Summer at the Duckpond

So, how is it October already!? Where has this year gone? 

We had quite a nice summer, pretty good weather and we managed to get out and about a fair few times plus do our annual road trip to Scotland and back. 

Here's a selection of what's been happening over the last three months:

• We spent lots of time at one of our local outdoor swimming pools, Greenbank Pool in Street. We cancelled the Small Person's swimming lessons (doing them indoors was too high risk) so instead I attempted to teach her myself. Each time we went to the pool, we were able to spend several hours there, mixing swimming and playing in the kids pool with some snacks and a cuppa for me at the poolside. I wouldn't say she was able to swim perfectly but by the end of the summer, she could do breast stroke under the water, glide and do doggy paddle (and a bit of breast stroke) on top of the water so I reckon that's a win. We'll pick it up again next year when the pool opens for the season in May. 

• We had a great road trip to Scotland, visiting the Helensburgh area in the first week and staying in Cramond, Edinburgh in the second week. We took my Mum and brother with us this year and hired a van so we could all fit in. We didn't see any shows at the Fringe (again, we didn't want to take the risk) but we did visit Edinburgh city centre to experience the atmosphere and watch some of the street performers. 

• We went to visit Carters Steam Fair on their Farewell Tour a few times in Bath and also once in Basingstoke. It's sad they're no longer going to tour but also completely understandable as to why they've made that decision. We had great fun working for them and visiting them on lots of occassions so we'll keep lots of happy memories. 

• Andrew took his 1952 Scammell lorry to the Great Dorset Steam Fair (for the first time since 2019). We camped in our usual place (behind the Freak Show) and when everyone had left at the end of the fair, Lily was able to go onto the stage and pretend to put on a performance. 

• We went up to the north of Scotland at the beginning of September, staying near Lossiemouth. It was a holiday originally booked by my Dad for 2021 but I had to postpone it when he had his stroke. We were finally able to go this year and spent lots of time on the beach when we had sunny weather!

• Carnivals are back this year, after being cancelled in 2020 and 2021. Lots of carnival clubs are smaller; it's been a hard few years for obvious reasons but people still seem to be enjoying it and it's fun to be back. The carnival club I'm in are taking part as a walking group, re-doing our Alice in Wonderland theme from a few years ago. My costume is the White Queen and Lily is able to take part with us on some of the nights, wearing an Alice costume. The big carnivals start on 5th November at Bridgwater and run through to 19th November finishing at Glastonbury (which is also a 'photo an hour' day!). I'm going to try and post on Instagram Stories over the season. 

• Photo an Hour over the summer took place on 23rd July (round-up here), 20th August (round-up here) and 17th September (round-up here). October's photo an hour is this Saturday, the 22nd!

• We've all had our jabs for the winter - COVID boosters and flu jabs (being eligible as 'carers' and 'household contact of immunosuppressed'). We also made the decision to get Lily her chicken pox vaccine - she still hadn't had chicken pox yet and we just thought what's the point?, the older she gets, the more horrible it'll be. And she wanted it as well so we got her booked in. 

• We watched 'The Sparks Brothers' on Netflix which was utterly wonderful. I tweeted about it the next day and had a like and retweet from its director, Edgar Wright! It's been taken off Netflix now unfortunately but I think you can still find it on other platforms. 

• Good books I've read over the last few months - 'Nothing But The Truth: A Memoir' by The Secret Barrister; 'Never Greener' by Ruth Jones; '21 Miles: Swimming in Search of the Meaning of Motherhood' by Jessica Hepburn; 'We Shall Remember' by Emma Fraser; and 'Where Are The Women? A Guide to an Imagined Scotland' by Sara Sheridan. 

What have you been up to?

 

May and June at the Duckpond

A two month round-up this time, as I didn't get round to actually writing a post at the end of May!

• We went on holiday to Butlins in Bognor Regis; on a break which was booked back in 2019 and had been postponed twice. It wasn't quite the break we envisaged when we booked it as we steered clear of all the indoor activities (not wanting to risk catching Covid) but we certainly made the most of the outdoor fairground and childrens activities. 

• Whilst we were in Bognor Regis we also explored the south coast area, doing an afternoon drive to Brighton on one day and a drive to Portsmouth and Southsea on another. And we also surprised Lily with a mystery tour to Paultons Park - which she loved!

