Happy Birthday, Peter.

It's Peter's 76th birthday today. The weather has been glorious but both of us had appointments in the morning which ruled out going anywhere for the day. Peter had a blood test and annual review at the doctors' (all okay apparently) and I had my tooth out at the dentist's.

I gave Peter his usual nice bottles of beer and yet another charcoal landscape by a local artist but the big present was a bit of a cheeky one. Cheeky in that it was something I really wanted but yes he liked it too. What was it you ask? A week in a cottage in Downalong, St Ives at the end of September. 

Although I only spent my early childhood in St Ives I have an emotional attachment to the place, something like Hiraeth for the Welsh and would swap this house for a flat there in a flash if I was on my own. We had our honeymoon there and another holiday the year after and then two more stays with the motor home. 

As St Ives is the UK holiday destination of the wealthy rental prices are astronomical but since it will also be our 50th wedding anniversary (on the day we travel home) and my 70th birthday earlier in August I thought Why not? Something to look forward to at the end of summer.

 

This morning at 7.00 I could already tell it was going to be a hot one. The heatwave is truly upon us and this afternoon the thermometer read 34C. Pleasant enough to sit out in with the breeze but I feel sorry for people inland.

When I was at the dentist I asked him to look at one of the teeth that he had built up with composite, a front incisor, as I thought it was looking a bit rough on the bottom edge. He said it was just a bit stained and he would give a polish but then he added more composite to strengthen the tooth. That was fine since he didn't charge me for that. The extraction took less time than the composite and wasn't even uncomfortable. Of course with the numbing effect of the injections wearing off it has been a tad sore and I did feel kind of woozy when I left the dentist. But since the tooth has been quietly aching since I broke it on holiday I'm happy it has been taken out. I have stocked up on ice cream and plenty of goodies (brownies, cookies, filled doughnuts and pain o chocolat) from Aber Surplus which should last a while.

While in town I got some 'gold' number stickers as my recent hunt for 100th birthday card for a relative had been fruitless, just one boring card in the whole of Aber and Mach. Instead I bought a nice card which I've now customised.

I also found a better frame for the picture I gave Peter as we both agreed that my first choice wasn't the best, too big and overpowered the sketch.

The dentist did tell me to take things easy today so I've spent the afternoon sitting out in the sun and had already pulled out of tonight's choir practice.

Tonight for Peter's birthday supper I shall be cooking salmon with onion and mushrooms in the oven served with peas and new potatoes. One of our favourite meals and easy for me to eat too.

Last night's sunset. 

Grooming Day.

The day began with low clouds and little sun but somewhere along the line the clouds departed and the heat began to build. By the afternoon it was all blue skies and felt like summer once more.

 

It was a good day to do more gardening at the zoo. I began by tidying up the gravel garden after which I cleared the spiral paths of the grass maze.

The zoo's ponies spend most of their time in a field up the lane but now that summer's here they are brought down to the public area. In common to many small ponies they are prone to laminitis so it is actually better for them to be off the grass for most of the day.

When my fellow volunteer who looks after the ponies mentioned that she was planning to groom Buddy, the elderly Shetland to help him get rid of his winter coat I quickly offered my services. 

We had a selection a brushes (I'd already vetoed using the metal curry comb though I know some people do use them directly on horses.) but it turns out I'm a dab hand at stripping out the winter coat by hand. We must have spent at least an hour grooming Buddy who although he was still somewhat fluffy looked a great deal better than when we started. It isn't so much about how he looks but he will be a lot more comfortable in the hot weather. Next week we should be able to get the rest of the long hairs out with the brushes. Pablo has already shed his winter coat but he hung around trying to steal things from my friend's pockets or licking her arm.

Buddy's cute plait was done to keep the hair out of his eye which has a touch of conjunctivitis. In previous years another volunteer (no longer at the zoo) used to chop Buddy's forelock off to about 2" below his poll which looked ridiculous and negated the function of keeping flies off Buddy's face. 

Some of the hair we removed.

When I got home I did a bit more work on the long hedge. I'm cutting it back a bit from the inside so once again it is looking rather sparse but it won't be long before it grows more leaves.

Pilates tonight was kettlebells. I can understand why not as many people come to the kettlebells session as it is hard work. Let's just say I sweated buckets. But I'm sure it is good for me so I shall persist.

A Greedy Pigeon.

