Christmas Eve

Just a couple more pictures before we go into enforced lock down for Christmas. Mrs S does not allow laptops to be turned on from this evening round to Boxing Day, (Quite right too, It's family time!) so this will be the last post for a couple of days.These pictures then are of the Silverwoods Turkey being beaten into submission by Mum and young M (5). He makes a good assistant chef but started off this exercise unwilling to touch the bird (Yeurrgghh! It's Gross!) and ends up up to his armpits in the pushing sage-butter under its skin and stuffing up its jacksey.

The stairs picture shows the stud wall alongside the stairs stripped back to its skeleton. These hardboard stud walls were pretty much condemned by the surveyor as fire risk, and seeing the hardboard burn like cardboard on the bonfire we can see why. This wall will be gone completely (along with any other hardboard) opening up the one big room with he stairs leading off, so that the front door opens into the dining room with the wood burning stove (the ancient and much loved range will not survive this phase).

The bottles of fizz were our welcome for the first night in the caravan. Sorry about the not very stylish champagne 'flutes'!

Finally a shot of Mum with her favourite weapon, the flexible 2-handled Curver bucket which is used to wrangle broken plaster board, rubbish, scrap iron and anything else to its destination. It's just about the right size to not get too heavy when fully laden and she love it.

Well, as I said, that's all for now. House rules and all that. Catch up with you again on Boxing Day

Merry Christmas to all our readers
Love from the Deefs

Christmas Eve

Dad manages to slope off a bit early from work (midday) and so has time to whizz round doing some last minute errands, shopping, dropping off a huge and almost flavourless (I know, I tried it) pannetoni to Diamond's for use in bread and butter pudding or sherry trifle, buying wild bird food etc.

We get a nice walk round the boatyard where the shipwrights seem to be working right up to the wire. We can hear the sharp buzz of an electric plane, the thump of hammers, the radio music and the banter between the guys coming from the enclosed coccoon of Cambria's hull, fighting with the chilly wind noise as we walk through the quaysides. More guys are working on the Lady Daphne's side frames, their pile of big (10x10"?) baulks of timber on the wharf gradually depleting as they work their way along the side of the barge.

Back home and dry and waiting for poor aul' Mum who works in a job where the customers might need access to her building right up to 5pm tonight plus she, as one in a position where you must lead by example, is obliged to carry on right up to the 17:00 deadline. We are still 30 minutes off that, with Dad poised to go collect her and save her a chilly walk up what is by now a road almost devoid of workers returning home.

Well, good readers, we all here wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year. Enjoy the break and take some time to make a real fuss of your dogs, as well as looking after your humankind.

Merry Christmas
Deefs

It was Christmas Eve, Babe...

Christmas - babies in mangers and all that Jazz. This pic might be of me, or equally it might be of Ellie or Archie; we all looked the same at that age. This is September 2006 and taken within minutes of my (our) birth(s).

Ah... that song, Shane Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl and the Pogues. Surely the best Christmas Song in all time (so says Dad, and Sir Terry Wogan, so it must be true).

Mum and Dad are just back from going to the wedding evening of Mum's colleague Marina to new hubby Ian. Well done you guys and all the best. The "evening" took place in the town's football club new-ish club house. 6 years ago our footie club was all derilect, the pitch overgrown, the buildings all burned out and graffiti'd up, the fences in disrepair, the team disbanded and the management moved on. Then thanks to a concerted effort by the club and motivating dozens of volunteers and getting hold of some money, it rose like a Phoenix from the ashes and is now very smart and doing really well.

From the wedding "do", Dad's now back, and Mum was too, but has nipped off to take Diamond to Midnight Mass. We are all ready. Prezzies are wrapped and (edible content not-withstanding) stashed under the tree, food is assembled and prepped for Hastings tomorrow, and we are almost out of space for any more Christmas Cards.

Y'all have a great Christmas and a well-deserved break from the daily grind.

Deefski-Claus

Eve Eve

Things are settling down here now into a new, Megan-less routine. We think we've told everyone who needs telling the sad news, except for a lot of the dog-walkers we would normally meet on the Rec, Short evenings and bad weather mean we've not seen the likes of Barney and Smudge's Mum, Ben's Mum or Maxie's or Finzi's Dads, so we'll have to catch up with them in due course unless the Jungle Drums get them first.

It's Christmas "Eve-Eve" and everyone's exhausted. All humans go crazy-busy at this time of year, and only now do they start to wind down towards the Holiday. Dad has, unusually, the luxury of a 4 day break which is, also inevitably, getting filled up with events. We may even visit Diamond and Rags - it'll be the first time we've met Rags since Diamond's been in and out of Hospital (and Rags has been "on his holidays").

Dad and his 2CV mates had their Christmas meal last night, and came back smelling of paté, venison/chestnut/ale pie and Christmas pud with ice cream. Very well fed and soon snoring away - only problem with being designated driver, he was on the alcohol free Becks, and had to forego a guest beer called "Christmas Fairy" which 2CV-Doctor Lew was raving about.

