My Blessings

I follow and read several blogs and so admire their photographs. I'm hopeless and mine don't do justice to the subjects I'm photographing.  I'm thinking particularly of our garden which has been spectacular, a lot due to Dh as I can't dig with my duff arm anymore and in all the heat he watered the pots every night.  We are getting ready to put it to bed for the winter, lifting the dahlias and getting those pesky dandelions out. 

I get blog envy when I see some. but I feel so sad for those who write about their everyday lives, some very lonely by themselves, others who can't fit enough into their days, carefully planned as though they're afraid to have one minute unplanned. I don't fill my days with planned activities and am happy to go along as things happen. I don't need to fill my life with things, activities or holidays. Even when I lived alone, I took my time through each day. Now having met my lovely Dh 18 years ago I have many and plentiful number of blessings.

He's not perfect in a lot of things, as he needs time to get round to doing things, which in all fairness, he's decided he needed to do himself. He made a 'to do' list the other day but hasn't actually done anything on it yet. He wants to paint his shed, he has the paint ready and waiting; he wants to sort out the garage, we have the shelves to put things on to be up off the floor; and he will do these things but not just yet. I don't mind, when he says he's ready I'll help, and it will all get done.

But he is perfect in other ways, I have always had a morning cup of tea each day since we married in 2006, he is always willing to stop what he's doing if I need help and he is a very good cook. He has never complained when I've woken him up night after night with my insomnia but will make a cuppa at 3 in the morning. And he happily cuddles up behind me in bed to warm me if I feel cold.  So he's pretty wonderful I wonder what I've done to deserve someone like him. He's generous of heart. He makes me think of the song 'Something Good' from the sound of music, because I must have done something good to have met him and he ask me to marry him.

Chrisxx

What puts you off a book?

We were booked to hear this author talk, this afternoon at the library, unfortunately she is not able to make it and it has been postponed till October 26th, will I still remember the story by then? I had 3 starts because I kept forgetting what I'd read the night before and to my way of thinking there were too many character names, so I kept getting muddled! 

As well as that it was set in Ireland, with some colloquiums and.....other things.

So, these put me off a book.

A lot of character names to start, and where they are police, some christian names and then referred to by their surnames. 

Not clearly defined chapters, when they are in different time zones.

Too faint and small font.

Too big a book, so heavy.

Local colloquiums or dialect.

Swear words and blasphemy.

Overtly sexual antic descriptions,

Too much dull description of scenery.

A Mills and Boone type book, basically 'chick lit.'

And these reasons are before I even look at what the story is about!

So, I found this book a hard read for me, but I read it because we were to hear the author talking about it. Dh read it too and came across several typos! But he liked it. 

Basically, and ex-policeman comes out of retirement to investigate old cases where the original cases had unsolved crime, as a hobby.  It was ok, but not my usual choice of book and I only read it because of the Author 'talk.' 

What puts you off?

Chrisxx

Simple things??

 A while ago we bought this weather station. it gives the temperature in the house too.

As well as pictures of clouds etc indicating the weather, there is a little man. He dresses according to the temperature, so he can be in shorts with a deck chair beside him or he can be carrying an umbrella. We love it! Simple things??

We consult it every morning and through the day too, do you think we're going through our second childhood? This morning it is telling us its 13.7°C so a bit chilly out there! There are already autumnal signs and we have put our heavier duvet on our bed. 

We've done a little gardening at the weekend getting the garden ready for winter. I don't wait till the frosts these days to lift my dahlias for the winter, I do it when I am able to; with just a little weeding on Saturday my achy muscles yesterday have reminded me of my age! So these days I like simple things that need little or no effort and do things when I can rather than when perhaps they should be done! 

Do you have days when you feel your age?

Chrisxx

🥪 👜 Ma’amalade sandwich Your Majesty?

She had the most amazing sense of humour, I'll never forget this..

Chrisxx

Our Beautiful Queen

 A sad time for our country

Queen Elizabeth 2nd her reign...1952-- 2022

Chrisxx

Gratitude Scavenger Hunt

1. Find something that makes you happy.

2. Something to give to someone else to make them smile.

3.Find something that you love to smell.

4.Find one thing that you like to look at.

5.Find something that is your favourite colour.

6.Find something that you are thankful for in nature.

