Monthly Archives: January 2023

Well That Was The Week That Was.

You know how it is you are just merrily going about things and then you get a broadside! Last week both DH and I had bank accounts opened in our separate names by fraudsters! It took us three days to get it all sorted out but the laugh of it was that the two banks that opened the accounts, which we do not bank with, knew they were dodgy accounts but opened them anyway!!!!

Our security is very heavy as you can imagine because of our business and with us dealing with the swimming club and also to keep us and the Boys safe, but we think they got enough information which is open public domain to get the accounts open but not enough for it to prove correct! The annoying thing is the time it takes to sort it all out!

The good news is that DH now has his new truck, above! Almost one year after his accident! It is very nice and he is very pleased with it. Now the white one he had to help until this one arrived Eldest has now had for his business.

Here he is picking the white one up after they did a few things to it. Two happy Boys!!!!

I am still trying to sort out the swimming membership side which is just a mess! Hopefully it will be done soon!! Work is busy as well and this weekend DH is spending the whole weekend at the new 50m swimming pool for the County Championships. I, however, will be spending the weekend doing something nice like my quilting! I know, don’t faint!!!!

Here is our little Coco’nut (!) she does love to make herself comfortable on our bed just like our little Treacle used to!

She is also like Treacle in that she lays at the top of the Stairs waiting for us, however she throws any toy she has down the stairs!! So you have to be careful going up or down as it can be littered with toys!!!

Youngest’s Girlfriend her dogs have had puppies! Saffy who is a miniture Cockapoo is two and Henley is a Cockapoo who is ten months old, the same as Coco, got together so to speak and Saffy about three weeks ago had six puppies. Here is Youngest with one of them. They are very cute although I have said he is NOT having one!!!

So I know I am so behind with things, especially Book Club Friday which I will do this Friday before February is due!!! The one benefit of this time of year is that the weather is yuck, I do get quite a bit of reading done!!!

I hope you lovely lot are all well.

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx

Christmas Books.

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I know I am already behind on Book Club Friday but thought I would show you the books I got from DH and The Boys for Christmas.

Youngest bought me the book “Queen” by Robert Hardman about Her Late Majesty which I am really looking forward to reading. When The Queen Mother passed away I read her Biography by William Shawcross which was so interesting and if you like biographies can recommend it.

“Godfrey’s Ghost” is about Playwright and Actor Arnold Ridley, whose most famous play “The Ghost Train” is still performed today. However is best known in the UK for playing Private Godfrey in the BBC comedy series “Dad’s Army” which we are all fans of. This book is written by his son, Nicolas, after his father passed away about his life prior to the TV show.

I seem to have been on a Biography train this Christmas! Sue Barker, British tennis player of the 1970’s and 1980’s and French Open Champion of 1976 who, when she retired, went on to a very successful TV career presenting Wimbledon on the BBC as well as the game show “A Question of Sport” and other TV hosting duties, including interviewing Prince Edward and Sophie Rhys-Jones after they became engaged. She retired last year as Host of Wimbledon and as they say summers will never be the same again.

If you follow Book Club Friday you will know that I have already read a few of The Railway Detective’s books by Edward Marston and you just know I love a good Christmas mystery so this is on my next to read list! I will let you know how it goes.

Finally Stephen King “Fairy Tale” published in September last year. I am hoping that this is a return to his usual scarey writing of his early books as I found a few of his newer ones lacking, particularly The Bill Hodges books; Mr Mercedes/Finders Keepers/End of Watch and I really did not like “The Sleeping Beauties” written with his son. I shall let you know again how I get on.

My local bookstore, Waterstones Nottingham, was having a sale on the Christmas books they had in. I have a points card with them, of course, and had quite a few points save up so used them to buy these books as well (!)Another Christmas Mystery. These books are excellent, British Library Crime Classics. Books which have been out of print and in the archives at The British Library are given a new look and re-published. This was originally from 1958.

Another British Library Crime Classic, an anthology of stories from bookstores! Right up my alley!

Another Christmas story about Jeeves and other Christmas stories! I do like short stories as you can read quite a few when you have the odd spare minutes!

If you also read my blog you know I have a thing for cook books! I love to experiment, not so much DH and The Boys, but you have to keep trying! Some of the books I have I have three or four recipes from that book which I use constantly. Anyway I saw this and although they say never judge a book by its cover, I do and I love the red of this one!!!! The recipes are easy and are linked to Christmas films. So in the Main Dishes section there is “Plain Cheese Pizza” of course from Home Alone! The type of the book and colours remind me of the American Diner style. I will let you know when I make something from it.

So that is my collection from Christmas and will be added to my To Be Read shelf, which if I am honest is a little full at the moment. So one of my Achievements this year will be to read as many as possible from the shelf before I buy any more books, well it is an Aim at least!

DH & The Boys also got me a wonderful gift for one day in the summer. Chatsworth, for one morning and you have to book, a private viewing of their Library and to see some of their treasures housed there! You know how I love the Library at Chatsworth, so this is something I am really looking forward to. I do hope I will be able to take pictures whilst we are in there!

