Friday: Thoughts on Decluttering

All the junk has now gone to the rubbish tip and there is just a bit more organising and freecycling to do in the garage. Much of what we cleared out was child related - toys, games, and things left over from our homeschooling days (we stopped homeschooling 13 year ago!). Now TG is 14 it was more than time to get rid of all this, but doing so was bittersweet after 25 years of having young(ish) children. Quite a bit of it was stacked up in the living room before it was taken to the charity shops, and each time I passed there was a pang of sadness to see everything go. In reality, it was nothing to do with the Stuff itself, it was all about the memories. The pink Early Learning Centre toy cash register that TG loved ... or the Hama beads that all three girls spend hours and hours using (only to then spend days nagging me to iron them and fuse the pictures together!) ... or the Pop to the Shops game that TG adored (which replaced another Shopping Game that H obsessed on to the point where we got rid of it because we couldn't bear the thought of starting all over again with TG!) ... or the outgrown chemistry set, because TG is now old enough for real labs ... and so on. 

Of course, getting rid of the Stuff doesn't mean getting rid of the memories, and in any case most of it hadn't seen the light of day for years. Some things had come from charity shops in the first place, and it was well past time to send it on for use by other families. We were also able to pass on TG's collection of Sylvanian families toys to the six year old girl next door, to her great excitement. We kept some timeless toys for any future grandchildren - Lego (not sets, just a large box of bricks and bits into which any sets long ago merged), a box of Duplo, a Playmobil toddler train set, and our large collection of Playmobil. 

I suspect we still kept too much. Inside I long to be minimalist, and just keep what I truly need or love, but it is still hard to get rid of things that might be useful. H was a star, and kept asking when I last used things - if the answer was a blank stare or waffle, out it went! Our medium term plan is that when TG finishes school in four years we will sell our house and buy somewhere smaller. It has been a wonderful family home, with plenty of space for five of us - even in lockdown we had four adults and a teenager here without feeling we were under each others feet - but when it becomes just myself and M plus TG in university holidays, and then eventually just the two of us, it will be far to large for our needs. At that point we intend to be utterly ruthless in getting rid of anything we rarely use, or which isn't much loved. Partly to be sure that when we move to a smaller space we actually use it for living in, not as a storage facility for Stuff; also partly so that our daughters will not be faced in future with having to deal with a house full of Stuff when we are gone or incapable of doing it ourselves.The garage declutter has been a good start, but there is still a lot else that need to go. R took everything of hers when she moved out, H will do the same, and TG's stuff is confined to her room. M is naturally tidy and not an accumulator of Stuff, so I'm afraid most of the rest is down to me.  

This evening we went to visit friends. They don't have a garden, but at the beginning of lockdown they took on an allotment (a kind of community garden divided into individual plots). They are mostly using it to grow veg but also have a small grassy area, so we bought fish and chips and sat there to eat them and chat. Part of northern England has been put under a restriction which bans people from different households meeting in each others houses, but with one brief exception we have stuck to socialising outdoors even though we are technically allowed to visit indoors. In winter when it is too cold to sit out, I doubt we will be socialising in person much at all unless we go for walks. Today was a very hot day but the weather changed in the evening and became cloudy with occasional drops of rain. It ended with a spectacular sunset and a red rainbow - the colours were altered by the sunset and only the red spectrum was visible. 

Thursday: Decluttering

As I do not go back to my archives work until next Monday, we decided that a free week would be a good opportunity to declutter our garage, which had got seriously out of hand - the downside of living in the same house for nearly 30 years and raising three children here is that we have accumulated Too Much Stuff. A lot of the Stuff had ended up in the garage which had become  a dumping ground for anything that didn't have anywhere else to go. 

The plan was that H and I would do the sorting and organising, and that M would be in charge of disposal and take the evicted Stuff either to a charity shop or to the rubbish tip / recycling centre as appropriate. The plan worked well. H was ruthless over what to keep and what to chuck and stopped me holding on to things I didn't need but was inexplicably reluctant to get rid of. M managed to sweet talk three charity shops into taking two car loads of Stuff between them - during lockdown lots of people decluttered then held on to Stuff until the charity shops reopened so they have been swamped, and as they have to quarantine anything coming in their capacity to take items is limited. I was probably the weak link of the three of us, but H and M kept me on task! There is still a mountain of junk waiting to go to the tip tomorrow, and we can't do the final tidying and organising until that is gone, so I can't post before and after photos yet. Oh, and there are a few items which we need to try to freecycle.