Once again the weather has swung between almost hot sunshine and cooler grey spells. Overall it does feel like we are heading towards the next heatwave. I had towels out on the line by 8.00 and they dried nicely even though there wasn't much in the way of wind.

 

Each morning I put out a small handful of seeds for the birds. The sparrows usually appear as soon as they see me, grab a few seeds and off they go. Mr Wood Pigeon on the other hand will stay and polish off the whole lot. I let him eat for a while and then I tell him to move on. But he doesn't take much notice of me and goes and hides where he thinks I can't see him.

This morning we headed off for our usual meet up with our friends at the Mach library to work on our Welsh. Afterwards I went to the Mach Post Office, at the back of the Spar as they often are, bought birthday cards at the nice card shop and checked out the charity shops. I'm not looking for anything in particular at the moment but you never know.

I my first job at home was to go up into the loft (really hot up there and an odd smell, not sure if it's hot plastic or something decaying) to bring down some underbed storage tubs.  I use them everywhere but these ones actually are going under a bed. 

I'm trying a new arrangement with the trundle bed. Instead of keeping the mattress on the lower bed that slides under the other one, I've put the pillows and bedding in the storage tubs and put them on the bed frame leaving the mattress on top of the other bed. I'm hoping I can reconcile the extra bulk vs having a better height work area with pillow piles in the corner. Not sure yet.

And of course I ended the afternoon with some gardening. Mainly cutting back and dead heading plus I did my best to dig out a rather too prolific small flowered campanula which had tried to smother some crocosmia.

And Breathe.

We've had a lovely weekend with our friends whom we've known since our eldest children were born. We used to live near each other in London but since moving to different parts of the country haven't met up so often especially since we moved to Wales.

Sam, Kate and younger daughter Alex arrived on Friday afternoon and we have spent the weekend chatting, eating, watching the sea,  going to the beach and yesterday we went for a walk at Ynyslas.

At the car park we got our residents' parking permit from a rather grumpy chap who asked if the paper Peter was showing him was for council tax and then grudgingly admitted that a water bill was also a valid proof of address.

From the Visitors' Centre, now manned by volunteers from Borth Community Hub we walked along the boardwalk through the dunes to the beach. There we sent Sam off to walk the four miles back along the beach to Borth (Kate has recently had a knee replacement) while the rest of us circled back to the car park and drove home to yet more tea and cake.

Considering how minimalist my cooking efforts are these days all my planning paid off and though I say it myself we ate well. Including lunches, cakes and puddings which we don't normally eat but were enjoyable though I don't think my waistline could survive such a regime for much longer.

Our friends left left this morning and while Peter hoovered and mopped I got the first two lots of washing done, dried and later ironed. Before tucking the trundle bed away I gave it a good clean as when putting it up I'd noticed that it was quite dusty but was too rushed to deal with it then. I also tightened up all the bolts with an allan key and now the bed no longer wobbles alarmingly. That led on to tightening up the bolts of our bed and wiping of the underframe. This cleaning lark never stops. 

Today's weather has swung between short spells of hot and humid and longer spells of cloudy with a cooler wind. In the afternoon I found a bit of time to do some gardening, mainly dead heading thrift. I think I'll use the seed heads to grow more plants in case the ravages/ toilet habits of the local cats cause the demise of the current plants.

Oystercatchers and a dragon.

A Change Of Routine.

It's been warm but quite windy today with the occasional moment of sun. Good waves and by the time I came home the sea was filled with surfers.

In a change to my usual routine this morning I went shopping instead of Friday as our friends will be arriving tomorrow lunchtime. I didn't bother going all the way across town to Morrison's but did all my supermarket shopping in Lidl.  I'm finding now that when I write out my shopping list the Morrison's side is getting smaller and smaller. I like checking the plant section and seeing what is in the reduced cabinet but in general I'm now only buying those items which I know Lidl doesn't have. Also Morrison's collects soft plastic packaging for recycling (including some kinds that our weekly collection doesn't take).

I first had a wander around town as I had a bra to collect from M&S and needed to call into Tesco's (which I usually avoid) for some olives for Peter. There I met a couple from the rowing club and we had a long chat, something you often see happening in the local shops.

