Life!

18 to 22 July 2018 - Thornham Magna Suffolk Write up and Photos Lee and Emma stayed in the house for the week, with Elora, Lacey and dogs Neville and Beau.  They took Suki out and about visiting the sights of London as well as Richmond Park and Hyde Park. Meanwhile Mike and I went off on the Barnes Ringers Summer Trip. Monica decided to take her own car, so we ended up giving Rod a lift which entailed going via Watford to pick him up.  We arrived at the first tower in good time and I went up to join in the general ringing with good intentions of doing this at all the general ringing.  However the first time I rang there was an incident and  I was left with the usual unsatisfactory feeling that I get on these outings, and decided it would be much better for my sanity and general well being if I didn't ring at all.  So I had a wonderful time sitting in churchyards cross stitching for the rest of the trip, and thoroughly enjoyed myself!  I particularly enjoyed visiting th

The next two months involved a lot of time away from London on various breaks (Barnes trip, Rovers, Devon, Butlins) and I was really looking forward to it. The heatwave continued throughout July and it was only towards the middle of August that we finally got some rain and relief. Mary and I went walking with Maryanne at the beginning of July - we did her Ibstone walk starting at The Fox  (I do like a pub that has a "dog friendly" logo on its web site!).  Very enjoyable - and finished with a nice lunch at The Fox.  I was shattered when I got home and had a snooze - unlike Maryanne who dashed about having appointments with fitters and planning officers, and visiting shops, apropos her pending building works and new kitchen. Then I went down to Devon for a week - primarily to go to the Exeter Craft Festival on the Cathedral Green with Jayne.  We enjoyed walking around the stalls, although didn't find much we wanted to buy, and then found a lovely little place

June was somewhat uneventful - a heatwave for the last fortnight of the month sapped my energy and although I managed to go to all my fitness classes I collapsed on to a sun lounger in the garden most afternoons and did very little.  I felt a bit guilty about this - I don't know why.  It was good to take advantage of the sunshine and enjoy the garden for a change.  Suki made the most of it - lying in the sun and commandeering my blanket! And she made good use of the shade under my sun lounger when she got too hot! On the handbell front we started going for Lincolnshire Royal at Guys with me on 5-6 - so I spent a lot of time practicing on Abel!  We couldn't get through a plain course on the first get together, although we improved throughout the evening, but we all agreed that it had been fun and worthwhile and more enjoyable than attempting yet another peal of Kent Royal. With Steve I rang a QP of 4 x spliced Surprise Major on 3-4 - we had attempted a peal whi