Today has been the first day of what is forecast to be a two-day heatwave, so I spent much of it outdoors in the garden. After all the decluttering I feel fully justified in being lazy for the last couple of days of my time off work. I did start the day with an exercise session and finished it with a three mile walk - we met R and her dog for a walk round the Duke of Bedford's deer park. We saw quite a lot of deer, including some stags who were bellowing loudly. We also broke the dog, who was exhausted by the end of the walk with hardly enough energy to jump into the car. Even his tail was tired. 

Saturday: A Trip to the Seaside

For the last twenty years our favourite location for a UK family holiday has been Weymouth in Dorset, staying on a caravan park near the sea at Bowleaze Cove. The park is not part of a chain and is very well run, and over the years we have watched it improve the facilities it offers year on year. When hotels and holiday accommodation was allowed to reopen at the beginning of July we realised we could book a few days break in Weymouth at a very reasonable price, so we did!

The caravan park had put lots of coronavirus precautions in place, and we trusted them to have everything thoroughly cleaned and well organised. In the end the five days we spent there were a wonderful bit of "normal" after everything that has happened over the past few months. We decided that as the statistics are looking pretty good at the moment, now was the time to venture out a bit more. We ate out one evening, and had afternoon tea at a favourite cafe, which both seemed quite momentous! Overall I felt quite safe with a couple of exceptions, both of which were outdoors when we found ourselves on paths with pinch points which made social distancing impossible, although we were only passing people briefly and only sharing space with them fleetingly.

On Tuesday we spent the day pottering around Weymouth and sitting on the beach. It was busy-ish. Based on experience we thought about half the numbers we would expect on a sunny day during the school summer break. There was plenty of space on the beach without feeling crowded. We indulged in a holiday tradition of eating takeaway pasties for lunch while sitting on the harbour wall, and bought artisan ice cream from a nearby shop. Their vegan peanut butter ice cream with sea-salted caramel is one of the best flavours I have had, with or without dairy.

On Wednesday H wanted to visit Lulworth Cove or Durdle Door, and we decided on Durdle Door as it has a larger beach and the weather forecast was good. Despite visiting the area so often, we had somehow never been there before, although we have been to Lulworth several times. We wanted a walk, so we parked at Lulworth and walked along the coast path to Durdle Door. There was a one way footpath system in operation which made it a very much longer walk - quite a lot of people simple didn't bother with it and went the wrong way down the shorter route. We were good and followed instructions! The beach was beautiful. Definitely somewhere we will go back to. The only downside was the steps down were two-way traffic and very busy, although there was plenty of space on the beach once we got to the bottom. The walk was tough going in places for myself and M (mainly the initial climb up from Lulworth) but well worth it. After our beach trip we went for coffee (or tea) and cake at the cafe where we had booked a table.

Thursday's trip was in the opposite direction, heading west from Weymouth to Lyme Regis, famous as a setting for Jane Austen's novel Persuasion and for the Cobb harbour where the French Lieutenant's Woman was filmed. We had been there before, but a very long time ago and I was the only one who remembered it. We walked all the way out to the end of the Cobb (a stone harbour wall first build by Edward I in the 13th century), sat on the beach for a while, had some amazing Asian street food for lunch (filled bao buns and salad), bought and ate fudge, and had takeaway coffee sitting on deckchairs overlooking the beach. There may also have been ice cream.

Yesterday we checked out of the caravan, drove part of the way into Weymouth and then walked the rest along the seafront, spent some time on the beach, and repeated our pasty and ice cream lunch from Tuesday before heading back to the car and home. I think we all came home feeling refreshed and better for the change of air and scenery. We are hoping now that we may be able to book another short break for the beginning of September, before TG goes back to school and H starts her new job.

