Christmas Tree Decorations

 I finished cross stitching the three little Christmas tree decorations and have completed two using the ribbon and bell from those Lindt bunnies (which by-the-way were Far Too Much chocolate! so it's a good thing they are too expensive to buy anywhere other than a car-boot sale!)

 My original tree decs like these from many years ago used cotton backing and were stuffed to make them really plump, I've not done that with these. The felt backing, and just a thin layer of wadding and the bell are enough. Don't think they are good enough to give away. I'm better at the X stitch than the putting together bit!

What a waste of time the year of Latin I did at grammar school was and how much more useful it would have been to do sewing and knitting................ Although in reality I'd rather be reading!

A Lot of News About..............

......................something of no interest to 99.9% of the population.

I don't know how many times over the weekend and on Monday I heard on the radio news that Oxford Street in London had been pedestrianised.

So???

Many towns and cities in all parts of the country have pedestrianised shopping centres. News about nothing.

I think it's called London-Centric - meaning too much importance on London. Of course this is one reason our new PM got his job - being a bloke from 'up north' and reminding everyone that there is more to the England than London.

It annoys me that the BBC have shortened news programmes from local areas. Look East - the BBC  early evening regional news TV programme used to be half an hour and divided into two parts for east and west of the area. Now it's often just 20 minutes squeezed into the national news and covers everywhere from Milton Keynes and Peterborough in the west to Lowestoft in the East.

I think I heard they are getting rid of BBC Radio Scotland  sometime too.

Really this is a post about nothing of interest - so 99.9% of readers should ignore!😐

Vases All Packed................

.................and then I was given a bunch of flowers.

The only thing I had still in the cupboard to put them in was a water jug. So I'll need to give it a really good clean later.

The flowers, a card and a box of chocolates were a surprise gift from the Keep Moving Exercise Group. I'd ended up doing almost everything (while a few just got out their own chair and then later sat waiting for coffee!) and as I was moving I decided to give up now rather than later. I hope it will keep going but after 4 years of hardly missing a week and too much responsibility, I'd had enough. I emailed the Village Hall treasurer to say I'd left all information about paying etc but not sure who would be taking over.

(I'm putting the chocolates into the 'being prepared' food box for winter emergency's! Much more appealing than cold baked beans!) 

On Saturday I had an email from the Village Hall Chairman asking for a contact number for who was doing the money now as they'd received no payment for last weeks Keep Moving Group. Every week for nearly four years I'd been dropping the money into the treasurer on my way home but it seems that  they didn't get organised to do this after all! 

I explained it's no longer anything to do with me!

Another Week of October

 As usual the week has rushed by and now October only has one week left. I've not been far at all as  the man from the removal company brought me a big heap of boxes so I've started packing and took two more bags of all-sorts to charity shops. Plus grandchildren's toys they've grown out of are also on their way out of the house.

The buyers of my bungalow had a survey done here during the week. We never bothered in any of our umpteen moves reckoning that Col would fix anything that goes wrong and if a property has been standing for 30 or 40 years it's not likely to fall down! And once we'd done up a very, very, old house back to it's timber frame and dirt floor anything else would be easy. 

I'd never seen a surveyor in action and I couldn't believe how long it took as he went round tapping all the walls, taking photos outside of roof and inside of ceilings and switching lights on and off as well as opening,  locking and unlocking all the doors. It's a 1983 bungalow, standard construction and really not much to go wrong - I wonder how much the buyers are being charged?  

First named storm of the season arrived yesterday. Worse in the south-west of the country, but lots of rain here then another storm arriving today, this time worse up north but with more rain forecast everywhere for later.  Almost all week has been a bit gloomy although I managed to get washing more or less dry on Thursday. Hopefully this rainy spell will help fill the reservoirs and the ground water.

Good news about a detective drama returning on BBC in November -Return to Paradise which is the Australian spin-off of Death in Paradise, will be back for a 3rd series. I've never watched Beyond Paradise which is the UK spin off as it seemed a bit silly.

 Info about the NCIS Origins series also keeps popping up, but we can't get it here for free.

Have a good weekend - hope you get power back if you lost it in the South-west and hope you don't lose electric in storm Boleo if you are in the north.

The Horse Chestnut October Photo

 I'm a bit late with the October photo and the leaves are falling and the conkers have gone.

