The second week of the Easter holidays has been another busy one, I've had both Oliver and Bonnie for three days and they have both slept over too.  

On Tuesday we went for a lovely walk around Haden Hill park again, the house was closed this time and the ducks must have been fed a lot because they just weren't interested in our offerings at all but, the weather was better there was lovely blossom on the trees, an abundance of garlic and we heard a woodpecker, although we couldn't spot it.

The trees are starting to fill out with leaves, I took a photo from this spot about three weeks ago and you can really see the difference.

On Wednesday we went to Bewdley and took a picnic to eat by the river, we also had a browse around the charity shops and came home with a few books for the little kids and one for me, there was nothing that took Olivers fancy this time.

More blossom, I do love to see all the blossom on the trees this time of year, this is in the little park in the town where there is an orchard.

We sat and ate our picnic by the pond, it's such a pleasant place to sit and just watch the world go by.

Yesterday we had a slow start, well as slow as you can with small people.  We needed to make a birthday cake for my youngest daughter, Stevie-Leigh, she was 28 yesterday.  Wow those years have gone so quickly, it's hard to believe that my youngest child is 28, in my head she is still a teenager, lol

It's become a tradition that I make the girls a cake on their birthday, Stevie had tagged me in a post on fb with a photo of a (professionally made) Battenburg cake a few weeks ago, saying 'this years birthday cake'  Well, I had to have a go at making a copy cat one when the challenge was made!

I think she was pleased with my effort, it tasted good anyway :-)

I put the house back in order last night after the little people had gone home so that I could get up today and have a day for myself, I've caught up with some podcasts and watched a couple episodes of Life after Life on BBC iplayer whilst knitting, it's been lovely after a full on week.

Mark will be back soon and we are taking Stevie and Darren out for a birthday curry later, It's been ages since we went out for a curry, I'm looking forward to it.

Hope you have a lovely weekend

-X-

A Friday outing

 I took Arty out for the day yesterday, Jenny spends a lot of time on her own with the boys with James being away during the week, she had a few different errands to run and it's so much easier when you haven't got a toddler in tow.

After the warm sunny days we were celebrating last week mother nature decided she wasn't done with Winter just yet and the temperatures plummeted.  We have had occasional flurries of snow with daytime temperatures or around 6 or 7°C and minus temps at night.  

My granny always said you should never leave your vest off until May, ha, ha.

It was bright and sunny yesterday at least so we went for a walk around Haden Hill park, ( I've posted about Haden Hill before), the cold must have put people off because we virtually had the park to ourselves.  I took a bag of bread to feed the ducks, there are two pools, one near the house and one in the parkland, the ducks couldn't get enough, some even came out of the water to make sure they got their share.

We saw a sign to say the Haden Hill House Museum was open for viewing, I've visited previously but not for many years, entry is free so we decided to go and have a look around.

The Library was Mr Haden Best's domain

This room would have been used as the dining room

The Morning Room where the lady of the house would prepare for the day, write letters do her needlework and have afternoon tea

Love the needlework station 

The Housekeepers Parlor

Upstairs was the Drawing Room, or Withdrawing Room.  After dinner this is where the family and guest would sit and talk, play games and perhaps listen to someone playing the piano.

It look like a lovely cosy room but the chairs don't look as though they would have been very comfortable.

The lady's bedroom

In contrast, the servants bedroom looks very sparse, although I do like the patchwork quilt on the far bed 

The only other room that is open was a play room, children can play with all the toys and the dressing up clothes, Arty would have happily stayed in there all afternoon.

Once we got back to the car the ice cream van had arrived, you can still have an ice cream in the cold when you're three, :-)

We went into town after our walk, I'd promised Arty to take him to feed the squirrels, unfortunately they didn't want to eat out of his hand today, but they did come pretty close and I think he was happy to see one close up.

I think I enjoyed the day just as much as Arty, it was nice to get out in the fresh air.

-X-

April, sunshine with a chance of sleet and snow

 Well it was all change with the weather after the lovely sunny Easter weekend, it turned bloomin freezing!  We had sleet and some snow one day, enough to cover the grass and cold enough so that it stayed most of the day.  Although yesterday started off bright and sunny by afternoon it had yet again turned to sleet and then rain, ditto this afternoon. 

I did manage to get out for a walk around Haden Hill park yesterday though before the weather turned, there are some more little paths to explore now that the ground has dried up.  

Just look at all the wild garlic.  I shall have to remember to go back and see it in flower.

I also saw a Treecreeper bird,  unfortunately I only had my phone with me to take a photo and I couldn't get close enough, I stood and watched him for ages though and if anyone noticed me standing staring up at a tree they must have thought I was out on day release, lol.

Everything's looking a lot greener since the last time I went for a walk here, It's surprising how much better a walk around green space makes you feel isn't it.

I'm still not feeling inclined to stitch at the moment, I did start another PS Santa but found myself getting irritated with it, so that was abandoned in favour of knitting on my jumper.  I've been watching Keeping Faith on catch-up recently and knitting round and round is perfect tv knitting.  I am almost at the point where I start the bottom ribbing, just got to double check how long I want it to be.

I haven't tried it on yet but I think it will fit, I don't like snug fitting jumpers or tops so I'm hoping there will be a bit of room in it.

I've really struggled again this week.  On Easter Sunday I woke up to the room spinning and feeling nauseous, this happened a couple of times, I got up but ended up going back to bed for a while.  It passed but happened again on Monday.  I've had a tension migraine and not felt good all week.  After a visit to the doctor she told me that the vertigo I experienced was most likely a side effect of the covid vaccine I'd had the week before.  I had really struggled with the decision to have the vaccine and in the end bowed to pressure, now I wish I'd just followed my instinct.  I won't be having the second one.  I said this to my doctor and she said that quite a few people that she'd seen had said that they wouldn't be having the second one either.  I feel better now that I've made that decision, I just wish that I'd not been swayed in the first place.  

-X-

New knitting

The second pattern in the Year of Dishcloths was released on February 1st, this is the Amour dishcloth.  I had just enough pink cotton to knit this one

This one came out slightly bigger than the first one, but that could just be because of the different cotton I used.

I'm not going to use these this year, I've got a drawer full of knitted dishcloths and I like to choose a fresh one to put out each night.  I'm going to knit these throughout the year and have a nice little pile of new dishcloths for use next year

I've had this Stylecraft special DK in my stash for almost three years.  I bought it when I went away with Joanne and Bonnie to Great Yarmouth in 2018.  I ended up buying a new pattern because those I have are only for babies, I was able to buy a downloadable pattern on Deramores instead of waiting for it to come in the post.  The back is all done but I found all that knitting time made my tennis elbow pain flair up so I've put it down to rest my arm for a few day's

Yesterday the rain kept off all day, there was even a bit of sunshine so I decided to take the short drive to Haden Hill Park for a walk.  Everywhere is still muddy after the snow followed by all the rain but Haden Hill has tarmac pathways so there was no need for wellies.

There were lots of people walking about but it's quite a big space so it was ok, I spent a good couple of hours walking and listening to my audio book, it was nice to get out on my own for a while.

Take care

-X-