July's last post left us in the rain and hey, guess what, hello to August... in the rain. This summer must have broken every wet summer record in the book!
Before we went away at the end of last month I had a list of garden chores as long as your arm. This was already backed up because of the bad weather. On into August and I still couldn't do do them when we got back to our Northern rain from our mini break in the much drier South.
The month started brilliantly with the arrival of my daughter and her partner. They had stopped at the Lakes on the way down to celebrate her birthday and arrived in time to continue that with us. To use a very well worn phrase , where do the years go? As a parent it I find it impossible to see through the welter of imprinted memories and take on my children as fully fledged adults. My logic knows that they are, but every interaction immediately returns to me-mom and them-child. I do my best to advance but fail miserably and sink into pride and worry and joy in equal measures as if they were six.
The weekend was filled with chatter and food and trips out for good ice cream. Perfect.
Tuesday 7th and we were out with 'The Secret Seven' doing 'Seven go Town Halling'. Just in case there is a massive government computer which filters all emails for suspected terrorist groups I should explain the seven are in no way secret. It is just a group of Ken's 'diving' friends from years back who I glue together now and then as they have now become my chums too.
This time instead of just arranging a meal somewhere I thought we could go and get 'cultured' (a bit like germs?) and I suggested that we did a tour of Manchester Town Hall. The added lure was that it would still include a meal afterwards. It is hosted by Manchester Walks and is to be recommended. The guide was good enough and the building itself well worth the effort. If you live within hailing distance of Manchester click on the link to see what else they do. Everything from walking tours to coach trips to canal trips. Something for everyone? We are doing Gorton Priory next month.
The meal was at Wings. My criteria for deciding where to eat was somewhere with a range of choices for everyone and as close as possible to the Town Hall as it would almost certainly be raining. It was the usual Chinese meal - not outstanding but it did the job.
The following week was given over to removing my raised veggie beds and putting a flower border back in the garden. As with all things gardening you can go to the garden blog if you want the trials and tribulations of the remake.
It was also the week which builds up to Ken's birthday and I always spend it thrashing around trying to decided what to buy him and what to do with him on the 'big' day. Also, pretty much as usual, it ended up being a damp squib. I had a two for one deal at a restaurant we hadn't tried, so that seemed like one problem solved. They were closed on Tuesday! Hey, ho we just had to go and do it on an 'ordinary' day. Good job we did as it was a bit underwhelming. Pub/Italian food finishing with mom-goes-to-Iceland profiteroles. Mmmm! as in mildly grumpy not as in yum.
Birthday lunch was moved to The Crimble. A place that has always had a bit of a bob on itself and was good in its heyday (the last time I went there!). Sadly time and I have moved on and it hasn't. Ken was a happy enough birthday boy so I gritted my food critic teeth and he/we had a nice enough time. His present is the real nightmare. I am sure most women reading this have the same problem - the blokes they buy for ''don't want anything'', ''don't need anything'', ''don't bother I'm not bothered"..... sound familiar. The truth is most of them really aren't bothered and I still don't know why I make such a big deal out of it. Why is it I can't get to the same place?
Just as we have done many times before we settled for the fall-back position of his deciding on a piece of electronic gizmo for the computer. Thrilling. Marginally better than the touch-screen stylus for his phone for £1.99!!! that he really wanted. Even more exciting we continued what is now turning into a family tradition - a tour of Staples.
To explain...on my mother's eightieth birthday, we took her to visit my sister in Cheltenham. We were staying at a hotel for a couple of nights and on the day of her birthday were driving mom to P's and we happened to pass Staples. Ken wanted to nip in for something, so mom and I went with him and spent a jolly hour trawling what is in effect (for mom and I) a huge stationery store. Being fans of pens and papers and things of that ilk, we were quite happy bunnies. As we were leaving she was all smiley and saying how good that was and we laughed about knowing how to show her a good time and celebrate an eightieth in style.
A couple of days after Ken getting older we were off on our August jaunt - this time a nine-day trip to France with a friend.
Talking about it all later with my friend, she and I agreed that in advance of doing it we were wishing we hadn't bothered when we thought about a two day trawl from our homes 'up North' to the gite in the heart of France. As it turned out it was just fine and the journeys down and back seemed to be entertaining enough in themselves for the hours to just fly by.
We had an early start (7.30 am) to allow us plenty of time for our drive to Portsmouth. As it happened we only took a short break en route and our packed lunch got eaten on the terrace (well at a table on the terrace) of the Terminal Building in the port. We had arrived in plenty of time and settled down for a nice relaxed meal in the sun. Before we got to the cherries we had a moment's panic as we saw the queues of cars being moved from the car park to the going-through-the-customs waiting area. We dashed off to rejoin our car and began the car ferry shuffle. Our car was one which got stopped for a cursory customs check with my friend's small bag being taken for an X-Ray. It was declared free from chest infections and broken limbs and we moved on to the boarding-the-ship waiting area. It is worth noting here that we left Manchester in pouring rain and arrived in Portsmouth in baking sunshine. How in heaven's name do you dress for this? We simmered gently in the car, relieved only by a giant bag of assorted sweets.