The ground underneath the tree is covered with the conker shells but not a conker to be seen. They've been taken by squirrels I guess or children although there probably aren't many children in this village.

The leaves show signs of the disease and normal autumn changes. With windy weather forecast I guess many more leaves will be on the ground after the weekend.

All the other photos of the tree through the year are HERE.

Collared Doves

 Collared Doves are much neater birds than fat pigeons and very shy so these are awful photos through the window. They nearly always visit the garden in pairs.

My bird book says they are widespread and common in suburban gardens and farming areas. But have only been a British bird since arriving from south-east Europe in the 1950s. The thing to spot to know it's a collared dove is the black half collar around the neck. These are young birds as they lack the dark collar.

Turtle Doves are completely different and only summer visitors and white doves released at weddings are really variants of homing pigeons. 

In my book "The Poetry of Birds" there is a poem dating from 1986 titled 'Listening to Collared Doves' by E.J. Scovell  (1907 - 1999) but it's not very interesting and not about the doves at all!

Ghosts on TV and in a Book

 Have you watched the new series of a TV programme called Winter?

Winter is a police procedural television series set to broadcast on ITV and ITVX and PBS Masterpiece. It is starring Richard Armitage and Annabel Scholey and is based on the long-running French series Balthazar. It premiered on ITV on 30 September 2026.

In Bristol, forensic pathologist Dr Ethan Winter and policewoman DI Lauren Bell work together to solve complex crimes.

One of the themes of this TV series is that his wife was murdered in odd circumstances, yet she appears  to him and they talk and she seems a very real ghost!

There are 6 programmes in the first series and  a second series has been commissioned. 

Balthazar is on ITVX too for comparing French and English versions

 Then I read a book by a new to me author, the first in a series.

17 years ago the inhabitants of Edenscar, a small town in the Peak District, was hit by tragedy when a school bus veered off the road and plunged into the reservoir. Everyone on board drowned except for young Joseph Ashe. His miraculous survival has haunted him and the town ever since. 

Joseph still 'sees' his best friend who died in the crash. Yet is amazingly real and has also grown up as Joseph has. Also when Joseph sees the parent of one of the drowned children that parent is able to 'see' their dead child beside Joseph.

Joseph is now a Detective Sergeant in the local police and is called to the scene of a brutal and apparently inexplicable crime. The whole town is spooked but Joe's new boss DI Laurie Bower, who is more used to inner-city police work, has no time for superstition. She just wants to find the real killer who has left no trace and seems to have no motive. 

Then just to add in another TV series on 4 called Anna Pigeon, taken from books by Nevada Barr. Which is about an Enforcement Park Ranger in Montana, but filmed in Calgary, who gets herself in to all sorts of trouble but often sees her dead husband whenever she is in danger. (Surprising that we have this series over here so quickly as it's brand new in the USA and Canada).

Having very real ghosts in fiction isn't a new thing of course  and I watched something on Walter Presents channel a couple of years ago where a police person had his dead wife often visit him. Can't remember what it was - something from Europe with subtitles but not Balthazar which is mentioned above.

 It seemed an odd coincidence to read  a book and watch two TV series with 'real' ghosts in the same month. 

A Different Cheese To Try

 I came home from a visit to YD and EGD via the Co-op in Debenham for the locally made  Lane Farm  sausages and while I was there looked at their range of 'artisan' (that just means expensive!) cheeses, to try something different.

Choose this smoked cheese from a producer I'd not heard of .

After googling I found they'd been around for 25 years...

I love cheese, any cheese, and there hasn't been a cheese I've tried in the 19 cheese tasting posts that I've not liked at all, but I'm afraid this one really wasn't good. Has to be eaten rather than thrown out but it's hard with an odd after taste.

Aldi don't have their multi grain crackers/biscuits that I used to get so I got these Salt and Pepper ones and goodness they really are peppery which is good as it overpowers the cheese!

Books Coming in 2027

 I was excited to find Jacqueline Winspear - author of the Maisie Dobbs stories - has a new book being published next year, three years after writing the final Maisie Dobb story. I added it to my list to reserve at the library next year. It's titled ' Charlie Bright' and should be published in March. Hopefully the start of a new series.

Already on my list are several other books by favourite authors due.................

