General Chat

Oh dear we had a full day without any postings! Well I hope that I am not the only one today.
The weather is glorious, the sun is shining and there is a slight breeze which means that the weather is perfect, at least it is for me. OH is outside painting all the white walls, so they will look good for the summer.

We have finally managed to get the pool back into good order, just in time for my son and his girlfriend and her son to use when they are here for Easter.
We hope to buy a few more plants and trees in the next few weeks depending on price.

We had a pleasant evening seeing some friends that I haven't seen for two years, and the husband has been very unwell but now looking so well, having had a delicate operation reversed.

Not much news today so will go now to prepare the veg for diner tonight

Have a good day everyone

14.27 hrs Spain

16.48.

Well, the pots have all been filled and hhhhave planted some lilies, flax and aloes.

Haven't had my lesson on re-sizing pictures yet, daughter hasn't had time to show me how it's done, maybe to-morrow?

This morning I made Greenfingers' recipe for "Elaine's Chocolate Cake", it is very , very nice! I know what you mean Bridget about not losing weight with all these yummy recipes. Next I would like to try the Lumberjack Cake. I also made a chicken pie for lunch which we had with a salad also very nice. So many dishes to wash!

Val.

Evening all,

It was a lovely cool day here, in the early hours of the morning we had a lovely shower of rain, the grass was cut to-day not that there was much to cut.

To-morrow I am going to make one of Greenfingers' chocolate cake recipes, haven't decided which one yet they both sound so good. Will let you know how I get on as cakes are not my strong point, I never get them light and fluffy.

Bought some potting soil to-day as I have a couple of pots in which I want to plant some flowers.

I was quite pleased with myself to-day as I managed to scan in the photographs of the graduation myself, but now I need my daughter to help me with the re-sizing so that I can send them to my brother. Thaty will be tomorrow's lesson.

Have a lovely evening.


Val.

19.40.

Tess, I can remember going to Colchester Institute for head massage and for having my hair cut I always found them to be very good and excellent supervision..I am sure that I saved quite a lot of money as well. Is the Warley you go to in Essex, if so I know where you mean.

I wish that I had lived near to my sisters but unfortunately I lived in London and Essex and my younger sister loved in Scotland and my older sister in Hertfordshire so we could not just pop in to have a chat.
Enjoy your visit to Birmingham.
Also rather pleased that someone else remember using Terry Nappies.

Still gardening but almost finished taking out what we do not want and today we cut down one of the Bougainvillea and will be removing another tomorrow. I then want to plant some more fruit trees. We have oranges, one apple in its first year of fruiting, an Olive tree, several Orange and Lemon trees, so need to think what else. I may try a plum tree but not in this particular place.

The words Whit Week brought back memories as well so I may write about those memories tomorrow.

Val and Berona, I hope you are both well and am looking forward to seeing an entry on here soon. I expect like most of us you are very busy, have you tried any of the recipes on the Culinary thread.??

Well time to go and set the table etc, I wish everyone a happy evening.

Spain 18.11hrs

Just a quick Hi before I go to bed. Have been shopping today (my weekly shop) had to buy some more clothes pegs, now that I have got a washing line and a prop, to raise it up higher. Managed to get a pack of 48 for 97p

Tomorrow I go for my second Indian Head Massage. I have booked a set of three (for twelve pounds) at the local college. They will all be done by the same girl 9or should I say young woman). I will be a "case study" for her!
I have been called a lot of things in my life, that "case study" is a new one.

Will be seeing my sister on Thursday, we are going to a Ladies Night at the Warley Male Choir (bro-in-law sings with them).
We keep out of the mens way, just have a get-together, where we have a talk, with a speaker, as well as a talk/chat to each other.

They are a group of lovely ladies, very welcoming. I have been on holiday with the choir a few times.
They tended to go on a Whit-week concert tour, every other year. It is all for charity and great fun.

Now I need to have a rest, as shopping tires me. I need to be fit enough to get into Birmingham tomorrow.

Good night all,

Tess

23.06 in U.K.

P.S. I used terry nappies too. Quite easy when you got used to them.

Busy gardening so have sneaked in just to say hello. The weather is glorious and as rain is forecast for tomorrow though we should continue getting the garden looking smart
Spain 12.35hrs

7.37.

