Amazing and 40!

I have been given some things and I kept them safe. On the evening before my birthday, in good tradition, I piled everything up on the breakfast table.

Alex came and cooked me breakfast and I opened my cards and presents.  I had more presents, more visits and more cards! What a spoilt lass I am. Thank you everyone for your greetings of the day.

My most prominent birthday present was a cold so I spent most of my celebrations sniffling in to my pyjamas.  Despite that I got out and about with some lovely people (who I hope don’t get the lurgy!)  I had a great time but I was so quiet I expect I looked miserable the whole time. I haven’t had a party – maybe I will have one in Summer.

The amazing Tea Room team (Chris, Marianne and Jess) made this incredible cake for me

The cake is delicious!  They must have had fun making it because I am intolerant to almost everything cake like these days. Despite that they made something Bones friendly AND delicious!

Being 40 is working out quite well (especially now I am feeling a bit better!).

40!

Today I am mostly being 40.

Who would ever have thought it.

To be surrounded by such support, such love, such laughter and such cheer.

40!

And I am ill. 

I recall being ill on my 10th birthday too – almost too ill to play with my most wonderfully large bag of the best lego ever.

Early morning cruise

These boats look low in the water which is what caught my eye first, asnd then I saw the reflection – the swan necks looking very sharp in the still water.

Shipton

I took a stroll on Saturday in glorious morning light. The second picture is Hercules looking as splendid as ever through the trees with smoking chimney.

Winter Project

A change in season and the fire is alight (and still being a bit temperamental by all accounts). The time has come to start the Great Winter Project.  It was a dry day so I got the tools out and with the help of a friend (who knows how to do woodwork) I set too learning about wood joints.  The front deck works rather well as an on site workshop.

The Oak rescued from a skip (with permission, of course) is slowly being turned into a bulkhead.

Weekend fun

I was reminded, again, this weekend how fortunate I am to have such good friends who enjoy sharing not only the fun, but the chores. 

Sharing turns chores into fun and the annual Big Dig has become a really good opportunity to spend the day with great friends and make my dad happy.  Dad’s vegetable patch is quite large and when I realised how much work the garden takes I started to help.  Slowly my friends started to come along too and now we have an annual big dig.  I am, naturally, delighted to have the help to dig, but it is so much fun spending the day with friends.

After beetling across the Northamptonshire countryside to pick up Maffi and a little while longer to realise I had set the sat nav to take us back to Oxford rather than to the ancestoral pile, a car full of us arrived at my Pa’s.  Others joined us there and in a record time we had the vegetable patch dug over.

Molly and Boots had a fantastic time running around helping but it wasn’t long before Boots crawled to the sofa and positioned himself there for the whole afternoon

As we were too early for luncheon, the catering department sent us out to rake leaves and then, when we had done enough work, we were called to feast.

Following that we had Elaines amazing apple pie and spent the afternoon catching up on each others news.

I do love it when friends are together; the house thrives as the sound of chatter and cheer winds its way around the walls.  Dad was, as he is every year, utterly delighted.

Thank you!

Uproar at Kensal Green Cemetery

There is something rather yobbish about these angels hurling hand signals across the quiet mass of graves that are held here

This little lady is running around freely preparing for take off

This dear angel seems horrified at the goings on in the churchyard.

Even the stones are gossiping

probably about a relative of Brunel who just wandered past:

Further names are marked on either side:

and the family of Brunel we saw are from (or descended from) the other  side.

I gather Black Sabbath were photographed here in 1971 on the steps of the gothic mausoleum in the distance here

This mausoleum is built from marble and gently ‘melting’ it will cost a fortune to be restored but as it is by an unknown architect it probably won’t be restored.

Eventually the day stood still

As we passed through the dissenters are which is in stark contrast to the taste and splendour of the rest.  I was told the coffins in the catacombs under the Dissenters chapel were in poor condition and indeed they were – if one regards absence as poor condition….