Design

It was sunny enough today for us to take our usual walk along the coast at Morte Point. There were lots of holidaymakers out and there were some red faces and shoulders from those who had underestimated yesterday's sun. Last week's walk had prove a bit too long for Peter's knee so we stuck to the shorter walk going down by the well and then round Morte Point. The thistles in the coombe seem to have sprung up overnight, I'm sure they weren't anywhere near this tall last week. Once again the sea was beautifully blue with sparkling white waves. A pleasure to watch as we drank our cup of coffee. There were a pair of sparrowhawks flying overhead and I finally a got a few shots of one of them as it hovered looking for food. They are not much liked by gardeners as they prey mainly on small birds unlike the much bigger buzzards which eat furry things, beetles and worms. Our kitchen is looking bare and huge as I've cleared a lot of things out ready for our builder,...

Much better weather today unlike yesterday when 6-8ft waves and 35mph gusts of wind (not ideal sea going conditions) caused the Ilfracombe Regatta to be cancelled. This morning Peter went out rowing on the Taw nice and early to catch the tide. He was full of energy when he got home and cut up the leylandii trees with his new chainsaw while I did the carrying. There were a few showers in the morning but it was dry enough when Fred came round so that he and Peter could finally put the oil tank on some concrete slabs. The wooden supports were getting rather soggy and the oil delivery man was rather unhappy the last time he brought oil. The tank is too close to the stream, it was put in before the regulations were brought in but if we were to pollute the water we would be liable for massive fines so we have to make sure it is secure. The sun came out in force in the afternoon and after a week of wet days I was able to get out and mow all the grass. Later we had...

This is post 1000! That's nearly 3 years of putting my thoughts out into the blog sphere. A lot has happened in those 3 years. Our plans to move to New Zealand sadly came to naught but new plans for our future are emerging. Our health has been up and down though Peter's arthritis is now under control and I am waiting to be seen again by a back specialist 5 months after first seeing him. Peter retired from his job with the NHS and is happily working for an engineering firm. I went from teaching full-time, to part-time, back to full-time and will be back to part-time after the summer, all at the same school. Our boys have moved on with their own lives and for the moment we live a contented peaceful life here in sunny Devon. Did I say sunny Devon? As the forecasters predicted the heavy rain arrived making for a day to be spent indoors. I've used the day to get on with writing the personal comments for my reports. That's the hardest part as I want to be positive but also t...

It rained a bit this morning and although it cleared up it was quite cold and windy which probably accounted for all the traffic heading into town. I had various places to visit ending up at the dentists' to repair the tooth that broke on the Nightwalk (the filling fell out a few days later). I had gone in quite calmly expecting a quick clean up of the tooth and a new filling put in. Oh No! the missing filling was right down to the nerve so the first thing the dentist did was to give me 3 injections. I don't normally mind injections but one of them really hurt and still didn't deaden everything so that every now and then the drill hit a sensitive spot. One bonus was that because too much of the tooth had gone I had a white composite filling instead of the horrible grey amalgam fillings the NHS makes you have. Bad point is that should this filling fall out the only option is to have a crown. Even worse, because it goes right down to the nerve I might have to have a root cana...

                       It has been rainy for most of the day and together with a few aches and pains the result has been very little done. The only constructive thing I have done has been a little bit of sewing, repairing my favourite jeans. The rain even seems to be affecting the Internet which is running at a speed that would make a snail seem super charged.

It was much cooler today but the rain held off long enough for us to go for an hour's walk around Morte Point. Not so many people out today and we did get to see a couple of seals bobbing about in the water and people watching. The pink of the sea thrift made a good contrast against the grey rocks, sea and sky. Back home my time was spent sanding and oiling a garden table and chairs that I had bought on eBay which was delivered in the morning. I had started thinking last year that my home made pallet table had had its time as not only was the rough surface quite splintery it was also getting very wobbly. I began looking for a second hand table (new being way out of our price range) some time ago and last week I found and bought just what I had been looking for. I wanted a large round, or possibly octagonal, table with good steady legs. So many of the new tables that I looked at had spindly or rickety looking legs which I thought would be a waste of time. I wasn't too worried...

The rain finally arrived this afternoon. For the last week the local farmers have had the contractors in their fields, cutting, turning and taking away silage. The cut fields are a pale lime green which contrasts with the emerald green of the new grass and the deep terracotta of the newly ploughed fields. Today is voting day so I did my civic duty (voting is optional in this country) and went to the village hall to cast my votes for a local council election and also for the national referendum on changing the voting system. At the moment we have a single non-transferable vote which results in the power always being with one of the 2 major parties though currently the 3rd smaller party did a sneaky deal with the conservatives to form a coalition government. Today's referendum was to change to a system where you list the candidates in order of preference so that the least popular gets knocked out and recounts done until the candidate who is more popular overall is picked. The cur...

