A week in pictures...

Thank you so much for leaving me such heartfelt comments on my anniversary post.  I wrote the post last week and scheduled it to publish while I was away for the weekend. What a treat to come back to lots of lovely comments!

The last seven days have been filled productively, so in the spirit of continuing with my online journal, this post will be photo heavy and short on words!

Sunset on Chesil Beach, last weekend

Fossil-hunting

Coffee at somewhere rather special in Axminster

Fishing off the beach. Check out the concentration!

Fresh mackerel for dinner

I managed to squeeze in one last camping weekend, in Dorset. The mackerel went from sea to plate in less than an hour. Hugh would've been proud of me!  We had two sunny days and a final day of persistent rain, but hey-ho! I got a very soggy tent dried at home eventually.

Getting dressed up on Wednesday...

... to attend a luncheon at Wadham College, Oxford University for Women of the Year, raising awareness for The Mulberry Bush School

I was thrilled to have been nominated for this fund-raising lunch. I thoroughly lapped up the experience and tradition of the day and was entertained afterwards by Emma Bridgewater and Dame Catherine Wybourne. I'm struggling to describe how it felt to be sat amongst 160 women. I felt very honoured, yet hugely welcomed.


There has also been a meeting of minds from a friend who I 'met' on Twitter, a bit of cooking, a bit of coping with decreasing pain medication but not a lot of crafting. Yet. I'm dying to get back to my sewing machine or knitting needles. This weekend, though, the garden is calling to me to finish off some jobs and do some general tidying after the wild and windy weather of the last week.  Have a good one, whatever you may be doing.

Right now...

• I'm wishing I could get on with some crafty-type things but my right hand is still feeling very odd and uncomfortable due to the pins and needles from that trapped nerve. I am starting physio next week. My right arm feels like my left one! Do you know what I mean? It can do things, but not properly. Awkward. Let's look at the evening sun shining on the cosmos instead.

• My new eagerly awaited magazine fell through my letter box yesterday. Have you heard? Do go buy it, it is an absolute delight. The production is fabulous and the styling, well too stylish for words! I took advantage of the brilliant subscription offer of the first three issues for a fiver. It's still available, I think.

• There was only one place to sit and read it at my leisure - the hammock. The simplest of pleasures. Made even more special by being surrounded by the birds coming down to the feeders, for their tea. The tits and finches are not put off by the thuggish behaviour of the parakeets. For the first time this year, I also saw a pair of Nuthatches coming to feed on the sunflower hearts - what a delight, one of my favourite birds.

Checking me out!

• My new hens are settling in nicely. Still a bit timid but they are getting used to me going in the run each day with lettuce or some other kitchen scraps treats. Last week, my skyline hen started laying and has presented me with the most gorgeous of blue eggs every day since.

Violet, my Bovans Nera hen

• I made a sour dough loaf and had a delicious lunch of poached eggs on toast. This has become a little tradition of mine - to poach the first eggs. 

• It is the simplest things in life that give me the most pleasure. What's yours?