We eventually took proper advantage of the sunshine and spent most of our time on the 'Normandie' on the deck. It was a lovely, calm (nearly six hour) crossing and we had an excellent first French meal in the Cafeteria (!). What a pleasant surprise. Offloaded at great speed but then a long wait in a queue of cars to get through passport control. Ten minutes drive to our functional overnight stay in an Etap (part of the Ibis group) in Herouville. I'd heartily recommend this group of Motels/Hotels. They are very basic but very cheap and very well-maintained and clean!!! Turned in for the night early(ish) ready for our trek through France the following day.
We had breakfast at the Etap, taking the only available seats in the corner of the conservatory. They were available because already the sun was up and doing its thing through the two windows. We were totally fried, having forgotten what sunshine was. This was an early warning start on the 41 degree day which was to come. Again, we decided not to break our journey down to Masbonneau by too many stops (which we originally thought we would do) and pretty much bombed down to the Chateauroux area where we used to have our farmhouse. We stopped at our 'usual' (from those days) motorway services and had a coffee. Our lunch was at Auberge des 2 Cedres in Cormery. To describe it as eclectic is an understatement. The décor was underpinned by inherited wallpaper and furniture from grandma. This was then overlaid with African and middle-eastern masks and all kinds of trinkets. There were butterflies pinned on the lace curtains and all manner of pictures on the walls, culminating in a huge framed (15,000 piece) 'religious' jigsaw. Just wonderful. The owners were a joy and, it seems, as always in these places, the service and food were a delight.
On to revisit our (brief) home in France - Les Roches. It looked terrific all tidied up and I was thrilled to see it had become the proper French family home for the young couple who bought it from us. Their names were on the mail box (which we bought) and the swing had been retrieved out of the barn and put under the old pear tree. I sneaked a few photos as a reminder. Someone there is keeping up my good work. I hacked back a monster of a wisteria and some neglected climbing roses - they are all lovingly pruned and tied in. You might spot all the shutters are closed, this was because it was around forty degrees centigrade.
We arrived at our lovely gite some (long) time after 4 pm as arranged. Ken and I then drove to the nearest Supermarket which might still be open at around 6.30 pm. This was some twelve miles away so I was soon sharply reminded of the draw-backs to living in Les Roches.
Back to the gite and the first of our cold suppers (and breakfasts) all to be eaten outdoors in the balmy air. It was accompanied by wine and a cake left for us by our kind hosts. The huge pineapple upside down cake was to be hauled out on many more occasions.
I promise you our gite did not slope at this angle! Strange photo. Yes, all that property was ours. In addition to the space, we had enough dishes, cutlery pots, pans, glasses et al to feed twenty people right down to eight of them being able to enjoy their lobster using their own set of picks. Really, really good place and excellent owners. They struck precisely the right balance between friendly and helpful without being intrusive in any way. I just felt bad that we didn't do justice to the food processor and its twenty blades, the espresso machine or the six large frying pans.
For our first day (and, in part to enjoy the car's air conditioning!) we decided to get the flavour of where we were by doing a circular tour of the area. Our major ports of call were St Benoit-sur-Sault, Argenton and St Gaultier; not that this stopped us looking at virtually every village and church and petit château en route.
We had lunch in Argenton sharing the peace and quiet of even the largest French town during Sunday lunchtime. Somewhere between 12 and 4 and everyone is eating.
This photo is where we ate, the Cafe de la Place. This is the absolute hub of the city and there is usually traffic in all directions and crowded pavements. It made me long for our old-fashioned Sundays back in the UK when the world had at least one calm day a week.
The approach to St Gaultier is pretty spectacular. The church (built in 1050) and its surrounding school and other buildings are huge and immaculate and they cling to the hillside above the river, seeming to defy gravity.
The church is fairly simple but enormously soothing. It is cool and dark and calm, with that familiar musty smell that always serves to remind me that my tiny point in time is so insignificant in the life of this building and, strangely, I find I am OK with that. Churches weave a magic for me and yet I don't have a religious bone in my body.
Monday was our trip to a glamorous building day and we headed out for Chenonceau. If you have the even the faintest interest in French History this is a place to go. The story of Henry II and his mistress Diane de Poitiers and his wife, Catherine de Medici, is all very much intertwined with this place. Indeed Catherine, as Regency, ruled France from here after Henry's death. It is the most wonderful Soap/saga and knocks Coronation Street into a cocked hat. The link I have given you here doesn't tell you much of the story but it does have photos of the beautiful Chenonceau.
We also managed to do the trip on the river so we could really appreciate the château straddling the Cher. You might also notice the blue sky? Yet again, a baking hot day. The week we were there did manage to cool a little day on day; by the time we left it had got down to about 34 degrees.