“Join our archives and library team for a very special morning in the Chatsworth Library and Archives. Start your day with a one hour tour of the house with our experienced guide, followed by exclusive access to the Library and Study Rooms to have a closer look at some of the literary treasures from the Chatsworth Library including early library catalogues, a first edition of Pride and Prejudice and papers of Hobbes, Pope, Gaskell, Bronte and more”

Happy Reading Everyone!

Hugs & Love, Susie & Coco xx

I Am Here!

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You now how you are on New Year’s Eve and it his Midnight, it’s like being stood at the top of a very long and winding road down a mountain. You know it is going to be a long way and there will be many twists and turns and some may be more difficult than others? Well January started off with a lot of bumpy bits for us!

Eldest was rushed into hospital in the early hours of January 6th not being able to swallow and shallow breathing. Last year he had two bouts, one in September and one end of October of toncilitis, which neither of our boys ever had when they were little. He had antibiotics and it managed to clear it but it started again just before Christmas. After a couple of doctors saying he was fine and wanting to send him home (!) the A&E Doctor said he was too poorly to go home and admitted him at 4.00am. They started him on much stronger intravenous antibiotics and then did lots of tests. They eventually found out that not only did he have tonsilitis again but also a chest infection too! He was in for a week.

He is now out and looking a lot better than he did but still has a cough and a bit of a sore throat but they sent him out with a lot of tablets too! DH and I spent the week running around visiting and taking things in he needed and of course not a lot of work on my part got done!

I managed to get the Christmas decorations taken down but the Christmas tree was still up in the sitting room until the Monday. We also had the swimming club’s big Open on the weekend of 7th/8th January. It all happens at once of course. It took me the whole of this week to get caught up with work jobs/home jobs/washing & Ironing!!!

Tom started a cold at the swimming Open and was “growling” at everyone on the microphone and spent the week after coughing and spluttering. I did, of course, tell him not to give it to me but he didn’t listen, so I have spent this week with a sore throat, cough and every joint in my body hurting! I do think we are now reaping the two years we spent wearing face masks during Covid! I am hoping that it will be gone soon.

Here is Madam’s Ten Month Old picture! This was taken on Eldest’s bed and she is looking over his TV out of the window!!! She looks quite big here but in fact she is just sitting up high, she still appears to be smaller than our dear Treacle was.

She was extremely interested in Christmas and in particular the presents and did start to help us open them just as Treacle used to. This is her sack and she is choosing a present to open from it.

We had some wonderful gifts from Molly and her wonderful Mom, Sue, but I have not taken any pictures yet due to all the chaos so that will be another post. We did, in fact, have a wonderful Christmas the four of us, doing not a lot which was very nice. The Boys and DH were busy playing cars of course and I got to stay home and read which was great!

This weekend and next weekend we are not doing anything but every weekend in February and March DH has a swimming event so I will be using the time to get things organised, reading and doing some quilting. The weather is not good, we had had a sprinkling of snow but nothing to talk about but it has also been very frosty, definitely hibernating time!

I hope you lovely lot had a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year to you all.

Hugs & Love, Susie, DH, Eldest, Youngest & Coco xxxxx

Happy New Year.

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Happy 2023 Everyone!

A little late today due to my monitor power lead failing and DH having to try and sort it out yesterday!!

I hope that 2023 is going to be a great year. So far the new Millennium “Roaring Twenties” have not lived up to the previous Roaring Twenties!! I read an article before Christmas about New Year Resolutions and instead of making lots that eventually get forgotten by the third week of January, another idea is to choose a word to represent you over the next twelve months. I decided that this is a good idea and for the last few years I have used Happy & Hopeful, but thought a new word would be good for 2023 and have decided on “Achievement”. There is a lot I want to achieve this year and thought that this would be a good word for me.

Achievement

Of course I also have my Aims for the year as I have done over the last few years, some of which I managed to do and others did fall by the way side, but again it is something to work towards and hopefully Achieve!

1. Aim to try and do more quilting. 2. Aim to try and do more reading. 3. Aim to try and be more organised with work and home things. 4. Aim to get jobs which need doing in our home and garden to be done. 5. Aim to work on me.

Only doing five Aims as I think that is enough and some of my Aims above are quite involved but hopefully I will be able to get them done.

Tomorrow DH and I will be taking the decorations down and I will be cleaning on Tuesday, this is a little earlier than we would normally do them but next weekend is the swimming club’s big Open which launches the 50th Year Celebrations as well and it is all weekend so no chance of sorting things out next weekend hence tomorrow’s jobs! I hate taking the deocations down as it makes your home look so plain and ordinary, but I am sure the way the months fly by it will be December again very soon!!!!!!!!

Happy New Year to all my Friends & Followers. I hope that 2023 is going to be very kind to you all.

Hugs & Love, Susie, DH, Eldest, Youngest & Coco xxxxx