Saturday: Calories In, Calories Out

I have burned almost a record number of calories today, according to my Watch - about 1100, thanks to a 40 minute cardio class this morning, which I mostly managed to hang in with, and a walk this afternoon.

I am not sure it totally makes up for last night's fish and chips, some amazing chocolate cookies with a biscoff filling that H made yesterday, and some lemon cake. The cake was also made by H, and was the first attempt at a cake for her BF's neighbour who is celebrating her 80th birthday this weekend. Very unusually for H, it sank in the middle so she made more and left the first effort for us to eat. She made home made lemon curd to drizzle over the top, and there were left overs to add to the sunken  cake. The final cake looked wonderful, with a mix of (bought) sugar flowers and her first attempt at buttercream roses on top.

Our walk this afternoon was in Milton Keynes, starting at what was a pre-Reformation Benedictine Abbey where the surviving buildings (barns) are now part of a Discovery Centre complex. The walk included the remains of a Roman villa, a 13th century church, and some concrete cows. The original concrete cows were made for the new town in 1978 by an American artist and have been in various locations since - they are now in the Milton Keynes museum. The set we saw today are replicas, but on the original site. They have had a coat of paint since I last saw them, though one or two are missing their heads.

Apart from exercising, I have watched my way through three episodes of Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain TV series, which for some reason I had never got round to watching before. I am also making good progress with my Rennie Mackintosh cross stitch picture, and have done a bit of reading. I do like Saturdays! Unfortunately, when M goes back to work at 111 next month, I'm afraid they won't be as relaxed.

Friday: Summer Holidays

Today was the end of the school term for TG and the official start of the summer holidays. She ploughed on to the bitter end, and finished off her last bit of school work this afternoon. Huge credit to her for being so hard working and determined throughout this term of school-at-home.  I had a bit of freelance work to do this morning, and now have two weeks off from my archives work to look forward to. Next week we should have been going up to Yorkshire for H's graduation, followed by ten days at Lake Garda in Italy. As it is, we are going to Weymouth in Dorset for a few days, and are feeling lucky to be able to do that. There is no doubt the last few months has made us more grateful for small things.

Yesterday evening we met up with R and went for a dog walk round the parkland at Woburn Abbey. The Abbey (on the site of an earlier, medieval abbey but now the country estate of the Duke of Bedford) has a huge deer park, with footpaths crossing it at various points. Last time we went we walked in a slightly different direction, but this time we walked closer to the Abbey itself. At one point a large group of deer ran across the path ahead of us - just too far away to get a good photo.

I was asked on Instagram how Woburn is pronounced here - the answer is Woe-b'n, although I know someone from a family who have lived locally for generations who calls it Woo-b'n, so I imagine that must be the original pronunciation (now virtually extinct).

Today I woke up tired and aching. Between exercise classes and walks I have been doing a lot physically, and I think it caught up on me. I had planned to do a more challenging exercise class with H this morning, but decided to listen to what my body was telling me and pass. M and I did go for our afternoon walk and I did a bit of stretching yoga with H after that. Definitely feeling a bit less stiff this evening than I was earlier.

A couple of friends came round this evening. We had takeaway fish and chips in the garden and sat outside for a long time chatting until it got cold and dark. This was the first warm evening we have had in a while, so it was good timing. I have a feeling we had the best of our "summer" weather was in April and May. Sometimes I am very jealous of people who live in countries where they can rely on getting sun and warmth during the summer. There was one summer a few years ago which was unremittingly cold and dull. I vividly remember sitting in the car on a sunny September day soaking up some warmth, and realising just how long it was since I had felt truly warm - I suppose we couldn't bring ourselves to turn on the heating in July and August.  At least this year we had a lovely warm spring.

Tuesday: Water Lilies

I had a successful working morning and managed to finish one of the mapping jobs I have been working on, then did a Fiit class. TG did a bit of school work, but is really starting to run out of steam now - she has done so well to keep up with everything working at home on her own, but is more than ready for the summer break. H did some exercise, then went over to her BF's to keep him company while he worked. I think she went via McDonald's and bought them both a late breakfast. M mowed the grass, ran a couple of errands, and sorted out some work stuff.

