Friday's Fave Five - 24/4/26

Friday's Fave Five is hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story.  Each week she reminds us to look back and find the things we were grateful for during the week.  It's good to be grateful.  Why not join us?

1)  Well firstly I am grateful for my Hubby.  He had a birthday last Saturday and we celebrated by attending a fund raising evening organised by a friend of his doing what he loves best - singing and playing his guitar.  He was one of several acts that performed at a nearby church and although I don't usually go to watch him play I couldn't miss out on his birthday.  We'll have been married for 42 years in June.  Definitely a keeper.

2)  The quiz night I mentioned last week raised £3967 for the Foodbank which is amazing!  

3)  Spring weather.  It's been sunny all week and although not that hot yet I was still able to get all my washing done and a lot of it dry on the line outside. (I still tumble dry things like underwear and t shirts to cut down on the ironing.) 

4)  Postal votes.  We have elections for councillors next month but our postal votes came yesterday.  I'm grateful not to have to get to the polling station on the day.  Usually it's fine but one less hassle to deal with.

5)  A good meet up for the evening book club on Wednesday.  There were only 5 of us but we had a good discussion about the book and lots of other things too.  We all agreed that we didn't like the book:

Hopefully the next one will be better:

And the jumper is nearly done.  I just need to do a few more rows and then the decorative bottom.  Oh and all the tedious sewing in of ends and seams to do.  Don't hold your breath for a picture of me modelling it!

Have a good weekend all.

An update on Nick, with Alice 15/8/22

Is that rain Wendy? Oh please tell me it’s raining. I feel like I’m frying at the moment with this heat. 

Yes Alice we have got some rain. At last, although I’m not sure how long it’s going to last for or how much it’s going to bring the temperature down but it is supposed to be a bit cooler for the rest of the week. 

Thank goodness. It’s like an oven in here. 

I know, it has been rather unbearable again. Even during the night temperatures have stayed high. 

Yes it hasn’t done wonders for your sleeping has it? I can tell. 

What do you mean Alice? 

It’s the dark shadows under the eyes that give it away Wendy. And your short temper of course. 

I have been very patient this last week or so Alice. 

Hmm with Nick as the patient? Not sure about that. He seems to be doing much better though apart from looking a bit yellow! 

Yes he is doing a lot better Alice but you’re right, the bruising on his face is a nice shade of yellow now and the bruising on his right arm in particular is pretty gross. 

When do you think he’ll be up to cooking again? That lamb curry you made last week was disgusting. And you haven’t exactly been very adventurous with your meal choices. 

Well the lamb curry was adventurous for me but not sure what went wrong. I was definitely too light handed with the spices. It didn’t really taste of curry at all. I was just worried I’d make it too spicy and I would struggle to eat it. Instead of which it was so bland it was horrible.

 

We have a Hello Fresh box coming tomorrow so that will help add some variety to our meals. 

Yes even you would struggle to spoil those Wendy. 

Well I could try. 

Please don’t. But I would have thought that if Nick is able to play his guitar, which I know he can, he should be able to do anything now. 

That’s a nice theory Alice but the main problem he still has at the moment is fully straightening his arms. The left one’s ok but he can’t get the right one fully straight but that’s not an issue when playing a guitar as you do it with your arm bent. 

Should he actually be playing the guitar then? 

Yes he can – we finally got the letter through from the hospital today and basically it said he should be mobilising his arms as much as possible but of course lifting things would still be tricky so cooking would be a challenge. 

Yes well at least you’re not having to help him shower anymore or get dressed. I didn’t know where to look when that was going on. 

Oh Alice, are you a bit of a prude? 

No I just didn’t need to be a witness to that. You’ve certainly kept to your marriage vow of “in sickness and in health” this last week or so Wendy. 

Of course. You can’t expect everything to be rosy all the time Alice. 

No but I suppose there were some small blessings I mean at least you never had to wipe his a..... 

Alice! I think that is too much information for our readers. 

 

(Fridays) Sunday's Fave Five - 7/8/22

Yes I do know it's Sunday but when life throws you a curveball days run into one another.  Late on Thursday evening I got a phone call from a stranger on my Hubby's phone.  Never a good thing.

Hubby had managed to take a tumble on his way home from an open mic he'd been too. Tumble is probably not the best word to describe his fall and subsequent injuries.  He obviously put out his hands to break his fall but still managed to hit the ground with his face.  In short he has a grazed and battered nose, a black eye, damaged teeth but worst of all he has managed to crack the ends of the radial bone in both arms where they meet the elbow joint.

We spent many hours in A & E (ER for my American friends) overnight and came home Friday morning with Hubby having both arms in a double sling.  Thankfully the follow up call during the day from the Fracture Clinic was reassuring - the cracks will heal, no casts are required, in fact he has to mobilise his arms, putting them through their range of movements every few hours and wearing the sling in between for the next week or two.  Although it will probably take 4-6 weeks before he has full movement back.

His left arm is already a lot better and moving more freely.  His right arm is much more painful and the movement is very limited at the moment although improving.  Of course he is right handed though so lots of things are difficult (impossible) for him to do himself right now. 

I have told him that if he wanted me to do more of the cooking he only had to ask and not resort to such extreme measures!  We're trying to maintain a sense of humour.

Anyway that's why this post is sooooo late and of course, although things have been a bit difficult the last couple of day, there are still things to be thankful for:

1)  The kindness of strangers.  2 men helped Hubby immediately after his fall, one of them stayed with him until I could get there in the car to collect him.

