Showers.

May your year be filled with many wondeful memories.

I stayed up till midnight last night and was rewarded with six different sets of fireworks. The best ones were from the same place on the beach where the 6.00 fireworks had been. There were some even closer ones, only a few houses along the road but I only saw the ones that went above the intervening houses and some in the road behind us for which I had to peer over the hedge. The rest were quite far off including a lengthy display that must have been at the holiday park near Ynyslas which held a proper party. Needless to say we don't mind not going to any New Year's Eve parties, in fact I've only been to a few in my life. I'm not much of a party person but I love fireworks. And it had stopped raining as I stood out on the terrace in my dressing gown. There was a final lot of fireworks quite close by nearer to 1.00 but I didn't bother getting out of bed for those. 

I woke around 6.00 this morning, took my tablets and for once fell back asleep (sometimes I do and sometimes I don't). About an hour later there was an almighty thunderstorm. The thunder roused me, I saw the room being lit up several times by lightning (possibly through closed eyelids) and heard the sound of hail crashing against the windows. I decided not to wake up and carried on sleeping. Several hours later as we were eating our breakfast there were still drifts of large hailstones in the garden. The day itself has been a mix of sunshine and showers and if you look closely at the photo above you may see the end of a rainbow on the horizon right in the centre. The weather didn't stop a few eager surfers and some very hardy swimmers. I saw a whole family swimming without wetsuits but by the time I'd got my camera they had gone. The main New Year's Day dip has been postponned until tomorrow.

My first task this morning was to take down the tree and Christmas decorations. All except this beautifully handpainted card from one of my cousins which only arrived a couple of days ago. It's too nice to put away yet.

Then, once the next shower had passed, I went out in the garden and took down the big driftwood Christmas tree. The wood is very wet after all the recent rain but I hope it will dry out in the garage and still be okay for next year. I did some weeding in between all the daffodil and other bulb shoots that are several inches high. These are all bulbs that I rescued from the old garden, I like it when I can preserve flowers that were planted by the previous residents. 

PS It made me smile to hear that Scarborough had cancelled their fireworks display because a wandering walrus is currently residing in the harbour. I wonder if they'll have the display at a later date when 'Thor' has moved on?