Today is a special day for a special young man.
We wish you a day filled with fun and laughter. We bless you for the joy you have brought into our lives.
We hope that you will like your presents. You will have many happy hours playing with "Old MacDonald's Farm" (now re-named Nathan's Farm) and singing this song which is your favourite.
We love you very much. Big hugs and kisses to the birthday boy from Nanjay and Grandy.
Many thanks to Donna for the Nathan birthday graphic.
I hope to be back posting sometime during next week. Due to health issues and personal problems of a different nature, journals and alerts are the last thing on my mind right now.
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay
Nathan gets excited at the prospect of being called from the benches whilst Daniel works out strategy.
"I say, Nathan old man, good throw".
This team strip is really cool Mum
Publicity shots
Many thanks to Becky and Dean for sending us these great photos last night of what must be two of the England team's youngest supporters. Eat your heart out, David Beckham.
For all those that do not like the new look of aol and judging by the comments I had on my previous posting, there are quite a few, go to main page and over on the right-hand side, near the picture of a couple there is a FEEDBACK facility for you to make your views known. I have certainly aired mine.
I am certainly not impressed with AOL's new welcome page. As soon as I log on the first thing I always do is check the news headlines and often the weather. News was always at the top of the list. Now it has been relegated to way down the page as though it is unimportant and you have to scan down for it. Blogs has disappeared from prominent view and are now listed under "Tools and Services". I have lost count of the times people contacted me because they found me through the old welcome page. They were intrigued to know what blogs were and found my journal that way. I am happy and proud to say that I have helped quite a few people start their journal because of this. I now see no encouragement for new people to maybe start a journal on this new-look page. I think the whole thing is awful. I was very pleased to see our Jan of Serendipity listed under the top ten blogs but that is about all. It is true that nothing stays the same forever, everthing changes, that is life. Change, however, is not always for the best. Progess often seems to make things worse. As my title says, If it Aint broke then don't fix it!
Well, despite the raindrops falling on our heads and the occcasional rumbling of thunder, we did get the border finished yesterday. Of course it does not look much at the moment, the plants have to settle in and start to grow and at the moment there are lots of bare patches. We have also sown seeds and it will be a battle as to which comes up first, the seeds or the weeds. To name but some we have planted Achillea, Helenium, Oriental Poppy, three varieties of Rudbeckia, Perovskia, Campanula, Allium, Creeping Jenny, Sedum, Cosmos, Geranium, Matthiola, Lamium plus cornflower and marigold seeds. All we need now is some nice warm sunshine to spur their growth along.
So, here is the border we have been working on together with some other flowers pictures from our garden:-
The blue cable along the back runs electricity to our garage and it will not be visible once the plants grow.
The bare patches in the grass are where bushes overhung or tubs had been standing.
I just adore the magnificent Allium flower
Now for two shots of the Cosmos
Water Lily in the pond
And finally
A pity that the sun was not shining but we are still pleased with the way things are looking.
Dean popped over yesterday. They had a rug they had no use for now they have the new carpet down. Pretty large and they thought we might have a use for it. We certainly did. We tried it in the sunlounge at first and when we saw how bright it looked, it was immediately taken from there and put into our lounge. It covers nearly the whole of our carpet and makes the room look so much brighter. Almost like having a new carpet ourselves. It was nice to get an unexpected gift.
Anyway, that is enough from me today. Have to catch up now around thehouse, all the things that were neglected due to the intense heat and then the gardening.
Have a good day everyone. Good luck to our England team with their match today. I shall be thumping fanimal again.
Ah bliss, welcome rain and the temperatures have dropped way down. The heat was really getting to me. Not that I dislike the sun but I like it pleasantly warm and not roasting. I hate the awful humidity which makes you feel you cannot breathe.