Sally Smith's third book in the Trials of Gabriel Ward series - A Case of Fear or Favour is due in January

Chris Nickson has a new series starting in February

Tim Sullivan has 'The Baker' due in April, another George Cross book

Anthony Horowitz has 'The Vanishing Jury' also due April this is in his Horowitz/Hawthorne series

A New-to-me author, Sarah Hilary, has the second in a series due to be published in April

Jane Thynne's new book 'The Woman with No Shadow' is out in May

Alan Parks has the third in the Joseph Gunner series due in July

Rachel Hore has a new book due in June 2027 'Song for a Suffragette'

The third book by William Shaw in the DS Eden Driscoll series is being published in July 2027

Tracy Chevalier's new book 'My Name is Agnes' is due in September

and in October next year Ann Cleeves is publishing ' The Final Vera'

St. Luke's Day

Tomorrow, October the 18th, is St Luke's Day (unless you are reading this on Sunday in which case it's today and if you are reading any later than Sunday - it's gone already!) and in the books of weather sayings they always mention St. Luke's Little Summer. This is a spell of warmer, dry days that often occur around this time. As October 2026  has, so far, been warm and mainly dry anyway this won't be much of a change this year.

 Below is the illustration from the  St Luke page of the Calendar Of Saints book. The description says mosaic in S.Vitale, Ravenna.

St Luke is the patron saint of physicians and artists and wrote his own gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. He is thought to have been a doctor and went with St Paul on one of his missionary journeys. He might have been a Greek Doctor from Antioch or an Hellenic Jew (combining Judaism with Greek Culture).

Luke's gospel has some stories from the life of Jesus that don't appear in the other gospels even though it's known that he didn't witness the work of Jesus himself. It's thought he lived until aged 80+ before dying in Greece.

Luke was often in religious pictures accompanied by an ox with horns and this led to fairs being held on his feast day called 'Horn Fairs'. A notorious one was in  Charlton in Kent, where the parish church is dedicated to St Luke. Horns were the theme, there would be horns for sale and merchandise made of horn and people would wear horns on their heads. People found the wearing of horns very amusing because of their sexual link. The crowds flocked to this fair until it was condemned for it's rudeness and indecency and eventually in 1872 it was banned.

The October Library Book Photo

Not so many books for me from the mobile library this time 'just' 12. 11 were reserved online and one plucked from the shelves.

Unusually there are four non-fiction this time.

The four non fiction are on the right although one is a thin book and hidden and I couldn't be bothered to take another photo.

As Kingfishers Catch Fire is a book about books and birds

Angels in the Cellar - A New life in a vineyard in France - no idea why I reserved this

Don't Forget We're Here Forever - no idea - must have seen it somewhere

Autumn by Kate Mosse is the one hidden

The fiction are as usual mostly crime except for September by Rosamund Pilcher which someone mentioned - not read any of her books for years.

Last month I came home with a huge heap of reserved books and have managed to read the majority. There was some really good reading and I even got on well with new-to-me authors.

These are the books from the the photo read and enjoyed in the last 4 weeks, copied from my Books Read 2026 page

• Tim Sullivan - The Cyclist. Crime Fiction (Published 2020) The second in this series featuring Detective George Cross. In this story there are lots of leads when a Greek restaurant owner and very keen cyclist is killed. There could be a link with drugs or with foreign criminals but maybe the murderer is closer to family.
• Susie Dent- Death Writ Large. Crime Fiction (Published 2026) The second book to feature Oxford Lexicographer Martha Thornhill and her colleagues at the Clarendon English Dictionary. In this story graffiti and mysterious symbols appear around Oxford at the same time as the body of a Lecturer is found at the bottom of the church tower. The police decide it's suicide but the messages and runes deciphered by Martha seem to predict a death and more to follow.
• Kate Ellis - Chapel of Bones. Crime Fiction (Published 2026) This is the 30th in the series set in Dartmouth in Devon (Tradmouth in the books) with DI Wesley Peterson and his colleagues. All of this series mix history with present times and archaeology comes into all of them too. This one starts with the mummified body of Dr Aleric Donnal, a historian last seen ten years ago, which is found bricked up in a wall in a large country house.
• Rachel Hore - The French Spy Mistress. Fiction (Published 2026) During the Second World  War there were two women with courage. This story is fiction but based on the true stories. In France Marie- Louise is recruited into and then leads a secret organisation called Alliance using agents all round the country to gather information to pass onto the British at MI6. In Sussex Sarah has been an ordinary wife and mother until her husband is asked to use his home as a stop- over for secret agents going to and from France. Marie-Louise and Sarah's lives collide as things get more and more dangerous.
• Louise Penny - A Fatal Grace. Crime Fiction. (Published 2006) The second in the Chief Inspector Gamache series set in Three Pines a village in Canada. Its winter and at the Boxing Day curling match everything is as usual until a huge scream and the death by electrocution of a spectator. It seems she was a person no one liked and even her husband and daughter are suspects. But why did no one in the crowd see what happened - or are they just keeping quiet for their own reasons

