time he rebuilt the bathroom and how he'd plumbed in the new shower cubical he had built. Well that would have been sometime in the 1980s! In the days of a limited number of shots on film to be sent off for developing and we had young children which I was obviously more focused on. 

Hubby went through lots of printed pics, very full memory sticks and our spare hard drive backup without success, but he quite enjoyed his trip through the years. 

It was 40 years ago that we all moved from being neighbours in the small Essex village of Silver End. We are all real friends that keep in touch, go out when we can and we have holidayed a few times with one of the couples. Not often we can get this many together at once and it was lovely. Lunch in a pub, back to N&T's for coffee/tea and we came home with a cake that friendV had baked and gift wrapped. 

Yaay we have a working shower again. The nice engineer came and fixed their faulty part and he installed the remote from our broken one into the new one, which Hubby was going to do but this way it doesn't void the guarantees. 

Excuse me if I post this quick as I'm off to have another long shower! 

.

Testing The DIY Skills........

 
Lovely visit Sunday from Son, fiancé and their little dog. They brought Hubby his birthday present and cake plus two roses from their garden and planted them in our raised rose bed. Looking forward to seeing how many will survive and bloom.

Daughter invited us over for pancake brunch on Tuesday. O said he was dressed for the occasion with pancake coloured trousers, his shirt was the cream and hair like the raspberry sauce. 

The two glass jugs had been made by E when she was glass blowing. 

After we'd eaten O cast all the short films he'd made onto the TV. He has a great vision of what he wants to achieve and a great sense of humour. He is also incredibly critical of his own work. 

Another power saving hour Tuesday evening. Hubby was told the two we had taken part in last week had earned us £3.90, not a lot but no real inconvenience to us and hopefully takes some pressure off the grid. 

The new shower was delivered and swapped for the wrong one they delivered last week. Hubby took it apart and fiddled inside, looking like he knew exactly what he's doing. He needs to change this wired model to be a remote controlled model like the broken one. I'm always amazed at his DIY skills. 

First attempt gave him a very soggy loft. He can see where it's leaking from inside the box! He emailed the company again and a back and forth conversation and sending photos and a video resulted in them advising contacting the maker to hopefully send an engineer! They are coming next week. 

And now the bathroom light has a problem which needs more than a new light bulb! Always something eh? 

When the dog is here I fold an old quilt in four as a bed when she joins us in the dining room. It's a bit of a tight fit in the washing machine so I made a cover for it that can slip off and be washed and dried much easier. Reused fabric that once was a single duvet cover. 

She was here all day Friday with me while everyone else was out and she liked her covered bed. 

Till next week then, have a good weekend.

.

Time For Rhyme........

 
Funny how the mind works eh, well my mind really? Often first thing in the morning a few lyrics from the middle of a song pop into my head and I'm forced to sing it through until I've remembered the title and maybe even the artist, then it inevitably becomes the earworm of the day. Sunday morning and I'm up first of the humans and let the dog out into the garden and while I'm watching her I've some words of the poems I learnt in primary school running round my head.

Two of my most memorable were

Night Mail by WH Auden and Cargoes by John Masefield

And this

Monday was quite eventful. I pre-warned the Coffee morning neighbours that we have the dog here. R had a work meeting on zoom so she took her laptop upstairs. The dog seems to bark the most when anyone is outside or near our front door, so I put her in the office and sat with her some of the time until everyone had arrived, then she joined us and was really well behaved. 

Hubby had signed up to take part in the National Grid Demand Flexibility Service. They are hoping that by getting a brief reduction in power used at peak times it will take the strain off the grid. Hubby got an email to say we needed to do this on Monday. 

I made sure of getting ready for our girls night out in plenty of time before our 5:30pm deadline. FriendHM was driving for a change (it's usually me) and she picked up both me and friendJB. At Miller&Carter we met friendM and friendT. As always we discussed everything, everyone noisily and laughed lots.   

The one hour reduced grid use happened again on Thursday evening. 

Valentine's day is also Hubby's birthday. 

Ended up the messiest cake but it tasted good, and for dinner I made Hubby's requested lasagne, salad and garlic bread which we all enjoyed too. 

The dog's favourite place is curled up beside me at the moment. Have to be extra careful with my tea holding arm because she often taps with a paw for strokes. 

Wednesday late morning Hubby drove R to work and she'll go home afterwards, and mid-afternoon Daughter came for a catchup cuppa or two and left with the dog and stuff. So we are back to just us. 

Hubby found that he couldn't get any parts to repair our shower as the manufacturer no longer supply that model. It's a special system using a flat control plate inside the shower connected by remote control to the master box in the loft, so changing to something different would mean breaking down the bathroom tiles. He's bought a different model that's the same make which he thinks he can convert. However we received the wrong one, so now we are waiting for another delivery/swap. 

