Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Staying put

I truly cannot believe that almost two months have gone by since I last posted, but the calendar doesn’t lie, so two months it must be. And what has she been doing with herself during those two months, I can hear you all thinking. She certainly hasn’t been reading and commenting on our blogs with any regularity, if at all. The answer is very simple. I have been busy, very busy, but with the kind of activity that doesn’t really make for rivetting (or even mildly interesting) blog posts. 

One of these was the recent move from Windows LiveMail to Outlook for dealing with my email, since Microsoft, in its wisdom, has decided to stop supporting LiveMail soon. It’s been a tedious and longwinded process, as somehow the vast majority of my very large number of stored emails were inadvertently duplicated in the process of moving across and the duplicates had to be laboriously deleted by yours truly. Sigh…  

On the positive side, it proved to be unexpectedly fascinating to go back over long-ago events, as I dealt with the emails concerning them. I’d never before thought of email as a memory store, but for me it turns out to be exactly that. I have never managed to keep a diary or a journal for longer than a few weeks, but this has proved to be almost better than a journal in many ways, because the sequence of messages captured not only my thoughts, but those of others involved. As you can guess, the deletion process took considerably longer than it need have done…

Then, of course, there are the preparations for the conservatory. The long-awaited ground-works are scheduled to start on June 2nd, and the construction of the conservatory itself will, all being well, take place in the last full week of June. As I type I can hear DH busily lifting and storing the last of the patio slabs (which were very solidly bedded in!) so that they can be reused eventually to create a small patio at the far end of the conservatory, overlooking the river. Thankfully the weather is being kind here in Mid-Wales, and we seem to be escaping the rain which is currently drenching much of Western Europe.

However,  overshadowing everything else is the major topic which has been consuming most of our time and energy since I last posted - the firm decision to put the old house up the hill on the market at last. What with getting estimates from estate agents, continuing to work on sorting and clearing the house and outbuildings, and trying to bring order to the riot of greenery which has been making a takeover bid, there hasn’t been much time or energy left for anything else.

The house will go onto the market officially as soon as the details of the sale particulars have been finalised by the agent, but, being us, we haven’t been leaving it all to the agent. Using material drafted by DH, I’ve spent a lot of time and effort in the last couple of weeks creating a website (using Blogger) to hold more information and images than any estate agent can include in normal sale particulars. It was a fiddly and sometimes frustrating process, but it finally went live yesterday, and we’re hoping it will help in the process of finding a buyer who will love the place as much as we do and be as happy there as we were for so many years.  

Beyond our own small concerns there is, of course, the looming referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union, about which, you’ll be glad to note, I don’t plan to say more than this. It is a huge decision, with very long-lasting consequences, and you will probably not be surprised to hear that as convinced internationalists, DH and I are profoundly hoping Britain will vote to remain a member.

Finally, because so much is happening at the moment, we have been forced to accept that we simply cannot go to Normandy as usual this year. What with the possibility of house viewings and the need to keep the undergrowth around the old house in check, we absolutely must stay here all summer – hence the title of this post. If all goes well we hope to get across to France for a short visit in the autumn, but for this year there will be no cherries, no kittens and no year’s supply of apricot jam to make and bring home. I’d better make the one remaining jar in the cupboard last as long as possible. Even the travelling pelargoniums are staying put this year.

The big bonus of being here is watching our still newish garden blooming through the spring and summer and having the time to carry on developing it. I wonder what new treasures will show themselves over the coming weeks…?








52 comments:

  1. It is great to see you back Perpetua - good luck with the forthcoming conservatory build and the sale of your old home.
    Why not make apricot conserve here? I made some last week and it is delicious - using your recipe of course, and apricots reasonably priced from Lidl.

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    1. It's good to be back, Rosemary. I've really missed blogging and reading blogs, but there just haven't been enough hours in the day recently. I look forward to catching up with your posts soon.
      Thanks for the good wishes. I rather thank we will need them. As for the apricot jam, yours is an excellent suggestion, though I haven't yet seen any apricots in our local Lidl. In France the jam apricots usually go on sale in July. Hopefully by then life here will have quietened down somewhat.

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  2. I should have mentioned that we are with you over Europe - it is not our future but the future of the young that concerns me. They have never known anything other than being part of the EU. I asked my granddaughter, the one who was at Oxford, what she, her friends, and colleagues opinions were, and she wrote back saying that they were all unanimously for remaining.

