Thursday 29 April 2010

Mocking birds,mice,men and ...then there's Duffy!!!! ;-)


It's a bit of a manic time for me at the moment! Very manic!

Not only have I had an awful lot of (you'll understand if you have GCSEs going on in your house right now) Mocking Birds, Mice ... and Men... like Seamus Heaney and Simon Armitage...plus those famous women Gillian Clarke and Carol Ann Duffy ...(..ah 'Duffy'...now there's a name we won't forget in a hurry!! LOL! ), I've been beavering like mad to get ready for the incredible, amazing, fantastic...drum roll please...

V&H Fair!

Saturday, Chipping Sodbury Town Hall...Please come
and say hello to me!

***

All of this has meant that something has had to give. Well, two things really!

Firstly, my garden, which I hope to give more time to next week, although I did manage to get into the greenhouse and sow some seeds on Sunday.
Secondly, my blogging..to be more accurate, visiting all the wondeful blogs I love to visit !
I have been sadly lacking just lately.
I apologise. I simply have not had the time .


However, I did take my iphone for a quick walk around
my Mum and Dad's garden this morning.

Their garden is beautiful at this time of the
year!
So much colour!

So here goes , just for you!














I'll be back on Sunday, hopefully with loads of fab photos from the weekend.
Tomorrow, we are travelling to Chipping Sodbury via one or two rather gorgeous places, so there will be plenty for me to tell you about, next week.

Hope you have a lovely long weekend, whatever you do!
xxx
;-)

Monday 26 April 2010

Smile please!!! ;-)



Well on to much more uplifting things...!
Firstly...

This is my lovely daughter, Helen... and she is 28 today!!

How time flies!!
Happy Birthday Helen!


I know that she's having a fab day with her lovely hubby , Ben!


Since we last visited, the park in Exmouth had come alive!

So that was Saturday in Exmouth.

And then came Sunday ...and the great raiding of the photo box!


Here I am (dreaming of vintage and handmade things!! ;-)



I took my mum and dad on a little tour of Newton Abbot, driving them around to all of the houses where we once lived.

Goodness knows what people thought of us, all having a good snoop!;-)
(''Oh, what have they done to the garden...oh I don't like the colour they've painted it...oh what a mess...etc etc!! LOL )
***

When we got back to my mum and dad's present house....

'We've been going through the photos!' said my mum!


So...here I am in the back yard of our tiny house in a road called 'Hilton Road' in Newton Abbot.

My great grandfather built some of these houses including the one that was to be my first home.

I was born in this house...number 38...if you want to , you can see it on Google Street View !
It's a tiny terraced house, two up two down, with a back yard.
I'd love to know who lives there now!!

If you know this area quite well then you can imagine what a pain it was for my mum to push the very large pram, up the hill.

She said it was very hairy coming down the hill too, as she had to hold on so tightly to the pram, for fear that it might run away from her!

Here I am, at about the age of three years old...practising for Wimbledon!
You might well laugh, but I did win the tennis cup when I was at Newton Abbot Grammar school!! ;-)



Here's my mum and dad pushing me through Courtenay Park....I wasn't the easiest of children!

My mum is expecting my sister, as you can just make out!

The first school photo!

Butter wouldn't....

And the next...

Me and my sis...

Growing up...


And then one of my faves...

I haven't changed much!!

Be it the park , the beach, the woods...you name it, I loved to play outside.


And moving on...


I suppose I was destined to become a teacher. Here I am in my mum's classroom.

I used to go in and help her a lot if I had the day off school. I'm about 16 years old here.


And finally...above is my mum .She's the tallest one, on the right.

My mum again...


And this cheeky little chap is my dad!!

That's it for now!

Hopefully, I'll get to see some more photos, soon.

;-)

Sunday 25 April 2010

Jabs R Us!! ;-)


On Saturday I lost the will to live....almost!

***

We were returning from Exmouth and had a 30 minute wait at Exeter St Davids station.
As we sat, we watched a member of staff picking glass bottles off the track, with a long, metal, grabbing contraption.
Then, he placed the bottles so carefully on the platform and I realised that they were still full... and the tops were securely on them .
Being quite naive at times,I thought what a waste of beer, fancy not drinking it...uh oh...

Then he put on his rubber gloves ...made a remark and I saw the light!
And you don't need me to spell out what was in the bottles,do you ?

***

How can people be so disgusting?

***

Eventually, we got on the train..a very slow train with just two carriages...the worst train in the world..well it's not the train's fault...should I say the worst people in the world were on it.
Let's just say that had inoculations ... 'Jabs R Us'... been available at the door, I would have been first in that queue!! I am not kidding. Honest!

The train was jam packed but we got seats.... separately. The carriage floor was strewn with rubbish as was the train we'd caught earlier.

***

What is it with people and litter?

***

Do you know, I was exceedingly lucky to be surrounded with such uplifting (!) people, as not only did I get a 'half wit' sitting behind me, who objected to me saying 'excuse me please' as I tried to pass him as he wanted to use the aisle for his legs and didn't give a damn about who might trip over him, I got the 'classiest ever' character sitting next to me...

***

I had drawn 'Chief Chav' ....
a grubby ,filthy speciman of the female (I think!) human race who spouted the most grubby, filthy language for the whole of the journey.That's in between her texting and relating to the whole train just exactly what she was going to do to her friend's legs when she next saw her!
(i.e. ..break them...but she didn't use the word 'break'...you need to study a chav thesaurus for that !)
Not only that, she coughed and spluttered constantly (in my direction!) and so the best I could do was to keep my back turned , all the way.
She was foul.
Her friends weren't much better and hung on every word she spouted.
I was glad to get off the train with my legs intact! I wasn't frightened, just disgusted.
I thought to myself...

'Tomorrow's parents'

I had to hold my tongue all the way,during that journey...and for me, that takes immense effort!

***

I am a great people watcher.
Indeed, I often teach lessons about characterisation.You simply can't beat 'people watching' if you are going to invent characters for a book.

But this sort of people watching ....I don't honestly advise it... on my train were prime examples of what makes our country great..NOT!!

I came home... and had a good wash!

Finally...I apologise that no photos are available for this blog post... for obvious reasons!
Just use your imagination!

Hope your weekend is a good one...I'll be back soon with plenty of pics!
;-)