7.Find something that you can use to make a gift for someone.

8.Find something that is useful for you.

Something like this was a favourite with my Guide Company when I was a Guider, and each Guide was given a match box to go off and find given objects. (I had all my friends collecting match boxes for months!)

Chrisxx

A Darling Visitor.

 We have a regular visitor and we're thrilled.

Who'd have thought that we'd have this little fellow in our garden, that was a barren grassy nothing when we moved here. Dh set up one of our bird feeders within a week of being here and we had 1 robin and about 4 sparrows at first. No butterflies, no bees not even a hover fly. The first flower bed dug did encourage some cabbage white butterflies and a few more sparrows, but insect life and birds were slow to arrive. Now it is alive with flying insects, bees and butterflies and this little fellow.

A few weeks ago, late at night, when we had popped Nell out for her last pee-pee, when we heard her bark then a very loud squeal. Dh rushed out and there bathed in the outside light was a hedgehog!

And he's been back a few times, and he's left little poos in the garden, so look like he's around a lot and we're delighted. We haven't put out any food, because with having with Nell, she'd wolf it down. Again, the other night when Dh had opened the door for Nell, there was the hedgehog, I rushed to get a good view and he was running like a 'bat out of hell' up to the top of the garden, to the safety of the hedge. We were cheering him on, and Nell stood there on the top of the steps behind us. 

Isn't that wonderful?

(Not our photos, he/she was too quick for us!)

Chrisxx

Bill Turnbull

 This has made me feel so sad this morning.. Such a lovely man, age 66 has died.

He lived in the next little village from us in Suffolk; you could see his house from the main road going through his village and as we drove along and it came into view I used to say 'Good Morning Bill' every time

RIP 

Good bye Bill.

Chrisxx

In under a year.

In only a period of 9 months this scrawny flower bed has bloomed and now is absolutely gorgeous. 

As you can see it has burgeoned and filled out, in fact its probably the best of the three beds Dh dug for me to plant up. The others are suffering from the intense

 heat we've had this summer

And this is my favourite dahlia, I love the colour and its mop head.

The first bed that we dug has been prepared for Autumn planting; it had dried up completely.  So we have  cut back all the top growth of the perennial geranium, Ladies Mantle, hollyhocks, and the bright pink with silver leaves plant. < Can't remember its name name>

We've thinned out the Shasta daisies and cut the penstemon down to 6 inches as well as pruning the two roses in that same bed. 

I love  the lime colour of the Ladies Mantle and I don't mind one bit that it seeds everywhere.

And this west facing bed has grown into...

.... this, with our grape now growing up the pergola and we have grapes!

It's a wonder we have any flowers here, as this is where Nell squashes her little bum into, when she's feeling too hot. 
So over all not too bad,  when you see what we had when we arrived here, June last year.

A bare weedy grassy garden! 

As well as our flowers, we've had potatoes, runner beans, carrots, lettuce and tomatoes which are all still producing, so not bad for two oldies, what do you think?

Chrisxx

Another problem, to decide on.

 I am still having urinary problems and the latest treatment I was given by my local Drs was two sachets of powder which contained an antibiotic, to be taken 3 days apart!!

So I drank the first one last evening obeying the instruction, in a glass of water 2 hours after food or could have been 1 hour before, fully confident that I'd have a good nights sleep.. ha ha, did I heck??

Nope I slept for 2 1/2 hours, then woke for the loo and then had to visit the loo every half hour or there about. Gave up at 5am and got up and read my book, but did then doze in my arm chair after my own Cystitis relief bought remedy and 2 paracetamol!

It's difficult to get through to our surgery for a Dr app, which would only be a telephone app. anyway. ( I was 90 mins one morning) This is now a chronic problem because I never really have sufficient treatment, when I have had a really bad bout of cystitis... According to the Urologist I saw, the best treatment should be a double amount of time of taking the antibiotics, ie. 2 lots over 4 weeks. I'm still waiting for my follow up app. with him. Grrr in the mean time I'm sleep deprived in a lot of discomfort.. Getting old with a failing NHS is agony! 

But who cares?? Now GPs are asking for more pay and threatening to drop out of the NHS, if they do I think they should pay for their training either in money or constant pain! What would you vote for how they could  pay, money or constant discomfort for months and months? I know what I would wish for them!!

Chrisxx