Foxglove Narrowboat

Every time I have said that today …..”ONE DAY MORE” I start to sing the music from Les Miserables, One Day more! That reminds me, the film comes out over Christmas, It is going to be good. One-day-more (Les Miserables)
Anyway, side tracked a bit there. One more day of work tomorrow and then RELAXATION starts. Getting really excited. We are trying to plan all the things that we want to do on Foxglove whilst we are off work. I think we are looking for some curtains first thing Saturday morning. Roy has never been so eager to go curtain shopping, he normally hates this kind of thing. Should be quite interesting. Parcels keep arriving for us to take to the boat. The lace should be arriving tomorrow. I hope Wish does not chew the package as she has started to snatch the post from the postman when he puts it through the door as Roy her saw her do it last week. This would explain why there are lots of holes in the envelopes. Unfortunately she has done it to a DVD today! Ahhh Wishy you naughty girl. She never gets told off, she gets away with so much. We are definitely going to have to start doing something about the post though as too much is getting ruined. She sees the postman coming down the drive, runs to the door and grabs it as it is being pushed through. I think she is trying to protect the house, although I am not sure the postman will see it that way. I think I got side tracked again there, I was talking about the post. Anyway, I hope everything arrives in time for Saturday as we will be starting to take some more “stuff” over to Foxglove. Just One More Day……..ONE DAY MORE!!!

I am so glad there are only 2 more days of work to go. I am exhausted tonight. Just want to try and get everything done at home and prepare everything that we need for our stay on Foxglove. We are both really busy at work to try and get everything done before the Christmas break. I have never looked forward to a break so much as I have this one. So many things I want to do whilst on Foxglove and I am looming forward to taking Wish for nice long walks. She will be so ready for her next bath if the weather stays as it is as the tow paths are very muddy. She is a good girl though and thank goodness she doesn’t go in the canal.  Let’s hope the weather stays o.k and perhaps a little snow would be nice. A Christmas is never the same without snow and the canals always look very pretty. I am sure there will be lots of photo opportunities. Anyway, I am off to the land of nod now……starting to yawn! Two more days, just two more days 🙂

It is official, I am now concerned about Roy as he has ordered some lace today!! OMG. Whatever next. I never thought I would ever say anything like that. My husband has actually ordered lace! I am killing myself laughing even writing about it. This is for the boatman’s cabin. Still laughing! Whatever next. I cannot write without laughing at the moment. My husband, Mr. Technical, the gadget man…….ordering lace. When he reads tonight’s blog I am not sure if he will see the funny side of it or not. I am still laughing. This  boatman’s cabin is his little project at the moment. I am sure it is going to look fantastic though because he has researched so much of how the cabins are supposed to look like I am sure it will be just perfect.

Three more days of work to go. Cannot wait!!!

Just read the blog to Roy……..he has just said it wasn’t any old lace it was a specific depth of lace that had to fit the ticket box……….he is now laughing. Apparently it needs to have a different depth along the shelves. He said if there is anything left over he might make a bonnet out of it ( I think that bit is a joke, at least I hope so…..oh and a pair of pants……now that I would like to see!)

This is the next plan for Foxglove, curtains. Roy is starting to worry me as I have never seen him so eager to go shopping for something like curtains. The reason behind this is because he wants to get the boatman’s cabin finished. He wants the cabin to look very traditional and he has already bought his brass bed knobs, ribbon plates, brass plaques etc etc. This will keep him very busy over the Christmas period. Four more days to go before I finish work for the year. I think this is the first time in a long while I have started to get excited about Christmas. It is going to be nice having some quality time together and spending it on Foxglove.

It has been such a busy weekend that I have not had much time to blog so tonight I am going to rewind back to Friday night and cram the whole weekend in.

As you all know, Davide our friend came over to visit us from Italy. It has been wonderful to see him. Very disappointed that everyone from work did not make the effort to come see him Friday night, however those that did turn up made it a lovely night. Thanks Lynn and Eleanor, Mark & Lizzie and Will. Sometimes it is quality and not quantity! Little Eleanor gave us a good performance  on the piano and she was as good as gold.

Mark was chilled and made great friends with Wish! For some though the night was getting a bit too much and so a little rest was in need, although that turned into playtime. I think Eleanor is going to love an i -pad, as this kept her amused for quite a while.

Amazingly enough,
Tigger even made
a surprise appearance.
Saturday we all went to Trentham Gardens for cappuccinos and cake! Yum! Davide wanted to buy a gift for his parents so we decided to take a look around the shops. Roy had to shoot off to the marina as Mike was coming back with the generator and Angus was going over again to help. Thanks yet again Angus.

I bought a few things for the boat, oven glove, another doormat ( goodness knows how many doormats I get through, it drives Roy mad!), some fake flowers and eucalyptus that I thought would look nice if I cut away at them to make some kind of arrangement for this jug I have on the boat ( Davide didn’t look convinced but I still wanted give it a try) and we also had to visit the pet shop at Trentham. Glad Roy didn’t come with me cause he would have stopped me from going in. Anyway, took advantage of the fact that he wasn’t with me and lucky Wish has a new dog bed! ( Roy has lost count how many dogs beds I have bought since I have had Wish. I just wanted a new one for Wish for when she is on the boat because the other one was to big, at least that is what I convinced Roy.

