Fluffy

Sadly, Ellie's rabbit Fluffy died today. She was a lovely little rabbit, although sometimes difficult to get out of her hutch. We buried her in the garden, not far from the guinea pigs. We will miss her.

A Weekend in Cornwall

 I was going to call this post a wet weekend in Cornwall, but Sunday didn't turn out to be that bad. On Saturday it poured with rain all day. We left home at about 10 o'clock-ish and stupidly left it up to the sat-nav to guide us to Liskeard. Well, we got as far as Launceston okay and where it took us after that is anyone's guess. It was a horrible windy little road and by the time we reached the hotel I was green. We didn't stop there, but decided to carry on to the Monkey Sanctuary (also down windy horrible single lane tracks in the middle of nowhere). We wandered around in the rain, and looked and looked, and barely saw any monkeys at all - they were all far to sensible than to come out in all that rain. Back to the hotel we went.

 After a rest, a cup of tea and a warm up we headed off into nearby Looe. We wandered around, still raining, and then had a meal in a restaurant. Back at the hotel we watched one and a half films then went to bed.

 It was still raining on Sunday morning when we left, but by the time we reached Land's End it was just very windy. As you can see, the dog came on our weekend away. It was her first holiday. She was very good although Land's End is not a very dog friendly place. None of the bars or cafe's would let her in. We saw all the sights, and Carl took Caitlin and Ellie on an Air Sea Rescue simulator thing.

Then it was off round the coast to St Micheal's Mount. Merazion, the village opposite the island, is very dog-friendly. We went for lunch in the pub in front of the causeway and not only did they let Willow in they brought her over her own bowl of water and a plate full of doggy treats. We let her off the lead on the beach and she ran around and had lots of fun then we all walked over the causeway to the island where we had to clip her back on again. She wasn't allowed on the path through the gardens up to the castle, so we just walked around the bottom part of the island for a bit then headed back to the beach again. By the time we left we even had some blue skies.

My New Bedroom



Finally, after living in this house for nearly 18 years, I have a properly decorated bedroom. When we first moved in I gave the woodchip walls a quick lick of paint, put in a cheap carpet and hung the curtains from my old living room. It's been like that ever since.

This half-term, with Caitlin ski-ing and Adrienne in uni, it was an ideal time to use the free rooms to clear out mine and do it properly. This is what it looks like now, with none of my clutter anywhere and none of Carl's clothes on top of the units where they normally live because he can't be bothered to put them away properly. It won't last. I'm planning on moving most of my clutter back in later today.

Red Nose Sponsored Walk

This is Ellie setting off on a sponsored walk last Sunday in aid of Comic Relief. Her and her friends, and some willing adults, walked from Braunton down the Tarka Trail to the Braunton Inn, and then back again - three-legged!!! At one point there were actually five of them joined so I guess that makes it a six-legged walk. Apparently that was difficult so they gave up on that one.

Snow!

Everyone went to bed on Thursday night hoping for snow. When we woke up on Friday morning the whole of  England seemed to be covered in it - apart from us! No nice snow day off school, no white stuff at all. It did snow all around us though, so today we escaped the Barnstaple Bubble and headed for Exmoor. No sooner had we gone 2 miles up the road than we found it. We kept going though and went out to Pinkery on the Devon/Somerset border.

 We took the dog for a little walk and played in the snow too. Caitlin and Annie are having a snow ball fight, while Carl helps Ellie make a snowman.

 This is the finished article. The only thing we could find to make eyes, nose and buttons was sheep poo!

 The dog had fun too. She ran round like a mad thing, digging at lumps of ice, sticking her nose into snow drifts sniffing for mice, and begging us to throw snow balls for her. We stopped when the ice she was crunching was making her gums bleed.

It stopped raining!!

 Today we saw blue skies for the first time in ages! It was so nice that when we got to Instow beach to walk the dog there were almost more people there than in the height of summer.

Ellie was disappointed there were no ice cream vans around. Even the hut at the end of the slipway was missing - not just shut, actually not there any more. She had to walk all the way down just to make sure, she wasn't going to take our word for it. She'll do anything for food.

After our walk we went to wish my mum a Happy Birthday. It's not until tomorrow, though. Shebought her own cake and lit the candles herself but we stopped short of making her sing to herself. Happy Birthday Mum!

P.S. The air in my house this evening has been very unsavory. Please don't feed my dog so many sausages next time!

Christmas

Christmas was a strange affair this year. Christmas morning started at 7 o'clock with the discovery that Father Christmas had visited during the night. Ellie and Caitlin opened their presents at the end of our bed as normal but Adrienne was missing. She'd stayed the night at the boyfriends. She came home in time for Christmas dinner though.

After dinner we opened tree presents, then Beth, Andrew and Francis arrived and more presents were exchanged. We had tea and then everyone gathered round the telly to watch 'Doctor Who', as normal. But Mum and Dad were missing, Dad having broken his sternum two weeks earlier.

We went down to visit Mum and Dad on Boxing Day, had Carl's mum round for tea the day after and then Julie, Ken and Christopher yesterday. I feel I have over-feasted and now need a normal day, but there are just so many tempting left-overs!