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    1. Glad to have your company in this, Rosemary. I completely agree with you about the young. It is their future that matters most and I'm voting Remain for my children and grandchildren. I just hope the young themselves are motivated to go out and vote in large numbers on this vital matter.

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  3. I love your website for your house sale. I can really feel the love that went into the place.

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    1. Oh, thank you, Annie, that is so encouraging. Yes, we love the house and its setting very much and I'm glad that came through when you read it. Hopefully it will inspire people to come and see it for themselves and perhaps someone will fall in love with it as we did.

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  4. Hari OM
    Bore da Perpetua!!! Your sale blogsite looks FABulous - what an inventive thing to do; I hope you have a quick response. My sister decided to sell her Edinburgh (very large) flat this month...and it was only on the market for a week! Staying put does have its advantages and give a fresh view on the 'in situ'. The abundance of colour (and, I am sure, perfume) is a delight.

    What is more, there might even be a summer this year! YAM xx

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    1. Noswaith dda, Yam. :) Very glad to hear you like the website. I laboured long and hard over it, but of course I'm too close to it to be objective, so it's good to know others approve. It's very early days yet and I somehow doubt the market here will ever be as fast-moving as a property hotspot like Edinburgh, but your sister's rapid sale is nonetheless very encouraging to hear.
      I'm actually rather enjoying staying put, despite the busyness, and in any case have always wanted to make an autumn visit to Normandy, hopefully after a lovely British summer - yes, I read that too!

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  5. What a very attractive 'sales pitch' for your lovely old home. I hope it sells very quickly so you don't have time to fall in love with again yourselves.
    It must have been quite a wrench deciding to leave but i can well understand why.
    You obviously have been very busy but your return is very very welcome.

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    1. Oh, I'm so glad you like it, Ray. I've never tried to put together a website before, so there were some fraught moments en route to the final version. Now we have to hope it and the agent's sales particulars do the trick. I think we will always be a little bit in love with the old house, as we invested so many years and so much effort in it. But that time is past and we are very contented down here in the valley now, though I'll be glad when the busyness eases off. It's good to be back blogging. :)

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    1. The bane of my life when commenting in Blogger. If only we could edit our comments as well as our posts. :-)

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  7. Cor - I wondered what you'd been up to! I was afraid you'd disappeared to another blog site and I hadn't located it!! Your on-line sales info is brilliant (although there's one picture that just might give pause for thought - the very snow-bound one!) No wonder you haven't had time to send me the bread recipe - that lot must have taken ages to get right!! Love all the photos - I must keep them as a reminder of many happy meetings in both Oerle and Ty'r Onnen over the years. See you soon. Love to you and DH from me and BH, Helva.

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    1. No chance I'd leave Blogger for elsewhere, Helva, not after more than 5 years. :) I was just too preoccupied with other things to think about blogging. Glad you like the sales pitch. I did wonder about including the snowy picture (you'll note that I didn't choose one with a drift-filled lane) but felt that giving a hint might be kind.:) Forewarned is forearmed...
      Yes, getting it all as I wanted it took a long time and a lot of patience, but it really mattered to get it right. Let's hope it works.
      Sorry about the bread recipe. I completely forgot, I'm afraid. I'll get it off to you today. xx

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  8. Hello Perpetua:) My, you have both been so very busy! What with all that is going on it is no wonder you have to miss out on your annual trip to Normandy. I wonder how you feel deep down about selling your wonderful hill property? So many happy memories to be stored in your mind:)
    Gorgeous photos, as usual. I especially love the one of the little pond with the 'girl' sitting on the edge. It evokes a lifestyle of leisure when we all made time to sit and wonder about gentle things.

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    1. Hello, Shirley. :) Yes, it's been an incredibly busy few weeks and something had to give, if we're to get everything done. Deep down DH doesn't really want to sell, but knows it's the sensible thing to do. I feel rather differently, in that I will always love the house on the hill, but I've moved on and feel very settled here in the valley. I just hope we can find a buyer who will appreciate it as much as we do.
      Imy glad you like my girl by the pond. I bought her for the pond we had up the hill and was so glad the new garden has a small pond for her. A local sculptor had an exhibition in the library where I worked and I fell in love with the contemplative pose of this little figure and just had to have her. Hopefully one day I'll manage to stop being busy and follow her example...

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  9. Oh, what a joy on what has been a difficult day, to find you in my Inbox, Perpetua! You certainly are having a busy time, and I enjoyed very much your House for Sale blog. What a beautiful, spectacular, place you have enjoyed all these years. I can see that it would be a lot of work, and downsizing eventually has to happen, but it must have been wonderful surrounded with nature in that way. Loved the snow pictures; I remember the time you were snowed in, and I thought it must have been very exciting. Good luck with it all, and I live in hope you blog again when you can.