Hope it's getting a little warmer for you like it is here. 

See you next weekend.

.

Repair or Replace........

 
Not the best start to the week when the shower broke. Of course I was in it and fully lathered up when it went to freezing cold, I fiddled with the dial and it went hot again, then scalding hot, then freezing cold and this is how it went on! I managed to get myself rinsed off but didn't chance hair washing so came out wrapped in a towel and washed my hair over the bath. The working unit is up in the loft so another job on Hubby's list, as he thinks it must be the thermostat cutting out, he has emailed the maker to find costs of parts and hopefully save having to buy a whole new unit.  

My sewing machine hasn't been at its best for a while, sometimes catching fabric that needs to be cut out of it and so ruining what I was working on. Finally I decided to have it serviced and found a local chap that has glowing social media revues by previous customers. 

He came to my house, took the machine apart, cleaned, oiled, realigned some bits and filed some rough edges away.... the whole time explaining and teaching and answering questions. He's not cheap, in fact not much cheaper than buying a new economy range basic machine but hopefully it will have been worth it. 

Two magpies in the tree. Two for joy isn't it? 

And a woodpecker came to visit too 

Freezer defrosting is not a job I look forward to but it really needed it. I unloaded it all and just over an hour later reloaded it all..... Hubby did all the hard work in between, isn't he wonderful! 

I did congratulate myself on making a totally upcycled bag recently but seems I was premature. One of the main problems of reusing materials that have already seen active service, is sometimes they let you down. O has been using this bag and just as he was packing it to take on holiday the zipper came away from the zip. Daughter brought it round and I failed at fixing it, the zipper kept bending, so it needed a new zip. I couldn't remove the old one so stitched new to it and didn't have one long enough so now it has two zips and double layer teeth.... totally unique! 

Having just spent money on a full service for my sewing machine, I didn't treat it with much respect shoving this lot through it, but so pleased it did the job. 

Friday R and the dog have moved in for a week. R gets to use the new sofa bed. The dog does like snuggling up close. 

Next week is Hubby's birthday and he says he doesn't want or need anything, hmmmmmm I can't not give him a present but what? 

That's about it for another week, stay warm.

.

Cobwebs are Blown.......

 
You've read here so many times about all that Hubby does, he's our DIY and techy hero and he's more than happy to share himself around to anyone that needs his talents or support. He now has this t-shirt gifted by friendsL&K. 

Beautiful sunny day on Tuesday and a message came from Daughter asking if we'd like to join the three of them for a walk. We all went to Walton-on-the-Naze, just under an hours drive from here.

Chilly when the sun went behind a cloud but mostly a warmish wind.

Warm enough to lunch outside too (no choice with the dog).

Our Wednesday gang met this week and for a change we went to the Felixstowe Sailing Club who were hosting a Greek night. Buffet style for just £12 each. Really lovely cooked food of five hot dishes plus Greek salad and pita bread. I had a little of everything. Some went up for seconds, not me I was really full. We all enjoyed it. Then onto the Grosvenor as usual and our men had the pool table to themselves all evening.

FriendM has just come back from a holiday and brought me back this lovely scarf. 

There was lots of talk about our group holiday to Spain in April, which seems a long way off but guess it will come around quite quickly. Glad we chatted as friendF has now realised he needs six months minimum on his passport since Brexit, so he's going to renew his immediately. Hubby has ordered new GHIC cards and now booked our Stanstead car park. Next on the list is bringing out all the sunny weather clothes to see what we have. 

Meanwhile I'm still wearing roll necks with my fleece and thick fluffy socks.

Nothing planned for this weekend so may just get to sit and read for a while. 

Enjoy your weekend and week ahead.

. 

Everything Takes Time.........

 
Gosh already Thursday and I hadn't started this post yet, usually that's because nothing worth writing about has happened but this week a couple of things have (don't get excited you'll be disappointed) but two things keep stopping me. Firstly I've been recommended a book I really must read, but I need to finish the book I'm half way through before I start it. Secondly our Internet keeps dropping out, not for long periods because the provider has a problem, but lots of very short hiccups for no apparent reason and very frustrating! 

If you are interested in what books, the one I'm reading is the third in Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club series, The Bullet That Missed. I'm totally invested in his main characters with plots that are ridiculously hilarious but sort of believable. 

Now downloaded and ready on my kindle is The Last House on the Street by Diane Chamberlain. I'll let you know about that when I eventually get to it. Told I must read it by two friends when we were six of us out to dinner Tuesday evening. 