The next day we were ready for a contrasting château and we set off for Sarzay. Yet another fascinating story of a different kind. This time it is of someone buying a dilapidated castle and spending his (and his family's) life renovating it. The article I have linked here is also amusing to read as it points up the incredible machinations and red tape of officialdom in France.
I loved Sarzay for a myriad of reasons, not least of which is the reminder of the tenacity of some humans to pursue their dreams. We were lucky to briefly meet the owner, Richard Hurbain. EDF meter reader extraordinaire.
We sort of ate and drank our way around this day's tour beginning with an excellent lunch in the restaurant directly opposite the château; photo on the left. Aptly named Bar Restaurant du Château.
Just to give you an example of our culinary experience ... on that day... in that unprepossessing place.... we had an eleven euro table d’hôte lunch which consisted of four courses and a two glass pitcher of wine each.
I had hors d'oeuvres, followed by a good roast pork dinner, then a large cheeseboard selection. I chose a Rhum baba for dessert. Ken's choice instead of the cheese board was was fromage blanc (something like Greek style yoghurt but still retaining all the goodness of the milk - made by a different process to yoghurt). The surprise was it came with four peeled cloves of garlic.
The picture on the right was our view from inside the restaurant. All included in the price!
On the way home we stopped at the Hotel du Lac for some cool drinks - how resonating is that? It overlooked the lake formed by the Barrage d'Éguzon.
The next day we decided to give up on châteaux and go and treat ourselves to one of the 'beautiful villages of France'. Les Plus Beaux Villages de France is an official designation for 157 villages in France in the hope of preserving them without turning them into tourist traps or museums.
Our choice was Gargilesse.
The village was indeed very pretty and had several interesting little shops. It has always been, and remains, an artists' community - the pivotal one being Georges Sand. The 11th century Romanesque church was unique to me. It has wonderful 13th - 16th century frescoes in the crypt. I have never been anywhere which has so many in one place and in such near perfect condition. Quite remarkable, and like everything else on this trip, it was all totally accessible to you. There are no ropes or barriers or people standing guard. You are treated with respect and trusted to behave appropriately and, seemingly, people do. What a joy. I was also totally blown away by some musicians and a singer in the church. She had the sort of sound which not only came from her but, somehow, the building itself as well; it was a truly incredibly moving moment hearing the melding of singer and stone.
The castle in Gargilesse - yes, it is impossible to avoid châteaux - doesn't have much château remaining but what it has is beautifully preserved; again, by a private owner. She has renovated it to use as a small art gallery. A gem of a place with a wonderful space behind it overlooking the river.
This isn't the entire gallery (!) just me in a corner of the garden waiting for the two intrepid explorers to return from whatever intrepid explorers do. Thanks to my chum for the photo.
Sadly our last day arrived and we trotted off to Argenton for a repeat visit when it was open! Mostly we were straining at the leash to get our hands on a French market and this was the only one we could find listed for miles around. Woops... we wandered around forlornly and eventually ended up in the tourist office who told me there hadn't been a market day in Argenton for years - out of date information courtesy of the world wide web. Nothing new there, then.
We consoled ourselves with a good lunch in a shaded patio at the back of the creperie. (sorry, can't find the circumflex on my machine) One of my companions took it literally - guess who - and went for a killer crepe. (that 'e' looks positively naked without it's hat).
The ladies were consoled by a bit of shopping - chocolates and a handbag being my choices.
As it was officially our last evening of our holiday in Masbonneau we thought we ought to scrub up and go out for dinner at night like fully fledged 'growed-ups'. Huge searching and head scratching ensued as we were in the heart of nowhere land and didn't want to travel miles for a meal. Finally we settled on Le Petit Roy in the hills of Menoux just outside Argenton.
I had the best quail ever - no, really, I did. Everyone's meal was lovely and it was a nice enough setting as we were able to sit outside on the patio at the back of the restaurant and gather up the last of our French evenings in the garden. Good food in a good setting, yet again.
Well stoked from a week of French eating we waddled back to the UK. The reverse two day trip was pretty uneventful. This time on our first day up through France we stopped off in Chatillon for a look round the town and a coffee at the back of Le César Brasserie. Sadly the wonderful Chocolaterie/Patisserie and a few other shops have closed since we lived there but the town is just as nice.
We lunched at a different and poor quality motorway services and hurried on up to Caen/Ouisterham/Herouville for our Etap overnighter. We arrived in good time for a walk on a blustery Ouisterham beach where we experienced our first few drops of rain for a week.
Dinner was in an incredible restaurant. It was utterly Barbie meets Elton John. Imagine pink and silvery grey and anywhere it could be done the the silver/grey was velvet and/or sequins, right down to the velvet covered menus. Add dresses and bows to the chairs and then throw in some beach themed objects such as bits of driftwood also tied to the chairs and the window blinds. Please trust me on this, my description is a very calm understatement of the surroundings. Neverthless it was an odd delight and the food, as ever, was great.