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    1. Thanks so much for your warm welcome back to blogging, Patricia. I'm sorry to have been away for so long. Yes. it must be a very difficult time for you just now and I'm glad to have lightened things for you for a little while with my post and website. We were so lucky to live in such a beautiful and unspoiled spot for so many years. Getting snowed in occasionally was a small price to pay. But with the passage of time it all became too much to cope with, so it's time for younger owners to take over with the kind of energy we had when we first moved there. Whoever they turn out to be, I hope they will be as happy there as we were.

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  10. I'm another one who is happy to have seen a post from you. The website is really good - easy to navigate and very clear. I have sent the link to a friend in Shropshire who dreams of a property in Wales.
    A conservatory - how lovely! I dream of a conservatory !

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    1. Thanks, Pondside. It's lovely to have been missed and I'll try not to stay away for so long again. Thank you very much for your specific comment on the website. That's what I was hoping to achieve and it's good to have independent confirmation of it.
      How very kind of you to share the link with your friend. The house and location wouldn't suit everyone, but for the right buyer it will make a wonderful home. As for the conservatory, we so enjoyed having one when we lived up the hill that we had to have one now we're settled in the valley. I hope you achieve your dream one day.

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    2. I'm working on it! We built so many structures at Pondside House and it is hard to start all over again. First we need a garden shed and a bit of a greenhouse - but perhaps a conservatory could do double duty????

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    3. Starting again isn't easy, but the advantage is that having done it all before, you'll have a better idea of what you want to achieve this time, or so we've found. A conservatory could certainly do double duty as a greenhouse for nurturing tender plants or growing on seedlings ready for planting outside. That, I think, was their primary purpose in Victoria times. Good luck with your plans.

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  11. What a lovely update. Enjoy your summer watching your garden.

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    1. Thanks, Catriona. Glad you enjoyed it. If we get the kind of summer some forecasters are predicting, I'll have a wonderful tume in our Welsh garden. :)

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  12. You are back!! As a newcommer I've had the privilege of hearing from you, but this new post was really very nice. You have two estates that is?? No, I'm not in the market but I wish you all the best of luck with this now that you are determined to sell and sorter out.
    Where is that place anyway? I would be in the dark even if you told me but tell me anyway. We live on the eastcoast, south part of Sweden. Blekinge the county is called, longstretched along the coast but with rather dense areas of forest and hills in the north.
    So nice to see these pictures, I wouldn't dare show MY garden, you'd faint or send us a petgardener....blessed days are these, heading for midsummer and fresh strawberries that won't cost a fortune like now.

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    1. Glad you enjoyed the post, Solve it, but sorry you had to wait so long for it. The house for sale is the old (and at that time very dilapidated) house we bought in 1973 and gradually renovated over the years. It's up in the hills in the very centre of Wales, but is now too big for us, so we moved to a modern house in the valley below and are now hoping the right buyer will come along.
      The new garden is flat and much easier to look after, though it's big enough to give me plenty of exercise and I have plans for what I want to plant in it.
      Enjoy your summer with its long days and fresh strawberries.:)

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    2. Hello!
      Wales seems to be the place to be, or Ireland, or scotland....or indeed Sweden.
      Did you see that I published my post on my 20 year celebration?
      Here school is out for summer, we are invaded by heavymetal the entire week and the weather turned a bit. Garden looks like a desert, no rain for weeks.
      I enjoy those lovely pictures of yours and hope you will find joy and peace in your modern house!!!

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    3. Thanks, Solveig. I've seen you have several new posts, but I haven't yet had chance to read them at leisure as life is really hectic here at the moment. School here won't be out until at least the middle of July. My grandson is busy taking exams. :( Our dry weather has come to an end, so I hope you too will get some rain soon.

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  13. Welcome back to the Bloggersphere, Perpetua! As you can see from previous comments, you've been missed!

    I'm very glad to hear that the conservatory on the new house is finally going ahead. Best wishes for the commencement of ground works tomorrow.

    I join with others in congratulating you on your house sale website. As I said in a comment on Facebook, you could probably succeed in selling without the need of an agent when you've done their work for them! Has DH finally sorted out all his things up there?