The weather was bound to change, him indoors got his shorts out! Then he got a ceiling fan for the bedroom. We have had one in the lounge since day one, in fact it was here when we bought the place and has been used every summer since then. After several nights of not getting much sleep what a joy it was to lie in bed with that fan circling overhead. When Mike went to buy it he found it was in a sale so that was a bonus because it was reduced by several pounds. So, what with Miks' shorts, the new ceiling fan and Becky and Dean buying a canvas sun shelter for their garden, you just knew it had to rain. However, they say it will be sunny again for the weekend.
I have not been on the computer much because our lounge is the hottest room in our home even with the ceiling fan and the lounge is where my computer is. We have no windows in this room, only patio doors at one end but they open onto our wooden sun lounge. There is no direct access of air and the place gets like a furnace. I have spent a lot of time in the bedroom where it is much cooler.
Half of my plants arrived and him indoors worked like a trojan yesterday. It meant digging out a lot of old shrubs that were past their best and needed constant trimming back, then it was digging over the ground and planting. It was just too humid for me to get out there and we had thunder rumbling around all the time. I spent most of yesterday with a thumping headache. We have lots of bare patches now even with the new plants in but hopefully the rest of the order will arrive soon and then I am going to fill in any remaining patches with ground cover plants to surpress weeds. I sat and watched all the little birds come down as soon as Mike started digging. They were all over the place pickingup insects and finding worms. They must have thought their birthdays had come.
Mike has taken the dogs swimming a couple of times only to find that Jack does not like water. Well, he certainly does not like water in large doses. Get the garden hose out and he goes mad jumping at the water to catch it and wanted to be sprinkled (we have no hose pipe ban here at present although we are trying to conserve water). Get in the bath and he wants to get in there with you. But put him in a lake and try and get him to swim, he scoots straight out again. Well, I remember how our beloved Pip used to dislike water when he was young but came to love it. Jack is only six months old so there is plenty of time. Jesse on the other hand never wants to come out! Here is the latest picture of Jack after his dip
Have not seen Nathan and Daniel so far this week. Nathan was a bit under the weather for a couple of days, probably due to the heat because he seems fine now it has cooled down. Dean has the day off today as they are having new carpet fitted and he is helping move the furniture. It was all going to be put into the garden but due to the rain, it now has to be moved from one end of the house to the other which slows things down. At last they are getting their house back to normal after having the extension built and the carpet will put the finishing touch to the lounge.
That is about all the news there is from our end. Due to the heat we did not do anything much for days. I hope the rest of my plants arrive soon, before the next heatwave sets in and also because it will give them a good start if the ground is damp.
Now I am off to try and catch up on a few of my alerts.
Oh, we have another new journal. Looks like it is going to be a good one. Please take a moment to stop by and give her your usual warm J-Land welcome. I know it will be appreciated. Here is the link
Just as I was finishing this entry, the doorbell rang - the rest of my plants have arrived! Guess who is going to get muddy now - but we will do them today before that blazing sun appears again.
Have a great day everyone
Well, it had to happen. Now it is too hot! Certainly too hot for me, I cannot take it like I used to. All through May with the dreary skies, the rain and the cold, the sun was up there rising higher and higher in the sky and I told the family it would come in with a vengeance without us having the chance to get used to it.
I am so glad we got the gardening done when we did (although I still have plants on order) because after four days of being perfectly fine out there I am now covered in the most horrendous heat rash. It came out of nowhere. Went to bed on Wednesday night with no sign of it, woke up scratching on Thursday morning absolutely smothered. Out has come the Calamine lotion and I am now so thickly covered with that I look like an extra from Michael Jackson's "Thriller". The postman saw me this morning and I do not think the poor man will ever be the same again.
I can see the funny side of the Calamine but the itching is not funny and now I cannot even step into my garden for fear of making it worse. At least I can look at it from the lounge. If the plants arrive next week and it is still this hot then him indoors will have to do the necessary. Poor plants. Mike is not the gentlest of men when handling things and does not know a dandelion from a rose. I shall have to shout instructions from the back step. He will not be best pleased.
The boys were over this morning so I am sharing some of the latest pictures with you.