2)  Our NHS.  It's definitely under pressure right now but it was there for Hubby and it's great not having to worry about insurance claims/what things might cost etc.

3)  Our DIL who cooked extra Cottage Pie on Friday so that we had an easy meal for dinner (and enough for Saturday) and our daughter for picking up some shopping for us.  

4)  A big walk in shower.

5)  Our son and his family are safely home from Vermont and we had a video call with them earlier today.

I usually finish by saying enjoy the weekend but of course that's nearly over so have a good week all!

Oh and if you want to visit other bloggers who joined in on Friday click here for host Susanne's site and the Linky list.

20 in 20 - Weekly Photo #15 - 12/4/20

Caught sight of this heron on our walk yesterday.  There are lots of ducks, geese and swans in the pond but we've only seen the one heron.  It was a quick walk yesterday - we thought the rain had passed over - we were wrong lol.

And I need to include this one today:

Happy birthday to my hubby!  This was taken last year at a steak restaurant.

Today he'll have to make do with home cooked steak and shop bought dessert.  I did offer to buy cake but he's not that mad about cake and declined.  We'll celebrate properly when things get back to some sort of normality.  

At the rate we're going we'll all be celebrating together - our eldest son's birthday was back in March just as this pandemic was beginning to grow, our daughter's birthday is in the first half of next month and it's unlikely we'll be fully out of lockdown by then.  Maybe by my birthday at the end of June we might be able to do something normal.

By then we'll also have the 3 Grandsons' birthdays to celebrate.  We'll need a big cake!

WIPs 9/8/15

Two works in progress here.  The first one is the start of a scrap book project.  The envelopes all contain a memory that were done for my husband's 60th birthday last April.  Friends and family were asked to provide memories of Nick.  My daughter then collated them into 60 envelopes that were presented to Nick at his party.

I've decided to put them all into a scrap book so that it's easier to see them and a nice memento to keep.  I want to have it finished by the end of next week so that I can take it to our family gathering.

Many of them were handwritten so I just need to display them but some were on two sides so I've had to scan them to be able to display the whole thing on one side.  Many were sent by e-mail so I need to re-format them and make them look pretty.

My daughter also married up photos with some of them and I might try and find more photos where appropriate.

I've done the scanning.  Now I need to reformat the typed text before starting on putting the scrapbook together.  I have already got the book and photo corners but will need some glue and I've also decided to get a paper cutter so guess who's going shopping tomorrow?

 

This is my other work in progress.  Yesterday I managed to visit some blogs on the A-Z Road Trip and one person that I visited commented back saying she would like to see the blanket I'm trying to make.

I thought it would be good to photograph it and it has actually done me a big favour as now I've worked out how many squares I still need to make and in which colours etc. So a big thank you to Cait at Click's Clan for pushing me to do this.  It's going to take a serious amount of blocking to get the squares matching up but one day it will be finished.  I have a lot of other things I'd like to be making and I'd also like to be doing some crochet but I'm terrible at starting things and not finishing them so I've set myself the target of finishing this before I start on something new.  I don't mind if I have say a knit, a crochet and maybe even a cross stitch on the go but I have in the past had more than one of each started and then they never get finished.

This is only going to get one more row which would be five squares but because of the colour distribution and patterns needed I worked out I need 7 squares plus the one in progress finished.

Watch this space for updates!

Birthdays & Memories

Having completed the A- Z challenge I have to keep my momentum going and continue with my blogging.  That was a bit difficult this weekend as it was all a bit hectic.

We celebrated my husband’s 60^th birthday.  His actual birthday was a couple of weeks ago but for various reasons we delayed our main celebration until Sunday.  One advantage was that it was a bank holiday here on Monday so no work for most people.

Originally he didn’t want to have a party, shying away from too much fuss.  Not wanting to admit he’s old enough to retire probably although he’s planning on working for a couple more years at least.  Then he decided it would be nice to mark the occasion with a small party.

Our family doesn’t do small.  We’re around 40 in number before you even add in friends.  It still seemed manageable.  I stupidly planned to organise the food myself (not as stupid as it sounds as I have catered for large numbers before and I have got plenty of time on my hands at the moment) but during last week the numbers seemed to keep growing.  I’d gone from 60 to nearer 80 people in the space of a few days and was trying not to panic. 

As it turned out I think we had about 70 guests on the day and Marks and Spencer and I make a good team.  (Just debated that one with hubby – M & S and I or M & S and me.  Of course it should be M & S and I although as I pointed out to him there is no I in team!)

The team was pretty much me leading up to the day but I did have help particularly once we got to the venue with setting everything out.  Note to self:  Ask for help next time.  (Next time???)  His musician friends provided free entertainment which everyone seemed to enjoy and a good time was had by all.  The food went down well too.  Quantities for the savouries seemed to be just about right and we had more than enough dessert and birthday cake.  Someone suggested that I might like to think about catering as a new career but I made enough sandwiches at the weekend to put me off that idea straightaway! 

The kids did a nice speech between them and my daughter had organised a collection of 60 memories for my hubby – they had come from members of the family as well as friends and she’d placed each one in an envelope, some with appropriate (or inappropriate!) photos.  We had a good time looking through them on Monday and I’ll set them out in a scrapbook at some point.

I think when my turn comes I’ll be heading for the hills.