No I haven't disappeared off the face of the earth .......

For those of you that have contacted me, no I haven't dropped off the face of the earth, just been caught up with a lot of things going on here right now.

Sadly Jim's father in laws mental and physical health have continued to deteriorate, which has meant he isn't going to be able to continue living at home safely any more. So a lot of time recently has been spent with meetings with various official bodies etc, to find him somewhere to stay until such time as a permanent and suitable home can be found that can cope with both his physical and mental health issues. All of which takes time as you can imagine, there are nursing homes that can deal with either one issue or the other, one that can deal with a combination isn't quite so easy. But all is in hand, and seeing as two of Jim's daughters are in the nursing profession this means that they can for see or at least be alerted very quickly when Johns needs aren't being dealt with properly, which is what has happened this past week. Anyway enough of all this.

We've had some beautiful sunny days here, along with some days where torrential rain has ruled. But all in all not too bad a summer so far. But the odd sunny day does spoil us a little, and we get to enjoy the heat of that bright yellow thing in the sky lol. Unseasonable weather does seem to be happening everywhere on our planet lately though, my penpal Terry in USA at the moment is having to deal with rain and clouds, in an area which normally only see's sun in the summer, unlike us in the UK.

Jim and I have managed to get out and about despite the various things going on with his father in law and a personal issue with another family member. Apart from our usual wanderings along the river and canal which we do all the time. We've been going off to Hest Bank and also over to Morecambe too. I've really enjoyed going over to Morecambe, as it has the usual seaside events which I quite enjoy, such as a sandcastle festival etc. In the coming weeks there's a blues weekend, which weather permitting we'll go to, and also a kite flying festival we fancy having a look at as well. So happy times and things to look forward to.

Yesterday on the way back from town via the canal, I spotted some beautiful metallic blue dragonflies, and whats more they were settling on some lily pads right by the bank. IF I'd have had my big camera with me I could have got some amazing shots of these lovely creatures. But I shall be taking my big camera with me more often now I've spotted this tiny area where there's a chance I might get a decent photo of them. Last night we also went out on a wander hoping to catch a photo of the almost full moon, coming up behind Lancaster Castle, of course just as the time was right it clouded over and any hopes of getting a good picture had gone. So we came home again via the canal ( a different part of it this time ) and much to my surprise I saw my second ever kingfisher, no chance of a photo of course they're much too fast.

I seem to have lost my craft motivation altogether, I haven't been able to settle down to do anything at all since before Christmas. I've got lots of new toys to use and lots of inspiration but when it comes down to actually getting anything done ...well that's a different story. I think a big part of it is that, now I've got so much more mobility than I used to, sitting in the house isn't such an interesting proposition any more.

Here's a  few of my favourite photo's that I've taken recently

Aren't these the cutest things ever, I could have watched them all day.








An action shot from on the river just down the road from us.



Finally a fern just beginning to open its fronds.

Happy New Year !!

A little late I know but Happy New Year to anyone that pops along to read my blog. I hope you all had a lovely Christmas too. Mine was great, although I have to say this being the first Christmas in 41 yrs that I haven't had any of my kids with me, it felt a bit odd and I missed them loads. My oldest daughter Emma, her hubby and my grand daughter Lacey Mae, did come and stay for a few days just before New Year, and I really enjoyed seeing them.

Seeing as it's been a while since I posted on here I thought I'd add a few extra photo's than usual. Some from the brief cold spell we had way before Christmas and some taken around Christmas and New Year time. For Christmas, Jim bought me a nice Fuji compact camera, as we've missed some really good unexpected things, just because I hadn't got my big camera with me. So now this little compact camera sits in my handbag all the time. As far as normal day time photo's go, I have to say it's excellent the quality and colour is extremely good and almost on a par with my big dslr camera. Night time and macro shots however it falls down a bit in quality, but it's so good to have a camera with us all the time, I'll forgive it.

So here we go, to start off with 3 photo's of hoar frost taken just before Christmas.

 








If you look hard at this next photo in the middle on the right hand side you'll see tiny part of a rainbow cloud I managed to capture.



This next photo was taken on New Year Eve, what a welcome change from all the grey and gloomy weather we'd been having when the sun popped out for a change. It showed off the River Lune and the Aquaduct off really well.

 



Finally, a couple of photo's Jim took when he went off for a bike ride the other day. This includes of course one of his bikes lol.

 

This is Crook O Lune

Birthday fun and busy days

A couple of weekends ago was my birthday, Jim came down from Lancashire and family and friends came up from the Midlands for 4 days. On my actual birthday we went up into the mountains and I actually managed to get to the bottom of a waterfall I've wanted to get close to ever since I moved to Wales almost 10 yrs ago. We started off on the Saturday night by all drinking rather a lot, and singing our heads off. We had a brilliant time, and the party went on till the early hours of Sunday morning. Martin had brought his laptop and a set of good speakers so I think I can safely say we made quite a lot of noise. It wasn't until the next morning, that I realised my elderly neighbour hadn't gone away to South Wales as we thought ....ooooops. The next day we went off go carting, the following day was another day at different go carting track followed by some fishing.I had the biggest catch of the day .... a supermarket wire basket, I was gutted I thought I'd caught a big fish !!! Jims met all but one of my kids now, and he's still with me, so they couldn't have scared him too much lol.

On the Tuesday every set off home, including Jim. However it was only going to be a short time apart for Jim and I, as I was travelling up to Lancaster again. This time I wanted to take my mobility scooter and also some of my glass, my art stuff and a load of other bits and bobs. So we decided the easiest way to do this was to hire van, which Jim's daughter Rachel kindly offered to drive for us. All went very smoothly and we made the trip in good time. The only hiccup was when Jim tried to install a wireless card in my pc, it just didn't want to have it, after a couple of hours, he finally got it to recognise his pc and all was well again.

Now I've got my scooter here, this means Jim and I can go out exploring, Lancaster being a city caters for scooters much better. So I got the chance to see the weir on the River Lune which is 2 mins away from Jim's house. What a beautiful spot, the amount of bird life was amazing, we also went into the city centre, and even though I normally don't like shopping, I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed myself. Today we went for a wander along the canal which is about 10 mins from Jim's house, yet again I really enjoyed myself, it's been years since I've been able to do this. The photo's this time are a mixture of my birthday, family and some of the things I've seen since I've been at Jim's.