• Rory Clements - Invitation From A Dictator. Crime Fiction (Published 2026) Book 3 in the Detective Sebastian Wolff series set in Munich in Germany in the years leading to WWII. When King Edward the VIII (recently abdicated from the British throne) and his new bride Wallace Simpson are invited to Germany by Hitler it causes all sorts of problems for Wolff, trying to walk a line fighting against darkness and brutality without causing grief to his son and his sons mother - who has her own agenda - or to his partner Hexie.
• Joel Hames - The Viewpoint. Crime Fiction. (Published 2026) Second in the series featuring the Cumbrian detectives in the Professional Standards Division. The murder of a known criminal in a remote area shouldn't get the PSD team involved but then one of the investigating officers is attacked and camera footage goes missing Carl and his team are dragged in to the investigation.
• Phillipa Perry - Shrink Solves Murder. Crime Fiction (Published 2026). When a body is found near Beachy Head the police decide it is suicide but psychotherapist Patricia Phillips isn't so sure. The victim was her three o'clock patient, Henry Clayton, and she been helping him for a while and was sure that suicide had not been on his mind at all. As she gets drawn into investigation with her friend and neighbour Pritchard they uncover all sorts of secrets about their neighbours.
• Alexander McCall Smith -The Big Cats Dance Party. Crime Fiction. (Published 2026)Another in the long series set in Botswana with the No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. In this story Mma Ramotswe etc all travel to visit the villages near an elephant sanctuary to find who is so angry with their work. Meanwhile Charlie is left in charge and solves a clients mystery all my himself.
• Ariel Lawhon - The Frozen River. Fiction (Published 2023 USA and 2025 Here). Based on the real person this story is about Martha Ballard, a midwife and healer in Maine in 1789. Maine, 1789: When the Kennebec River freezes, entombing a man in the ice, Martha Ballard is summoned to examine the body and determine cause of death. As a midwife and healer, she is privy to much of what goes on behind closed doors in Hallowell. Her diary is a record of every birth and death, crime and debacle that unfolds in the close-knit community. Months earlier, Martha documented the details of an alleged rape committed by two of the town’s most respected gentlemen—one of whom has now been found dead in the ice. But when a local physician undermines her conclusion, declaring the death to be an accident, Martha is forced to investigate the shocking murder on her own.
  Over the course of one winter, as the trial nears, and whispers and prejudices mount, Martha doggedly pursues the truth. Her diary soon lands at the center of the scandal, implicating those she loves, and compelling Martha to decide where her own loyalties lie.

The Last Apples

 I brought in the last apples from my little Falstaff tree. Almost every apple this year has been damaged by critters, probably codling moth larva.............

The codling moth or codlin moth is a member of the Lepidopteran family Tortricidae. They are major pests to agricultural crops, mainly fruits such as apples and pears, and a codling moth larva is often called an "apple worm"

When BiL was here doing the hedge last week he tried one of the apples and wondered why I'd let so many fall off. I said I hadn't 'let' them fall off but they've gone bad from the inside out and fell off. I've been eating apples everyday and couldn't pick them for keeping due to their damage.

In our orchard at the smallholding we always hung  Codling moth traps and then painted the trunks with a ring of black sticky stuff to stop bugs crawling up the trunks. It didn't seem worth the expense here for five small trees and this is the first year there has been damage.

(Someone wondered if BiL was moving too. Had to laugh at that idea! He has only ever lived in two houses in his 67 years, a confirmed bachelor and very set in his ways. His Dad also only lived in the same two houses in his  80+ years. The house where he lived as a child, moving to a tied cottage on a farm when he married and back to the first house with the family when his parents died. Of course Colin was the same ..................... until he met me!)

