SOOP's kindly Kitcheners.

When I saw the heading "the prevailing wind is in the west" I thought we were back to a thread from a few months ago pertaining to spy codewords. But maybe I am the only one who remembers that. I do have a warped sense of the ridiculous. It is keeping me sane.

Looplou Burning leylandii! My eyes lit up at the thought. However The Leylandii which over hang at the bottom of our garden, support my clematis Montana Elizabeth. Which if I let go where it wants to is spectacular and this variety has a lovly slightly vanilla perfume.

The temptation is to cut off the branches that are hanging over our side and let the clematis romp all over their blasted hedge.

I have done that - at this house. The elderly lady next door wouldn't let us bring down the height of her blasted leylandii, but she couldn't stop us chopping off all the branches on our side. So we did, and treated it like a fence and grew clematis up it. It looked quite good. She was a lovely lady, but had bad taste in hedging.

When she died, before it was sold we quickly chopped it all down to 6' high so that the next owner couldn't refuse. It looked so ugly that the new owner took it down and replaced it with a nice new fence.

And no, her daughters never noticed, because they never visited her.

A very positive step forward, Galen. Nice to catch up with your archery pals, too. .
My neighbour brought me quite a large box of Belgian chocolates back from her holiday. I ate the top layer last night and the next two layers this evening.
I'm so glad they've all gone now. I might have made a pig of myself otherwise. !

That's great to hear Galen, you must be feeling rather chuffed!

I hope you don't ache too much today x

I hope you feel loads better for having gone to archery.*Galen*, how is Lucy?

I'd like to borrow your flame thrower please anno. We have a few huge trees with TPOs that stand to the west of our garden which stop the evening sun reaching us!

Hello my darlings. Yay! The sun continues to shine. I'm pleased to say that all is going according to plan. We'll be touring the Kintyre Peninsula today. Lunch at the Royal. Roast lamb prepared for tonight's meal.
Our dear pal (next door neighbour) has been readmitted to hospital. We understand that "she won't be coming home again..." It is her twin brother whom we visit in the care home. He's been looking forward to being able to visit his sister thanks to the Red Cross ambulance service. He's unaware that her lung cancer (she has NEVER smoked) is so far advanced.MacS is calling in to see what, if anything, we can do to help. Our dear pal's husband (a lovely, lovely friend ever since we arrived in Kintyre) has vascular dementia and cannot continue living at home. Plans are in place for him to move into the Erskine Care Home.
I may not have the opportunity to pop into our kitchen again today. I shall however be thinking of you.

Oh soop that's very very sad for them all. I hope somehow that your friend's twin brother can manage to see his sister as soon as possible. You will miss them living next door

In the meantime, have a lovely day, and I hope the sun shines. xx

soop that is so sad, the entire family members are affected with illness and none will be returning home again.

Enjoy your tour and also your lunch. I hope that Rory will not be on his own for too long although like Tara he will make good use of his "me" time by catching up with slleep.

Tara has been out for nearly 4 hours although she popped in briefly for a bite to eat. That is a minor miracle although I would think that she has found either a bush or long grass and is having a snooze.

Homeward bound now - Leicester tonight and back to Tiptree tomorrow. Looks like I have a lot to catch up on.

I do hope that you had a good rest and that the weather was decent most of the time pompa. Still, there is nothing like sleeping in your own bed again.

That`s so sad for your friends Soop, I don`t know what to say.
Do you remember our holey garage roof and the sleeping pussy cat I found in there? That was a couple or so weeks back, no more intruders since then, but I went in there this afternoon to put a load of washing on, as I opened the door a long haired tabby shot out, and when I got inside, there was the previous visitor, asleep in his/her previous place! I don`t know how long they`ve been in there, last time I was in was on Saturday afternoon. Mia didn`t look too impressed as I carried puss number 2 outside!

Isn't it sad when that happens soop, it's no easier even when you think you're prepared for the final days or weeks. I hope your dear friend's husband settles quickly into his new home, aren't they lucky to have such wonderful caring neighbours in you and MacS?

I hope dear Rory is welcoming your visitors especially with potentially extra laps to sit on and dollops of attention aimed at him.

number you seem to be attracting waifs and strays [ smile], are you sure Mia isn't putting the word around that there's free B&B chez moi? Maybe she was hoping you wouldn't notice! I guess having 'dropped in' via the roof they have to wait for you to release them

pompa have a safe journey home (hopefully the mankini's been mislaid!)

Just popping into the kitchen to say hello. Taking a bit of me time while the DGSs are fighting about Minecraft. Sitting in the sun room because there is a freezing cold wind blowing through the garden as usual. The garden is full of birds of many varieties, all busy with the offspring. I know how they feel! There is even a male pheasant strutting around being beautiful.

The keyboard on my iPad has split in 2. So annoying! Has anyone come across this? Don't know how to fix it

I keeping the mankini for use in the garden, a couple of Mrs. Ps old bras for supporting the pumkins and the mankini for the marrow, or for the wrens to nest in

For a few moments I thought you were were -wearing- it in the garden.....

loopylou that is how I read it and I thought that I may not be able to face my supper thinking about it. I am relieved.

Me too!
I bet MrsP is thanking her lucky stars too !

I have a rather disturbing picture in my mind, too! I think I shall get my knitting club to knit pompa a mankini, he obviously really wants one!

I've been experimenting with making GF cakes all day, the carrotcake muffins made with ground almonds are particularly nice if anyone would care for one?

Sounds tasty, janer. I would love to try one please.

I thought that they would be reasonably healthy and not too many carbs, as the sugar content is quite low. Almonds, grated carrot, eggs, mixed dried fruit, mixed spice, oil and sugar. I have had to freeze them to save me from myself. But it means that I can go off to an afternoon tea party on Friday, safe in the knowledge that I can eat something without making other people feel guilty as I refuse all offers of cake. I do hate having to keep telling people that I can't eat gluten anymore.

Oh pompa mankini, marrow, pumpkins my mind is boggling Think I need a little lie down!

Delicious, janer. All to the good if they're also healthy.

janer they sound delicious but I have recently had supper but if there are any left tomorrow I may try one or two.

Just thought, I could put the mankini on my scarecrow, that might then scare the pigeons off my peas.