starling watch......

we happen to live in an extremely beautiful 

part of the UK......

we have Bristol and Bath a few miles north of us......

and Glastonbury and the Somerset levels to the south......

and we are always looking for new places to go and new

things to see.....

this week was no exception.....

we had been informed by a friend-of-a-friend that watching

the starlings come in to roost on the levels in the evening

was a sight not to be missed and that the best place to

see the 'murmurations' literally lies just a few miles away

from where we live........

well, we needed no more of an invitation than that, 

we headed off the following evening to see this 

great big nature show - and we weren't disappointed.....

it started with the most enormous flock {or murmuration} of starlings 

arriving to find a place to roost for the night among the reeds.....

{there can be between one and one and a half MILLION

starlings here in the evening....}

they swoop and shift and make amazing patterns in the air 

{which are made even more interesting when a bird of prey 

flies right through them and interrupts their bedtime routine.....}

 

and just when you think that the show is over.....

another huge murmuration arrives to join in......

 

nature at its best.....

oh dear......

i love having my hair brushed by someone else.....

i love having my eyebrows shaped, my eyelashes tinted,

my nails done, my feet pampered.....

i love it when someone else does those things for me,

and i count myself very fortunate that i have a daughter

who loves to give me pedicures and manicures and who 

enjoys 'styling' my hair......

however, a few days ago she decided that she was going

to 'curl' my hair and, whilst my mind was wandering somewhere

else and i was unaware of what she was doing, she wrapped a

nice big, thick strand of my hair around a comb.....

bad move sweetie......

when she tried to undo it, it got knottier and knottier........

until, finally, i called 'time out' and took the scissors to it and just cut the whole knotty mess out.....

she was devastated.......

who'd have thought cutting a bit of my hair out would cause her so much

angst when she didn't bat an eyelid when she made this!

the joys of moving......

moving can be a bit of a tricky business.....

there's so much to organise......

lots of ends to tie up.......

and people to say goodbye to......

it's not always easy and can make us feel

'all mixed up' and 'at a loss'

for quite a while......

there are joys mixed in there too though......

for us it was coming 'home',

back to family and friends that had

been around FOR EVER......

we were sad to leave 'the south',

but we were happy to return to 'the north'......

it's been lovely to 'settle in' to our new

home and to reacquaint ourselves with some

of the treasures we left behind when we

flew half way around the world to live for

a while........

isaac has been happily reaquainting himself

with his wooden tracks........

even at 12 years old there is still a lot of

play value in the wooden tracks, engines, cargo,

engine shed, bridges and crane......

i love to watch him play and try not to interfere -

even when he builds his

tracks right in the main thoroughfare between the

lounge room and the sun room where we spend most

of our day......

these things may be a little chipped and

'worse for ware'

but that doesn't detract from the

joy they bring as they are 'discovered'

all over again......

and me?

well, there's lots of things I am enjoying

about being here......

Saturday morning coffee in the sun room with a cream bun

and a broadsheet newspaper being

just a couple of them......

though the joy would be even greater if I

could just finish the pesky crossword.......

oops......

i completely missed january......

no post from me at all here.......

but it was a bit of a busy month filled with
'house-moving-and-settling-in'
so that's ok......

we moved into our new home a few days into the new year

and only had the bare minimum of 'stuff' borrowed from my sister

to keep us going......

a couple of camping chairs and a lamp for the front room.......

a few air beds, sleeping bags and pillows for the bedrooms.......

a few pots and pans, crocks and some cutlery for the kitchen......

it was minimal, but absolutely workable......

and it gave me time to plan where things would go when they arrived.......
{i earmarked the above corner in the sunroom as 'my' space,
a place for my sewing machine and craft cupboard......
it's important to have your own little corner i have found......}

and 6 days ago our 'ship came in' and all our 'stuff' arrived......

it took four days of unwrapping, unpacking, constructing and organising

but we have pretty much got all our things where we want them and it feels

so nice and homely here now.......

isaac even found his 'build-your-own-medieval-castle-book' which I had been 

promising him we could start to construct as soon as it arrived back from australia......

so that's exactly what we started to do......