Nighty, night in our motel, with an early (no breakfast) start in the morning. I had a full English on board the Mont St Michel while my two companions did their usual continental minimalist thing.
The crossing was a bit choppy and there were a lot of very poorly travellers - not us. My bacon and eggs and I remained firm friends.
Our first English food was Marks and Spencer sandwiches (or, in my case a crayfish salad) on the motorway on the way home. I couldn't face the though of motorway food after a week in France.
Guess what... we met the rain north of the Midlands. We were back!
A couple of days later, on the 27th, we had a meal and movies with our mates and it was like we had never been away!. We saw 'The Bourne Legacy', which a critic described as being an 'over a two hour chase with no plot or characterisation'. That just about covers it for me.
Tai Chi on Thursday and then Friday the 31st wandered in. This last day of August was spent moving me back from my garden work room which we created back in April to my office/spare bedroom in the house. This saga is in the Bentleys blog (or will be soon) if you are curious as to why.
All my Clavering chattering is done. There is a Masbonneau photo album for a flavour of our trip but it is really hard to choose a couple of dozen photos from about 200 so I am not sure it is a very rich view of our time there. The flowers are separated out into another album for the benefit of my ramblings in my garden blog - in the new few days. This is the first of a lot of writing catch-ups I want to do.
It feels like July was a really busy month but I suspect as I trawl through my diary it will turn out to be otherwise.
In the writing up of the May/June 'events' I left you round about the end of the first week of July when I was just about recovered from being poisoned. So, already a quarter of this record is written!
The first weekend (7th) we did an overnighter in Cheltenham to visit my sister and help celebrate her Golden Wedding Anniversary. How great to be able to do that these days (!) and lovely to see her and husband and both her children and their partners and children - just terrific to all be together for once. She, like me, has children who are scattered all over the planet, so the chances of us ever being in the same place at the same time is pretty remote.
Thank you P and K for making it possible.
The next weekend we did a great Garden Trail. Every two years the Edenfield Horticulural Society oganises a trail of 14 gardens for people to visit. We managed only eight I am afraid. As always you need to visit Bury Gardeners if you want the details of the day. It was really good and we look forward to the next one, where we shall be perverse and work our way numerically backwards in hopes of doing the six we missed.
We took the leaflet's advice and ended up having a late lunch at The Eagle and Child. We had a long wait for a table - handy hint if you go on Sunday book first. It was OK as it happened as we had to wait for a friend to join us.
The food was good and they have a brilliant garden being developed at the back of the pub. This turned out to be a good excuse for another meal there on Wednesday as we took them a load of cloches and stuff I wouldn't be using any more now my veggie garden is defunct.
19 July might turn out to be a marker day somewhere in my future - or a damp squib .... I decided I fancied doing Tai Chi in the vain hope of being mobile for longer. I suggested to my other half he might want to give it a shot as he would otherwise just be hanging around for an hour for me. Two friends decided it sounded like a good idea and so four of us are now strutting our stuff..... or stretching our stuff. I am totally useless. It is all like patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time and I can't do that either. I have never learned to dance so the 'choreography' of it all has me completely beaten. I can proudly claim to be the worst in the class - I have always wanted to be the best at something and it would appear I shall be the best at being the worst. There is a lady I copy (not the instructor) who tells me she has been going fifteen months and that I am not to despair with only three weeks under my not-so-black belt. I am an instant gratification person. If I can't do it first time in two minutes then I don't want to. I also hate looking like an idiot! It is a good job that three others joined me, otherwise I certainly would not have gone back after session one. This way I have no choice but to keep on keeping on..... and we do have lunch afterwards!
Third weekend in July and, guess what, more garden visits. This time to the fabulous Jefferson and Susan garden. As before track down the visit in the garden blog if you are interested. As ever it involved two friends joining us, tea and cake and lunch out afterwards. I love my English life.
The garden is a two day event and we chose to do it on the Saturday as I wanted to go to a new dolls house fair on Sunday. Yippee, at last, a local one. Mecure Hotel, Bolton. Good stuff. it was an OK affair but it only took me a little over an hour to cover; so we pootled off for a Chinese Meal.
I am getting so professional about this dollhousing game now, I just know which stalls I want to look at in an instant. I exercised proper restrain and I only bought a few things, all of which I really needed/wanted. No more buying on a whim and then having to sell stuff on.
On which note, the next day I was busy listing stuff (previous whimsical purchases) on E-Bay. I did very well this time - twenty out of twenty-six things sold and some actually at a profit. That said, of course, when I have paid E-Bay and Paypal charges, packaging etc etc etc , not to mention the original cost of the object it is always an overall loss. At least I managed to retrieve about seventy pounds which is better than handing it all over to the charity stall at the next show, which I have done in the past.
