Hello Danny

Yesterday I went with my mum and dad to collect their 'new' dog from the rescue home. Meet Danny a 6 year old Dandy Dinmont terrier, a very friendly little cutie.

New freebie

I love the free kits from Miss Minton Peppermint Creative. Within moments of downloading this months I had whipped up this simple creation from it (a few bits from last months kit too).

Its been pretty quiet this week, after last week being busy working full time and travelling to Deal there has been no work at all this week (guess its too soon in the term for courses and ill teachers) and things seem to have calmed down a bit on the emotional side although Laura and Wayne are not back together again.

So a chance for me to 'spring clean' the house from top to bottom and do a bit of crafting. Luckily its been nice enough to get all the curtains washed

Harvester

I forgot to add, they have finally opened a half decent family eating establishment near us. We have heaps of them in Canterbury but parking is an issue, the next nearest being on the coast, a good 14 miles drive away, so we were really pleased to see a branch of Harvester being build in the nearby town.

On Friday it had been open a week so we ventured over, just Martin and I, and had a really good, stuff your face meal. We like the eat-all-you-want salad bars in the Harvester, and this one had a particularly good one. Even though the place was packed with the remnants of the Early bird cheap menu, they managed to keep it topped up with fresh goodies, and hot rolls.

I can see a fair few meals being eaten there.

Goose fair LO

I've just uploaded the details and class for making this LO on my other blog.

Blog count

This week my blog count seems to have gone up big time .... and I cant work out why. So if any one knows why I have suddenly jumped from averaging 2/3 visitors a day to a whopping 109 in one day (when I hadnt even updated for a week) please let me know and I will try doing it again LOL.

So on the news front ... mum and dad have 'ordered' their dog!!!!!!!

Its the longest dad has ever been without a pet or a dog in particular, I am amazed they have stuck to it for so long, but after seeing all the dogs at the fair last weekend he was determined to get one of his own again. Obviously not a puppy as they are too old to start training again, and they didnt want anything too big. Plus they couldnt afford the prices of buying from a dog rearer. First they tried the Dog's Trust as it is only a mile away from our house, but they only had big dogs and still wanted £75 for allowing you to rehouse one.

Then they spotted a little doggie in the local paper, advertising the Lord Whiskie S!ancturary. Danny is just what my dad is after, a six year D old Dandy dinmont terrier. They have to have their house inspected but if they pass that this morning then they can go collect him next saturday

Followers

I have just added Followers to my sidebar, what an interesting new blog development? Should be interesting.
Goose Fair Apparently my Son-in-law Ollie wants to know why I have not updated my blog. I have actually got an account of our weekend outing to Challock Lee's Goose Fair to add, but I have been covering in a school in Deal, a round trip of nigh on 60 miles a day, and have done full time for the last week and a half. I have also had to do half the planning for the class, so I simply havent found time or energy to update. The lady I am replacing is on Jury service, so I have at least another half a week work there if not more, dependant on the case she is judging.

So, to my weekend. Saturday was spent catching up on housework as the house looked like a bomb had hit it with Laura moving back in and me not being around. I also had to sort out the bedroom for Laura properly, getting hangers down out the attic, putting boxes and spare beds back up there, etc. etc just so she could fit in. I finally got to do a decent food shop too, I dont think the fridge has been properly full since Christmas.

On Sunday since I had it in my head that Martin was working, I persuaded my mum and dad to come with me to Challock goose fair. I wrote about this a couple of years back, I had really enjoyed it and wanted to go again. Turns out it was something dad had always wanted to go to anyway. The weather was fab, and the place was packed, yet we managed to get a parking place near the gate,. The first thing we watched was the dog racing, and this year, knowing how fast those hounds run I positioned myself in a much better place to get some photos. Dad was pretty impressed with the owls, and the traction engines, and I was facinated by these little critters. This was a new event to us, can you spot it? Its an egg hurling competition! Anyone willing to run the risk of getting covered in egg could enter. I think it was meant to be a lot messier, but the soft ground and the brilliant throwers and catchers meant only one person ended up with egg on their face! We were dissappointed that we couldnt see the goose herding on the timetable of events. Neither had we discovered where the dog show was being held. Loads and loads of lovely dogs wandered around but no show, until we got back out in the carpark to discover it being held there.
We had a great day out, and dad finally admitted he wanted a new dog himself to replace Charlie dog, and would be going off to get one asap. We dropped in to see Kelly and Ollie on the way home, making me even later than ever getting in, only to discover Martin had not been at work at all, but at golf. Boy was I in trouble for not getting that right, and being out when he got home!!! Ooops!!

Sad

Ater two weeks of trying to sort things out, Laura has finally left Wayne and moved back in with us.

And the rain came down

Yesterday, after my appointment at the dental hygienist, Martin and I drove down to Deal to check out where the school I am supplying at next week is. Its going to be a big of a trek but not too hard to find.

After, we went to Deal and had fish and chips on the beach. Well I say on the beach but by this time it was chucking it down with rain, so we sat in the car and looked at the water driving down the windows.

The plan was then to spend the rest of the day at Dover Castle, making the most of our English Heritage membership, so undaunted by the rain (which did ease off a bit as we meandered round the country lanes) we made our way there.




When we arrived the guy checking our tickets told us that included in the price was a tour of the secret underground tunnels, next tour starting in 20 mins. He booked us in and helped by the wind forcing us down the hill, we made our way down to them.




The tour was quite interesting, and despite not liking tunnels, you didnt really feel you were in one. More an air raid shelter that went on and on. The war time engineers had built a whole network of tunnels, one layer containing a whole hospital, complete with operating theatres and all.




Other levels hid a repeater station,

a telephone exchange,



a barracks and a war combat control centre, as it was from here that Ramsey controlled the Dunkirk landings.

When we came out though, not only was the rain coming down in droves, the wind was now lashing it across the ground. Dover Castle is set on a very steep hill, so wearing heavy sodden coats and fighting the bitting wind and rain was not giving us any pleasure. I am afraid to admit we gave up and came home. I did feel sorry for anyone who had paid the £10.50 entrance fee and so was more or less obliged to stay (and there were a fair few) but equally very impressed with the spry old dear in only a thin rain mac carrying a walking stick who carried on regardless.

NB Photo's curtesy of the English Heritage site as you are not allowed to take photos underground, and above ground the weather was just too horrendous.

Announcing my new scrappy blog!!!!

You may have noticed that in my profile I have another blog. This one is going to be for uploading my Layouts only - along with descriptions/classes of how I made them and the credits/supply lists that go with them.

I decided to do this as A) I am not very good at listing the info when there is other stuff I want to record on here, and B) the craft stuff is getting lost amongst all the real life stuff, and C) I have noticed a huge return to cardmaking and a decline of scrap (purely scrap) blogs and want to redress the balance a bit.

I will however continue to put photos of the Layouts and other crafty stuff on here, you just will need to go to Scrappy Layouts if you want to see how it was done, or for my stories behind the LO's.