it's been a fair old while since we updated the blog and seems even longer seeing as so much has happened since then.
so, in chronological order:
- me and nikki went to blighty for a week and a half.
here's a short summary of uk based events: mine and bens three day 150 mile cycling/camping trip. joining the others for three days in the new forest for more camping, eating and fun with donkeys, deer, cows and horses. seeing family (and especially abdullah). picking up loads of sinks for the house. riding with eddie in the peak district. seeing everyone for their birthdays in london. there's probably loads more i'm forgetting but you'll have to forgive me.
- on the return trip we had a mini adventure in the form of a wheel coming off the trailer on the french motorway which made the trip back three days long and significantly more expensive than we'd planned but we did stay in a nice b+b and ate a really nice omelette.
- returning home we found muca fat with soon to arrive mini cats (monkey boy claims to have had nothing to do with it!) and.....on friday she gave birth to three (i called three!!!) beautiful blind stumbling kitties - no photographs yet as they're still in the paper sack that muca selected as their birth place.
- everything is now in full summer mode here with flowers everywhere and ever increasing lushness.
- monkey boy seemed to have been pretty much constantly at work since we left having dug a potato patch, worked on the downstairs internal walls, put in some more windows, installed a great wooden lintel over one of the doors, put the platform on the mini ramp (happy now chris?) and loads more.
- here are a few photographs of the flowers/insects that are around right now:
bug on a flower
hummingbird hawk moth on lilac
another stunning moth
and one final moth which was in the house
we also had a night out with our new hammocks/tarps which was pretty nice.
we went and set up the hammocks in a good spot and then had some lunch, scouted future bilberry hotspots, put up the tarps, cooked dinner and had a good nights sleep (ok, nikki was a little cold but it was her and not the conditions).
the tarps and set up
and inside our temporary home
we saw this cool looking little fella too!
- things are progressing in the barn too! the remaining windows/doors should be with us around the end of the month and the stairs were measured this morning and are being started and so shouldn't be too long either. we've started the massive task of chasing out the old pointing and repointing the entire inside of the barn which i'm sure you'll hear loads about in the coming weeks (months?) as it ain't a small job!
- we also planted out most of the remaining vegetables in the garden. we put in onions, potatoes, parsnips, carrots, beetroot and peas with cauliflower, turnips, raddish and a few other bits still to do.
- finally (i've missed loads i know but i'll put the rest in later entries) we saw this stunning blue butterfly this morning
ok, we'll get some kitty images up as soon as they're out and about but we don't want to invade their space while they're so young so you'll just have to wait.
gairy.
p.s. i forgot to mention that we had our first french lesson today with 'roger the wood dude's' wife (i will most likely never remember her name - apologies!) - it was fun and way overdue.
No comments:
Post a Comment