Indeed this was the month for making money out of my hobby as my first article was published in Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine and I was asked to send an Invoice for my fee. Deep joy all round. Mind you I haven't actually been paid yet!
The very next day after the fair we were off to Nottingham to pick up my next project. Yes, I know, totally crack pot.... but ..... trawling E-Bay I saw this lovely build. It is a defunct Dolls House Emporium property - O'Rouke's Post Office. It doesn't appear very often. In fact in my two years doing this I haven't seen one. So how can you not? This time you need to go and look at Chocolat if you are curious as to the source of my lust.
Its very kind owner also gave me the stables to go with it, but I didn't really have room for it to go beside Chocolat or a reason for it to be there. On the way home I felt bad about taking it because I thought I would have to sell it or also pass it on to someone else; then suddenly it struck me that it would make a terrific beach cottage... so there's 2014's project then! Do you think the miniature God is trying to tell me something?
As always we managed to build in a decent lunch to the day out by stopping off at a National trust place on the way home. Bit of an oddity this one - Kedleston Hall. It was somehow an arid sort of place. Being Robert Adam's first major commission (1760s) and not a penny was spared on its realisation it should have been beautiful but it is so full of showing off that it misses the mark. I think it was Samuel Johnson who said on his visit there - it would make a wonderful Town Hall. I couldn't agree more. Worth seeing if you are in the area just to see how you feel about it.
The next day we had a change in the hellish weather we have been having and my attention switched to my much neglected garden. Newbank delivered some trellis and a tree ready for the great border re-do, but then this went on hold in favour of meals out, tai chi and finally the last few days of July being spent in Much Birch near Hereford.
This was another one of our cheapie trips; this time courtesy of Mighty Deals (a sort of Groupon thing). The Pilgrim Hotel was very nice and the restaurant and its food very good. Much Birch is between Hereford and Ross-on-Wye. We made a pleasure trip out of the journey down and tried not to use more motorway than we needed, stopping off at Attingham Park for an NT lunch and tour of the house.
The next day we did a bit of a tour of the black and white towns taking in Hay, Ross and all the other on-Wyes. Our main stop was in Hereford so Ken and our friends could cram in some culture in the cathedral and I could go to The Pedlars Tray (you guessed it, a Dolls House shop). I did get to meet my companions back at the cathedral for cake and tea though. Best carrot cake ever! My claims for having seen it all before on a family holiday when I was seventeen didn't go down well.
Being a Midlander by birth and therefore an 'expert' on the area I proposed that the next day we went home via Powys Castle as it had spectacular gardens and great views across the Menai Straits. Some of you may have spotted the fatal error. I was remembering Plas Newydd! To be precise I was correctly remembering the lovely terraced gardens at Powis but I had managed to mentally transport them to Plas Newydd's setting. It is very confusing being me.
We had done very well for good weather during our stay but began to run into the rain on our trip back. This started at Powys, so our friends toured the house and Ken and I imitated mountain goats and shinned up and down the fantastic terraced gardens. By the time we were on the motorway it was a truly dramatic downpour. I was truly glad to get home in one piece. So the last day of the month saw itself out like most of the others this summer - with rain.
I have two months to catch up but it still won't fill a page I'm afraid. As I said before because I now run three blogs (four if you count Wentworth) there isn't much left for this one. I no longer keep a personal journal and I never did do much of that on-line so this space is really a record of things we have done and if you remove gardens and dolls house to the other blogs we don't seem to be doing very much. This is driven more by me than by Ken. I am perfectly content pootling around my home and am very reluctant to leave it even for small trips out. Not sure if this is the first sign of impending old age, clinging on to Bury because I am made to live in the sun all winter (!) or just plain laziness. Whatever the reason home seems to supply my needs. I love my doll-housing and garden and small domestic stuff and alongside reading, writing, talking to friends, meals out, visits to gardens and things to see my days are filled.
So, here's a quick flit through May and June to record any markers I might want to recall some time.
The first week of May and my daughter and her chap came for a brief visit which was a real joy. Even with phones and email and Skype to keep in touch with the people who matter in your life, its nothing like the real thing. She got in some driving practice by taking us to all the ice cream places within striking distance - and one in another universe. As always the time flew by and we were soon back to just us two.
May seemed to be filled with the chores of life - banks, dentist, hospitals, hairdressers and such like. With the exception of the hairdressers they all had positive outcomes.
We had a catch up with 'The Seven' and tried a new restaurant near us - Gatapardo - not overly impressed, so that doesn't go on the 'again' list. I missed the catch up with the old (in more than one sense nowadays) Langworthians as I wasn't well; I will get them again before we fly back to the US of A.
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| This is not Ken and me |
My best friend and I went to the Bolton Octagon for a very well done production about Pat Phoenix (Queen of the North). It was certainly well acted and not badly written but it did feel like a documentary which is an odd sensation to watch on stage. Ken joined us for the pre-show meal but decamped before the play as it was decidedly 'weemins' stuff.