Good morning,

We arrived back late yesterday afternnoon. Thoroughly enjoyed the graduation ceremony on Friday and also the garden tea on Saturday afternoon. Guests who did not have seats in the auditorium were assembled in one of the halls where they watched the proceedings on television screens. The university catered for 6000 at the tea and my word they had such a spread and the trays of goodies just kept appearing on the tables, I think they did a wonderful job. On the return trip we made a detour to see my brother and SIL, she is looking very well and also speaking quite clearly, I must say they are both working hard at the exercise and speech theraoy which has really paid off.
Somehow two tyres were damaged, I don't know how that happened as the roads are in good condition, so in Port Alfred we had to have two new tyres fitted.

To-day it is back to normal and all the usual things.

Berona, your post brought back memories for me too as we also used to have bread and milk delivered daily, the milk was in glass bottles,

Take care all.




Val.

Nudge

I will be back later

Bye for now

10.03 hrs Spain

Penny, thank you for posting. The racing was in fact held at the local English Bar and we were all outside in groups of six or eight. We were given toy money to use, I felt quite rich at the beginning and we placed bets as a table rather than as individuals, that made the money placed quite high. It was great fun and there were about ten tables with people travelling from the next little town. Our table did quite well and we came second, "out eiders came first"! the prize was bottles of champagne and chocolates. The food provided was very good. The bar closed earlier than usual, after all the hard work the staff needed the time off, and we went for a walk around town, along the sea front and just enjoyed the views.

We came home and OH fell asleep, to many beers methinks!

Berona, welcome back, and thanks for the description of your experience of the 1960s &70s. The 1970s were when my children were born and life was starting to change and not always for the better methinks!

I have been wondering if anyone has any thoughts for another topic for us to discuss ?.?? all suggestions will be considered and be great fully received.

Something that may make us all smile might be good, such as The things my
Parents never knew" , I could definitely think of one or two things that I did!!

Well time to take a cold drink to OH, and sit in the garden for a while, I will look in again sometime today.

Enjoy the day

10.58 Spain

It's Sunday morning here (9:15) and a lovely day starting. Top temp forecast is 28 and although it was the same yesterday, didn't quite get that far up - but nevertheless, very pleasant.
Tess's post brought back a lot of memories for me. Some even applied to my own married life, as well as before. My children were born between 1961 and 1970, so I had nappies to wash but I also had bread and milk delivered daily and meat delivered three times weekly. We also had a man drive around the streets twice a week with the back of his delivery van set up with a display of fruit and veggies and another man had a panel-van with dress materials and sewing needs. He called around every few weeks. If we didn't feel well, we stayed in bed and a doctor made a home visit.
All of those things disappeared during the sixties, as the supermarkets increased. However, it meant that we had to find transport to go out to purchase all of these things - so many of us had no way of getting there until we bought a second car. For many, that meant that the women needed to get a job (for which they needed the car to get to the job) and they needed the job in order to pay for the car! It became a viscious circle!

Bridget, I hope you enjoyed your "day at the races" and you were fortunate to be one of the winners.
Val hope your weekend of celebration went well also, and that you enjoyed the occasion.I have been fortunate in going to two graduations for two of my daughters, and enjoyed each one, made me very proud as I brought them up on my own.
Well hope to get back on here tomorrow. Take care ladies. Penny

Sorry, I pressed the wrong button and the message was sent to quickly!

This afternoon we shall be at the races! Well ee shall be watching the racing on the tv and placing bets, having champain, chatting with friends, having raffles, and generally enjoying ourselves . We have some excellent prizes for the raffle winners, and I am sure that we will have a lot of fun. The ladies or atbleast somevof the ladies will also have their fine dresses and hats, and one will be chosen as the winner....I also do not have to cook today as we have a champagne picnic!

Not a lot more to say this morning except I hope that you are all well, and have a good day today.

I will be back tomorrow when I can tell you if I am one of the lucky winners of the raffle

09.13hrs Spain

Good morning everyone

It is a beautiful day here in Spain.the sea is shimmering and is a beautiful shade of blue, the birds have been twittering, I am sure thstbthere arebmore varieties of birds than there used to BR. Their songs are quite delightful...
Now that I have had all the trees and hedges sorted out and reduced in size I have my amazing panoramic view once more and now I really do feel at home again.