Another almost perfect day. Not quite as hot as recent days but 20C is fine by me. Yesterday had been very peaceful and quiet here in the valley which felt right for Good Friday but today there were the usual cars going to and from the stables next door and everything felt busier. Peter went off to row with the gig club which he loves doing and I spent my time out in the garden. I daren't try rowing until my back is sorted and although it has been offered I don't fancy just sitting in the cox's position. On his return Peter cooked up another barbecue, home-made sausages (Fred's not Peter's) which were very garlicky (good thing I'm not back to work for a few days) but tasty. Fred is our builder who also has an interest in cooking. His partner works at the same place as Peter so she car shares with him which is 'greener' and helps with his petrol costs and there is another lady who travels with them 3 times a week. The company encourages car sharing, it p...

This is the chest of drawers that I painted yesterday. It was only today that I remembered its history. We've had this chest of drawers all our married life. In our rented flat it lived in our wardrobe alcove behind a white curtain. Then we bought a house and started a family. The chest was painted white and put in the baby's room as it was the perfect size for a changing unit. The top is exactly the same size as a baby changing mat, it was nice and steady and the drawers were very useful. Funny to think that all 3 of my big strapping lads have lain there waving their little legs in the air! When we moved here 18 years ago the drawers went back into another wardrobe alcove this time behind a cream curtain. That is until I decided to keep my clothes in large clear plastic boxes with lids. Then it was time to send the drawers to the spare room and this good weather gave me the chance to spruce them up with a lick of paint. The chest of drawers would have originally come from a Lo...

I woke to grey skies and wet and colder weather. Hooray! said my back which was protesting mightily at the unaccustomed garden work. Instead I spent the morning spring cleaning in the kitchen, mainly the window over the sink. It is amazing how much work there is in cleaning one small area, blue glass washed, junk cleared, curtains washed, dried over the Rayburn, ironed and hung back up and of course the window itself. I prefer the frugal method of soap and water and polishing off with crumpled newspaper. I have tried 'proper' window cleaners but have never found them as good as newspaper. We don't buy any papers but there are always some around left by friends or the free ones that come through the door. And of course you have to clean the outside of the window, and the door windows and the other window and in fact I could spend the rest of my holiday simply working my way round all the windows and mirrors in the house but I shall resist. Every now and again my peace was i...

The sun was shinning today making even this bunch of fading tulips look special. The wind was blowing strongly and it would have been a good day for a walk. Unfortunately Peter had to take his car into the garage so we'll keep our fingers crossed for tomorrow. On the weekends I like to start the day at my PC to see what's happening in the world. I looked up to see this pheasant peering in at the window checking me out ! By the time I got my camera he had moved away but soon he was back, this time checking out what was in the conservatory. ( A mess as usual.) I couldn't stay in on a day like today so I wrapped up against the wind and did some garden work. The other day when I'd been out on the cliffs my wrap around sunglasses had been great at keeping the wind out of my eyes but were a little too dark for the conditions. A quick browse on eBay and I now have some very similar in shape but clear safety specs which do the job brilliantly. First job of the day was to ra...

As forecast it has been raining all day. I haven't done very much at all today, mainly pottering around, tidying up and a bit of reading. I still have my planning to do but that will have to be tomorrow. One thing I did achieve was to mend a kitchen drawer which had broken yet again. As the kitchen was put in before we came (we re-used the original carcasses, moving them around and adding beech work tops when we knocked 2 rooms into 1), everything is in imperial sizes not metric and you can't buy a new drawers to replace the original ones when they fall apart. To fix the drawer I had to resort to screwing into wood when I could and using resin to glue when I couldn't. It should hold for a few years so long as we don't put heavy stuff in the drawer.

A calming picture from our walk around Morte Point. Another long day spent writing reports. We were given a day off to write reports which makes it 10-15 mins per report. I'm fairly new to report writing so with these longer 'short' reports it's taking me over half an hour just to get the basic information onto the reports. Then I need to add in the maths and check through everything so I could be taking up to 30 hours to do these 30 reports. No Way! That's the whole of my half-term holiday gone. At last now I'm getting to the middle group of children I'm able to do a lot of cut & paste with just a few changes. I had so wanted to be able to get out and do some gardening this week not sit chained to the bloody computer. The bed foot-end finally came this morning after an early phone call which woke me from my slumbers. I didn't pick up in time but called back and left a message that I was dismantling the bed and would definitely be at home. When th...