I didn't manage to get in any garden visits in May as it was back to back rain. Neither did I do a dolls house fair - Kensington is in May but it is too expensive for us to get to and it is massive and heaving and I am saving myself for the NEC for that.
June trickled in with more and more rain. I think, ultimately, it managed to achieve the accolade of the wettest June on record.
My reference when writing Clavering is my desk diary. It is used to note any ongoing chores that are then kept from day to day for the ultimate satisfaction of being able to tick one off now and again. I also keep 'appointments' listed there so it is a useful point of reference for these meanderings. June is page after page of dolls house things I need/want to do, so clearly that's how much of the month was spent.
We did go to the York Dolls House show on the 10th and luckily the weather held sufficiently for Ken to sit in the sun while I did a morning's traipsing round. We then drove over to Beningborough (NT place) for lunch as the food at all the shows is pretty wretched. Someone could make a bomb catering those things - captive eaters with money to spend! Then again, I suppose for the very same reason they don't have to make an effort as they are still madly busy selling their grotty stuff.
I delivered my second article to the Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine stall but didn't get to meet my editor, Lucie Roper. Got a bit paranoid as the four times I passed their stand she was nowhere to be seen.
On the 13th we went to our lovely dinky theatre in Ramsbottom to see 'Annie'. You have to admire their stamina and sheer hard work, especially this time as it was a never-ending production - one and a half hours to the interval! We are wicked in that we manage to get laughs from all sorts of unintended things and keep ourselves amused for days with stuff like the Mrs Danvers housekeeper character and three singers in red sequinned frocks which my friend described as looking like Easter eggs. It is very wicked of us and I need a good hiding. So a good evening was had by all even if it wasn't for the right reasons. Well done those chaps!
Weekend of the 17th and finally a glimmer of sun (sort of) so off we tootled for a trip round the village of Bretherton and five of their excellent little gardens. Good lunch, nice walk, pretty stuff to see and home tired. Definition of a good day out.
June 25th and we had another trip to the Octagon for 'Little Voice'. This time Ken joined my little friend and me but I have come to the conclusion that plays have too many words for him/most blokes(?). D and I enjoyed it though. I am convinced all the rubbish TV and movies we are inundated with which have minimum dialogue (cheap writing) and maximum background music and 'action' sequences and are written by men for men as they don't 'do' talking and listening, they just do 'doing'. Venus and Mars for sure.
Unhappily the last week of the month I was horribly poorly having been poisoned by something - possibly the meal at the Octagon (!) It is the 6th July now and I am just about getting back to right but still a bit low and floppy-doppy. That's my excuse for writing this boring ten-year-old's 'this is what I did on my holiday' type piece.
So April has arrived and we are already truly bedded in here, at home.
Our flights back (29th/30th March) and our grocery order and warm house all kicked in smoothly and uneventfully. We had a bit of added luxury on our overnighters this winter as we stumped up for the wider seats with more legroom. I think it is really worth it - for me any way. Ken pretty much sleeps his way home, so he'd be fine in a match box.
By All Fool's Day I was already ordering stuff for the shop project. I had also changed my mind about the building I would do it in. I won't take up space here with garden or dolls house chatter as I do that on the other blogs for anyone interested. That said, when I remove those two elements from this one there doesn't seem to be much left.
Our first week home was stuffed full (smile) of eating out; so much for me ordering the grocery in advance so we wouldn't starve After all, if you have to go to the garden centre you may as well eat there.
By the second we were up at the crack of dawn for roof repairers and the cleaner. Deep joy; I have a cleaner here in the UK for the occasional sort out. I hate cleaning house; it is a thankless task, within five minutes it all needs doing again.
We also had a lovely surprise. Amongst our mountain of post was a card saying we had a registered package to pick up. Neither of us were expecting anything, so Ken went off to pick up the mystery item. This turned out to be a note from the Halifax saying he had won something in their monthly prize draw. Off he trotted to Bury and was pleased to find he'd won £100. It won't pay for the roof, but it is better than zilch. Apparently the prizes are 100, 1,000 and 100,000.
Now the next sentence is worth noting. I had my haircut and it was fine. .... end of subject
On the 4th my new dolls house shop arrived - the Lyddington. I don't actually love it, like I loved the Honeychurch, but it is a much more practical building to go at for what I want to do. I am though loving the historical research aspect of it all. I must drive Ken crazy with - "You'll never guess how Edwardians.........". He gets tortured with it because I can't imagine how anyone can't be interested in how our grandmothers/greatgrandmothers lived. It is an almost touchable part of our own histories.
The 5th and off to Ikea for a general rummage and the table, shelves and drawers I wanted for my proposed work room. Such fun - I am great at finding the cheapest and the also the most perfect thing for the job. take this literally - my shelves, drawers and table were the cheapest of their kind that Ikea do. I don't have many talents but this is one of them. Give me tuppence and I can convert a barn to a home. Think Doris Day and Calamity Jane.