October Trees and Flint

At this time of the year as the colours change you can see all the different trees across the field.

The industrial fencing is around land that will eventually be new housing, a sign says 'Launching Autumn 2026' but there is no sign of work starting yet. Locally there are two sites of new housing where the builders have gone bankrupt and houses remain unsold and unfinished and one new site at the other end of the village where builders have just started.

The Ash tree below has lost it's leaves already, I wouldn't be surprised  if it is on it's way out with Ash Tree dieback disease.

Further up the lane this Ash still hangs on to all it's leaves, against a very grey sky.

We don't have granite, sandstone, limestone or any other rock in Suffolk but plenty of flint and this huge piece, over a foot across, must have been ploughed out of the field recently as it was laying on a field edge and I've not seen it there before. It would be a lovely piece to keep - except it's too heavy to move!

Best Before End Dates

 A few weeks ago I mentioned the tins of carrots tucked away at the back of the cupboard that had a Best Before End Date of 2024, I can't find the post now but I know several people leapt up to say that BBE dates are only advisory about quality (yes I know!). Then I found the Lindt chocolate rabbits at the boot sale also past BBE but perfectly fine with enough sugar in to preserve for a very long time and the coffee which was years out of date mentioned ages ago.

It's a good thing I don't take any notice of BBE dates.

The tinned carrots and the Lindt bunnies were all perfectly good as I knew they would be. 

After 'finding' the tins of carrots I also 'found' 2 tins of potatoes, a small tin of ham and two cans of mandarins in syrup, all several years past BBE.  (I say 'found' because I knew they were there, just not how long they'd been there!) 

I'm eating my way through them .

I've just realised that with the mandarins  being dated BBE January 2021 they were bought before I moved here and therefore must have been in storage when I moved between holiday lets. Good grief!

Squash

 Not the sort played in a four walled box, with a hard bouncy ball. I went to watch someone play once - vicious and much too energetic!

My squash are 5 Butternut and I only had one plant - they obviously really loved the heat. There are 3 others too but they're not ready yet and probably won't be suitable for keeping.

It's a good thing that as long as they are kept dry they'll last ages until I can use them all.

Saturday 10th

 Random Stuff..................

• Heating oil is really being saved with the warm weather most of the week. So far this autumn the heating has only switched itself on on a few mornings but off again less than an hour later. We had rain on two days this week, more than there has been for months.

• BiL got here to cut the yew hedge out the front - it took less than an hour to cut and clear up, it would have taken me days with my small hedge cutter. He stopped for a coffee and a chat which is good - he has a very busy schedule for a retired person!!

• Thank you for all the comments about charity shop clothes last Tuesday. It was interesting but I'm still puzzling about the comment from anon who actually came back to explain his/her comment but I still didn't understand their assumption that buying secondhand means I'm denying myself the pleasure of buying new or I'm somehow implying it is wrong to buy anything other than second-hand.............. They don't know me at all!

• Remembered to go and find a diary (NEW!) from The Works when I was in town. I'm ready for the new year.

• I've actually watched England playing football on TV in the Nations League - they do seem to be playing well at the moment. I really prefer watching rugby but when Harry Kane etc are scoring so many goals it's easier to watch...........guess that makes me a 'fair weather' football watcher.

• Finished reading Phillipa Perry's first crime fiction book 'Shrink Solves Murder'. It was a good story. It's always interesting to see a well known person writing fiction, sometimes they are successful and this definitely falls into that category as she is writing about what she knows. I'm sure there will be another book to follow.

• It's EGD's 10th birthday this weekend so off to see her and meanwhile down in Surrey YGS is settling in at school while Daughter sorts out a High School application ready for EGS . Many schools there are HUGE, she said that their nearest has a ten class intake each year! So funny to think back to my schooldays with just 6 children the same age at my primary school and a 90 pupil intake at Grammar School. A whole different world.

• Hope mentioning a house move wasn't a mistake, maybe tempting fate? The housing market is very odd and I wouldn't be surprised to get a phone call to say someone had pulled out. I'm primed for disappointment but hoping for success. Please forget I mentioned it!

• Imagine watching a live streaming of execution by a firing squad in 2026 - no thanks.

Have a good weekend ..........I hope to be back Monday.

On the Move Again?

 Yes! 

