Out In The Snow

 What a cold day it was yesterday! Tom was back at work after nine days holiday so I felt quite lonely. He has been going out and feeding our birds and ducks while he has been off so it was a shock to my system on such a cold day going out to see to them. It took me such a long time as all the water was frozen and the ducks little pool was frozen solid too. After the struggle of chipping all that away, of course the hose pipe was frozen so I had to walk up and down the garden with buckets of water from the kitchen. We have steps up to our garden which are pretty treacherous at the best of times so I felt I was risking life and limb doing it yesterday. I carried warm water for the ducks little pool as a treat and even though it was only just warm in the freezing cold there was steam coming off it. Scoot our female duck just sat there with her little legs floating for ages she enjoyed it so much.

The whole time I was walking up and down, the beautiful vixen who always sits at the end of our garden was watching me, no doubt in amazement at my antics. I always think she has the most perfect face I have ever seen on a fox.

I felt so sorry for her sitting in the cold and snow I went into the house and gave her a bowl of dog biscuits before I went inside. While I was sitting in the warm enjoying a cup of tea I sat and watched the fox carefully carrying some of  the biscuits and hiding them around the garden.  When I was talking to my eldest daughter on the phone yesterday evening I told her about the fox's behaviour. Before she was a police officer she worked for two years in the London Wildlife Hospital and she said if a vixen is displaying different behaviour she may be pregnant. I do hope so, she had three cubs last spring and it was such a pleasure watching their antics in the garden as they grew up. 

When youngest daughter got in from work she said she saw, on the way by, the local park was completely packed with families out sledging on the big hill there. All off school, I suppose they deserve to have a bit of fun. Tom said the buses were empty though and he spent most of the day driving round and round with only a few people on his bus. I start to wonder if the days of busy buses will ever come back.

It was such a cold night last night. We leave the kitchen heater on all night when it is cold, for our dogs and Cleo our cat who sleeps pressed up next to it. Cassie our little Yorkie sleeps on our bed and even she got under the covers! I kept waking up and thinking about the poor fox out in this snow. It is still snowing today though only lightly but I think it may be a while before this clears. I have plenty of work to do inside but I will be glad to get out walking again. Have a lovely day everyone and I hope you are all able to stay safe and warm xx

Little Precious Items

 Yesterday was a strange day weather wise. We had quite a lot of snow from dark overcast skies but at regular intervals it turned to sleet so barely settled. It was cold though and I was glad to be inside. Tom was watching sport in the afternoon so I took myself up into the loft to sort out some toys for Scarlett. Everyone laughed at me when I packed up the toys carefully years ago but I said we would be glad of them one day. We have so many, there are new ones for her all the time, without spending any money and I get so much pleasure knowing that all these toys are having a second lease of life and being recycled. I found a little Easter bag with a rabbit on the side that my Mum gave to my eldest daughter with little Easter gifts in probably thirty years ago. I'm going to clean it up and fill it with new Easter gifts. It will feel as if it is partly a present from my Mum to Scarlett too. 

I keep all these little things as I am always taken back to an exact moment and I love remembering it. There was an incident that happened yesterday, that we really laughed about that reminded me of  one of these precious items. In the afternoon, in the middle of one of the heaviest snowstorms, youngest daughter came downstairs  and exclaimed  "Can you hear that!" When we listened, we could hear it too, that wonderful sound that I love, the melodic chimes of an ice cream van! After birdsong I think it is one of my favourite sounds in the world. I think this ice cream van driver was being a bit hopeful though, I hope he managed to sell a few ice creams.

When I was a little girl in the 1960s the ice cream van seemed to call all the time. I would listen for the tinkling music of The Teddy Bears Picnic and ask for an ice cream. As soon as I sat down to eat my breakfast I would be asking "What time is the ice cream van coming?" There was an incident that happened in my childhood that has made me remember these old ice cream vans very clearly.

I was three years old, the same age as Scarlett, my Grandparents had come to stay and I was so excited I ran upstairs to get a new toy I wanted to show them.  I'm not sure what I fell on, but I just remember the blood everywhere and the worried faces looking down at me. An ambulance was called and I remember sitting in it, wrapped in a blanket looking out at my sister and my grandparents as we drove away. My main worry at the time was my little slippers that had horses on and were covered in blood! 

After what seemed like hours of hospital staff, stitches to my forehead and being separated from my Mum, who wasn't allowed in with me, we arrived home in a taxi. Then the final trauma was my bloodied slippers being thrown in the fire! I was lying in the dining room on a little bed they had made up for me and my Dad came home from work. He gave me this little ice cream van and I was so thrilled, all of a sudden the whole day didn't matter. Today it is on a shelf in our living room and I still smile when I look at it. I almost remember the day as a happy memory when I look back all these years later!

