Flooding near grandma's

There's been very heavy rain near my grandma's flat.  Fortunately she is safe in a respite home.  We had to drive the long way around to her house as we made two separate attempts which were blocked due to flooding.

Finally we got to her flat and managed to move all her furniture and precious items up high enough so that any flooding doesn't damage them.

Darth on the hearth

I think this is the earliest we've ever decorated for Christmas

A lovely time with the girls

L looks like The Fly on our shopping trip, hahaha

Later, I went on a lovely evening walk with B.

Holidays

We've had a brilliant holiday in Wales, in a beautiful country cottage about 7 miles from the coast.  We had a fantastic time.  In fact Squidge loved it so much she's obsessed with buying a small-holding out there.  We are apparently going to have ducks, chickens, dogs, ponies and some llamas.  Squidge is also learning Welsh, in preparation, bless her.  For those of you who don't know, the Welsh have their own language which is very different from English - they all speak English too, but some areas prefer to use Welsh.  It's Celtic language.  I love words so I find it fascinating.

We went on a steam railway, climbed down 300ft of steps at a place called Devil's Bridge, go rock-pooling, watched dolphins and seals, visited a farm, visited some friends at their small-holding, and visited a National Trust house.

Well, I'm not sure how much blogging I'll do this week, but I'll have to see :)

Family walk

We had a lovely family walk around a local reservoir today.

God's creation is just beautiful!

Out and about again

We love our walks out and about.  I popped out with my gorgeous Chatterbox in the beautiful countryside that surrounds us.

We are truly blessed.

Seven Quick Takes - Rotting beans, teenagers and tender mercies

Visit This Ain't the Lyceum

1.  If you read any of my other posts you will note that on Monday I proudly stated that I was soaking some beans and lentils for a homemade soup.  On Thursday I announced that on Wednesday I realised I'd forgotten that I was soaking the beans.  Thursday I went out to go give my Grandma a shower and clean her flat, on my return G announced that he had found the beans in the microwave and the slimey bean-water had overflowed all over the microwave.  He refused to throw the beans away, such was the smell.  And he was right - they smelled like feet and vomit.  How on earth did I manage to recount the beans tale and then forget to actually throw them away?  How?  It's a mystery to me to be sure.

I think I need to point out that I am not disgusting, we just don't use the microwave much and the beans were hidden. I do clean! :D

2.  My plans today are to do some cleaning and some ironing whilst I wait for a friend to let me know that she has the keys to their new house and then I'm going to go and help scrape some wallpaper for them.

3.  My eldest daughter has reached a peak of teenageryness.  Anyone who has teenagers will understand what this means.  But G and I mostly look like this:

Well, especially G what with him having a beard and all...and the fact that I would be wearing a top... haha

4.  I am waiting in trepidation for the washing machine to finish.  It has our bedding in and I just KNOW that it is not going to like it.  We got the washing machine with the house.  It's a small top-loading machine and for some reason, especially when it's doing our bedding it decides to announce that it needs servicing (well it doesn't announce it, a little red light comes on) and then it seizes up for half the day.

5.  We visited some friends at their caravan on Wednesday.  We had a lovely time chatting whilst the girls played with their daughter and some other kids from the campsite all day...well except for a time of teenageryness from Chatterbox who sat in the car for about three hours reading her book.  She did emerge when they announced they were going to play hide and seek.

6.  Whilst we were chatting we talked about various things and one of the things is forgiveness.  If Jesus died 'once for all' do we need to keep asking for forgiveness?  I say, "Yes".  I won't go into a big theological treatise as to why I believe this, because this is seven QUICK takes and would defeat the object of this meme.

7.  I've been thinking a lot about selfishness, self-less-ness, etc.  I read this Gentle Selfishness.  I'm not sure but they suggest that the Spiritual fruit of Gentleness can 'kill' gentle selfishness because it is 'not weakness but controlled strength'.  I always think of godly gentleness more like tender mercy, I think if I look at it like that, then mercy does kill selfishness.  Something to ponder.

Happy weekend!