I'm all cross at the moment. The day started well enough. I got up just after Peter left, dismantled our new bed and brought the foot end downstairs as a replacement piece was being delivered sometime today. That was not an easy task as the mattress is very awkward and I had to prop up the rest of the bed on stools and books while I loosened the screws holding the end on. I then tidied the kitchen, hoovered said kitchen, boiled t-towels, made bread and generally prevaricated before sitting down at my PC in the sitting room to work on those blasted reports. I wasn't out of the kitchen for more than half an hour , had no radio or music on yet a while later I found a card slipped under the porch door saying they couldn't find anyone at home. WHAT !! The lights were on, the car was in the yard and the sitting room has windows that overlook the front door. The delivery man must be as thick as 2 short planks! I rang the delivery people explaining that it had cost me considerable...

Hi Folks. It has taken me this long to get over having my pc invader by a nasty virus. One of those ones that look through all your files. The worst thing was finding out that the hacker was actually looking at us through my switched off, web cam. How do we know? Well Peter had come to my rescue when all the screens went black, realised what kind of a virus was in my pc and before cutting this virus out of my system he made a rude gesture at the web cam - which was responded to by an indecipherable comment issuing from my pc just before being cut off. That's not nice to think that people can watch you. My web cam now has a lovely view of the inside of a pot until I actually want to use it. Luckily I don't bank on-line so my biggest threat is identity theft. No money has been lost but it took until today to get my new bank cards and a stronger anti-virus put on the pc . Peter, who tends to take a dismal view of things says I should scrap everything with my old email address...

Very cold again today, -4C out of the wind. Peter went and checked on the pump and it looks as if the pump is ok , good news. There is no electricity getting to it so we'll have to get an electrician in to sort out the supply up to the outbuildings and that could be as expensive. So for the moment this is the little waterfall where I go to fill up buckets for replenishing the toilet cisterns. I spent the morning in town, meeting a friend for coffee and some general shopping. It wasn't too crowded first thing in the morning but the bitter cold made me eager to get inside the shops. Some schoolwork this afternoon followed by roast lamb for dinner.

A little bit of sunshine today and generally it was much warmer. The new mattress is proving its worth in that it supports our aching backs perfectly so it was tempting to have a nice long lie-in but there were things to do. Not a sign of frost as I took the rubbish up to the road. I left the car up the top just in case but also because a man was coming round to collect our unwanted 4ft bed. Originally bought at an auction the bed has old fashioned walnut? head and foot ends and it would have been a shame to simply throw it away. Freecycle is such a good way to pass on items that are still good enough to use, and it would have been a major job to take the bed down to the recycling centre so we both benefited . Once the bed had gone I had time to finish off my school planning and then do some work out in the stream. It looks like the recent cold weather has affected the pipes or pump again and we currently have NO water coming into the house. Oops. Not sure what we are going to do a...

Another cold day today, -5C all day. Peter had to work today so I had the house to myself. Spurred on by the bright sunshine I got a lot of things done including some small DIY jobs. I fixed a broken piece of our old bed which is now in a spare room, wood glue and mending plates for that job. Then I put 2 kinds of draught proofing on the front door. I was crouching down measuring the length of the brush strip which needed to be cut before when being screwed on when there was a tap at the glass panels above me. I popped up to see Jack from next door bearing a hanging basket of sprouting daffodils which he had planted for me. Luckily I had a Lindt chocolate Santa which I had been saving for him. I also managed to replace a broken hinge on one of the kitchen cupboard doors. I felt rather pleased that so many jobs were done. I've even got most of my school planning sorted. Half an hour tomorrow should get the last bits done. I can now relax with a cheesy pasta bake to look forward...

Came home early (5.00) to find new bed had been duly delivered and left in the porch as per instructions. Carried all parts upstairs. Dismantled old bed. Wiped down old bed. Carried old bed to spare bedroom. Answered phone to man who would like to have the spare room bed (I freecycled it). Cleared under bed storage boxes and moved to spare room. Hoovered much dust and removed accumulated odd items from under bed. ASSEMBLED NEW BED. Dragged in new mattress. Solved problem of new mattress being a couple of inches too small for the frame. Made bed. Now worn out. It's 9.00 and planning still to do. GOODNIGHT.

On line at last. That trojan reappeared yesterday so it took until today to scan and then delete all the copies of the trojan . I'm going to invest in a better anti-virus so that I don't have to go through this again. I felt rather isolated not being able to check my e-mails, blogs & facebook but more importantly I couldn't do my school planning without access to emails from my colleagues. As it is I've had to spend the whole of this afternoon doing my planning, yuck. Normally I try and do as much as I can on Friday evening and an hour or so on Saturday and Sunday. The weekend has been very wet though a brief walk around the garden revealed lots of spring bulbs already making good progress. As I had to go to the bank yesterday I treated myself to a leisurely stroll around the sales. We've reached the time when final reductions are being made and I ended up buying £82 worth of clothes for just £21. Mostly tops and t-shirts and a pair of palazzo ? pants with th...