Happy New Year from Barbara

 Happy New Year.

Hope it a happy and healthy year for everyone.

Lots of love 

Barbarax 

What a state the country is in!

 I have been been reading a blog which was telling us about an elderly man falling in his house.A neighbour managed to get in and phoned for an ambulance.He waited six hours!!!!

This is just not good enough.If things are that bad bring in the army,pay carers more.

Would you want the job that they do?I dread getting ill.

A lovely day today.

 My brother is five years older than me and lives about an hour and a quarter away.Because of COVID we have not seen a lot of each other but today we went to visit him and his wife.He will be 83 next week.Both  C and I were shocked to see how he had aged.Fine mentally but obviously not as good with mobility.

It was great to have a catch up.It involves us visiting them as P does not want to drive on motorways anymore.P’s wife died aged 32 .They had three children aged 9,6 and 4.He was lucky enough to meet J,14 years younger than him.They married and she has been an amazing stepmother to those children.

J is really into crafts so we always have a great chinwag about .We inspire each other,!

C and P put the world to rights!

On the way back we called in on our daughter (only ten minutes away from home).Both our granddaughters were home from school(14 and 17) and it is such a tonic to be in their company.Lots of laughter etc.This all with a background of waiting for their father to get the results of his latest brain scan.

Keep you fingers crossed for good news.

Back soon.

Barbarax 

H

Has anyone heard from Pat/Weaver?

 I haven’t blogged for a while. I read other people’s blogs but feel I have nothing much to say about my everyday life.

Is anyone interested in my day to day things,my crafts,my family ?

Feel free to be honest(but not rude)

Barbarax 

Teapots

 Do you use a teapot when you make a cuppa or am I the only one?

Barbarax 

A week away on Anglesey

This is the cottage we have rented for a week here on the Island of Anglesey in North West Wales.It is over 150 years old.Quite small but ok for a week.

I have brought some things to do if the weather is bad but so far so good.

This is the book I am currently reading. The blurb says it is funny.It isn’t so far.

 A Bargello kit half completed already before we came.

Today we have been onto the mainland on the Lleyn Peninsula 

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Nefyn and Portdinllaen are the beaches.I had some lovely family holidays here as a child.Just look at those beautiful beaches.Hardlyanyone there today.

Barbarax 

It has been a busy week but not much cooking!

 This last we have been quite busy.

Art Appreciation Tuesday.Great to meet a lot of our old friends.

Our closest friends who moved 200 miles away were up for a few days.We gathered as many of our old “gang” together for a meal out.Seven out of the eleven made it.Another couple have moved away also,another had dementia and is in home.The last one did not want to risk catching COVID.

Thursday it was Social History here and we were doing a bit about Great Budworth church(previous post).

Friday Chris (one half of the couple who were visiting arranged a college get together lunch.Six of us were great friends in college many,many years ago but have still managed to meet up twice a year for lunch.It used to be in the evening but now we prefer lunch!!! Partners are also included.Naturally we haven’t met for two years because of the pandemic.It was great getting together again.The good thing about old friends is that you take up where you left off.Sadly,one of the husbands has died and another wasn’t well enough to come.

Saturday our daughter and OH wanted to go and buy plants and wanted our advice and also suggested lunch out.So we ate out three days out of four last week but no cooking.

I got up this morning and said I am not going anywhere today!

Ignore this photo .It is my tomato seedlings I have shown you before.

I have been busy making mandalas again.This time to hang on the fence.They just add another feature to look at and they only take one evening to make.

Barbarax 

I can’t “sign in with google”.Help!

 I have just been readings posts and a couple (Through the keyhole and A bracelet of days) won’t let me comment.It just says sign in with google but when I try to nothing happens.

Any else had this problem?

Barbarax 

Tomato seedlings for free!

 

This is how many seedlings I have got from two slices of tomato on some damp compost.I did this last year and it was very successful.Tomato plants for free.

Great Budworth,Cheshire.

 We did a quick visit to Great Budworth today.This is a pretty English village which has been used many times on film sets.It is only about ten minutes from where we live now in Cheshire(I still missNorth Wales).We are part of a social history group here and for our next meeting we are looking at churches in the area.C and I have got this one.

It was mentioned in the Domesday Book and there are records that show there has been a school here since 1578.C is doing the history and I am going to talk about the items in the church.The font is over 500 years old.

There are two old chests.The older one was made in the Middle Ages.They were a kind of safe, housing silver,vestments,parish records etc.

There is a stone carving of Sir John Warburton who died in 1575(Elizabeth was queen of England and Sir Francis Drake was planning to sail around the world..

Lots of other interesting things so lots to talk about.

Cambridge again.

Our daughter in law ( and son but he has a day job too)has two coffee shops in Cambridge,one in CB24 and one in the village of Histon just outside Cambridge.They also have the above,a coffee van.How great is that.

Matt has had an annexe built in his back garden.This is where we stayed.It is really for their 22 year old daughter who is at University in Manchester.There is a bedroom and a lounge with a sofa bed and shower room.

