5 OS Pleasures in your Day Today part 2

Rainy-Days

DFV ((hugs)) to you and yours. I am a huge believer in the afterlife, mainly because I have had enormous proof.

1. Took the spaniel shopping with me this morning. She loves being in the car and I love having her with me when I am out and about. Bless her heart she is always happy to come home though

2. Got the lawns cut front and back yesterday so admiring them today has been fab.

3. Only had 40 minutes sat in the conservatory this afternoon with a nice cup of tea, but the sun shone brightly and warmed it up in there.

4. Popped to Aldi and pets@home - spent more money on the cat and dog than I did for food for us used a £5.00 voucher and a 10% off voucher in pets so brought it down quite a bit. They are sorted for a while now though.

5. Made a lovely fresh soup when I got back from Aldi, it will last a few days, but it will be appreciated this week beings as it is forecast to be cold.

VickyA_2

DigForVictory - sending my sincerest condolences to you and the family. x



Hardly seems right to have pleasures in the day, but there are a few.

1) Getting quite addicted to checking how my item is doing on eB*y. Now up to a decent amount with 22 watchers. :j :j This is me testing the water as I used to sell more (of my own stuff), but it became a hassle when postage costs shot up/changed. However, this will be worth my while...

2) Found a local book group mentioned on a website. I'm hoping that it's still "live" as I've contacted the leader...

3) Managed to do some arm exercises earlier... which only highlighted how horrendous my bingo wings are. Must continue the exercises!!!

4) Tulips, bought as bulbs in Amsterdam last year, are about to flower... :j :j

5) Tulips bought at the local market are looking gorgeous in the house. I'd never bought flowers from the stall before, but I'll definitely be going back. Gorgeous!

Giddynmg

DforV - My thoughts are with you and your family. Sending you lots of love.

sparrer

DFV sincere sympathy to your MiL and the family. Your FiL will live on in your thoughts and hearts.

1. Laundry done and dried on the line
2. Packing laid out in spare bedroom, 5 outfits ready to go into case tomorrow, plus the travelling one
3. All the upstairs cleaned
4. All fresh food in the fridge turned into soup and frozen
5. Needed a black skirt for my week away but it was 5.25pm so too late but I had a :idea: - I remembered a long black skirt in the wardrobe which I never wear as it's a tad too short (yes, even for me!), so with a snip and a stitch I now have what I needed and it cost me nothing

Sweet dreams

Purple_kitten

DfV: You're in our thoughts, hugs to you and family

The not buying it thread is having quite an effect, well that and temporarily not having a role lol, but seriously we are using everything we have and questioning to see if we already have it or can make it from something. We shop a lot less, and enjoy time a lot more at the moment, finding it quite luxurious.
A mix for the weekend…
1.Both DH and I spent the day getting the garden into order Saturday, at the end of the day watching the animals play out there with a cuppa in hand, we declared it not a bad job.
2.I found some Snowdonia cheese in the freezer and defrosted it overnight, wow it is a superior garlic cheese, put some on top of some hm garlic bread, with chopped tom’s it was delicious.
3.For today up early to travel, meet my brother in a coffee shop, and it was really lovely to just sit and catch up, we then popped over to DF who was happy to see us both.
4.I food planned for today, salad for when I got back and there is a roast cooking through
5. Howls of laughter from upstairs to discover that the laser light DH was using to put shelves up was being chased.

For today
1.With the new built in storage in the bedroom a great opportunity to finally get my clothes in logical order once and for all.
2.Clothes wise, the animals have a host of soft snuggly jumpers from today, the heart foundation have 2 bags full, I can see what I have, tomorrows job is the final part, the wardrobe. I have used a roll technique I saw from the forum a while ago which works fantastically to be able to see everything at a glance.
3.Spent an hour just enjoying the garden when the sun came out at lunch.
4.Food planning is working well, fajita’s will be tonight’s tea.

ampersand

dfv - sending strength to you and yours and nan. The encircling is right and the nesting and adjustment, which comes hard after a full good life en couple, will arrive. Yes, it will.
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I see none of my thanks are staying attached to posts - please accept them as THERE, plonky rubber-stamped, bright red inkpad:-)
Quick time now while Vicar's surprise b'day[Good Friday]cake bakes and, as I had too much mixture, more or less magicked rest with add-ons[all French farm eggs and ditto butter used] into a somewhat simnel cake. They're sharing the oven now.
Took big mix down to recently widowed neighbour for her to do Big Stir Wishing and am glad I did.
Lots of catching up, but here are some, in absolutely no chrono. order:

1. Just now shouting 'We've done it! We've won!' as &'s little kiwi fellas beat the 'boks to make the WCC Final on Sunday. Amazing match and perfect accompaniment to o/n prep. and standing time and beating and sifting and mixing etc. Dramatic stuff, penultimate ball, hit for 6 by a former SA player, an enzed man since 2001.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Elliott

2.Not much voice left for shouting, after Saturday 3 match sesh at The Alma. What a fantastic afternoon's rugby - and the right team won. France were much better, thank goodness.