I had used our National Trust membership to book a slot to visit Ascott House again this afternoon. As it is only a couple of miles away a wander round the Ascott gardens makes a nice alternative to our usual walking routes. For some reason when we last went (two or three weeks ago?) we missed out the large lily pond and another section of the garden which is designed around mounds and circles.One of the things this season of coronavirus has made me appreciate is just how lucky we are to have so many beautiful places within easy walking or driving distance, and we are making the most of them with our new habit of daily walks. I really hope it is a habit we will manage to keep up. 

This moated circle was surrounded by an outer circle of lavender. It smelt gorgeous and had attracted a huge number of both bees and hoverflies. Those bees will be making some beautiful lavender honey!

I am not quite sure what this circle / mound thing is supposed to be, but it reminds me of the motte of a motte and bailey castle.

H and her BF came back for dinner, which was fish with sweet potato fries and broccoli. We then all (except TG who got bored and wandered off) watched Greyhound, a film about a trans-Atlantic convoy during the Second World War which has been released on Apple TV instead of in cinemas. I currently have a free subscription to Apple TV, but our television doesn't have the Apple TV app, so after a bit of experimentation with alternatives we ended up plugging my laptop in via an HDMI lead and running it from that.

Monday: Cool Lakes and Hot Chilli

Photos today are from yesterday's walk in nearby Milton Keynes. Unusually TG decided to come with us and wanted to walk round a lake, though when we got there she complained it wasn't the lake she meant!. As a new town (built from the 1970s onwards) MK was deliberately planned with a series of stormwater balancing lakes and linear parks. As a result there are lots of great places to walk, all linked by traffic free paths. We walked a full circuit round the perimeter of the lake, which turned out to be our usual three miles. The top photo was taken in front of some housing built facing the lake - quite a view!

We started our walk outside a lakeside pub / restaurant and hotel. Pubs and restaurants were only allowed to open a week ago, so we were intrigued to see how it was working. We walked past the entrance to the outside area and heard a member of staff directing a couple of people to a table and explaining that they could download an app and use that to order from their phones, or order from a staff member if they preferred. The tables were very well spaced, and we both felt we could go for a drink or meal outside quite safely.  While we were out walking H was working her first cafe shift. She was indoors working the coffee machine and said it was quite quiet. A couple of regular customers had found out she was going to be working and popped in to give her a card to congratulate her on her graduation, which was lovely of them. 

We found another swan family on the lake. There were eight cygnets, but they were spaced out too far to get them all into a single photograph. After our walk we decide to go for a drive through Starbucks as TG loves their their frappuccinos, but when we got there the queue was long and barely moving so we gave up. 

Today I went to a shop for the first time since March. I needed to pick up a click and collect order from Marks and Spencer - we have a food only store, but can get other items delivered there without paying postage - and then did a bit of food shopping. I wore one of my new cotton masks for the first time, and found it surprisingly comfortable. I should think about 15 to 20 percent of people were wearing masks. The messaging about them here has been so confusing - the government now seems to be suggesting people should wear them, but in a very vague way. There is some speculation that masks may be made  compulsory in shops soon, which has already been done in Scotland, but ministers seem to keep contradicting each other and nobody seems to want to take a decision about it. They really are useless and leadership is non-existent! 

TG cooked dinner tonight as she had to make a high fibre meal for her catering course. She made baked potatoes with chilli (beans for fibre!) and avocado. It was very tasty, but also very hot. After a bit of discussion it turned out that she had misread the recipe and instead of using mild chilli powder OR a smaller quantity of hot chilli powder, she had used both! The extra heat didn't stop people having second helpings. 

Saturday: Dunstable Downs

We woke to a much brighter morning after a dull, damp week and decided to take advantage of the better weather with a walk up on Dunstable The Downs are chalk downland, managed by the National Trust. As NT members we don't have to pay for the car park, and got there just in time to get a space. We ended up doing a four mile circular walk - a very elongated circle,

We started by walking along the top of the Downs towards Five Knolls. The route is part of the Icknield Way, a path which dates back to prehistoric times and is thought to be the oldest in the country.

Looking back you can see the ridge of the Downs running into the distance.