• TV - obviously we're 10 years behind everyone here but wow, 'Line of Duty' is rather good isn't it! We binge-watched it over about 2-3 weeks and probably ended up with far too many late nights as we wanted to keep watching the next episode. We watched 'Vigil' as well, which was also excellent - although watching it immediately after 'Line of Duty' meant than we suspected everyone in the show :-D

• Music - I've been listening to Arcade Fire's new album, 'WE' which is brilliant. I've only seen them live once (Glastonbury 2014), I'd love to see them on their tour later in the year but it's not worth the Covid-risk. I'll stick to listening to the tunes on repeat!

• After we'd finished in Bognor Regis we headed down to Cornwall for the weekend to see another show at the Minack Theatre, 'Calvino Nights' - which was fabulous. Lily asked to go to that theatre again so we've booked one of their October shows, 'Horrible Histories - Terrible Tudors'. 

• We've been visiting one of our local outdoor swimming pools a lot recently so that Lily can practise her swimming. We decided to cancel her indoor swimming lessons; she hadn't been since last September (when the Covid rates started rising) and she didn't want to risk it herself. So we've been doing lots of afternoons out in the sunshine, taking a picnic and enjoying the water. 

• I did my usual shifts at Glastonbury festival. helping to look after a farm and a lane in Pilton village. I took Lily into the festival on Thursday when the Kidzfield opened and she had a fantastic time, I think her highlight was playing on the adventure castle and watching 'Andy and the Odd Socks' from CBBC. We didn't go on site the rest of the weekend though, there was just too many people and it wasn't worth the risk. 

• The other half turned 44; we had an outdoor fish & chip supper at a local farm shop which was tasty. Not sure he's looking forward to next year though, being halfway through his forties!

• The other half picked a birthday day trip out to the West Somerset Railway to see the steam trains and eat chips by the seaside. 

• May's photo an hour was Saturday 21st (the day of our visit to the railway) and June's date was Saturday 18th. The next date is Saturday 23rd July. 

• Andrew took his vintage lorry out to its first show since August 2019 - the Bath and West show. It rained quite a bit but he still enjoyed it. 

• We watched some of the Jubilee celebrations on the television. It was brilliant to see the carnival cart from Bridgwater take part in the pageant parade (anyone involved in carnival has been following its build progress over the last year on social media!). If you want to see it all lit up, come and see it (and lots of others) during the Somerset carnival season in November. 

• I've been eagerly making my spreadsheet of all the wonderful shows on at this year's Edinburgh Fringe. There seems to be lots worth seeing although I haven't actually booked anything yet - not sure if any of them are worth the risk. We'd be wearing our FFP3 masks anyway but still, I haven't decided yet what to do. 

What have you all been up to? 

 

52 Lists - Your Summer To-Do List

The prompt this week is all about your summer to-do list - I have lots of things I'd like to do, whether I actually get round to doing them is another matter!

 

 

 

 

 

Have a few barbecues in our back garden

 

Plant some flowers in our new flower border

 

Arrange our new sofas in the living room

 

Start decorating our en-suite bedroom so we can build the wardrobes and then actually move ourselves into that room

 

Go swimming in the sea (ideally at Weymouth)

 

Take a picnic to Greenbank lido

 

Go see some magical outdoor theatre (this one I know will be ticked off as I've already bought my tickets for Kneehigh Theatre's new show at the Lost Gardens of Heligan!)

 

Visit Shangri-la at Glastonbury Festival (we always get put off by the mahoosive queue, one day though, we'll just have to have patience and wait)

 

See some friends at various steam rallies, ideally with a home-made cake in tow

 

Try and see at least 20 shows at Edinburgh Fringe Festival (I probably should add that we're only there for four days...)

 

Have a day out on the West Somerset Railway

What's on your summer to-do list?
 

This post is part of Ema's (Made in Hunters) 52 Lists Project

For a full list of all the other lovely bloggy people taking part, visit Scarlett's site (WorkRestPlayLove) for a nosy!

52 Lists - Things That Make You Happy To Be Alive

 

 

 

 

 

These things all make me happy to be alive...

Somerset's spectacular (and best-kept secret) - Carnival season

 

 

 

Fabulous stand up comedians

 

Lazily swimming in the sea or splashing around in a lido

 

 

 

Kneehigh Theatre Company and their magical shows

 

 

 

The mayhem and chaos of Edinburgh Fringe Festival

 

 

 

This guy (Andrew obviously, not Emu...)