While we were there we visited Kettles Yard Art Gallery.There is an exhibition by Ai Weiwei.He was born in 1957 in Beijing in China.Some of the antiquities are genuine some not.He normally does huge installations.

These were made out of marble.His point being that everyday objects can be works of art.

This chair represents a conference he was not allowed to go to.

Finally, pictures of the artist made out of Lego.

 It was interesting but not spectacular.

A visit to Cambridge to see our son.

 Last Thursday we went down to Cambridge to see our son and family who live there.Our grandson ,Finlay(18) ,was flying to Thailand on Friday morning to go travelling for 8 weeks with friends.It was lovely to see him and enjoy a family meal with him ,his younger brother Angus(15) and his Mum and Dad.This is a shot of Kings College taken from the Backs.

Friday morning Matt and Jude were working and Angus was in school.We had arranged to meet our oldest friends for lunch so we decided we would go to the Orchard Tea Rooms in Grantchester for a coffee/tea.

These are some pretty cottages in Grantchester.

The church in Grantchester.

The tea rooms are famous because they were visited by so many famous people .They are just a punt away from Cambridge.Famoue people who came here were Rupert Brooke(above),VirginiaWoolf,Maynard  Keynes,EMForster,Bertrand Russell and others.You sit in the orchard and drink tea sitting on deckchairs like they did so many years ago. 

I will continue the story tomorrow but it has been a great weekend.After two years of lockdown it was a pleasure to escape it.Masks worn all the time.!,,

Which should I do?

 

It is my daughter’s birthday in two weeks time  and I thought I would do her a little cross stitch kit.Her surname is Peacock  but the other one says love.I havn’t time to do both.Excuse the rubbish photos but I shake.

Tomorrow we are off to Cambridge to stay with our son and family for the weekend.We havn’t been down for two years.We are going tomorrow because our eldest grandson,Finlay,Whois 18 is going off travelling for 8 weeks.They are starting off in Thailand.l must admit to being a bit anxious about going.My OH is in the vulnerable category but has had his fourth jab.We will off course wear masks when appropriate.

Our daughter has just come from 3 days in London with her two daughters (our granddaughters )who are 14 and 16.Grandpa(my OH) gave them each £100 to spend .They packed so much in and had a wonderful girlie time and walked 5 or 6 miles each day shopping and sightseeing.

Now going to watch the final of Landscape Artist of the year.

Bye for now.

Barbarax

I am delighted to say that I have got my money back.

 A couple of weeks ago I put a post on saying that I had been scammed by. “policeman “ to the tune of  almost £20.000.I heard last week that the bank had recovered the first £10.000 but the second lot went to an independent bank.That they haven’t been able to get back from them but gave it me from their scam fund.They admitted that they had not warned me it might be a scam and had not shown a duty of care.It has been a wretched time me feeling gullible (but it was all very plausible)and also what a waste of my hard earned money.Anyway I have got it back but it has made me very nervous.It has also made me feel old and vulnerable.There are some evil people around.

The first thing I am going to do is to put £1,000 into each of my five grandchildren’s savings accounts for university (or whatever).

Back soon with a brighter post.

Barbarax

A warning.Please read.

 I was scammed of £20.000 yesterday by a “policeman”.He had even tampered with my phone so he could get me to call 999 to check his identity.He told me not to contact my bank as they were the ones being investigated.

I just feel sick.Thank goodness that didn’t clear me out.Not certain whether I will get it back.

The vase in yesterday’s post was bought in West Berlin in 1966.

 Has a history behind it.In 1966 my brother had married Ute ,aGerman girl he had met on holiday on the Isle of Man. She was working there for the summer.They settled in our home town of Bolton.In the summer of 1966 my brother suggested we drove to West Berlin to see Ute’s mother.He didn’t have a car and we only had an A35 van with seats in the back but no windows! We had to drive through East Germany to get to West Berlin as the Berlin Wall was still up.It was quite scary.We spent two weeks there in the middle of the World Cup.Peter and Charles were in their element as West German tv were showing the West’s footie matches and East Germany the Eastern bloc matches.It was interesting visiting West Berlin and seeing the Berlin Wall,Checkpoint Charlie etc.We drove back home watching the first semi final in a bar in Belgium and then racing home for the second semi final.

To get round to the point I bought the vase on Kurfürstendamm back then.It survived the journey back and various house moves and it is still treasured today.Unfortunately my sister in law did not survive .She died in 1976 from malignant melanoma aged 32.She left behind three children aged 4,6 and nine.She was a lovely lady and a wonderful mother.So sad.Peter went on to remarry and his second wife took on the children as if they were her own.Bitter sweet memories.

First daffodils of the year.

 It is always good to buy that first bunch of daffodils.

We had lunch today with a group of friends back where we used to live.Great company and great food.I miss it so much.There used to be eleven of us who lunched together.One couple went to Cambridge to be near their daughter,another couple went to Wiltshire to be near their son.Another of the group has dementia and is in a home so now we are down to six.

What a beautiful day it has been today.Clear blue skies.I wish I had taken some views of the Clwydian Range from the pub.Next time!

Stay safe.

Barbarax