what is my decor rating?

'nil' i think - hahaha
that is such an old joke that i shouldn't put it on here - it's just that i need something to cheer me up in the decorating department!!

here is what has happened in the last week:
i cleared out bedroom and now have a pile of stuff in the 'guest (ie stella's old) room'
here is a photo of the mess:














ii i stripped the old wallpaper using my new (!!) wallpaper stripper
iii a considerable amount of plaster fell off - but i carried on!!
iv i decided to call in a plasterer
v a jolly good plasterer arrived and gave me what i considered to be a good quote - and said he would come on monday and do the job
vi i went out yesterday and arrived home to find a message on the answerphone to say the plasterer was going to ireland for a week to visit relatives - but could still do the job on tuesday week if i still wanted him to
ho hum!!
and i had hoped i could complete the room in this week's hols!!
oh well - at least i don't have any visitors expected in the next month or so!!
frankie (who came over on monday with lucia for lunch) and i did have a good laugh, however, at all the funny writings we found underneath the wallpaper - mainly messages that boogy and franks wrote to each other when they were decorating in 1999 (frankie started but then had to let her dad take over!!!).

on a lighter note:
yesterday:
visited with o and g and stella rich and the pies came too. we had a lovely day and went out in the afternoon to foxton locks on the canal. we walked for about as far as we thought o and g could manage, stopped at the tea rooms and then walked back. a good day

today:
f'ster's second birthday party at cat and david's. a good time was had by all - especially f and lpip: f in his new little car and l on the slide. david cooked a leg of lamb on the barbie!! i wouldn'[t have thought that was possibly - but yumm!!! it was delish!!
here is a photo of f'ster's birthday cake - splendido or what?

and now a funny . . .
it would seem that stella was telling the pies that in her family when she was young, it was her dad, boogs, who did the cooking.
and kpie said:
oh, so that's why avie can't cook!!
out of the mouths of babes!!!!!

counting at my house . . .

This year we had 'The Counting' at my house - please read Cold Comfort Farm if you don't get the allusion - please read Cold Comfort Farm if you never have before - please re-read Cold Comfort Farm if you have not read it within the last 10 years!! Oh yes! it's a great book!!
Nearly all the family managed to come and the weather was warm enough for us to sit around in the garden - though very windy!! Alex put the paddling pool out for the littles and Kpie, Jpie, Cpie, Lpip and the F'ster had a grand time! I was too busy to take any photos but maybe I will be able to nab some from those who did.
Stella and company stayed at Jackie's house but they returned the following day to 'help out' with the left overs and then Lizzie and Matt nipped over too before travelling back. I love my family - we always seem to hurt with laughing when we are together - and we are very noisy!!
Wednesday was Reading Group and we were at Cat's house - so I got to see the F'ster again - all spangly clean after his bath and ready for bed. We had been reading 'The Sea' by John Banville - a Booker winner which provided lively discussion and a mixed reception from the group. The vocabulary was the most challenging I have read in years!!
. . . and now I have a week's hols. Yay!! I'm not going away but will be trying to decorate Frankie's old bedroom. This is my first attempt at wallpapering and I've chosen F's room because it is the smallest . . . so watch this space . . .

I like this story

I have been seriously debating whether to blog this . . . but I understand that just recently Stella has been reading 'Little House on the Prairie' to Kpie and it kinda brought this tale to mind . . . it's about O when she was little.
O is a farmer's daughter and in 1924 when she was 4, she lived with her parents and 2 younger brothers on a farm high on a mountain in south eastern Austria. In the spring of that year Opapa, her father, heard of a farm for sale down in the valley: a bigger farm and, because of its proximity to the village and a (largish) town, providing a much better opportunity to sell their produce.
I'm not sure if they had a horse, they certainly didn't have a tractor and cars were virtually unknown in those parts; so the move to the new farm was accomplished by Opapa going on ahead with the household goods and his equipment and tools (and possibly on a handcart!) and Omama and the children following on on foot. It was a very long journey: a long way down the mountain, through the little village and then about a mile to travel on from there. O remembers it very well: she tells me that she and Manuel (they were aged 4 and a half and 3 and a half) had little rucksacks on their backs with their picnic lunch and Omama carried not only an assortment of pans but the baby as well! (and he was only a month old!)
The journey took almost all day with every so often a glimpse through the trees of their destination. At last they arrived! And there was Opapa working in the farmyard and when they saw him both O and Manuel, tired as they were, rushed to hug him, they were so happy to see him!!
I like this story because it makes me think of Pa in Little House who was always moving his family on to better situations (this was the third farm O had lived in - there was just one more move when she was 13: to 'Singer', the next-door farm . . . my cousin lives there still) but also I like to think of the little children rushing to hug their 'Vattie' at the end of their long trek.
. . . and I'm still not sure whether I should blog it . . .