We've had more snow over night and my Dad was on the phone at the crack of dawn saying he was going to cancel his doctor's appointment as it wasn't safe going out. The snow is always quite bad where he lives and with less traffic on the road because of lockdown the side roads seem to stay icy longer. So it looks like another day inside for me. I hope everyone has a lovely day staying safe and warm. xx

Shopping During Lockdown

 During this lockdown we have started using Click And Collect from Morrisons. Unable to get home delivery slots anywhere and fed up with queuing in the rain outside local shops I decided to give it a try, You can order it the day before, choose your slot, then Tom drives to the car park to the pick up point to collect it. If you don't want to get out of the car they will even load it in for you but Tom says there is no way he could sit there watching a couple of young girls doing all the work! On the whole we have been very pleased with the shopping, Only a few substitutions and Morrison's food is nice quality. The only time I go shopping now is for my Dad once a week and that is to his local M&S Food so isn't really that crowded which is why going to B&Q yesterday almost felt like an adventure! 

We decided to go and look at the railings there to see if they would do for our garden plans. We were so pleased with them we bought some straight away. I have learned before in B&Q sometimes they just stop stocking something, usually the one thing I decided to go back and get a while later!  Tom used his new B&Q pensioners 15% discount card. He worked there years ago and now he has turned 60 gets a very small pension from them. As the young girl on the till, who must have been new, had never seen one before Tom explained what it was. "So there you are" I said "That's something to look forward to." She looked horrified! 

I managed to fit in a little bit more tidying in the garden yesterday, more to batten down the hatches before the bad weather really. One thing I am really pleased  about is this little tree that has appeared in a pot with a small oak tree in my Dad potted for me from his garden. I'm not sure what it is and if it has germinated from a seed from his garden or ours but I will put in it's own pot soon and add it to my tree collection. I will enjoy waiting to see if I can identify it as it grows. 

The promised snow has just started here, just a few a light flurries but it is freezing cold. It seems to be on it's way from Kent and I'm really hoping it's not too heavy as Tom and youngest son and daughter are all going out to work tomorrow.  I'm planning to be out early too, travelling over to my Dad's as he has a routine doctors appointment in the morning .I'll just have to wait and see what the rest of the day brings. Have a lovely day everyone and I hope you are keeping warm. xx

Big Ideas For The Spring

 It was a beautiful day here yesterday and I spent most of it out in the garden. It felt like spring out and about and the sun shone most of the day. I managed to clear lots of the winter rubbish away and do some cutting back that hadn't been finished last autumn. Bulbs are coming up everywhere, it was lovely. All the time when I was working a little robin followed me about singing away. All gardeners seem to have a friendly robin around and I think that is why we love them so much. I am selling a few bits on ebay that are just too valuable to send to a charity shop and am already spending the money in my head, on a new arch and some decorative railings around the flower bed the dogs always run across when they come out of the house. I can't seem to grow anything there and have had to move a few precious plants to further up the garden as since our neighbours have had an extension built it is really shady. That, coupled with the excited dog being let out problem, has turned it into a depressing mess. I have been looking through garden design books and my ideas are running away with me (as usual!). Beautiful ferns, water features. Victorian lanterns. Oh well I'll just have to see what it all sells for. 

It won't be long now until everything is coming into flower. and my lovely little statue Summer is surrounded by colour.

Apparently snow is on the way later today so I will be inside catching up with the pile of jobs there always seems to be. Hopefully it will mean I can finish off the caravan curtains and more sorting out with items for the charity saleroom. 

Finally I will leave you with a song from probably my favourite film ever The Sound of Music. One of the first films I ever saw as a child at the cinema. I doubt there was a year went by in her later life we didn't watch this film on the television with my Mum. We knew every song off by heart after a school concert when I was a child and I had the whole songbook.  I was one of the nuns in the chorus and Mum always laughed she sewed me so tightly into my costume I couldn't raise my arm to wave goodbye in the final scene! This is to remember Christopher Plummer who sadly died yesterday. Have a lovely day everyone and I hope you escape the worst of the weather. xx

Stitching Through The Generations

 With Scarlett's "help" yesterday I finished the repairing of the large crochet blanket. She loves to help, she has her own ball of wool (purple her favourite colour) and she sits busily working in and out of the ball of wool with a crochet hook looking very serious! "I find crocheting very easy" she says as she just winds the wool around the hook! When she is a little older than three I will definitely sit and teach her how to do it properly. It is really something to look forward to. 

