Skip to main content

Heat wave!


The weather has continued and this week / weekend has been hot, hot, hot. Just as the kids went back to school we have been blessed with an early taste of summer and it couldn't have been better timed for Izzy's party #2 - the spa gathering! Having looked at the weather I booked a bouncy castle at the last moment and despite both girls saying they were far to old for that, they all spent the whole day bouncing on and off it (with Bertie), everyone having great fun. We ended up with Izzy and Abi and 5 of Izzy's friends having Emily and Yesim do nails and make up while they took it in turns to choose music and make the most of the sunshine - it really couldn't have been better. Last night the weather broke for a while and we had an amazing storm - great big crashes of thunder and claps of lightening which lit up the whole garden. The rain lashed down and I think the whole county was up at 2:30am finding it impossible to sleep through all that noise. Amber and Effie had stayed for a sleepover so the 4 of them huddled up together in the playroom counting the seconds between thunder and lightening to see which way the storm was moving. I loved doing that when I was young - so nice to think some things don't change.


Today was all about water fights and chilling in the sunshine. After a disrupted night and an early morning (Izzy arrived in our room at 6:12am to tell us they were awake - I cant remember the last time Izzy saw 6am on a Sunday!) we did pancakes for breakfast and then they played while I (finally!) made it out on my bike for a short ride. It's been ages since I managed to coincide opportunity and motivation for cycling. I've been doing other things to keep fit, just not cycling. By the time we'd had people pick up kids / bikes / other bits and pieces it felt like another very busy weekend - we must be heading towards summer!


Abi's highlight this weekend was getting out for a short ride this afternoon on Sam - the pony she's intending to have on a part loan. He's been suffering with a damaged tendon so it's taking a while for him to be back to work, but today we were told we could start riding him. We spent ages brushing him (he's moulting like mad given the weather) and then ventured out for a short hack. As it was it turned out to be shorter than intended - we got half a mile down the road and he refused to go any further, blowing out of his nostrils and looking like he just wanted to go home. I'm not surprised - he hasn't been ridden for ages and very few ponies that I've come across like going out on their own. I think we may need to find a friend for him to hack out with if we are going to get much further than that! We decided to play it safe - it's early days- and so he pranced back to the yard looking very fine, proving to both of us that when he's fitter and less hairy he will be a very nice looking pony!


Unfortunately the forecast is set to return to something more akin to normal temps for the time of the year - such a shame, all that sunshine really does make everyone feel so much better. Oh well, at least we've had a reminder of what we can hope to expect for the summer.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Snow!

After a beautiful day of sunshine yesterday, today it snowed... but more of that in a minute. Yesterday actually felt like a day of much progress. Despite Covid we managed to arrange a visit to Taunton School to have a look around with the girls and to meet the Headmaster. This was a massive relief as I had got to the point of thinking we would have to accept a place without ever stepping foot inside the school. In the end we had a very comprehensive, if a little deserted, tour of the school and the kids loved it, as did we. There may even be a small chance they might squeeze us in if we are there by the summer term - that is of course if the kids are back into school by then. The other news was that I managed to speak to Mr &Mrs Tucker - the people buying our house - and we tentatively agreed that we will try and complete during the Easter holidays which could have us moving in the third week of April. This does require everyone to have got all of what they need done, and that of ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Busy, busy, busy

Full English brunch for these two! Life is VERY busy and I don't feel like we have stopped for weeks (or is that months?) It seems like the 'to-do' list is endless and while I know we don't have to do it all at once, I have taken on the unenviable task of trying to get the Muppet to finish all the work he promised / we have paid for and that has been like pushing a mountain of water up a very steep hill. We've got to the point where I think we have got all of what we are likely to get and the rest we'd rather finish ourselves anyway. The electric gates are clearly a work of his imagination based on the gates / the electric cables he spec'd and the cheapo motor mechanism - there is no way they'll work so we have decided to not bother and source proper gates that do the job and look better as well. Knowing that we are almost at a point where we sever the ties feels very liberating. Looking back this last 6 months has been incredibly stressful and just didn...
Post a Comment
Read more

Showtime!

It's that time of year again, the Newbury Show, and this year I made a point of not planning on going with anyone else as that always results in dissatisfaction as we don't get to do the things we really wanted to do. The weather forecast was a tale of 2 halves this weekend, with glorious sunshine and summer temperatures on Saturday, followed by torrential rain and lightening for Sunday. Of course this meant that anybody contemplating the show made the decision to go on Saturday, us included. Given we knew the A34 would be a car park we took the back roads and despite the traffic being heavy it wasn't too bad - helped by the fact that we had already resigned ourselves to a queue. On getting there it was clear that the weather had brought out massive crowds and everywhere was packed, with the tents steaming and the poor animals looking like they'd had enough by lunchtime. We went into the pig tent and half the pigs had sensibly knocked their water buckets over to have ...
Post a Comment
Read more