SUNDAY 2ND AUGUST

  And I am now officially retired!!!! It's too early to say how I feel about this , I'll know more by the end of the week, when I have not actually had to go to work!!!

So lets go to what's been happening last week. I have to say I've had a lovely week, starting with the arrival of my new to me, no navel Sasha Evie !

Yes I do know you've seen her already but you have to admit, she's worthy of a second viewing  :)

This little old Kathe Kruse doll arrived Saturday after a long slow journey.

The parish council cleared away the fallen tree but left in the bottom of the trunk, Paul gave it a push and it just came out!

So back gate, now the tree's been cleared and Paul not being one to miss an opportunity and knowing I'd said it would be good if we had an old piece of log/tree to put in the shade garden, carried the old trunk and put it in shade garden!

The trunk was hollow in the centre, so he planted a couple of ferns into those openings. So a bonus!

Even placed another small piece behind these plants.

I'm still working on my decluttering and sorting but have definately fallen by the wayside most of this week. I went to see my colleagues at work , not to say goodbye as I'll be going back in a time or two over the coming months, as another colleague could be going in October and we will have a  socially distanced drink  then along with a colleague who left in late March just as lockdown started.

We are also making plans on getting things done in the house , now we will be retired and have time to sort things out and get people in or do them ourselves. One of the things we are looking at is maybe getting some new stairs, as our existing ones are very old and creaking being just short of 100 years old and no matter what we do, we cannot completely get rid of the noise. So we are looking into maybe replacing them. This is actually something Paul could do, but we have decided it would be quicker and less hassle if someone else did it and we then sorted out the rest of the hallway.

Also we need some electrical work done, so that needs doing before we start any decorating! But there are plenty of other things we can be getting on with.

You may or may not remember the William Morris tiles we decided to get for behind our range cooker? As usual we didn't get round to buying them at the time and now on thinking about it , we've decided that a more ramdon pattern would be better, so today I went looking for something that would suit and found some that pick up with the blue in the unit doors and the grey in the floor tiles. So they've been ordered.

Now remember last week I said I was going to get on finally with my Ercol chair cushions? Well I did get as far as finding the fabric, shown below, but I now need to get the right colour zip but will start cutting out the pieces this coming week and start sewing! I also bought some cord to do piping, if I have enough fabric, so thats another thing I need to find !

This is a lovely medium weight linen mix which I just hope the cats won't destroy! I really don't want to have to throw a cover over it once it's finished.

I also bought this lovely piece of Arts and Crafts stained glass recently and it now stands in the middle of the front window looking beautiful. It does have two finials but one was not attached when we bought it and we think these were used as feet and the attached rod at the back, that you can see through the glass, stood away and propped it up, maybe like a fireguard when the fire was unlit. The outer edge is bronze coated brass and Paul tried soldering it, the finial, back on but it would not take, so we may resort to a glue but for now I'm happy as it is, sitting in my window looking beautiful.

A photo of the sun streaming into the folly yesterday. We had the one incrediably hot day and it's cooled a little each day since, which is lovely as it was just too hot to do anything on Friday.

Well we'll be doing lots over the coming autumn / winter / spring and I will share it if you'd like to see how we get on but we'll not be rusting as we'll have time and space to do it all in.

Wishing you all a Happy Healthy week ahead

Dee

Ps Don't forget your doll photos for the 5th August.... yes it's that time again !