    As you know, I'm in full agreement with your views on the EU referendum. I've already cast my postal vote to remain. I do intend to write a blog post about it in the near future. As well as writing my 'Postcard from Prague' for the Reimagining Europe website http://www.reimaginingeurope.co.uk/postcard-from-prague/, I'm also a contributor to a 'Church Times' feature which will be published this coming Friday. So I'm not short of material :-)

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    1. Thanks, Ricky. It's nice to have been missed, but I'll try not to make it necessary in future. :) As it happens the start of the groundwork has been postponed until Monday. The very nice builder apologised for their previous job overrunning by a couple of days.

      It's been very encouraging to receive so many positive comments about the website, but in today's uncertain property market, I think we will need all the help we can get to find a buyer. The referendum is just adding to ghe uncertainty according to the edtste sgents we tsled to. In the meantime DH is steadily working his way through his stuff...;)

      I've read and enjoyed your Postcard from Prague and am now hoping the Church Times article isn't hidden behind their pay wall, as I gave up my subscription when I retired.

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    2. Unfortunately, it is behind the pay wall :-(

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    3. Sigh... On such an important subject it would have been good if the rest of the world could have read it.

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  14. I do like your sale website. Now, if I was still in the U.K. and many, many years younger.......

    I always love the change of seasons and seeing what flowers appear. I find here that I often have new plants that have just self seeded from somewhere or other.

    Enjoy your summer in Wales and the new conservatory build and good luck with the sale.

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    1. Thanks, Susan. The website is obviously coming across to people as I had hoped. Yes, it's not really an older person's house, but it's a wonderful place to bring up a family, as our children would testify.

      I'm still discovering just what this garden does or doesn't have and making plans that will keep me busy over the summer. Once the conservatory is finished, I can really turn my time and energies to the garden. :)

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  15. Your sale blog is brilliant - makes me wish I was thinking of moving! Sorry you'll miss Normandy this year, but yes: you have too much happening. We'll be having builders in soon - starting on the outside of the house next week (eek) and another lot once the outside's done. Feel as if we're going to emerge on The Other Side when it's done... And in case you hadn't noticed, I'm with you on the referendum, not least for my half-French grandchildren.

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    1. Oh, good! If it has that effect on you, hopefully it will have even more of an effect on someone who IS thinking of moving. :) I'm resigned now to the loss of what would have been our 10th summer in Normandy and am busy making plans for what I can do in the garden here if the good weather is kind enough to continue.
      Good luck with your building works. At least all our work is outside the house, so life inside should be able to continue reasonably normally.
      As for the referendum, glad to have you with us. I have everything crossed, but it's going to be very, very close, I think...

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  16. Your "moving" website is wondrous, Perpetua. I enjoyed looking at it a few times, wishing I could buy it myself, and I have enjoyed your newsy post, for I've missed your many interesting blogs. Everything it is time, I say.
    Maybe you can travel with your pelargoniums if just around your yard.

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    1. Thanks for the encouragement, Penny, and I'm glad you've enjoyed exploring our long-time home. Yes, the post had to be newsy, given how shamefully I've neglected my readers and left them wondering where I was.At least they now know exactly where I am, if not always just what I'm doing. :)
      The pelargoniums look quite happy to be staying put too and seem to be thriving on the front lawn, where they provide me with a splash of colour from my kitchen window.

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  17. I'm so glad to finally get caught up with your very busy life, Perpetua. You have a lot of wonderful transition in your lives right now, but I don't underestimate time it takes to sell a beloved home or the emotions that must be stirred. I really enjoyed your website and give you a lot of credit for handling so much of the sale yourselves. Your current home is beautiful. I hope you'll be able to occasionally let us know how it's all going! And did I miss any posts related to your trip last year? I have tried to be aware and I'm so interested in the way you were going to "remember" your Uncle and be a part of such a historical WW I memorial trip. If I have somehow missed the sharing, would you please alert me? ox

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    1. Given what a very busy life you lead, Debra, it's lovely to see you commenting here. As you obviously thought your first comment hadn't got through, I've taken the liberty of deleting your repeat comment, since the first one did indeed arrive. :)
      I'm glad you liked the house sale website I created and we're hoping potential purchasers will find it useful and appealing. The house will go onto the market officially in the next few days, now that the last details of the agent's sale particulars have been finalised. As for the conservatory, the initial work has just started...
      The trip with my sister to Belgium in February was wonderful, but I haven't yet managed to sit down and do more than the initial post soon after my return, which you've already seen and commented on: https://perpetually-in-transit.blogspot.com/2016/02/first-impressions.html
      It took me a long time to get over the chest infection I caught there and since then life has been really very full of preparations for the house sale. When things quieten down again, I still plan to do at least one more post. Watch this space...

