frayed at the edge

Fetching in Marigolds!

Malcolm caught me this morning having a bit of a clean and tidy in the kitchen!  (my apron says "a balanced life - a glass of wine in each hand")

 

so I thought I would have a bit of a tidy on the blog as well, and catch up with some photos lingering in the unpublished folder, starting with these photos of a sunset earlier in the week

 

I always think of skies like these as "Old Testament" skies

 

that you see in old paintings with the hand of God reaching down to man, or angels and  saints in heaven

 

the camera was still on the sunset setting when I took this photo the next morning, but it turned out ok ........ a rather dishevelled finch sitting on the bird table

 

it's always exciting when post arrives from abroad

 

and even more exciting when (almost) naked men are involved!!

 

oh my, what a dilemma, ogle the men, or appreciate the lovely quilts!

 

but unless you buy your own copy, you will have to wait until next year, when I will show you each month's photo in turn

 

as we walked along the path to the front door this afternoon, I paused to take some photos.  The climbing rose has a touch of pink on the outside of the buds

 

but once the bud opens, the rose is creamy white

 

my bargain supermarket fuchsias are flowering well

 

surviving the heavy rain showers

 

a few weeks ago, I noticed this little self-seeded tree growing in the back garden, so Malcolm dug it up and put it in a pot - it has grown about six inches since then

 

this afternoon, we popped over to Border Meringues in Jedburgh for a cuppa and cake.  I love the eclectic collection of china for my tea

 

Malcolm had a date crispie

 

and I had a piece of meringue roulade - I thought it might be slightly less calorific than lemon meringue pie!!

 

I was grumbling away to myself this morning ....... time wasted dealing with the problem with the phone......... the beautiful silver bangles that Malcolm was going to give me for our Pearl Wedding Anniversary next month were sold out......... my gorgeous new car, which should have been delivered this morning, won't now be delivered until Monday ..........

then I though of all the families mourning the loss of their loved ones in Nice ....... and my grumbles really didn't matter anymore.  I hope there is a pit in the deepest darkest horrors of Hell for this murdering terrorist, and all those like him, who want to destroy our way of life.......

 

But the best thing to do, in the face of these horrors, is to live our lives to the full, so I will wish you all the best of weekends, love Anne

Spontaneous combustion!!

I have just spent the last seventeen centuries* on the phone to my phone/broadband provider, and my head is in danger of bursting into flames!!  So no post tonight, and hopefully it will all be sorted out for tomorrow!!

 

* ok, that was an exaggeration, it was only fourteen centuries!!

Going back

Yesterday we went up to visit Stuart and Alison.  We stopped first at New Hopetoun Garden Centre, planning to have lunch ......... but it was mobbed, as it was a "10% off everything day"!  So we went to plan B, and went to Rouken Glen Garden centre, which is on the same road

 

as you can see, we didn't have any trouble getting a table!

 

Malcolm had a cheese and pickle toastie

 

and I had a coronation chicken sandwich

 

when we turned in off the road into the garden centre, we noticed this new building.  We went to investigate after lunch, and discovered that it is a new farm, gift and coffee shop.  We will pop in for lunch next time we are up that way

 

if you want to know what all these gubbinses are .......

 

....... ask Malcolm, because he used to work there!

 

this building in Grangemouth used to be a bank, but it has been lying empty for at least 30 years

 

we used to occasionally go to this pub for dinner ........ no matter what you ordered, it came with diced turnip!  Chicken curry, rice and diced turnip, steak, chips and diced turnip ...... yum!

 

when we parked to go for a stroll round Falkirk, of course I had to visit Hobbycraft

 

I asked this young man busking in the High Street if I could take his photo - I put a contribution in his bagpipe case in return

 

I didn't go into this new wool shop, as I didn't want to buy any wool

 

some major repair work on the Steeple in the town centre

 

a lot of people think that the Romans didn't come any further north than Hadrian's wall ........ but they did, building the Antonine Wall, which runs across Falkirk.  The house we lived in during the 90s is on the line of the wall, but we never dug up any Roman treasure in the garden!