The stillness is difficult to describe other than to say that it is tranquil, peaceful and yet full of promise. I am sipping my first coffee of the day and happy at the thought of talking to my twin boys in a short while as they ar 31 years old today,I sometimes wonder the years have gone.....one minute they were tiny, tiny people who were so precious, the next they were going to school and then the left home to go to University,
. These were the boys who I was told could have brain damage,,,so the relief was great. They brought me and their father great joy and completed our family as we had wanted 4 children.
The church bells are ringing now and I am wondering why, maybe it is just a practice.

Val, I realised that many people are poor I guess though that I am only thinking about the level of poverty in the UK, here in Spain there are many people, most from eastern Europe who also are very poor by UK standards. Anyone in Spain who is found to be illegal are either shipped straight back to their country of origin, offered to live in a community and receive two years education and learn Spanish. Then they can stay. There are many who manage to get around this and once they have employment they register. For example for the last 3 days I have had men working to get our garden back to how it should be! Our gardens are on 3 different k
Levels and therefore there is a lot of physical work simply in taking the rubbish etc out of the gardens. We have had 40 fur trees cut down from about 40 metres to just 10' then there has been around the palm tree to reduce and remove all those hugh seed packs and many many hanging palms, BUT we have very little problems with any stealing etc

Tess, you have a great ability to describe your early life, and it has brought back many memories although we never travelled although mum and my sister and I would have loved to do so. Dad was offered a terrific opportunity to go to South Africa, but declined at the last moment, we were very upset.
Please keep writing

Well have to stop now, will be back later

10.49 Spain

A little more about housework...
My mum married my dad (a soldier) soon after the war.
We were sent to the Far East where he was stationed. All families of serving service men are allocated a servent, so we had one of our own.

My mum wrote to her ex-employer to tell her that she now employe her own servant (with a few added comments!!).
I only vaguely remember this time, as I was very young and at this age took everything for granted.
When we came back to live in England (after a quick visit to Ireland to meet the family). We settled in a newish housing estate, in Oxfordshire.

We had a large red polished door step. I used to love to keep it polished nice and bright. We also had brass numger plates and door knocker, something else that I loved to polish.

No servant now, so Mum had to do her own washing. No washing machine either. So everything was done by hand. We had a mangle outside the back door. I liked to help, but was rather frightened of it, having caught my fingers more than once!

we too used blue a little bag that was put in with the "whites" Later washing powder had blue specks added to it.

It was also a time of stiff collars, starch was used to make them really stiff, and I think that a little was put in with the shirts too.
No steam iron, so a spray was used during ironing, clothes would then be rolled, so that they were evenly damp.

Only carpet squares in the middle of the room. no vacc. so these were brushed with a stiff brush. The surrounding lino was mopped and polished.

No supermarkets to do the shopping, just a lot of little shops. Bread and milk was delivered to the door (this was the norm). We also had a local butcher who delivered meat to order.
We didn'thave a local chip-shop, but a mobile chip van came around every friday evening.

No polyester or easy iron fabrics in those days, all natural material instead. A lot nicer to wear, but a little more difficult to launder.

We seemed to have less clothes in those days (and changed them less often). There were no disposable nappies, so mothers of babies had to wash all the nappies, it was lovely to see a line-full of lovely white nappies fluttering in the wind.

Food was prepared from scratch, and there was a lot less waste. The Suday joint would be streached to last a few days. Vegetables were often grown in the garden. (It was usually Dad's job in dig the potatoes or pick the cabbage).
Less choice of veg. in the shops too. I remember tyhat we thought that the lady from Malt, who lived close by was strange because she used olive oil in her cooking. We only used it to soften wax in ears.

Mum made some of our dresses, knitted our cardigans, jumpers and those dreaded long socks (worn with garters)..

Again, I rather took for granted all the work that my mum did, at this time she had her fourth child (my baby brother). By the time he was six months old, my dad was posted abroad again. It was another six months before we followed him. So Mum had to do every thing for all of us.
This included chopping wood for the fire and digging up the potatoes, getting the coal in from the coal shed, and keeping us all in order.
She managed all these jobs really well and this is one of the really happy times of my life.


