Let's have another shot at this.

The computer has been very poorly, and away for a major operation, so this is by way of an experiment to see if it was the machinery or the internet connection which didn't want to play last time.

(Tries to upload photograph)

Nope!

Imagine a sunflower, against a blue, blue sky. Very pretty - too pretty for the system to handle.

I have been knitting some dear little titchy jumpers as well - imagine them.

SO annoying - especially since BT hooked up the lady next door to a good internet connection but here, and next door the other side, and the people next door but one are starved. And BT sent out a flier today saying how good their system was and would we like it. Of course there will be some small print somewhere saying conditions vary. Soon we will be hit with extra charges to ensure that people in rural areas are able to get really whizzy internet. I would so like to make introductions between left hand and right hand, and see if they could manage to work together to sort it!

Here goes nothing.

Time for the big experiment. Let's see if this snailey internet connection can cope with a picture.

Nope! Well I will just have to say it in words. Painted Ladies - the butterflies that fly all the way from Morocco to the UK. We had just the one when there was a big invasion a few weeks ago. Now on the Buddleia flowers we have at least four: new generation, home grown. It is hard to know if this is a good year for butterflies, being in a new area, and it being the first year we have had our own Buddleia, but we have seen a lot of them, in many varieties this summer.

I took some good photos. But if they are not going to upload in the first five minutes, I reckon they are not going to upload at all.

Sort of takes the point of blogging away if I can' t share to good things.

Boy has it been a long time!

First we lost the internet. Then we moved. Then it took best part of two months for the people who look after the wires to tell us that the one to our new home was so bad that we could never get internet service, and no, they didn't see it as their duty to renew it.

So now I have what is called on the box a "dongle", and I am trying to catch up. It is very slow, and I really don't know how it is likely to cope with pictures when I get around to any. But it IS there, and I am now able to pronounce loud and clear that I LOVE my new home, and I am having so much fun getting everything sorted out.

No photos again.

But it was quite a special day.

My last trip to London - well, probably not, but the last before we move, which is going to make that kind of jollification a much more complicated affair.

Two main objects.

A trip to Shaukat, to stock up on Liberty fabric. They have so much, and I wanted to get a supply before I retire to the country to do Serious Sewing. If I can find the camera, I will produce photos at some stage.

More important, a trip to iKnit London, for a little light stash enhancement and a happy couple of hours knitting and musing with Jean, Judith, and Christine - friends from the blogosphere. It was especially good to meet Jean, whose blog I have followed for a long time. Meeting all three ladies served to remind me that there will be like-minded people wherever I go, and I needn't fear leaving behind my present set of friendly acquaintances.

Big frustration - there was an American lady in the shop who asked permission to photograph us, and said she has a yarn store in somewhere in New England - I completely forgot to make a note of where she said, so I could check up on whether she features us! I like the idea of being part of the "things I saw on my holidays"!

Something special

Walking down the garden path, a spot of colour caught my eye. It was a feather - a very small feather - but there is only one bird in this country that could have shed a feather with this incredible colour and hint of iridescence. There were no others around, so this is not the scene of a Sparrowhawk crime: it must have simply fallen out as it flew past, since it is the moulting time of year for birds.

Yes they are around in this area - I have seen one perched on a post, eyeing the prospcts of the goldfish in next door's pond.

So yesterday a Kingfisher flew over the garden and left me a tiny treasure.

Funny feelings.

I feel like a murderer. After all those years with three children who told me firmly "Mum, if you are going to put teddies in a bag, you really MUST leave airholes so they can breathe.", what have I been doing? Packing cuddly toys into plastic bags, and firmly vacuuming out all the air!

Perhaps it is time they departed this house - but how can I do that? Firstly, they are not mine, and secondly, I remembered all their names as I packed them.

I have to have faith. Didn't I read somewhere that they have the ability to hibernate at will? Certainly, I whispered to them as they went into the bags, so if they were listening, they should be ok.

Things have been done.

Last week we went for a visit to the east coast. Here is a picture at the east coast.

We also went to Stamford. I only took a couple of pictures there - it was pretty overwhelming and I hardly knew where to point the camera, so here is the better of the two!


For the benefit of the American branch of the family, when we move our new postal address will be Boston. Here is a picture I took in Boston.


Despite being just to the east of Maryland, and up a bit from New York, we are not emigrating! There is a memorial to the Pilgrim Fathers, but that is because this is the Boston that they started from.

We have found the house that suits us precisely. The sale is "subject to contract", so I will say no more now except that it is situated EXACTLY as I had hoped to find - in a small hamlet, but very close to the main village, which has all the services that we need. With neighbours, but not too many. With a large enough garden on good soil. With a walk-in pantry in the kitchen. That last one has been puzzling my other half. He realises that it is a "good thing" but is amazed at the way every woman I mention it to says "Oooooh!"

Shan't mention the socks I knitted except that they will forever be known as my housebuying socks.

No photos

No photos and no knitting and not even any sneaked in sewing.

I have had quite a bit on my mind of late, and here is the gist of it.

My Dearly Beloved has retired, and we are now getting started on a project that has been in our minds for a long time. We are not quite running away to sea, but something similar. Now that all three children are out of the house, and getting on with their lives, we are going to do likewise. We plan to move home to somewhere rural, fairly far north of here, and out of the ambit of Surrey, London and all that that entails. We don't know where yet and next week we make a start on looking. We will be pottering around in the right sort of places, waiting for something to announce that this would be a good place.

I doubt if there will be much posting for some time.

It feels a little bit like an elopement. It is just that we have waited 42 years to get around to it!