These bumps two of the Five Knolls, prehistoric burial sites built 4,000-4,500 years ago. Archaeologists also found around 100 skeletons of young men in shallow graves on top of the prehistoric site, which date to the 5th or 6th century - it was decided they may have been defeated Saxon invaders who were killed and buried on what was already an ancient site.

Soon after Five Knolls turned round the end of the Downs and started walking back along the bottom. Here I was looking up towards where we had just walked, with lots of willow herb in the foreground.

We passed the gliding club and watched as this glider was towed up into the air by the small plane in front. The Downs are often windy, so good for gliding, hang gliding and kite flying.

Getting back up from the lower path to the higher one was challenging. This was steeper and longer than it appears from this view back down. M slipped and fell at one point, but fortunately didn't suffer any real damage apart from a scraped wrist.

I managed to get a photograph of a rather shy peacock butterfly. It sat with its wings shut for ages until I moved the grass and persuaded it to open its wings and fly off, just giving me time to catch a glimpse of its "eyes".

This has to be one of my favourite local walks, although the hilly parts make it quite hard going in places. We got home in time for a late lunch, and have spend the rest of the day mostly being lazy, although I did fit in a short yoga session in the late afternoon. 

Friday: Back to Work Plans

A very routine couple of days, with work, exercise, walks and not much else to write about. Now people are allowed in each other's houses H and her BF have gone to his home for the weekend. From now on they will drift between the two houses according to who is working, where and when. He will be starting back in the office next week, working one week in, one week at home, and she is doing Sunday shifts at the cafe. 

M has had a return to work pack for his job at 111, with various things to work through, including risk assessments. We think occupational health will want to check his, but that it is very likely he will be going back at the beginning of August. Everything seems very well organised, with catch up training and supervision to ease returners back in after their four months away. Meanwhile I have no idea when I will be going back into the archives, as most of the staff are still redeployed with the community hub. That may be winding up at the end of the month, but nobody seems very sure, so until then, who knows! A couple of people are now going in for one day a week to catch up on the backlog of enquiries, but quite what happens after that seems to be an open question and I doubt I will be going in for a while yet. We also had a letter from TG's school today to confirm that she will be going back full time in September, although a few days later than the original return date as they want to stagger the start of term by year groups.

Our brass band had just started organising small group rehearsals on Sunday afternoons, in the garden space outside our normal rehearsal venue. I didn't go last Sunday, but was down to play in one of this weekend's sextets. However, the government has announced new guidance for wind and brass groups and choirs, which is that NO amateur groups of any size should play together for the time being while further research is carried out (previously the advice was that a group of six could pay outdoors with 3 metre distancing). So this weekend is off, and so are any other small group rehearsals. By the time they are allowed again, I suspect it will be autumn and the weather will not be good enough for outdoor playing. A shame, and to be honest it seems over cautious - indoors I can understand, but banning any outdoors and distanced playing seems excessive. If the government was more competent I would assume they know something we don't, but as it is I have very little confidence in their decisions.  

Wednesday: Missing Masks

Today I was the victim of an extremely minor Covid crime. I had ordered some face masks from Etsy which were delivered today - or, at least, the envelope was delivered. Empty. At first I thought it was a packing error, then realised that the bottom of the envelope had been tampered with. Someone - presumably a postal employee - had opened it, taken the contents and stuck it back down again. As crimes go, this one was so ridiculous as to be funny! I emailed the Etsy seller with pictures of the envelope so they can complain and hopefully get some money back from the Post Office, and they are going to send me replacements.

It was another busy day, with work this morning, a yoga class this afternoon which both H and TG did alongside me, a three mile walk, and a band committee meeting by Zoom this evening. We are in the process of registering as a charity, and had do go through the new constitution which was dry but necessary. H made beef pie and mash for dinner, which was just right for a wet and miserable evening.

On our walk today another willow had come down over the canal tow path, just missing a moored boat. Fortunately it was easy enough to climb over or under, according to preference. We also walked past an open canal side pub with a few hardy customers sitting outside - today really wasn't the weather for it, although at least at that time it wasn't raining.