 

 

 

What makes you happy to be alive?

 

 

This post is part of Ema's (Made in Hunters) 52 Lists Project

For a full list of all the other lovely bloggy people taking part, visit Scarlett's site (WorkRestPlayLove) for a nosy!

Day 29 - All I Want For Christmas

Day 29 of Rosalilium's blog every day in November challenge

All I Want For Christmas

(What do you want for Christmas this year? Go on, get us in the mood!)


Am I able to ask for more hours in the day?
No?

Well then, I'll just have to settle on exciting things like a cheese grater, a magazine subscription and a camera bag. Yes, I don't know about anyone else but I've found that the older you get, the more boring your Christmas list becomes. You end up 'saving' things you want so that you don't have to spend the money and you can ask someone else to buy them for you for Christmas.

I toyed with the idea of writing about a fantasy Christmas wishlist but the truth is that even if I had lots and lots of money, the sort of things I want aren't tremendously expensive.

Tickets for a swim at the Clifton Lido in Bristol - I love the architecture and history of the place, plus it's an outdoor swimming pool!

Some kind of digital camcorder - I bought my first camcorder when I was 16 (it took me 2 and half years of saving my pennies) but it's quite old now and I haven't used it for several years, so a digital camcorder would be lovely.

Tickets for Matilda the Musical in London - I saw the show last year for my 30th birthday; it's an absolutely amazing show and I would dearly love to see it again.



What would you like for Christmas?

July Happiness

Five things which have made me smile this month...

 

 

1. Watching my friends fall in love with one of my favourite shows by my favourite theatre company -

Kneehigh Theatre with their magical performance of 'Tristan and Yseult'

 

 

 

 

2. My tickets arriving for the Edinburgh Fringe - this time next week (touch wood) we'll be well settled into our octolodge and will have enjoyed about 7 shows already!

 

 

 

 

3. A lovely afternoon in the sun in Weymouth, lazily swimming in the sea (it was so warm!) and a massive knickerbocker glory to round off the day.

 

 

 

 

4. Gromiting!

 

 

 

 

5. My gorgeous summer dress from Joe Brown's. I really like this picture Andrew took of me in West Bay, mainly beacuse it's unusual for me to look anywhere near that good in a photo!

 

 

 

 

What little things have made you happy this month?

 

 

Beside the Seaside, Beside the Sea...

So...another long hot weekend in the UK, another sunny day trip to the beach.

 

 

 

 

This weekend we went to Weymouth, one of my favourite seaside places and probably my favourite place to swim in the sea. The bay is so shallow for such a long way out that the sea gets warm quite quickly - no need to shiver and "phawr, phwar, phawr" your way into the waves.

 

I'd only been holding the ice cream for about 30 seconds and already it was melting!

 

 

We aimed to get there late afternoon when a lot of the crowd had begun to go home, had a quick look round the shops (3 charity shops open! and on a Sunday!), strolled along the prom, prom, prom and then hopped into the sea.

 

I got throughly into the swing of seaside style with my gorgeous orange 'she sells sea shells' dress!

 

 

Andrew and me are complete opposites when it comes to having a dip in the sea -  he likes rough seas and breaking waves, whereas I like a calm bay and lazily swimming for ages staring at the sky. Weymouth bay on Sunday managed to keep us both happy with choppy waters to jump over and large gaps to swim into all the while in a nicely warmed swell.

 

 

 

Afterwards we lazed on the beach, Andrew asleep and me reading the latest copy of 'Style at Home' magazine before going for a walk around the harbour and eyeing up all the million pound yachts and sailing boats.

 

 

 

We then finished the evening with haddock and chips and a really retro knickerbocker glory -

complete with cherry on top!

 

 

 

What type of sea do you prefer? Choppy waters or calm waves?

Day 16 - Pampering

Day 16 of rosalilium’s 'blog every day in May' challenge

Pampering

(What is your ideal way to pamper yourself and relax?)


This is a short and sweet post today as I'm not really a girly girl who likes a lot of pampering.

But there is one pampering treat I would absolutely love for a birthday present.


Either this in Bristol...

Clifton Lido

 Image courtesy of The Spa Traveller


Or this in Bath...

Thermae Bath Spa

Image courtesy of Thermae Bath Spa


I don't mind what sort of spa package it is, anything will do - so Andrew, if you're reading, you've got 6 months to get it organised for my birthday!