After the 2020-2021 move to here which dragged on for 7 months including nearly 9 weeks in holiday homes in between, I thought it best not to mention moving until I was sure it was happening, but, fingers crossed, all seems to be going well.

After just a couple of years here I knew I shouldn't have downsized so drastically. After living on 5 acres at the smallholding and then 1 acre I really missed the space and open outlook of Clay Cottage (the cottage at the end of the lane).

My bungalow has been for sale for 18 months and finally found a buyer who then pulled out after 4 weeks just as I found something I liked (I viewed about 10 properties in that summer heat, most were too tatty or too expensive.) Luckily just as I'd almost given up hope,  a new buyer was found for this place and  a bungalow I liked and could afford and had viewed in August came back onto the market, and it all fell into place in the space of 3 busy days. 

So now I'm heading back toward the East coast, just a few miles from the sea, and just 4 miles from YD and YGD. Son and DiL have their house for sale and hope to move nearer the coast too.

Mad?    Probably!.................. I'm excited but nervous.

No idea how long it will take but the chain is short - just 4 people. So maybe before Christmas?

Something To Stitch

 I wanted to get back to a hobby that I'd not done for a long time and have been looking on ebay for a tapestry to stitch.

Eventually this came up. It said " Has been opened but not started" and looked as if it had all the wool still included. It's just the sort of picture that I might have bought to stitch years ago but are now a bit out of fashion.

It's finished size is 12 inches by 18 inches which seemed a size that I would be able to find a picture frame for.

My small stitching frame has those twisty clips to fix but the big frame is very old and the tapestry has to be attached by stitching it to a canvas strip at the top and bottom, which isn't the easiest thing to do. Eventually got it onto the frame.

Now I need to sort the wools.

But in the meantime I'd started on the small X stitch Christmas tree decorations and had all those 15 library books to read, so the wool tapestry has been put on hold for now. 

This tapestry to stitch is one would have been apt for this year, with the Bayeux Tapestry (which isn't a tapestry and probably not stitched in Bayeux) being here in this country for a while.........but not at £86!

The Other September Car-Boot Finds.

  For a Christmas present £1 - My Essex friend likes traditional ways of doing things, including using proper handkerchiefs.

Pack of 6 suet blocks for the birds £2

2 Christmas Bags, 50p each for Granddaughters who will probably get a bag full of crafting bits.

A pack of 5 new flannels £2 - they were wrapped and tied with a ribbon but I forgot to photograph

Exciting..........a new loo brush! and a bag of heavy duty rubbish bags - £1 each.

50p each for two shower scrubby things - do they have a proper name? Don't think I saved much money for these.

And something from a charity shop that will be part of YGDs birthday present. £2.50 for a pretty photo frame.

All useful without breaking the bank.

Charity Shop or New?

 I've always bought clothes from charity shops whenever I can but I looked at a secondhand winter tunic top in the Barnardos Charity shop it was £8. I looked at a new tunic top in Asda and it was £12. I didn't buy either, I can manage with those I have for another year.

I looked at used tee-shirts in charity shops in the summer and they were often £6.

For the grand total of £5 I bought three new from the car boot sale. They are ex Original Factory Shop - a company that closed down last year. They'd been sold in their shops for £8 each. Someone had bought-up a lot of their stock.

Choosing what's best to do (planet or purse?) used to be easy - now not so much .

Another Good Story...........

  ................from this author.

Rachel Hore's books are always so well researched. This is her latest and is the fictional account based on two real women who showed courage and resilience in World War II.

This is the story of one of the secret organisations working in occupied France. Much has been written about the French Resistance , working directly against the Nazis but another organisation - The Alliance- secretly gathered valuable  information using agents all around the country and passed this to MI6 in England.

Details from the Fantastic Fiction website............

In Occupied France

Marie-Louise, a headstrong, single woman with two young children, is recruited into a secret intelligence network. She must collect privileged information about German military activities to help the Allies liberate her country. Her skill and daring will propel her to the top of the organization - and along a path of hidden passion and extreme danger.

Deep in the English countryside

Sarah, a Sussex wife and mother, looks after evacuees and keeps the home fires burning while her husband is away on secret war work. When she’s suddenly plucked from this life of humdrum duty to run a safe house for foreign agents, she is forced to make sacrifices that threaten her health, her family and her personal happiness.

As Marie-Louise and Sarah’s lives collide, the danger mounts in this exciting and moving story about the resilience of the human spirit.