Tuesday: Medieval Churches and Garden Failures

Life has just been chugging on in its normal routine this week. Archive work in the mornings, with a break both days to do a Fiit class, then a walk in the afternoon. Some TV and family time in the early evening, and bits of time reading and genealogising (can I make that a verb?). Yesterday's exercise class was cardio and nearly broke me, so today I stuck to a reasonably challenging yoga class. 

The biggest piece of news is that H had official confirmation of her degree result yesterday - 1st Class  Honours BA in Italian and Linguistics. She was very blasé as she already knew from her module marks that was what she would get. What pleased her most was that she managed to keep her marks up despite having to study remotely once Covid closed the university in March, and didn't have to rely on the safety net put in place to make sure nobody's final grades suffered due to coronavirus. 

I am adding more photos from our walk on Sunday. Both of the North Buckinghamshire villages we walked through have some lovely old houses as well as medieval churches. The church at the top is in  Mursley and dates from the 14th and 15th centuries. Parts of the church in Swanbourne (below) are from the early 13th century, although the tower was later rebuilt. The church still has medieval wall paintings, so next time we go that way I'll see if it is possible to look inside. The cottages above are also in Swanbourne, where my ancestors lived in the 18th century. I have no idea where - it could even have been in one of these for all I know!

After a couple of brighter days the weather has gone downhill again and there is rain forecast for the next couple of days. I do miss being able to spend time in the garden! H and I have talked about possibly venturing out to a garden centre and trying to grow things. As I have a long track record of killing any plant with which I come into contact, this will almost certainly be doomed to failure. Our garden is simply grass, hedges, a few wild flowers, and a few persistent daffodil bulbs by the drive which come up every years of their own accord. I haven't braved trying to grow any flowers for about ten years because it is always a disaster. I can't remember to water plants, and on the rare occasions I do keep something alive, slugs eat it and I get discouraged.  

Sunday: Flights and Flying Things

H decided to cook pancakes for brunch this morning, which turned into a slightly loud but fun family meal, with a fair amount of amicable teasing. Yet again, I am counting my blessings that we got to spend lockdown with these girls (and for part of the time, boy). There have been grouchy days and hangry moments (H and I are the main culprits there!), and a teen who isn't currently doing mornings, but overall we have enjoyed each others company and I am grateful that we have young adult and teenage daughters who value their family and are happy to spend time with us.

After the pancakes M and I went for a four mile walk in a different area. We drove to a village a few miles away and walked a circular route to another village and back. On the return section I managed to get some nice photographs of a damselfly (common blue) and two butterflies (small white and small tortoiseshell) so I am adding those here - I'm pleased with them because catching small fluttering things with an iPhone is tricky! It was pleasant walking (apart from a couple of small sections with a few too many brambles and nettles) with some good scenery - I'll post some more pictures over the next day or so. Definitely a walk we will do again.

By the time we got back H and her BF had gone out for a walk of their own, and they then went back to his house for a BBQ. I did some menu planning and updated the grocery order for Tuesday, then spent a bit of time in the garden reading until it got too chilly in the wind. I also did some more travel rearranging. I had intended to take N to Paris for a couple of days during May, and had Eurostar train tickets and a hotel booked, both of which had left me with credits. We were supposed to be going to Italy later in July, and I had been given refunds for cancelled outwards flights, but the return flight still (so far) appears to be running, which means my only option for that was to alter the flights for a future trip with the same airline. We had talked about trying to do a short trip to Disneyland Paris over the winter as a small compensation for missing out on Disney World, and towards the end of last week a plan came together - use the Eurostar and hotel credits for me to take TG out to Paris for a couple of days during half term week in February, then meet H at Disneyland Paris on the Friday and spend the weekend there; the final piece of the jigsaw was to swap the unusable Italy flights for late flights back from Paris to our local airport on Sunday evening. H will not know until she starts her job in September whether or not she will be able to get the Friday off. If she can, there is an early flight that will get her to DLP by mid-morning, if not she will catch up with us on Friday evening.