The next couple of days we emptied, cleaned and painted the inside of my new work space. Bing, bang, bosh, build the furniture and I was in!
During the same time period I managed to write my first article for Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine. As it isn't due until July (for publication in September) I am a little ahead of the game. I hope to do one each month for the next six months, so it is done and dusted. It needs to be done while I am at home in the UK alongside the Wentworth; otherwise if there's a snag like needing another/different photograph, it would be a tad difficult. See, there is a method in my madness.
On the 15th Ken and I got all gusseted up ready for a grown up trip into the big city for a meal out with friends. Crikey, it seems like forever since we actually went out, at night, to Manchester, in a cab. Such japes Pip. It was a lovely evening in good company in a Japanese Teppanyaki restaurant.
A couple of days later and I was back in almost the same part of the city to meet my best friend for a trip round the Art Gallery, some lunch and a huge gossip catch up. Every inch of it was a delight.
The guide for the Pre-Raphaelite exhibition (possibly my favourite period of art history) was absolutely excellent. A really good balance of information and humour. The exhibition itself seemed a little sparse and I think he was required to add in some pre pre-raf stuff along with some post pre-raf stuff to extend the tour. That aside, it was excellent and I learned a lot. I won't be able to retain it, but it was fun while it lasted.
Lunch was delicious. I have no idea why that every art gallery I have ever eaten in manages to produce good meals, but they do.
As for the chatter - it was essential and it mends the horrid six months gap in our friendship every year. We are puttering along in parallel as ever again now.
I might mention that the date of this event was 18th April and I wore fairly hefty clothes and a mac and scarf and I was as frozen and wet as if it were mid-winter. I remember our guide mentioning one of the Bronte sisters going for a walk, getting wet through to her woollen vest and dying of consumption - it struck a chord.
As compensation when I got home I managed to join my other half in a full-on Indian curry in the evening. No, I am never outfaced by two main meals a day. We also managed to eat out the next two days too with friends. It is good to catch up!
On the 21st we were off to the Pudsey Dolls House Show. It kept me occupied from 10.30am to 2pm so it must be a fairly good one. I had ordered a load of stuff to pick up so it was also useful for that. It was even more useful for the person who bought the Honeychurch, we carted it there so they could drive down from Humberside to collect it to save them coming all the way to Bury. I never got to meet either of them as I was in the show. Ken and her husband did the deal in the car park!
The rest of the month is back to back Bentley's. I even missed the Harrogate Spring Flower Show.
That said, it really hasn't been the weather for it. This April was the wettest since records began (100 years ago) so England certainly knew how to say welcome home. Without any exaggeration we have had one fine day in the whole month since we got back and that was on the 30th. I wonder what it will chuck at us in May.
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'I crave an iPhone. I am totally in love with Siri and all the other bells and whistles but today I found the item which clinched this for me. There is an App which purports to keep you in a thirty foot mosquito free zone. It supposedly emits ultrasonic sound to keep female Mosquitos away and will run in the background of your device. I decided it probably wasn't all that useful on my iPad but on an iPhone.... Sheer heaven. Please tell me it's for real?'
I just found that note which I scribbled in my collection of March thoughts. We have been back in the UK ten days and I can barely remember and certainly can't 'feel' Florida. It really is like having some sort of split personality this dual life we lead. I put on my English coat (literally this year!) and Florida falls away. Bear with me while I scratch around to remember what we actually did in March. I know we had special visitors but other than that???
I've just skipped through my notes and I am right we spent the first week getting ready for the arrival of my son, Chris and his partner, Gayle and my grand-daughter Lucy (17 plus months old). They live in Canada so we only get to see them a couple of times a year. They stayed just nine days which simply flew by. We then spent the last few days just sorting ourselves out for our summer-in-the-UK departure.
I am pretty sure Chris and Gayle are comfortable with my nattering about them and sharing pictures but I try to stick to my rule of not scooping other people up into this public place too much. Just because I choose to share my mental wanderings with you doesn't mean I can drag others along too.
Suffice it to say it was truly magical to have my grand-daughter under our roof. She is at an age and stage where she is just a laugh a minute. I know there's barely a grand parent alive who doesn't think their grand-child is just the best but in this case ..... Seriously she has a lovely temperament, amiable, not grizzly, a joy to take out - even to restaurants. She is as bright as a button (like her parents) and watching the mass of newly learned things she added every single day takes your breath away.
She is also delightfully brave, nothing outfaces or alarms her. She met the sea for the first time and literally took it in her stride.
All in all it was a wonderful time and one I will treasure.
Sailor Ken completed his sailing course during their stay and has since taken out a Hobie-cat a couple of times so I thought I'd share a picture of him in it (he doesn't count in the privacy stakes apparently). Actually he probably won't be happy because he said when he saw the ones I took that they were useful because they showed that he was sitting too far back. So all you Hobie-cat sailors can boast how you do it better. Me - I was pretty impressed; they get up a fair lickety-split when they catch the breeze. Not impressed enough to join him.
