I decided this morning to hand wash some of the lace I had bought a while ago. It was a hot sunny day again, with a little breeze coming up from the valley, so a good day to hang out washing. And no, these white bits dangling from the line looking like ancient mummy wrappings are not the monsters of the post title, lol, they are sweet crochet laces and beautifully hand stitched broderie anglaise -
A little while ago we had a couple of days with a goodly amount of rain. The last few days have been really hot again, temps in the mid/high 30s. So last night I decided to water the veggie patch as the forecast for today was hot hot hot. All went well for a half hour or so while I watered the tomatoes, the beans, the cavolo nero.......... and then I got to the yellow courgette. Good grief, I almost fainted when I saw those courgettes, they were monsters! Three days ago, when I checked, they were dinky little yellow courgettes, last night, they were giants, monstrous giants -
Bigger than my beautiful Sussex trugg, longer than my hand and forearm together, and weighing an absolute ton. How could that have happened in three days?
I was going to use a yellow courgette for tonight's roasted vegetables dinner,
but I picked a small one for that, lol, these giants were just too big. They'll be in a big pot of vegetable soup tomorrow with leeks and onions and chilis, and sprinkled with crispy fried lardons ( bacon bits ).
Off to bed now, its almost midnight and I am so tired, but I had to finish listing a few things in my Etsy shop and showing them on the vintageland blog.
Toodlepip xxx
Warning - extremely photo heavy, you may want to skip this one unless you are family :-)!
The week my family visited from the UK went by far too quickly. Before we knew it, it was Friday, the last full day they could spend with us before leaving Saturday morning. But it was a fantastic day, mostly due to our wonderful friends and neighbours Peter and Andrea. In fact, the two older girls called it the best day ever ever!
Peter and Andrea love animals, they rescue, they give them a wonderful home, they walk the dogs at the animal shelter, you name it they do it. They have 3 horses and 2 very eldery and frail ponies, and a while ago we asked them whether we could bring the girls over just to say hello to the horses and maybe stand with them for a photo.
What did they do? These two wonderful people prepared a beautiful afternoon for the girls, not just a few minutes, but a couple of hours with two of their big, gentle horses. I was stunned. They taught the girls so much about caring for the horses. But I will show you in photos how they made this the best day ever for the girls. Having come straight from Autun and lunch, we were dressed totally inadequately, which meant taking even greater care around the animals, but after a serious talk from Andrea about safety etc, things got under way.
Peter brought the three big horses up from their field-
Andrea started by teaching the girls how to clean and brush the horses. Paige and Grace were a little reserved at first but soon got more confident -
Of course, Emily had to have a go as well -
First one side got the treatment -
then the other side -
and the top had to be done as well, even if that meant sitting on the horse to reach all parts :-) -
And while the older girls brushed and combed ..
Emily wanted to brush the barn cat -
We all made a fuss of the cat -
until he escaped and watched the show from far above -
Peter started saddling one of the horses,
while Andrea showed the girls how to clean the horses' hooves -
and then Paige helped to saddle the second horse -
Next, the girls got to lead the horses around the exercise yard -
in preparation for the next step - riding on the horses, yay! -
A little game followed. The girls had to lean down the side of the horse and drop a cone on top of the cone on the ground. Difficult! -
Sometimes it went well -
and sometimes not so well, lol -
Grace did it as well -
Wow, a whole stack! Well done, Paige! -
And then it got really exciting, Andrea and Peter increased the tempo -
the girls couldn'st stop laughing and grinning.
Darling little Emily wasn't going to miss out, oh no. She got sit on the horse with her sister -
but of course that wasn't good enough. She want 'THAT' horse over there!-
Well, she didn't get to ride 'that' horse, but she got to ride this one by herself and loved it-
That was almost the end, but first the equipment had to be put away, the horses had to brushed down after their exercise, and naturally, they deserved a treat after putting up with our girls, lol. Apples, yummm-
The girls were the happiest I had ever seen them, and I can't thank Peter and Andrea enough for what they did for us. They gave us memories of a really magical afternoon, and the girls will always remember this day.
Now I am all sad because it is the end of the blog posts about and for my family. But it was wonderful revisiting every day spent with my whole family, and I am sure I will look at these blog posts again and again.
Toodlepip xxx