The Crochet Blanket

Now the blanket is repaired I just love it. It's enormous, large enough for a big double bed and I have decided not to take it to the caravan. It's strange but repairing someone else's stitching I think you almost build up a bond with them. Whoever crocheted this blanket worked so hard on it it needs to be displayed all the time so I think I will put it on our bed and it will brighten up our bedroom which is very dark. I have another bedspread I will start work on soon for the caravan. 

While I have been repairing the blanket I have been using bits of the wool that I found in my Mum's knitting bag. Ten years ago, when I was really enjoying knitting all the time, she gave me her knitting bag. I remember the day really well. It was in the summer and my sister who worked in a school was off work and was there too. We went out for an Indian meal and had such a lovely time all chatting and laughing as we always did. When we got back to the house Mum told me she had found her knitting bag in her wardrobe and thought I might like it. I could only really remember her knitting when I was very young in the early 1960s so it hadn't been used for nearly 50 years. Apparently my Dad bought it as a present for her just after they got married in 1955. 

I remember we really laughed at the 1950s patterns. I have still kept the knitting my Mum started years ago. 

While we have been mending the blanket, using my Mum's wools it has made me realise that it is a very precious thing passing on crafts and skills down through the generations. Schools don't teach these skills anymore so if it is not taught in the family I think they will be lost. It's not just the skills though it's a love of recycling and reusing that I don't think happens without being taught it. 

The whole day was so enjoyable yesterday. We went out for a walk in the morning and looked in all the shop windows of the closed shops talking about why they were closed at the moment. It reminded me of the days when we used to go window shopping on Sundays when we were children. 

Working and going out walking. Pandemic or not there is still fun if you can enjoy the little things and yesterday was definitely a day of enjoying them. It's lovely and sunny this morning so I hope I can get a few bits tidied up in the garden before the cold weather comes this weekend. I hope everyone has a lovely day what ever they are doing. xx

The History Of A House

 I always think houses have good times and bad times in their history. When I am walking the dogs, the same roads for years and years, I can see a pretty little house I really admire, then sometimes sadly it will start to look a bit neglected and then more and more so. Often it is when an old person becomes too old to tend it. It is ever so sad to see the once loved garden getting overgrown. Sometimes a really lovely house never seems to get back that loved look and I always think maybe one day it will in the future. There is a house in our road that has been empty since we moved in 17 years ago. Neighbours have told us that it has been empty for 20 years before this. Nearly 40 years of neglect and lack of love, it is a sorry sight. Years ago occasionally we would see an old man going in at night. With a bare bulb lighting up the room we could see him through the filthy net curtains sitting looking through the piles of boxes and newspapers that reached up to the ceiling. We all have a very vivid imagination in our family and we would ponder on what the story of the house and the old man was. Then for many years no one ever entered. Behind the damaged gates at the side of the house is an old Morris Minor car, rusty and covered in dents. It added to the sadness I felt every time I walked by. 

Then one day last year, people started going in clearing out the house and we were told the old man had died. Skips and skips of rubbish and old 1960s furniture were taken away. We were all ever so pleased to see the house coming to life, it is a lovely thought that after all this time a family may be living there again. A house deserves so much more than all that neglect especially when there are so many people who would love it. Yesterday I looked at the estate agents details online and there was something about the photos that made feel even more sad. It has obviously once been so loved. A beautiful fireplace, wallpapered rooms but it was the children's bedroom that really caught my eye. Torn and hanging off the walls was wallpaper of little puppies. Someone had gone to so much trouble for a loved child, they must have been so happy in that pretty room looking out over the back garden. I really wonder what the story of it all is and doubt I will ever know but I hope the house becomes loved again as I think it definitely deserves some good fortune in it's history. 

We are looking after Scarlett today so I'm hoping we will be able to get out and about before the rain comes later. There seems to be quite a lot of good news on the vaccine front so I'm sure it won't be long until we will be able to go a bit further afield again. Have a lovely day everyone what ever you are doing. xx

What A Swansong

 Like everyone I was so sad to hear about the death of Captain Tom Moore yesterday. What a tragedy after all he did to finally succumb to coronavirus himself. A lovely man with a wonderful life and my goodness what a swansong. At the age of 100 he became the hero of the whole country. We all have to die and to live to 100 is all any of us could dream of but who could imagine the final year of their life would turn out like his. He did so much good, gave so many people hope and looked as if he was enjoying it all so much too. 100 or not, his family must be devastated to lose him, but as a country, at a time of great need, we were so lucky to have him.

There's something about being around a really inspiring person that inspires you to be better! I'm not sure I will live to 100 but I hope I still have many years left and it makes me realise that being 60 is nothing. I still have the opportunity for so many new challenges left. I think that facing new challenges is what keeps people young and I'm going to try never to think that I am too old to try anything. Have a lovely day what ever you are doing. xx