3. Even less voice on tap after y'day's big garden tidy-up, which began as raspberry cane-forest fell and burn. Managed to get many great smoke billows in eyes and lungs going wrong way suddenly. But it's done, having known I must after...

4. ...doing same in France for M, those framboises being another generation ex &squat. I called this another cadeau d'anniversaire. knowing I needed to do mine own, v. late this year[but I say this most years]. Can simply say that this 70th celebration of my oldest Nth Hemi friend was all I could have hoped and wished for. Just a fantastic few days with 2 champers brekkies, smoked salmon, my farm family's wonderful butter[called in for early en route] Everything went perfectly, despite big Sat night storm which killed the leccie. The sangliers were out too, rutting and roaring all around. & slept beautifully in car, glad of all new torches as top house is not safe now. Cake arrived in one piece, much desired by numerous français whose praise of recettes anglaises is sparing, but 'le cake de &' is on a throne down there. Have to fetch back my tray and lidded crate next time:-) - ideal transport. All happy Hello's and renewals with old friends and fine times, all just wonderful and ditto our birthday lunch, down valley at restaurant. We were late, but kitchen produced meal fabulously fit for occasion.
Everything grand. River was rising fast as rugby hit half-time on the Sunday and we had to move cars to other side. & then left , in order not to be cut off, or swept from passarelle. Great timing, as from Lyon Sud and onward hit various manif.s of Operation Escargot....many camions, blockages, slowslows...
but made it back up to farming family, who insisted on feeding me, then final leg to Dunkerque, and leftover delays ex.ferry strike on French side somewhere.
Slept on and off at Samphire Hoe Dover, again, great day there and picked up marvellous this[doubly-signed by Mary Reed and Elizabeth Adela Armstrong, in fine old cruciform castellated frame, with significant brass Cross burnishes]:
Pencil drawing by Mary Blanchard Reed, half-length; untraced. Ref. Morning Post, 24 Mar. 1885 ('an unpretending work' drawn from life in 'October or November 1884'); repr. as etching by Elizabeth Adela Forbes (nee Armstrong), half-length to right, bareheaded, wearing cape or fur-collared coat, right hand holding newspaper, issued Aug. 1885 (BM, London, 1916,0524.2); also repr. Duff 1926, p.5. This is one of the two portraits by female artists recorded by Wright 1908, p.250.

Frederick Gustavus Burnaby is completely astonishing - accomplished linguist, balloonist, traveller, adventurer, athlete, remarkable soldier of huge courage, investigator for the Stafford House committee[fore-runner of the Red Cross and probably responsible for Florence Nightingale arriving at Scutari] and just so much more...
Had never heard of him, to my shame[born in sparrershire]:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Gustavus_Burnaby
and
http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/personExtended/mp00652/frederick-gustavus-burnaby?tab=biography
and
http://www.nam.ac.uk/whats-on/lunchtime-lectures/larger-life-colonel-frederick-gustavus-burnaby-1842-85
[wish I'd known of this one in time]
and[although I dislike the 'nutters' appellation]
http://greatbritishnutters.blogspot.co.uk/2008/01/frederick-burnaby-bravest-man-in_23.html
and
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Burnaby,_Frederick_Gustavus_%28DNB00%29
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I'm sure that's more than enough for you, but not for & - another great research immerse continues and must obtain/read his books - bestsellers in their time for which he was handsomely paid ahead of publication. First one ran quickly through 7 edns and he received £2,500 for 1st printng in advance. It is 'Fred Burnaby' as signed on my July 1885 etching, that Newbolt's famous Vitai Lampada refers to in the 2nd verse - quote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Newbolt
'Frederick Gustavus Burnaby is the colonel referred to in the line "The Gatling's jammed and the Colonel's dead...", although it was a Gardner machine gun which jammed.[1'

bop - he really is one for you to take a look at[and I saw paddington dvd at emporium check-out hier soir.]
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Right, away to do 1st check on simnel cake. 3 hrs, then lower temp and further marzipan+90 mins. 6 hrs for b'day one but that's not allowing for shared heat, so, maybe longer for both...off I tootle to see.
Forearm remains black and lumpy, only 3 body bruises left now. Give them time. Ditto for lungs/eyes - I really am still full of big smoke. It's not great.

Blessings to all - and how is new workplace/coalface, bop?

DigForVictory

Thank you all. Just knowing you are there is a warm comfort to lean on.

We're still waiting to get the paperwork so we can then move onto the ceremonial but I found their regimental quick march once on CD - either we'll find the blinking disk or we'll download it, to be played at the funeral. Nan has spoken.

It is startlingly interesting to hunt a bugler. The Americans (& their "Taps") get buglers: for all the shocking fake bugles that play mp3 files, there are volunteers who'll come on out & play "the hardest 24 notes" just for being asked. I think having shared a flat with a music student will mean we get a real live bugler pretty much wherever the ashes are strewn, but my fee calculations include extra beers per 100 feet above sea level as well as petrol. (If by very strange twist of fate, they happen to be teetotal, we're with range of the last temperance bar.)