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  18. As you can see I am also totally out of the loop with blogging, as I am adding my comment here two weeks after you posted. I do of course keep up to date with you on Facebook.

    Good luck with the house sale. The photos are lovely, and it maybe rather nice to be there for the summer and watch that lovely garden bloom xx

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    1. Nice to see you whenever you can make it, Ayak. :) The house should go on sale fully this coming week if all goes well. There are so many things to get right before a property goes on the market nowadays.
      The weather recently hasn't been at all conducive to gardening but next week looks rather better, so I must get outside and see how things are coming along - and cut the grass before the house disappears!!

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  19. Your farm website is very professional – you should get many requests. I can understand that you have been very busy. We are also trying to clear out 40 years of accumulation in our house toward a move to Nashville, but with my husband’s illness it is going very slowly, mostly because I am his caregiver with no support. I am still hoping to move by year end, but, maybe not.

    I have been reading on Brexit and am sorry of the result of the referendum. I read that young people are disappointed since most of them wanted to stay in Europe and also have a choice of 27 countries to go for schooling and jobs. Today candidate Trump kept congratulating himself that he saw this coming and also congratulating Scotland for being free of Europe (I guess he did not hear that Scotland voted to stay in the EU…) Here, we had not heard very much about this referendum but to me it seems that if GB has been in the EU for decades it would have been better to try to fix the problems they had with Europe than to quit altogether. I thought they were the ones who said “keep calm and carry on” – no more?

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    1. Glad you like the website, Vagabonde. It has been visited a great deal as has the estate agent's website and we've had several viewings already in the week since the house officially went on sale. I wish you all the best in your preparations for a move. It's such very hard work, even more so when you also have someone to care for.

      DH and I and also our two children, as well as almost all our wider family, are deeply disappointed and upset about the referendum result, the younger members especially. Donald Trump couldn't be more wrong about Scotland's reaction to the vote. The Scottish government is actively researching whether it will be possible for Scotland to stay in the EU in any case. Of course it would have been better to stay in and try to reform the EU, but sadly not enough people agreed. We live in unsettling and difficult times.

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  20. Hello dear Perpetua,

    I myself havent been blogging for some months.. and have resumed again.. hoping to pop in a post here and there.

    I do hope that you have been lucky with the sale of your beautiful house.. !!

    I can imagine, with the Conservatory..(hope much has advanced with it)! you wouldnt be going to Normandy.. and the Traveling Pelegoniums would be staying home.

    We are all passing difficult times at the moment.. I do believe, it will take a few years for all this to settle down.

    Sending warm wishes..
    Happy July
    Val xxx

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    1. Thanks, Val. Yes, I think a few of us have been rather hit and miss about blogging recently, though I still hope to get back to it when life settles down a bit.

      There have been delays with the conservatory, but the foundations are now finished and we're waiting for the next stage to start before long. We've also been encouraged by the amount of interest shown in the old house, but it's still early days. As for the present political chaos - the less said about that at the moment, the better...

      What we need now is some good summer weather in the UK, instead of the changeable and often damp weather we've been having. Fingers crossed it will improve in time for the summer holidays. :)

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  21. I too have not been blogging. I've just been way too busy to sit down and read and write. Life gets like that. I know you are working on the conservatory. I hope it is all coming along well now. I miss your posts. I hope to get back in the swing of blogging again soon. In the meantime, enjoy these fleeting days of summer.

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    1. I doubt your blogging break has lasted as long as mine, Sally. I miss blogging and reading blogs, but I just can't seem to get going again at the moment. Yes, this summer has been hectic and disrupted by all kinds of things and I'm hoping for a quieter autumn, when i can get back into the swing of blogging and catch up with all my friends.

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  22. Hello there!!!
    How are you?? Autumn is indeed approaching and I for one really look forward to words from you. Hope all is well. Blessings!!!

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    1. How very kind of you to ask about me, Solveig. I'm afraid I've been unwell again and it's taking me time to get over it. Coping with everyday life seems to take all the energy I have. My blogging muse has gone absent without leave and I'm now spending every spare minute getting ready for a trip, which I promise I'll write about very soon.

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  23. Oh my, I hate to hear that you are feeling poorly. Hope your upcoming trip gives you time to relax and get back to good health.

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    1. I'm over the worst, thanks, Vic, but the energy has been slow to return. I'm really looking forward to my trip and will be posting about before I go, promise. :)

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