Then ... the best bit! Staying in the 5* Disneyland Hotel - the iconic but expensive one at the entrance to the park - has been on our bucket list for some time. We priced it and the exact dates we wanted were significantly cheaper than the days either side; so much cheaper that if I deducted the value of the included meal package, it was cheaper for those dates than both the 3* and 4* Disney hotels.  I have read through the arrangements DLP are making for when they reopen in a couple of weeks, and everything seems pretty well set up, with limited numbers, compulsory face masks and social distancing. Hopefully there will be less need for restrictions by February as the situation seems to be reasonably under control in France, but I'm optimistic that even with same precautions we would feel safe and have a good time. So - I booked! And this morning I managed to sort out rearranging the flights, which is as far as I can get for now as Eurostar tickets for the dates we want won't be available for a while yet. 

In the evening M and I watched a documentary about triplets who were adopted separately and then found each other. It turned out they, along with several sets of twins, had been deliberately split up so their development could be monitored for a child development study which ran through the 1960s and 70s. Ethically awful, with all sorts of repercussions, and thankfully not something that would be contemplated now. 

Saturday: Hamilton and Holidays

Since lockdown forced me to reorganise my week I have been very much enjoying my more leisurely weekends. Today I have listened to my audiobook (Underland, by Robert Macfarlane), done quite a lot of cross stitch, read some of my non-audio book (Rewild Yourself: 23 Spellbinding Ways to Make Nature More Visible, by Simon Barnes) and watched Hamilton on Disney Plus with H and TG. We loved it, and can certainly see why it has been such a phenomenal success. Maybe when theatres are back we will get the opportunity to see it in London - I would love to see it live.

I did quite a lot of exercise today. This morning I did a strength Fiit class followed by yoga, then this afternoon went for a three mile walk with M. During our walk we discussed ideas for short breaks over the summer. Having cancelled our planned trips (Lake Garda and Disney World) we had not expected to go anywhere, but possibilities now seem to be opening up. We don't quite feel safe enough to fly, even later in the summer, but had started to consider something like an AirBnB. Talking it through and looking at prices, we realised that the Dorset caravan park we have visited many times over the last twenty years could be an option. It is always immaculately clean, and I'm confident that they will be taking extra care and have plenty of safety precautions in place. Usually it is very expensive in the summer, but as they are only just opening up (from today!) there were still reasonably priced breaks available for July.

After our walk, we talked it over with the girls, and have now booked to go in two weeks for four nights. Although the swimming pools will be closed (unless the government relaxes the rules between now and then) there will still be plenty of outdoor things we can do, and it will be lovely to get a little time by the sea. As long as we are careful, I don't think it will be any more risky than staying at home and doing outdoor activities. There have been some terrible pictures of overcrowded beaches, but the park is out of town in a quiet area, so if there is any sign of beach mayhem in the town we can keep well away.

After the excitement of holiday bookings (there was another I forgot to mention yesterday, which I will now save until tomorrow to write about) and Hamilton, we had a Chinese takeaway. A very nice end to the week.

Friday: School Day

TG had her morning at school this morning and, being 14, was not very communicative about it. Apparently the group she was in was all people from her maths class, including one of her friends and a few others that she chats to. Beyond that, she didn't say much. She also decided that as she had been to school and had an English class, the bit of English work that showed up in her school app could wait until Monday. 

I spent a lot of time again today writing up and researching my friend's family - I am probably doing far too much, but I'm enjoying it. Interesting to see where a family that had lived in London for three or four generations came from originally - so far I have found ancestors who came to London in the mid-19th century from Berkshire, Norfolk and Essex. I have also found a family in the workhouse, a boy who joined the Navy at the age of 15, and statements on censuses and marriage certificates that were either entirely fictional or at least economical with the truth.

I did a Fiit class before lunch which was, let's say, challenging - as in, there were points where I just gave up and slumped on the floor or the sofa. Serves me right for congratulating myself yesterday on having improved to the point where I could get through classes without stopping. Today's definitely took it up a notch and I struggled. M took a boot load of stuff to the tip which left him tired too, so we decided on just a short walk later in the afternoon. Just as well, as it was raining quite a bit by the time we got back. We ran into an old friend and her daughter and stopped for a chat and a catch up, which was good. H has been the dinner chef every evening this week, and today she made burgers, chunky fries and homemade coleslaw. After dinner we watched some TV and I did a bit more family history and some cross stitch. No photos today so I have added a couple of pictures of trees from yesterday.