Good long, fast paced walks nowadays - one compensation for the passing of the Megster.

Nearly there
Deefski

Wet through again

Off to reculver this morning, but the forecast had said showers with sunshine, and all we got was 10/10 cloud and cold February rain. We arrived, paid for our car parking, then sat listening to the rain drumming off the car roof, swooshing the wind screen clear every now and then with the wipers, looking out to sea, like proper British tourists, and waiting for the rain to stop.

It eased, we walked, and then it returned in earnest and we got thoroughly soaked. Dad texted back to Mum to have warm dog-towels ready (again), for when we arived with warm bread and croissants from the farm shop

I met two lovely children today, James and Eve, grand children of the neighbours. They both wanted to make a fuss of us, pick us up and stroke us. Eve, though, did not believe that I do this blog - she thinks someone else types it in for me. Dog's can't type, she says. That's her purple skirt and pink fleece I'm sitting on in the first picture. The other is of a very typical Megan pose - looking out of the door. She likes to have her bum in the warm and her nose in the cold. That's till she get's shouted at by either Mum or Dad "Come on Meggie - make your mind up! Either in or out!"

See you again soon, Eve and James

Deefs

T'was the Night before Christmas

Coo! Christmas Eve,yet! The adventure continues. We've left Portmarnock and headed westward to the next step of the journey,off to visit Mum's sister,"Silverwood", hubby Mr-Em and the neices, Em-J and J-M (There's lots of Em's and J's in this family). They have a collie-cross as old as Meggie, called Chance, and another young one called Sam. Yet again, amazingly enough, we stroll in and these dogs accept us straight away onto their turf.

That's great because we are soon playing and romping around in their house and garden.

There is just one fly in the ointment, and that's Megan. Silverwood has a couple of guinea pigs, one of which is heavily pregnant and about to give birth. Megan is Kent's No. 1 ratter, her deadly skills honed when Mum and Dad had chickens, before I was born. Spilt chicken food inevitably attracts rats (don't let anyone try to kid you different!) and Megan became quite adept at nailing these critters when they ran into the greenhouse to take cover, and found there was no way out. No problem- who wants rats anyway?

BUT , when they (Meg,H,Mum and Dad) were here (in Silverwood's house) a couple of years back, Meg's targetting system locked onto the family hamster cage, and she'd not leave it alone, spending hours looking up at it and whistling, just willing that hamster to leave the cage and come down and "play" with her. Then one day when M+D were not being particularly vigilant, Meg sussed that if she grabbed a corner of the tea-towel on which sat the cage and pulled, the whole lot might just fall on top of her and burst open. Ooops. Meg 1; Hamster nil

So this time the gang are fore-warned.The guinea pigs are 3 feet up on top of the dish washer,with no tea towel. Much to Meg's disgust

Ah well.... currently doing "Little orphan Annie" impression 3 steps up in the hall, due to extreme exhaustion (Sam loves me.... so many men, so little time! )

Merry Christmas One and All

Deefer

The Late Lady and the Artist

This is Puppy-Heaven! Portmarnock beach, now I've seen it in daylight is massive - acres of flat sand backed by sand dunes and walked on by dozens of nice people and their friendly dogs! (Well, so far anyway, I've not got into any arguments, but I guess there's still plenty of time!).

All that night driving and ferry stuff left us all a bit tired, so we crashed out and slept till mid morning, before venturing out onto the beach. Dad has some pics on the camera which we'll put up if we can suss out this strange PC. We walked out from the Portmarnock town end, all along the sand spit towards Baldoyle and Howth, and we met a labrador cross pup with eyes different colours, various terriers, spaniels, greyhounds and cross breeds and said nice hello's to all of them. We ran in and out of the sea and we three westies charged about occasionally play-attacking each other or chasing through the waves (We don't do proper swimming, but everyone likes a paddle!)

We've also been to see Mum's longest standing friend, the "Late-Lady" and hubby "The Artist". Don't worry, she's only "late" in the sense of having a very relaxed attitude to dead-lines. She always gets there at the last minute (or soon after) but drives everyone crazy in the process. They say, never to rely on her for a lift to the airport - she'll get you there in time to sprint on board, but your nerves will be frazzled. In one story, she actually took the family on holiday with a dustbin liner of wet clothes in her luggage, where she'd not got organised soon enough to dry and iron them by the departure minute!.

The LL and the A (he paints in oils - Mum and Dad have a couple of his pics up in our house) have a lovely old Cocker Spaniel called Jack. Jack's feet are about 4 inches across, like human hands, and he has big floppy-down ears and doleful eyes. He is 10, same age as Megan, and they've known each other since puppy-days. Jack generally doesn't tolerate other dogs on his turf, but he's always made an exception for Meg, and then for Haggis, and not (to everyone's amazement) for me. So we had a great time playing and charging round the house

More soon
Deefer