In the car park I saw people coming out of Matalan clutching handfuls of items and realised they had a sale on with a lot of things reduced by 50%. Of course I went in to have a look and also came out with a handful of items, underwear for Peter, (men's) socks for me and a silicone dish meant for an air fryer but also good for the oven. I was tempted by a lot of their homeware but unless I know exactly where I will put something I don't buy it. Also, in Tesco's I bought some new soft hand towels for the blue loo in their sale. I can never resist a new towel when it's the perfect colour.

When I got home I had to do a scientific packing of the fridge to accommodate the extra food for the weekend (must remember which things need to come out of the freezer). Shopping put away I turned my study into a guest bedroom by putting up the trundle bed into a super king sized bed, opened up the dining table to its full length and best of all finished off the painting. I only needed to paint a second coat on the skirting boards in the blue loo and the utility room so that didn't take too long. Another job completed.

All I need to do now is make a salad for supper before going to disco aerobics. It's Rachel's (she teaches all the classes) birthday this week so we're going to celebrate with prosecco and nozecco. She's always thinking up more ways to make things fun.

The flowering sedum on the terrace looks like a bunch of cute aliens come to say hello.

I shan't be blogging tomorrow or Saturday but should be back on Sunday. See you then.

Painting.

It's been warm today. occasionally sunny but mostly grey. 

Not that I have spent much time outside as today I have been painting. Peter had brought me home a tine of the paint I needed (£30 for 2.5L, paint's not cheap these days.) so I was able to get on with the long drawn out painting of the woodwork.

Of course I couldn't just paint over where the offending oily knots had been, tempted as I was but needed to paint whole door frames and most of the skirting boards in the main part of the house. And as any white paint does yellow slightly over the years I have to admit it all looks a lot fresher.

It will need a second coat which possibly will get done tomorrow but then that will be another job I can tick off my mental list.

While I was doing that Peter took the car to the garage to have the clutch fixed. It had got to the point where the clutch was right at the top so we didn't know how long before it gave out entirely. I'll admit that might be down to me driving with my foot resting on the clutch which I know isn't good for the car. The mechanic also repaired a part of the suspension so the car should be fine when next it goes for its MOT. 

Walking around the garden I saw a busily working white tailed bumble bee,

 

a small butterfly sheltering in the leaf of an arum lily and a fly/bee? resting on an ox-eye daisy.

Just got home from choir. The new clutch takes a bit of getting used to. Despite Peter's dire warnings I didn't stall the car though it was a bit hippety hoppety at times.

Some Good News.

The day began with some sun but while remaining warm it soon turned wet. A welcome relief for the garden plants.

 

In the morning I caught the tail end of the sunny spell as I sat on the wall of a raised bed in the front garden. All around bees were buzzing as they visited the flowers in search of nectar and the grasses swayed gracefully in the wind. 

I decided not to go to the zoo this week as I've got a lot to do at home. But that didn't stop me from crawling around on my hands and knees as I weeded the path that runs along the side of the house. 

I'm afraid I went into grumbling mode as I worked. Not because of the weeding but I don't think I'll ever come to terms with the outside boiler (that grey box blocking the path). 

I get irritated every time I have to turn sideways to squeeze past it. It's only just possible to push a bucket through the gap, bags of cuttings have to be lifted over and there's no way the pressure washer can get through. Instead I have to take the pressure washer out by the drive, down the road and carry it over the shingle garden to the paving at the front of the house. And why is it there? It has to be outside but the path widens as it goes towards the garage. Even 4 or 5 ft further up the path and there would have been an extra 10 inches. I guess men just don't think of such things. 

On a much more positive note - remember my eventful trip out to Crete? Well, I finally got around to phoning to see if I could claim for the money on the travel insurance. (I don't do personal phone calls but am reasonably okay with 'business' calls). 

I didn't hold out much hope as I had no paperwork from either the airline or the lost and found office in Schiphol as it had been first thing in the morning. One chap kept telling me to scan the QR code and fill in an on-line form which wasn't a lot of help as my phone was in the lost bag.

But today a very nice lady took my flight details etc and I also happened to have the receipt from when I got my euros from the Post Office. I had also got the holiday insurance from the Post Office. It took a while but she upheld my claim and I will get £250 which is the maximum they give. As I was expecting nothing it was a really nice surprise. I guess I'll be using the Post Office for my holiday insurance next time.

The changeable weather brought a variety of colours to the sea.

I've been tidying up in the house, washing floors etc while Peter took yet another car load of bags to the dump. It's dry at the moment and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will stay that way so I can walk down to the Hall for Pilates rather than drive.