Thursday: Dodging the Rain

I decided to exercise first thing before starting work this morning. I can feel I am getting fitter - there is still a lot of huffing and puffing, but I am making it through a workout without having to stop for a rest in the middle. Work was frustrating today, as the online web editor I use was being annoyingly glitchy and kept logging me out without saving what I had done. In the end I managed to get what I was trying to do finished, but it took me far longer than it should have done and I ended up finishing and eating lunch very late.  

Our National Trust booking for this week was for Ascott House, which is only a few minutes drive away. Owned by the Rothschild family, it was originally a farm house, much extended to be used as a base for hunting. A lot of work has been done on the grounds in the last few years, extending the area open to the public and adding new features. It is much smaller scale than the other NT grounds we have been visiting, but as it is so close we don't need to spend long there for it to be worth the trip. After we arrived we stopped at the takeaway cafe for M to have tea and some shortbread. By the time he finished it was looking ominously dark, so I suggested we go back to the car and wait it out for a while in case it rained - good call, as it rained heavily for about 20 minutes. By the time we started our walk round the grounds it was brightening up nicely and we even got a bit of sun. This week really hasn't been great weather wise. Fortunately the forecast for next week looks much nicer. 

I am still doing research on my ex-neighbour's family history. I find genealogy very addictive and once I start it is hard to stop. This evening I got bogged down somewhere on the Norfolk coast, and ended up coming to the conclusion that there was a census error which had transposed the names Mary and Sarah, making me think there were two separate families whereas I now think there was only one. 

More small steps towards "normal" are happening. This afternoon H went into the cafe where she works for a meeting about how things will be working when they open up at the weekend, and tomorrow TG will be going in to school for the first time since March. It is just for the morning, but the school wants to have some actual contact with the kids before they go back properly in September. She will be in a group of 12, and is quite happy because she has found that one of her friends is in the same group. On the other hand, she is not happy about having to get up early in the morning!

Wednesday: Sleepwalking Through My Day

I woke up at 4am this morning with a headache, and by the time it had cleared enough for me to go back to sleep, I was too much awake and that was it for the night. Sometimes I function OK on four hours of sleep. Today was not one of those days. I was mostly a sleepwalking zombie. I managed to pull myself together enough to get my work done this morning. Meanwhile, M cut the grass and TG worked on her latest assignment for her photography class, which was to produce a banner and logo/profile pic for the art and photography department's Twitter account, using her own photographs.  She did a very clever banner with a picture she took a little while ago of her friend's camera while her friend was using it, with a photo of a row of colouring pencils edited into the lens; she then used the colouring pencil photo for the profile pic.

H had to go to a nearby town for routine blood tests, so went into Greggs and bought home some of their vegan steak bakes and vegan sausage rolls for lunch. Even those members of the household who are normally more carnivorous love these, and H and I both think they are better than the meat versions. After lunch I spent some time semi-comatose on the sofa, before reluctantly dragging myself out for a walk with M. I was glad I did, as I felt better for it. I had seen a photo on Facebook of a tree which had blown down across the canal last night, so we walked down to see if it had been moved. It had - a couple of men were still clearing the last bits from the opposite bank, and there were a few small leafy branches around, but both the canal and the towpath were clear. The tree was a willow, which I imagine had become unstable because it had been allowed to grow too tall too close to the canal.

Today's wildlife sightings were this gorgeous ginger cat lazing on the top of a narrowboat, and the swan family, who we spotted as we crossed a bridge being fed dinner by someone on a boat. No wonder those cygnets are growing so fast! I wonder what will happen to them as adults. Will they be allowed to stay on the same section of the canal as their parents, or will they be expected to go and find their own territory?

One of H's girlfriends has just got a new puppy, so she and her BF went over to meet him and have puppy snuggles. He is a very cute black cavapoo (Cavalier Spaniel / poodle cross), just eight weeks old, and H was besotted. She loves dogs and can't wait to be in a position to get one of her own. While she was out, M had a Zoom chat with friends, TG did a dance class, and I read and napped in the hammock. H cooked lamb curry for dinner, so I had a very lazy evening.