Monday 1st April 2024: April fools day, Bank holiday Monday.
We have had very few nice weather days lately, one was on Saturday which was great for the party and another one was today. A fair bit of sunshine and only a couple of heavy showers, we certainly could do with a few more hours of sun though. We spent the morning trying to get the last bit of the new bed dug out and tidied up, I am glad to say it is now all done and I am pretty sure John is glad to see the end of it too. We now need to fill it up with some well rotted compost and top soil before planting up, actually John needs to dig out a bit more for the posts that are going in for the climbing plants. There has been stuff dumped there over the past few months, some ibc tanks, heras fencing etc and the fence posts we had delivered a while back. They were supposed to be in by now but the fields are so wet that the tractor would churn them up too much so we have to wait. We moved a lot of the stuff but still have more to move but called it a morning at around 11.30am, can’t work all day 🙄 Today is my Mums actual birthday so we went round to visit, give her birthday presents and have cake. I did manage to get some washing on the line in the morning and we just about managed to get back before a downpour arrived hot on our heels 😂
I was watching the news about the shortage of water in Mexico City and here we are with a deluge of the stuff every day for weeks it is crazy, so I have to think to myself ‘don’t complain, don’t complain’ because I would rather have rain than no water at all.
Tuesday: A change to Oscar day today. I was with Oscar for a while but he had a paediatric appointment at the hospital and I had an eye appointment so I went up with Macca and Oscar for his appointment and then when they left I went to wait for my appointment. Mine was a couple of hours later but it made sense to go up with them so that John did not lose a day at work bearing in mind we just had a long weekend. I pootled about and had some lunch while listening to an audio book until it was nearer my time.
Once I had booked in it was the usual couple of hours wait until I was seen. I had the initial eye checks and thankfully the high pressure in my eye has gone down, I had scans on both eyes and then waitress for the consultation to find out how the eyes are doing.
At first all was well, with the eyes at least, there is no sign of active inflammation and the pressure has gone, all good so far. Then the discussion of what medication I am on, I was dumbfounded when the Dr had no record of my previous appointment, the last one they had notes on were for the appointment in December. This meant they had no record of the beta blockers they prescribed for the high pressure in the eye, no record of the continuation of steroid drops and no record that they had increased my immune suppressant medication and lastly no record that they were supposed to inform my Rheumatology consultant! I even pointed out to the Dr that it was her that I had seen after an initial consultation with another Dr because he wanted a second opinion on the change of meds 🙄 I had to convince her that I had actually had been to an appointment at the beginning of February 😳 So I now have little faith that they will inform Rheumy this time nor that it will filter down to my GP who is actually the one that signs off the repeat medication they have changed ffs 🤦♀️ I realise they are under great pressure but really, I should have thought that it was a basic chain of communication that was important to be relayed.
By the time I got out of the hospital it was 5pm, I had looked up the bus timetable online and there would be a bus that left at 5.20. So I made my way up to the bus stop only to see the bus going past me 😬 I get to the bus stop thinking, that’s ok the online time table says there will be another one along eventually. I read the time table at the bus stop to find that it does not say the same as the one online 🙄 I call John and he comes to pick me up, there was not another bus in all the time I was waiting 😒 We eventually get back around 6.30pm and pop round to say happy birthday to our son in law before eventually get home just before dark.
It was a broken systems day and I was knackered just from the thought of it all 😂
Wednesday: Rain again, every day we have rain, I won’t complain though as others are no so lucky but the spring sunshine is very little and not very often at the minute. It is Saturday now and I can’t actually remember what I did on Wednesday, I did cut flowers ready for Friday I know that much.
Thursday: I started early and got flowers arranged first thing then Charlie phoned to see if I wanted to go out and get a coffee, yes please. While we were out she wanted to see if Oscar would get his hair cut at the barbers and despite the heroic efforts of the barber, Oscar was not having any of it 🤪 We went and got coffee and a bit of breakfast then a quick bit of shopping before returning back to mine. We got Johns hair clippers out and had a go ourselves with Oscars hair which was a little bit more successful but obviously not as good. Then we went out for a walk round the village as the weather was dry today for a change.
I had a couple of hours rest in the afternoon before going back out into the garden and getting a few small jobs done.
Friday: Today I had Sam’s three while she went to work, we spent the day, colouring, crafting and playing in the garden. Hearing ‘nanny’ every two minutes from one is head filling enough from from three at a time is hard work. In the end I had to tell them I can only listen to one person at a time 😂 bless them. I definitely was tired out b the time they left so didn’t do much else until it was time to get some dinner on.
Saturday: An epic day of non stop work today, first job was deliver flowers to a weekly customer and then back home to get started on a lot of jobs that need doing. The rain held off all day and so we were able to get a lot done, pushing ourselves to our limit at times. John spent most of the day building the Parthenon 😂 that’s what I am calling it. It is the new bed for the climbing plants and it looks as though we are building a house but it is actually just a flower bed with uprights. The uprights will have mesh attached so that I can grow things like my chocolate vine, an evergreen clematis, jasmine and a climbing rose. Luckily there is plenty of room for other flowers too 😬 Meanwhile I planted up some of the flower plants that are now big enough to go into the poly tunnel. Snapdragons, stocks and China aster, I had to stake it all and put in some support mesh too which I made from string. Once I finished that I dug up a few self set plants and potted those up along with some excess sweet peas. Then onto the job I really had on my radar which was the fruit cage, this needed a few hours of work to bring it back under control and by the time I finished I was knackered. John got the ride on mower out and cut the grass in the small paddock at the back. We didn’t do it last year and it got too long to manage so we had to leave it, now it has died off a bit over winter he was able to mow it and hopefully we will keep on top of it this year. He did some more mowing down the walkways before mowing the lawn with the hand mower, we are well and truly pooped today.
Sunday: Another dry day 😊 so plenty of work to be done as always 🤪 I don’t think we will ever get to the stage where we are wondering what job we could do 😂 the list is always long and gets longer by the day. We did go out for a coffee in the afternoon and ended up getting a roast dinner instead, saves time cooking later 😬
frieslandfarm (flowers) 