The Boy in the Red Velvet Suit

Remember last year......the little boy in the red velvet suit......well this year he's EIGHTY.

~

He's a man that's been through lots of experiences in his life, from being (very briefly) evacuated during the 2nd World War, my Nana couldn't bear to leave him and his sister, so she brought them straight back home!! To doing his National Service and then settling down in civilian life in an office job.

~

~

He met and married my Mum in the late fifties and has looked after her and his family ever since.

~

We presented him (and my Mum) with a great big learning curve when we came to the farm but he just got stuck in. From helping to fill polytunnels, to being chased by giant pigs....he's coped with it all.

~And the best thing is he's coped with it all with a great big smile on his face.

~

At every family 'do' and every restaurant we go to, ours is the noisiest table, full of laughter and happiness, that is why it's so sad I can't be there today to help him celebrate this special day. We are completely snowed in and the roads between here and my Dad are impassable. But the link we share as father and daughter is never impassable, is never ending and can never be broken.

~

Since the days he came to meet me from brownies and we walked home chatting away, the day he taught me to ride my first two wheeler bike...I pedalled and pedalled and he said "don't worry I won't let you go".......and then suddenly I looked round and he had let go, way back down the street, a Dad sure in the knowledge that he had instilled in me enough confidence to carry on, on my own down the street on my bike, and then years later off on my own in the big wide world. ~

Everyone deserves a special Dad, and I have mine. I am secure in the person I am because of the way my parents raised me. They are always telling me how proud they are of me, and of the woman I have become. I wouldn't be that woman without them and their love.

~

I love you Dad, have a wonderful birthday.

Sue xx

My 'new' man.....

My new man is temporarily clean shaven........

...extremely shocked at how cold his poor little chin is getting...

~

....upset that the dogs didn't even notice the difference...

...but happy to hear that I still love him lots, even though I do keep slapping his chubby little cheeks!!

Sue xx

My old man......

~

In a minute we are off out to the shops. Not too much shopping needs to be done, in fact the main shop we are visiting is the Barbers!! Ever since I have known him (and for the 22 years before I met him) Lovely Hubby has sported a full beard and moustache. Not unusual for a submariner who was used to spending months at sea, they all looked pretty similar after time away at sea on water rationing, but now very distinctive and in my opinion very sexy!!

~

However, this Christmas his present to me is a glimpse of his face. So now that he has 'broken up' from work for the Christmas holidays and can get away with not looking like his security pass he is having it all shaved off, a proper shave with a cut throat razor. So sometime in the next couple of hours I will be getting a whole new man for Christmas.

Could he have picked a colder time of year to lose his insulation....lol! Let me know if you would like to see the results....and also if you'd like to know what my Christmas present to him is in return!!

~

And for those of who who wanted at peep of the goodies in the hamper..... ~

....there were lots of lovely things to eat and drink.....including biscuits in a musical tin!!

~

Sue xx

Ooooh.....it must be Christmas!!

Every year the company Lovely Hubby works through, send us a little gift in appreciation of his hard work, a food hamper from Fortnum and Mason, I must say I'm always impressed.

This year he must have worked even harder than usual....we have the bigger version.....I'm very, very impressed.

We haven't unpacked it yet, it's sat beside the Christmas tree, we were going to last night but we both fell asleep on the sofa while watching the Edwardian Farm...zzzzz!!

Tonight we will investigate what goodies it contains, very appropriate as Lovely Hubby breaks up for his Christmas holidays today and we will be together on the farm for the next couple of weeks.

Sue xx

Chick Flicks

Our gorgeous little Lavender Pekin Bantam chicks are now 4 weeks old, and they have turned into little balls of mischief and feather. The fluff is almost all gone and their wings and feet are fully feathered, now you can see all the under feathers all appearing.

~

They can eat for England and have learnt how to take dust baths (in their food dish!!).

~

They recently had their first tast of 'greens' in the form of baby salad leaves and they loved them.

~

Yesterday, for the first time, I turned off their heat lamp for a couple of hours (the central heating was on in their room) and I forgot all about them, until I looked up at the spare room window when I was putting the big girls to bed for the night and saw that the room was in darkness. I felt SO guilty it was the first time they had ever been in the dark.

~

When I went into the room and put the lamp back on they were cuddled together in a mass of feather and looked just like one adult Pekin, well that is until 7 little heads popped up with a reproachful glare at their forgetful 'mummy'.

Sue xx

Simply.........Christmas

~

We have thought of many names for our challenge next year, Naturally Frugal, Living Naturally, Continuing the Good Life, etc etc....

~

~

Then on Friday evening we went to buy our Christmas tree. We went to a local farm where they had trees galore, little tiddlers, tall elegant trees and trees with little cones on....in short every type of tree for every type of family.

~

Lying down against the fence and looking nothing spectacular was a green bushy tree and when Lovely Hubby stood it up, it's branches fell into place and it was.... Simply the Perfect Christmas Tree.

~

It was ours, duly paid for and swaddled in its netting it came home with us, we took one look at the tree and pushed aside all thoughts of tinsel. It has been adorned with the hanging baubles collected over the years, with sweet smelling cinamon sticks and with the minimum of twinkly lights.

~

It's the symbol of our Christmas and also of the coming year -

Our Year of Living Simply.

~

Sue xx

I've been warned......

~

I've been warned that over the Christmas holidays my kitchen table will be required for the maintenance of tractor parts, or to be more precise plough parts. Lovely Hubbys' pride and joy is to be stripped and cleaned. The plough being sand blasted (not on the table thank goodness) and then repainted in that most fetching of colours.....John Deere Green.

~

~

In the meantime we have a whole folder of photos of the plough in it's current state, so that it can be re-assembled and re-photographed all lovely, shiny and green. I wonder if it will be ever seen in this format again or will it remain a heap of scrap metal!!

~

Sue xx