Today

Higger Tor with resting cattle
 Today was a good day. 

After a breakfast of Crunchy Nut Cornflakes with slices of banana and a pint mug of tea, I went upstairs for my daily shower then donned some shorts and a  blue T-shirt I bought in Croatia before the pesky pandemic arrived.

I grabbed my car keys and ordered Clint to take me to Burbage Bridge.

"Steady on the brakes!" he advised following Tuesday's costly garage work on that particular feature of his anatomy.

It was another warm spring day with the golden orb shining from a milky blue sky. I plodded a four mile circuit around The Burbage Valley, Higger Tor and Carl Wark and then got back home for 1pm. I made Shirley and I cheese salad sandwiches for lunch.

She ferried me to  my friend Mike's house for 2pm and there I met up with Mick and Danny for beers and conversation. We hadn't met like this in five months but the session was legal following very recent changes in England's coronavirus regulations.

A view of Carl Wark

I was home for five where Frances was sitting happily with Princess Phoebe having her nappy changed by her ever-willing grandma. It was time for me to set to work on our evening meal.

I prepared fried chicken, fresh green beans, roasted tomatoes and some good quality pasta in red pesto sauce. It was almost ready when Stewart arrived from work. For dessert we had brownie slices with vegan ice cream.

After what we in Yorkshire confusingly call tea and not dinner like most people, it was time to watch football on the television - a World Cup qualifying game between England and Poland which we managed to win by two goals to one. Up The English!

Next of all I edited the photographs I took while  walking this morning before sitting down to write this blogpost. Three of those pictures accompany this blogpost.

As I say, today was a good day.

A rock composed of millstone grit in Burbage Brook


from Yorkshire Pudding https://ift.tt/3uc8Hd3

Surrender

 I think of worst case scenarios

And I need to stop

it's killing me inside

The control freak

in me

can't decide

if I want answers

or can handle them

it's a week 

Where the more

i try to surrender

The more I'm not

getting it right

Who knew 

i ask for prayers

as i let go

And let God

Tired

but a friend

told me

it would take

exhaustion 

until I would 

embrace surrender



from R's rue https://ift.tt/39tfc3q

My Girls

 



One girl asleep sat up on my trendy couch
Another, sat carefully on my knee, watching the world 
My girls....
I wouldn’t have enjoyed Bodnant Gardens without my Mary today
And tonight, I wouldn’t have laughed out loud spying Dorothy asleep with her head propped up at the strangest of angles.
These two have carried me throughout the last year of lockdown , and have lifted my spirits through the year before that  without even trying..... without them 
I doubt I would have made it........so easily .....

My girls......


from Going Gently https://ift.tt/3sEFsPT

Bodnant Gardens



Mary amid daffodils


Very slowly, things are starting to open up here in Wales.
On Saturday I am meeting my sisters and sister in law for a garden based light lunch and today Mary and I are off to newly reopened Bodnant Gardens * for a walk.
I am so glad that the National Trust allows dogs into their gardens. Going alone is always fraught with the vague sense that I’m seen to be an old pervert. Having a dog with you precludes this strange stereotype.
Dorothy is far too excitable for such a place.




The gardens were thick with people determined to get the most out of the spring sunshine


* Bodnant Garden (Welsh: Gardd Bodnant) is a National Trust property near Tal-y-Cafn, Conwy, Wales, overlooking the Conwy Valley towards the Carneddau mountains.

Founded in 1874 and developed by five generations of one family, it was gifted to the National Trust in 1949. The garden spans 80 acres of hillside and includes formal Italianate terraces, informal shrub borders stocked with plants from around the world, The Dell, a gorge garden, a number of notable trees and a waterfall. Since 2012, new areas have opened including the Winter garden, Old Park Meadow, Yew Dell and The Far End, a riverside garden. Furnace Wood and Meadow opened in 2017. There are plans to open more new areas, including Heather Hill and Cae Poeth Meadow.



from Going Gently https://ift.tt/2O9bpk9