Davide was great to take shopping as he carried all the bags, gave me more chance to pick  up things to buy!! Sorry Davide. After 1 hour we had decided to go and meet Roy at the boat as I was getting too carried away with the shopping and Davide’s arms were nearly dropping off. It was very Christmasy down at Trentham and it was nice to see people getting in the Christmas sprit.
Saturday night, Roy , Davide & myself went to our favourite restaurant, The Arch Restaurant, in Newcastle. Best Chinese food ever! We all had our photos taken before we went out. Even Wish got in the act.

 
Lovely meal although we all ate far too much. Davide always manages to make us laugh and he did not disappoint tonight. They gave us all fresh fruit at the end of the meal which is the first time they have done that. Davide decided to eat the oranges! Good night out though and then we went back home and watched the new Batman film. We were all shattered by the end of the evening.

Sunday morning and it was time for Davide to go back home. He said his goodbyes to Roy at the house as Roy had to go back to the boat as the generator was being installed today.  Wish surprised Davide this morning with her Christmas bow on and she seemed to know he was going and she lay down in the hallway as he said goodbye to her.

Off we went to East Midlands airport. Anyway who knows me well enough will know that this was a big thing for me as I am not very good going to new places especially when I have to get back on my own. Anyway, we went into the airport and it was very quiet considering it was only 10 am ‘ish ( notice the ish there Davide, new word he learnt this weekend) They had put up a beautiful Christmas tree which we decided to take pictures of and then we went for a coffee togehter. It was very sad to say goodbye but I have promised Davide that I will go to Italy with Roy and visit him soon. Got to get a bit more confidence in myself first, but I promise Davide it will be next year!

I left Davide at the airport and I was in a complete panic but to cut a long story short I found my way home without a problem and worried myself for nothing.

Went and met Roy back at the boat and Mike was still installing the generator. Angus was there again to help lift it into palce. Don’t know what we would have done without him. He has been a good friend. He even thought my flower displaywas great! ( I will make one for you boat Angus as you loved it so much, only joking!)

Roy has done quite a bit on the boat still this weekend. Lots of things still to do but it is looking better each weekend.

Had a beautiful present given me as well last week which I thought would look lovely on the bath and it does. Thank you for the gift ( you know who you are 😉 )

Thanks Anita for bag,
they always come in useful.

Talking about friends, Lynda & Haydn off Narrowbaot Tinker came and joined us this afternoon for drinks and a bit of a buffet. Whilst they were here suddenly all the lights got brighter and there was this funny noise in the background. It was the gerneator. All up and working! Fabulous. Definitely time to pop the champagne. Had a real good laugh with Haydn & Lynda. Can’t wait to see them again over Christmas.

All in all it has been a great weekend. One more week of work to go. Cannot wait! Really looking forward to this Christmas.

Well today has been very busy and we still have our guest Davide over, so tonights blog will have to be very quick. I think todays picture was a moment not to be missed. It was just something I looked at and thought that would make a perfect picture and was quite funny.

Your normal men going down the pub senario after a hard job was not quite the image today.Far more civilised.

It was chocolate cupcakes and a cup of tea.!!

The picture says it all.

That is exactly what tonight has been, a good evening! Friends from work came over to see Davide who we all used to work with. Our youngest guest was little Eleanor. So so cute!! Plenty of wine flowing and lots of laughter. Lots of catching up to do this weekend.   Really late tonight so just a quick blog.

Oh my goodness, I got home from work tonight and spent 3 hours doing housework, mainly because our friend from Italy, who I used to work with, is coming over to visit and I have also invited everyone from work to come over and see him whilst he is here, so I just wanted everything to look nice. Not used to entertaining lots of people so I am a bit nervous about tomorrow night. Anyway, got a bit side-tracked there but the reason I am writing tonight about housework is that it would never take this amount of time to clean up the whole boat. Sometimes I wonder how much time I would save and have time to do other things if there wasn’t so much housework to do all the time. That is another thing I like about the boat. You are living in such a small space it does not take that long at all to have a good clean up.

Six more work days then Roy and myself will actually get a break. Cannot wait. Seems ages since we have had a day off. In fact the last day we took a day off was the day we had the survey done on Foxglove. It is going to be so nice having Christmas on the boat.

One thing that I find quite amazing, actually quite funny is that Roy is really into this engine, The Gardner 2 LW. Actually I have to admit it does look quite stunning. Roy is the kind of person who never even adds windscreen fluid into his car so when he first got interested in changing oil filters, fuel filters and all kinds of jobs like that I was quite gob smacked. This engine is far more complicated though and he is really into it. He always thinks I am quite obsessive about my cleaning, can’t wait to see what he is going to be like with the engine and the boatman’s cabin. I think it will be the shiniest engine ever!! 😉

Received a lovely comment today from the lady off narrowboat Hadar. Nice words of encouragement and I really appreciated her time writing it. She has had no regrets about living aboard permanently and I really wish we would both take the plunge now and do it. We are definitely going to be trying it out for the next few months but Roy has concerns that because we are both working full time and with him running his own business he just worries that it won’t be the same experience as when we have used the boat in the past purely for holidays and weekends. Anyway, as I have said before, time will tell.

Already looking forward to the weekend. We might even have time to decorate the boat for Christmas. Our friend from Italy who used to work with me is coming back over to visit……Hi Davide! There will definitely be lots of photos this weekend!!!