Tuesday didn't actually go to plan. The plan was as friendKW needed Hubby's help on his laptop he would come with his wife, friendLW, in the afternoon then after the fix we'd go out to the pub for dinner. We haven't seen friendsL&M for ages (mutual friends of course) so they were coming too. Both couples were delayed, one by an earlier funeral and the other by last minute grandparent duties. Eventually all here and enjoying tea and cake. Laptop fix was easy apparently. Pub booked for 6pm so a three car convoy just 10 minutes before. Pub was busy and obviously short staffed as our crazy waitress was doing far too many tables. 

To cut a very long story a bit shorter let's just say there were incredibly long delays at all points of service, there was over zealous allergy scrutiny which ended in friendLW having inedible fish and considering we booked for 6pm as they all live a fair distance (we would normally meet half way) we didn't leave until 10pm. Glad they'd all had cakes earlier and thankfully with this gang we always do a lot of laughing! 

Dog sitting for the day when Son and fiancé had a day in London. She's a little cutie. 

Hubby has had two light bulb replacements to do, one on my car's brake light and the other for Daughter on her car's headlight. Plus he's still up in the loft, think he's done about 75% now. Not all done at the same time of course. 

I need to now be thinking about what to get Hubby for his birthday which is just a couple of weeks away. I'm also starting to think about the Royal Coronation in May as we will definitely have to have our usual street party, thinking now as Hubby and I are on holiday just before getting home with just four days to spare. Guess I'll need to recruit a committee! 

Enjoy your week ahead, stay warm and try to avoid the horrid virus that's doing the rounds at the moment.

.

Is it 2:30?........

 
I'd had the bottom half of a broken tooth near the back at the bottom of my mouth for quite a few years, but as it didn't hurt or clog with food I told the dentist just to leave it. Probably worth mentioning I really hate going to the dentist as I have a very strong gag reflex so when her hands are in my mouth I sometimes panic. I always go for my checkups but the sooner I'm in and out of that chair the better! 

Early last week that bit of tooth worked its way loose and came out! Reminded me of losing my milk teeth how you play with it with your tongue and then give it a final wiggle till it's in your hand. It wasn't painful at all. 

A few days after that the tooth furthest back at the top was painful but only for a day or two, one dose of paracetamol, using plenty of the toothpaste for sensitive teeth and eating on the other side and it sort of stopped being anything more than a little uncomfortable. 

Saturday about a third of that top back tooth broke away! Amazingly the remainder of the tooth no longer feels uncomfortable! So do I need to make a dental appointment now or wait until my next checkup (which isn't till mid March)?

Apparently the third Monday of January is called Blue Monday, referring to it being post festivities and bad weather etc causing depression! Well in this house we have Brew Mondays as it's coffee morning full of chat and companionship. 

Tuesday night and with friendL and friendS we went to the panto. We were all winter wrapped up as the forecast was a drop to  -2°C possibly colder. 

I don't really like panto in general. Very old very corny jokes do not make me laugh. I used to like taking the children and watching them enjoy it did give me pleasure though, so I've sat through a few although my own children outgrew them very quickly. It was friendL's idea as she loves them and friendS had never been before and was keen. 

This was a rock and roll panto and was full of really good musicians and all the cast had great voices and it was a constant flow of musical numbers. They all put so much energy into it. I don't mind rude jokes at all but the "dame" was totally over the top with smut that I was a bit worried for the children in the audience. Maybe I'm more of a prude than I thought. 

FriendL stayed excited right through and still giggled while driving us home. FriendS said she enjoyed it "but wasn't it loud!" 

I still don't really like panto. 

After the first long bag I made from the old airbed (see last week's post)  which worked but wasn't totally suitable for what O needed, I had another go! This one I lined, put in a zip (argghh) gave it side handles and a shoulder strap!   

Certainly not the neatest sewing but I'm pleased with the end result. 

When Daughter came to swap her car for mine (her's going for a service) she said that she'd also had serious tooth pain and needed an urgent dentist appointment. Hubby had toothache briefly this week too! Have they changed what's in our water? Will we all be reduced to soup meals soon! 

We managed our Wednesday gang night out this week. FriendM had been away for the last two Wednesdays and she's away again for the next two so it was good to catch up this week.

Bad photo but quite yummy apple cake with our apples from the freezer and some leftover Christmas mincemeat stirred in.  

Hubby hasn't done much in the loft this week as it's been too cold up there to work and he doesn't want all that cold coming down into the house. No rush but he gets the figits when he's hindered. 

Q - When is the best time to see the dentist? 

A - 2:30  (tooth hurty) 😂😖🤭

After that very silly joke I'll say cheerio for this week.

.