The real life women were Marie-Madeline Meric - who published her own memoir in 1968 Noah's Ark and Barbara Bertram wrote French Resistance in Sussex. Her son Jerome later wrote a book about his mother and father's war work The Secret of Bignor Manor.

Rachel Hore says in her Authors note

"In my novel I have simplified historical events and the large cast of characters for dramatic reasons and to avoid writing a multi-volume work!"

and the book really does race through the 6 years of war but as she says it was the best way to do it or the book would have been huge. 

I've enjoyed many of this authors books and this is another really good read.

Saturday Round-up. Wordy With No Photos!

Is the blog reading list updating hitch resolved? - on Wednesday it seemed to be........and on Thursday...........yes and Friday...........still OK - this looks very hopeful but where have some of the regular bloggers gone? especially Janice at Jabblog, who  used to post almost everyday. It's worrying.

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Hearing the story unfold about the men arrested near an RAF airbase used by the USAF was very odd if you'd been watching the recent series of the drama Trigger Point on TV a couple of weeks ago. The story there was bombers supposedly being from Iran - but actually they weren't. They were just trying to start a world war. Their bomb was nuclear  (thank God just fiction). 

There seems more to the story of the men here in Fairford, Gloucestershire. A 999 phone call from one of the men to the police(?) very odd.  No explosives found - just petrol (which they would have needed if they were stealing quad bikes - which is the more usual reason that men in balaclavas and white vans are sneaking round the countryside) And they were released on bail - which terrorists surely would NOT have been. Politicians from other countries chipped in with their tuppence worth - could have done without hearing from them......... Then someone in London arrested. I guess we will find out eventually.

What I want to know is............ have they stepped up security on the two bases used by the USAF in Suffolk? One has the huge KC135 Stratotankers used to refuel  USAF planes. Not a mention has been made of them.....as far as I've heard.

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The grass was cut again, it's amazing that even without much rain it's growing like crazy. I'm waiting for a heavy rainfall to see how well the gutter clearing has worked, but there was only a light drizzle, that didn't last on Wednesday. I also finished clearing out the greenhouse bringing in the last few tomatoes to finish ripening indoors. Have to say that pulling grow bags out of the greenhouse and tipping out onto the veg beds is much easier than hauling out big pots.

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I'm now reading the 2nd Louise Penny Chief Inspector Gamache series and wondering why I've never got into them before. Just like the Donna Leon Brunetti series that I didn't try until a few years ago but then loved and read them all (and I've just discovered that there is another due in 2027 after a 3 year gap - she's 84 now so no wonder she's slowing down!) Maybe years ago I was put off by crime fiction set in other countries and now I'm more adventurous?  Anyway, I went onto the library website to reserve the 3rd and 4th and found that for many of the early books in the series - from the early 2,000s - the library has just one copy or none and the more recently published have very long waiting lists. Then I hopped over to amazon and discovered I could buy a huge set of the first 15 for less than £2.50 each. As I'd not bought hardly any books from anywhere recently I went mad and ordered - these will be my Christmas present - instead of my usual Chocolate liqueurs- and will be for the just-in-case emergency/winter book store! 

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To watch or not to watch - that is the question. Strictly Come Dancing - yes I'll watch as it's good for Saturday Night glitter from now until Christmas. I know nothing about most of the celebs so have no favourites. I'll just watch for the skill of the professional dancers, choreographers and band  and the brilliant people who do the costumes and sets.

The much hyped Celebrity Traitors. The jury's out. I did watch part one just to see who was on it, some people I've never heard of but lots of well known comedians. Maybe it's for half-watching -with reading at the same time.

The only thing in the diary for the weekend is too far away, given the huge increase in diesel prices, so I won't be going far.

 Hope you all have a good weekend, I'll be back Monday.

Oven Gloves

 Filling regular blog posts means sometimes they are very boring! and this one comes with a warning as this is the first of three posts about car-boot sale finds.........sorry.

I found a pair of brand new heavy duty oven gloves at the Sunday boot sale for £2. They looked just like the ones I like to use that come from the Lakeland company but the packaging wasn't  the usual  Lakeland labelling, although that little tag looked vaguely familiar.

I couldn't remember if I had a spare  in the cupboard already - they are something I've found at boot sales before, but at £2 I knew they were a good money saver. When I got home I put my glasses on and found a tiny note on the back saying they were made for Lakeland.