 

Malcolm made this fence ........

 

......... which is somewhat neglected

 

he also made this bridge, which you can hardly see, as the garden is sadly overgrown (I will have to look out some photos of how it did look)

 

I wasn't trying to spy, taking a close up of the bedroom window ...... I was just amazed that my lace curtains are still hanging there!

 

after all that strolling down memory lane, we popped into the cafe in M&S for a quick cuppa.  We shared a cheese scone, which was tasty, but a bit small

 

somewhat larger were the meringues that we bought in the farm shop - we left one with Stuart and Alison, and we had this one after dinner tonight.  It was delicious!!

 

 

A cliff top walk

On Saturday, Malcolm suggested that we went for a walk along the cliff top at the far end of Spittal Beach.  He had walked there before, but this was my first time (I'm not a fan of walking on cliff tops).  When we parked the car, we were greeted with a bright yellow splash of gorse

 

the start of the path looks down on the end of the promenade

 

looking back towards the lighthouse

 

even from this distance you can see how much better the beach looks after the clean-up

 

this is a train on the East Coast Main Line ........

 

I wouldn't want to be any closer when it goes past at 110 mph!

 

an unusual signpost 

 

there may be 1000 of these signposts, but this is the only one I have seen

 

at 110 mph, it won't take long to get to Edinburgh!

 

Seahouses, of course, is where we get the best fish and chips

 

this fish could find its way into a quilt

 

I think we could walk to these coves at low tide - but then we would be stranded if the tide came in, as I doubt we could climb up to the path!

 

I was slightly nervous about walking past this bit of the cliff, as it looks ready to fall in the sea

 

 

the next two photos show some of the gubbins which hold the high-voltage wires for the railway .......

 

as I used to work for British Rail (many, many years ago), Malcolm was asking me all sorts of technical questions, but I had to point out that I worked for the Chief Civil Engineer, not the Chief Mechanical and Electrical Engineer.  However, I could tell him about the track!

 

as we returned to the car, we saw these two gulls deep in conversation on the chimney tops

 

just as the sun was starting to set, these two swans came into the dock

 

it was such a still evening that you could see the reflections of the lighthouse

 

and the old chimney

 

the low sun was shining on the windows across the river

 

after our walk we may have had a sweet treat with our cuppa

 

I'll be back tomorrow to tell you what we did yesterday - it may have involved rather tasty scones!

 

oh, the agony!

Yes, this morning I had my last visit to the dentist for the current block of treatment, and had to pay the bill ....... oh, how that hurt!!  But now I am celebrating, as he fitted the new partial denture that he made for me, and my smile has been restored.  So this bottle of cava may well be opened after dinner!

 

we quite often drink this cava when we have our annual holiday in Majorca ...... where it costs about a third of the price here!

 

I also got us another little treat

 

now, I could lie through my (new) teeth, and tell you the I baked this cake

 

or I could be truthful, and tell you that I bought it in the supermarket!  We had some with our afternoon cuppa, and it was delicious!

 

although the partial denture replaces some back teeth, which you couldn't see were missing, I just feel that my smile has been restored, so I thought I would take a photo to share with you.  Not such a good effort, as I was looking down at the screen on the camera

 

ok, now I am looking up, but I have nearly cut the top off my head!!

 

then later on, I remembered that I can flip out the screen on the camera, so I can take a selfie (this is not something I usually do!)  By this time I was doing the housework, so please excuse the old t-shirt I have changed into

 

we are staying at home this weekend, so no doubt I will be out in the studio sewing ...... and hopefully on Sunday we will get out for a walk.  Have a good weekend, love Anne

I baked a cake!