As you can see, they really love playing with their bricks and Nathan goes to great lengths to make his "buildings" as tall as they can be. Of course, he has not got the hang of creating a firm base so they always topple and that always makes him laugh.
Last night Mike and I had a date with "King Kong". I know that some people have panned this picture but we thoroughly enjoyed it. The main gripe people have is that it takes too long before you actually see Kong. For some reason today people want instant gratification, they want it and they want it now, they are not prepared to wait. Well, I like the suspense to build up and I was glad we got to know the characters first and just how they all came to be going to find Skull Island. The special effects are superb and certainly thrilling, lots more "creatures" than in the Fay Wray version. Yes, they did completely gloss over just how they transported Kong back to New York in a ship that was obviously too small and how they would have restrained him on the voyage or how they would have fed him. The ending of this film is so well know and perhaps it was a little drawn out but extremely well done and just as in the original, you end up feeling so sorry for the poor ape. We did not know how long the film was before we put it on and were amazed when it finished to find it ran for just under three hours but it passed so fast that it certainly did not seem that long. We do not care what other people think, we really and truly enjoyed it and Kong certainly looked real, not like the original version, although that was excellent for its time, Kong was obviously a model. This fellow is so life-like that after a while you forget that it is not real. Well, worth a viewing if you have not already seen it.
Now I am off to get a nice cup of tea and replenish my Calamine Lotion and no, dear readers, you will not be getting any photographs of me.
Have a great weekend everyone and COME ON ENGLAND!!! Good luck to our team, let us hope we have reason to really celebrate.
Well, actually they are in the middle of our garden, I will show you later.
The gardening goes on. We had a large centre bed in the back garden with a tree in the middle of it. It used to look wonderful all planted up with Impatiens but it got to be so much extra work and very expensive so, about three years ago, we put down weed surpressing membrane and covered it all with large pebbles. Looked quite good. However, neither the membrane or the pebbles stopped the weeds and there was more work than ever. So Mike and I have now taken it all away and I have planted grass seed. It will make mowing much easier and also give the dogs and Nathan and Daniel a bit more room.
In between all the jobs we did find the time to put our St. George flags up at the front of the house and two in the back garden. Nothing like a bit of patriotism
Not that Mike and I are football supporters, well only in World Cup years but we hope our boys do well. Come on England! I have my football mug for drinking tea (courtesy of P.G. tips) and today Mike got me a Peperami fanimal. I love it, you can hit it as hard as you like and it comes out with lots of different phrases
So, if England do well, I shall be watching the games and thumping fanimal in delight. If they do badly I can thump him in frustration and annoyance. If they get knocked out he will be stamped on. No, I cannot do that as I can use him again for Wimbledon, not to mention all those times when him indoors drive me up the wall. I think this is one little mascot that is going to get really bashed!
We got the front garden all planted up yesterday so that is out of the way except we have decided to take the centre bed away from there as well but there is no hurry that job can wait for a while.
Most of my bedding plants are in now except for a very few which will be done tomorrow and that will leave me room in the greenhouse to plant my cucumbers. We found another corner to clear out, one with a broken wheelbarrow and lots of cracked and chips pots so that was all done today as well after we had looked after Nathan for the morning. I have not worked so hard in a very long time and I am so brown (naturally from the sun) that I look like I have been on a cruise.
The Irises in the pond are doing well. Shame they do not bloom all summer. The fish are thriving now that the pond is clear and we found we hardly lost any to the Heron last year when we thought they had all gone.
So, tomorrow we will be out there again. Mike needs to take a trip to the council tip and then we have one large border to cut back and weed and finish off the tubs. I bet when it is all done and we are looking forward to sitting out there eating our lunch or having a nice cup of tea the weather will change again.
Oh yes, those fairies, snapped a photo of them today
I would have more fairies, I do not have the room. I would write more on this entry, I do not have the time. I am starving and already late with the evening meal. ThenI am going to put my feet up for the soaps although I doubt I shall stay awake.
Adieu for now, dear readers.