Tess

Hello everyone, 8.30 a.m..

It is going to be another hot day.

Bridget there is a lot of poverty because unfortnately the people who are the poorest and cannot afford to feed, clothe and educate their children just keep on producing more, they don't stop at one or two this apparently is a cultural thing, this includes the unemployed. Then of course the government gives a grant for each child up to the age of 6 years, so now we have schoolgirls having babies so that they can claim the grants. Even not having a house makes no difference.

Am off now to do a bit of last-minute shopping as we will be leaving early to-morrow morning for Grahamstown to attend the graduation ceremony on Friday and then the garden tea on Saturday. On Monday we will come back via Port Alfred where we will spend a couple of hours with my brother and sister-in-law.

Bye for now will be back agan next week.

Val.

Sorry for rambling above and then I pressed the wrong button and had not said good bye for now. I must have another coffee, I obviously need the boost. Have a good day

08.02 hrs Spain

A fairly late morning entry from me so that must mean thatni slept all night, wonderbof wonders, this morning in about 30 minutes we have the workmen / gardeners arriving to do some fairly messy work. We have a wonderful palm tree in the garden on the lower level next to the swimming pol and it has not been cut back for two years, so it needs a very good cut back to stop it blocking som light and to stop the seeds and dead branches from falling, that could cause damage. Therefor a chap will go up some scaffolding with safety harness of course and start to cut all the offending branches and then cut everyting remaining , to a smaller size. It will look wonderful then and I shall have my favourite view again. After that they will be cutting down the evergreen trees which are now around 60 feet tall! Lord oh lord do they
make a mess and also tale away a lot of light and sunshine from the house. They also have hundreds of what I call pods which fall all over the place and look so messy. We will replace them with something else but I would like it to have colour and be easynto maintain so all suggestions will be carefully considered. It is the disposal which is of some concern as there are no dedicated places. We will have the trunks of the evergreens cut for firewood in the winter but as for the greenery that will have to be taken by the workmen as will the palm tree.
Yesterday we spent quite a lot of time giving the annual White coatnof paint, well I did some but OH did the most, so we have been fairly busy.

Now I am wondering what topic we could have next, I have enjoyed reading about the housework of bygone times although with the world economy being so flat I hope that we will all become a little more thrifty etc. I am not suggesting that we should take advantage of housemaids etc, but using old ways of cleaning etc without to many chemicals, I hope you all know what I mean.

val, it has always puzzled me why a country such as SA has so much poverty? Surely it can be reduced, or is it simply that the country has too many people. I recall that even a few years ago the tribal way of living caused problems , re hierarchy is that a reason.?
A few years ago there was a sudden influx of SA people arriving in the UK, but they where mostly people whose family had at sometime emigrated to SA and made a fortune, they were bringing into the Uzk huge an mounts of cash. I can recall that where I lived, a much sought after seaside place an SA family came to view the house next door to me and they not only bought the house but paid in cash. It was £450.000 and then they bought an even larger house for even more again in cash. this was happening all over the UK.

This was about 14 to 16 years ago. It set a trend in the upward house Market in our area and we also sold our home 7 years ago last September and we also benifitted but since then the Market has been static and now is dropping.

Evening all, not much to add today, so will keep it brief. Val sorry to hear about your tumble (I did have the image in my mind, and tried not to laugh) hope now your bruises are out and you are feeling better.
Bridget, glad to hear you are sleeping better,long may it continue, as I have said before I am a night owler, but never have any trouble sleeping when I go to bed. Am lucky I suppose.
Tess, what hard work went on years ago, my Grandma was in service but I never knew what it entailed. You live and learn.
Well ladies shall say goodnight. Take care all Penny

l4.00 here.

Bridget, there is so much fraud which is why it is done although those who receive State pensions don't have to provide the certificates and that is where most of the fraud occurs where the pensions of deceased pensioners is drawn either by family members or offcials. Once we have received the certificate from the Treasury Department we have 2 months in which to return it and if we don't do it in time they stop our pension. I go to the Police Station to have mine done and then there is no charge, we also have to send a certified copy of our ID Book along with the certificate.


Val.