Yes, it's true, I baked a cake today!  As there is no patch'n'chat tomorrow, I asked Maureen if she would like to come over for a sewing day, and rashly said I would bake a cake for us.  Yesterday I looked out a recipe, and as directed soaked the fruit overnight, ready to make the cake this morning

 

we had a little piece with our afternoon cuppa (just to check that it was edible!) but you will have to wait until tomorrow to see how it turned out!  I thought I should also tidy the studio, so that we had slightly more than a square foot of table to work on.  First, the two "before" photos

 

ok, there is a third "before" photo, but it is a bit embarrassing to show the state of the carpet

 

after a bit of tidying, and quite a lot of vacuuming, here are the "after " photos

 

did you notice that I had a little play with the black and red blocks?

 

when I was doing the housework this afternoon, the sun was shining in the bathroom window on my little box of succulents

 

but the succulents aren't quite what they seem to be - if you look in the centres you will see wicks.  Yes, they are candles!  And this last photo doesn't have a dirty mark across it!  It is the telephone wire on the other side of the road, which is out of focus behind the sparrow!

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!!

Typepad is still misbehaving, and won't load any photos.  I have even tried a different browser to no avail.  I'll take the laptop with me tomorrow when we go over to the flat, and hopefully will be able to do a post, as I have lots to share with you.

So in the meantime, I will wish you a great weekend, love Anne

A special day!

Happy (29th) Birthday to me!!

Birthday boy!!

Of course as a Mum I am duty bound to embarrass Stuart on his birthday! He will be relieved to know that I have decided against showing the really embarrassing naked photos....... instead I have unearthed two photos from previous birthdays.  These aren't the best of photos, as I simply took photos of the old photos, which weren't that good in the first place!  This was his fifth birthday ........ and yes that is Malcolm way back when he had dark hair!

 

 

 

this was his eighth birthday.  We had just moved to Hampshire, and he had only been at his new school for two weeks, but had already made enough friends to have a birthday party!!

 

Happy Birthday Stuart!

A very special quilt

I recently read on Rachel's blog about a very special little boy called Rex.  He had been diagnosed with SMA, which you can read about here.  I followed the link from Rachel's blog over to Team Rexy, which is written by Rex's Mum Charlotte.  It is a very moving blog, detailing life with Rex ........ there are lows, but there are also highs, such as his recent first taste of chocolate!  Through Rachel, I got in touch with Charlotte, and offered to make a quilt for Rex.  After an exchange of emails, we decided on a tractor quilt.

This morning, I took the quilt through to the back lounge to take photos  ........ and that's when the fun began!!  The first photo wasn't a problem

 

but then there was a great commotion, as the Gnome Brothers charged across the room, and said that they wanted the quilt ....... the littlest brother is always lagging behind

 

the boys were returned to their own chair, and giving a stern talking to

 

but when I turned round to take another photo, the Gnome Sisters were tucked up under the quilt - well, they said, it is our chair!

 

the quilt was removed, and the girls were reminded that they have their own quilt on the back of the chair

 

suddenly there was a great roaring noise, and CheekySockMonkey came speeding through the door on JDtheTractor

 

they declared the front of the quilt to be totally unacceptable, as only green tractors should be allowed, so they demanded that the quilt be turned over

 

then they had to have a stern talking-to, as they wanted to play in the mud with the pigs!

 

there was a slight flaw to their plan to steal the quilt ....... the daft things couldn't see where they were going!

 

the silly pair were returned to their lookout post on the coffee table, where they keep watch for the neighbours' horrid cats trying to sneak into the front garden

 

with order restored, I put the quilt through on the bed in the guest bedroom.  But then, there was a lot of giggling and commotion ....... and there, under the quilt, were Miss Jemima Ragdoll, Winnie the Pooh, Katy Koala and her baby and Percy the Pink Pig!!

 

after the fun, a serious moment.  Should you wish to help families of children with SMA, you can make a donation here.

I have told you before about Harry, Margaret's grandson (you can read about Harry and his amazing achievements  here).  Harry is fund-raising again - you can visit his page here.