Birthday bon-bons...

Is it only girls that expect a lot from

birthdays?

As I get older they seem to deliver

less and less, or is it me

expecting more and more?

Got a horrible feeling you, as well as I, know the answer to this...

careful!

So many birthdays,

so many expectations...

exceeded...

so many wishes and dreams

falling wide of the mark.

A particular favourite of the

forgettable kind...

my 40th where I primped and preened

expecting to be taken to some

salubrious sexy

South Yorks hot-spot.

(alright, I know it's a contradiction in terms)

The entire evening I spent bouncing

on the kiddies castle in the pub garden with the daughters of farming friends.

I bounced away the pain along with

the thought of money spent on

facials, fluff and nails.

A night to remember of the

Hammer Horror Motives kind.

My 60th in the Arctic, 

words have no place here to describe

how things had changed in the intervening  twenty years.

A flavour of today...

The brooch...

 the tale of which I cannot tell!

Ted had this, one of my favourite

items of jewellery

repaired for me.  

The pin wasn't very secure and I was

afraid I would lose it.

Beautiful, beautiful

paintings of moths on the pages and
jackets of antique books

by a lovely new friend called

Helen

see better photographs on the link above

How can the manic murderer of clothes moths
love these so much?

These were from Ted.

This card I gave to myself
in rememberance of my much loved
and still sorely missed
Lettice

it is so like her 

This morning I searched in the long grass
for the cross we put to mark her favourite spot in the garden.  No matter how hard I looked I couldn't find it.
Getting dressed I saw from the bedroom window Ted doing a finger-tip search in order to find it (old police habits die hard).
This in my book is the mark of true giving, no money can buy that sort of gift.

The trip to Deal has had to wait as Ted
is suffering from a nasty cold/chest infection bug that has swept through the cast
of Oh What a Lovely War.
The price you pay for fame!

I baked my cake...
ingredients... the weight of three eggs.
The mixer was spurned in order for me to beat the eggs in very,
very slowly.  It works: this beat it all together carry-on, doesn't give
the light touch I was looking for.  My only nod at convenience
was to use Lakeland cake liners, hence the ridged sides.

It's four-o-clock...
time for the birthday girl to
sign off.
If you have lasted this long down the blog,
I raise my glass to you.