Himself, whilst still lacking his emotional North, has said firmly that we will plant an oak tree. Like any devoted spouse, I have sorted the tree he wants, but on these boards I can smile that I also found a voucher code, which will pay for the proper supporting stake, strapping, weed suppressant fabric & root growth compound.

It is a seriously beautiful sunny day - even if I am briefly in an office.

An old friend, himself fatherless of a few years standing, is being unspeakably wonderfully supportive. He absolutely understands, as he's been there, and the gentleness of his emails is remarkable. Through them I can look at the pain and grief and loss without getting instantly shredded.


VJsmum - ice-cream house? Colour, location? Bemused & somewhat detatched from the plot!
Frith - you for SEN Of Course - who else will so completely understand? Although I do hope money is not gruesome bad & that you will still have time to win with charity shops.
ampersand - the adjustment will come? Promise? As they're all so fragile, and it's catching.

mcculloch29

Hugs to you DfV, and to all who loved your FiL. Wishing you courage and strength.
What a lovely idea an oak tree is. Oaks ARE a rather special tree, and your getting a good deal to ensure it is properly nurtured brought a little smile .
Just seen the time eek. Quick pleasures.

1. A rainy day today but the rotary drier is back up in the back garden as of a sunny yesterday . I got it to review a couple of years ago and other reviews refer to it bending in high winds, so it comes down each winter. Dr C. did this, a few weeks ago it wouldn't have happened.

2. A fantastic book just read - I got a preview copy - The Shepherd's Life

3. The Shepherd's Life is shown as being #1 Best Seller in the Wild Animals category in Am*zon. Made me smile.

4. Heavenly tortilla pizzas made from a collection of bits and pieces, what a quick and enjoyable meal that is and ticks Dr C's 'low fat, low carb' boxes if I use just a sprinkle of low fat cheese.

5. Small treats to self of needed toiletries, and a lovely eye cream to review. Far more than I would normally pay for such a thing.

An extra heartbreak that the aircraft lost in France was flying to one of 'my' parts of Germany. I lived in two locations in Nordrhein Westfalen and my parents met near Dusseldorf. The German lady I chatted to in Aldi the other week was from there.

ampersand

Related train of thought, mcc.

Went down via Digne/Alpes with trailer last year and M, whose 70th we've just celebrated in the Haut-Var, spent a transhumance summer up there near Barcelonette with someone, helicoptered in and out, supplies ditto., a few years ago. She has a wonderful album of pics from then, with eagles near and never-melt snow caps all around.

Frith

DfV - so sorry to hear your sad news :-( If you were nearer, we could find you a bugler (brother's tootly trumpeting connections). I hope all the arrangements come together smoothly.


Ampersand - glad you are on the mend a bit.


Bit busy here enjoying last week of freedom! Well, I am free over Easter but then with children.


Pleasures so far as I can remember them:


Sunday


1) A lie in.


2) A crafty McDs as sons love the "monopoly game" they run every year.


3) Off to the allotment where sons shrieked at spiders while I planted 5 rows of onions!


4) Sainsburys for hair wax as obviously they can't share the same pot. :-/


5) Phone call from my school friend who moved away recently and I shall be popping down to stay over Easter. :-)


Monday


1) Not a bad sleep.


2) Went to meet a friend for a cup of tea and she didn't turn up! Lots of funny texts afterwards as she had forgotten and gone out on her horse!


3) Lots of charity shops but no luck.


4) Painted the stairs (each bit needs 4 coats of silly chalk paint and you can only paint alternate stairs otherwise you can't go up and down!)


5) Still got a bit of a cold so watched a lot of TV in front of the stove.


6) Listened to Just a Minute.


7) Son has had a volte face (?) and wants to do PE now, including a special day on Thursday in a local leisure centre run by Aphasic for kids with speech difficulties.


Today (Tuesday)


1) Not a bad sleep.


2) Another coat of paint on the stairs. :-S


3) Off to school to wave the right bits of paper at them for my CRB check, or whatever the police check is called these days.


4) Serious charity shop shopping! Did towns round Malvern (looking lovely today) and my photo can be seen in the "charity shop" thread.


5) It hailed and snowed!


6) Mum and dad's to give them some of my garlic from last year so they can grow some. They gave me seed potatoes.


7) Passed my brother in the lane who had just been to Malvern, coincidentally, to put himself up as a local councillor again. (he has been one for some years).


8) Popped to town where smaller son goes to school to buy PE kit! He hadn't done PE since about year 3 - now year 7. Expensive - £14 for garish, lurid top. £13 for just bog standard tracksuit trousers. Did I want the proper school sports socks? - no!


9) Just had handyman ring back and he will be coming to fix stuff that I can't (e.g put trellis back on the wall of the house so honeysuckle is no longer lying in the garden).


10) Looking forward to Holby City.


Silly busy day tomorrow, fitting in visits, varnishing the stairs (which must be done at 8am with me ending up downstairs at the finish so I can go straight out!), numerous phone calls etc.