Before I launch into February, which promises to be about three sentences long, I've just remembered I forgot to tell you about the robbery! While Ken and I were in the UK it seems that someone (a couple of youths?) broke into all our garages and stole various things. Phil and Sue told us about it when we got home. We had a cursory check and all seemed to be OK.
We then saw a slew of (plain clothes) detectives and police rummaging around and taking prints and generally spending a great deal of time and energy searching for clues - photos in the bushes etc. We were mightily impressed and were quick to compare the service to the level of interest our police show in a petty domestic robberies. Joke on us! Their interest was because one of our neighbours had his gun stolen! Another had his magazine nicked. Being British we had a brief flash of Playboy or a car magazine before the penny dropped - he, of course, meant ammunition. It is a whole other world here. Since which we also learned there is at least one other neighbour in the eight of us who has a gun - so that's three that we know of. Moral of that story - don't argue with Americans.
Meanwhile Ken figured out what was wrong with the doors - they were all badly fitted. The tongue of the lock wasn't going all the way across which allows the locking mechanism to drop in place. The hole hadn't been cut deep enough to allow this, so it was easy to slip in a screwdriver and push it back. Hey presto - one open door. They then helped themselves to all and sundry from the cars which most people don't lock when they put them in a garage.
We were crowing about how we were fine... always lock the car and never leave anything in it of value even in the garage. Really we are too perfect to live!
A few days later, planning our Orlando trip, Ken couldn't find the GPS. Yes, you guessed it.... not only had it been left in the car before we went away but the car battery was on charge and the car was therefore unlocked. Talk about rubbish timing.
It gets worse, the American car insurance doesn't cover theft from cars... the car has to be stolen then it covers contents! The American house insurance doesn't cover stuff in garages and cars. The UK travel insurance didn't cover it because we weren't here!!!! No wonder people don't buy insurance.
Any way all that happened way back at the beginning of January and this is a February natter.
Well, actually there's nothing to tell you and no pictures to show you....
In preparation for Lucy's visit, we've spent a lot of time mentally returning to the mid seventies and trying to remember what tiny tots need . We did really well and bought a (nearly) brand new cot, priced at $25 so I bid him down to $20 and bump a up seat for the dining chair priced at $15 and yes, you guessed it I got it for $10. This was less than the hire cost. I've also bought masses of bargain price clothes and other bits and bobs. Indeed the hard part is not to buy stuff.
We did a lot of Library lectures and concerts, nothing too much stands out except someone who played a resonator guitar wonderfully and a good lecture on Bach's (two and a half hour) Mass. Funny and informative. In comparison we did a lecture on Alzheimers that was totally forgettable (!) Why, oh why, do some lecturers produce 15 slides and then proceed to read them - adding nothing and doing it inaudibly???? In fact he hadn't even produced the slides himself they were taken from the Alzheimers website. We actually did the Bach lecture and this one on the same day - gluttons for punishment.
In the middle of the month Ken went on his first of five sailing lessons while I stayed home and fried weevils and baked ships biscuits. He is loving it and I can see us sailing our catamaran round the world as our next adventure, with two pairs of knickers and one saucepan for survival.
A couple of days later we succumbed to the unforgivable sin and went to an English food shop and bought English stuff. Hate ex-pat pandering. Hate it even more after spending an arm and a leg on awful stuff. We paid £4.42 for a packet of, actually so bad they went down Oscar (the waste disposal), sausages. £7.58 for two tiny equally nauseating pork pies; their only virtue which helps overcome the bright pink nasty gluey paste like substance in them is they are so salty we were too busy complaining about that to notice much else. Get ready for this one... Weetabix cost £5.36. They are great, though they are being rationed. Pataks sauce, tin of custard, HP baked beans, tin of Golden syrup (deep joy - I made a syrup sponge pudding and then a treacle tart) and a packet of McVities digestive cost us another £12! Perhaps if I didn't fantasise over pictures of Tesco Finest every time I get a missive from them I would do better. They are my on-line food porn - the, unobtainable for me, fantasy ideal of food.
Oh - looking through my diary I just spotted another library offering - a guy with guitar purporting to sing music from the 50's and 60's. His earliest was 1926 and he just about scraped into the late 40's. Worse than that the audience were asked to 'sing-along' - and they did! I had this awful sensation of being in an old people's home thinking this was fun. Actually I didn't think it was fun, I looked around me and saw my (not too distant) future. Not good for an already depressed person.
The next night our night out was a fun evening with an Irish singing group of four, interspersed with a pipe band and air step (Irish) dancers. That was certainly more lively and even Ken sang along with Black Velvet Band. Good craic.
.... and, as if like magic, it was the 29th. I never proposed to a soul to get a free silk dress; and then it was March.