They'll last ages because they are good quality and are now £9.99 new. 

On the Lakeland website there are all sorts of oven gloves, some like mittens, one for each hand, some shaped like a glove puppet with an opening 'mouth', some made of silicon, and some coloured to match your kitchen. They range in price from £7.99 to £14.99. Or on Amazon there are over 1,000 different sorts listed! 

What sort of oven gloves do you prefer, or do you just grab a handy tea-towel? 

October Days

 Here are the October events from my little Almanac book and the way the months rush by it'll soon be Halloween, and of course the shops have been full of Halloween things for weeks already. 

Looking back at previous October 1st posts and I've already written about so many weather sayings. There were several HERE in the October 1st post from 2024.

So instead I looked in the Illustrated Country Year book by Celia Lewis and found these lovely Thrush illustrations in the October section.

And in the Miranda Mills Country Commonplace Book I found a poem by Robert Bridges

North Wind in October

In the golden glade the chestnuts are fallen all;

From the seared boughs of the oak the acorns fall:

The beech scatters her ruddy fire;

The lime hath stripped to the cold,

And standeth naked above her yellow attire:

The larch thinneth her spire

To lay the ways of the wood with cloth of gold.

Out of the golden-green and white

Of the brake the fir-trees stand upright

In the forest of flame, and wave aloft

To the blue of heaven their blue-green tuftings soft

But swiftly in shuddering gloom the splendours fail,

As the harrying North-wind beareth

A cloud of skirmishing hail

The grieved woodland to smite:

In a hurricane through the trees he teareth,

Raking the bough and the leaves rending,

And whistleth to the descending

Blows of his icy flail.

Gold and snow he mixeth in spite,

And whirleth afar; as away on his winnowing flight

He passeth, and all again for awhile is bright.

Robert Bridges (1844 -1930)

(Photo from internet thanks to Biały Ług, Kędzierzyn-Koźle, Poland)

September Financials Ins and Outs and Penny Savers

 Just the usual income of State Pension and Suffolk County Council Spouses pension and some interest from savings (and if the Labour party abandon the triple lock for pension increases, they'll be losing an awful lot of votes - I don't think they'll dare do it)

Above all the usual expenses there were just two known extras in September.................. DiL's Birthday and Amazon Prime. The unknown extras were for the repair place for sorting the car tyres, some camping gas cylinders and a wind-up/re-chargeable lantern..........just-in-case.

The usual regular monthly outgoings were  for Council Tax, charity, phones and broadband, monthly electric bill and diesel that came to £390. I topped up with diesel twice, didn't really need to but I found the Co-op garage in Stowupland was several pence cheaper than my local one. Everywhere is now creeping to £2 a litre. I wonder whose fault this is??!

Personal spending was low, only exercise group and a haircut, the Elvis dcuk and chocolate rabbits.

Other spending were mostly small things, except for getting the gutters cleaned....... there hasn't been a good rain since to see what  difference it's made. Food spending already mentioned. Organised YGDs birthday pressie ready for October. Then I got sunflower hearts and suet blocks for the birds and stocked up with paracetamol and ibuprofen for bad weather. Small spends for kitchen bits and washing soda crystals. The window cleaner came - thankfully, as the gutter clearing had made a mess of some windows and then someone told me I had a brake light out so it was back to the repair place where Ashley soon got a new bulb in for just £5. Also found a few useful things from car-boot sales which will be blog posts later.

image from google freepik

A few penny-savers

• Beetroot from BiL's garden
• Eating apples from my small trees
• Last of the tomatoes from greenhouse
• Peppers from greenhouse into freezer
• Gift of pears from friend
• Last of the courgettes from garden
• Bread loaves from bread machine
• Only doing one or two lots of washing each week
• Only use dishwasher every other day
• Lots of days not going out so not spending
• Free postage at Lakeland so I sent for a pack of their good quality freezer bags.
• Reading library books for free - no books bought.
• Make sure to always get the in town parking fee refunded by spending £5 in Asda
• Made up a tin of pre-prepared oranges to make 6 jars of marmalade.

Looking at October and there are more birthdays that need presents ....... YGS and Son as well as cards to nephew and great nephew. 

September 29th - Michaelmas

 Today is the Feast of St Michael and All Angels or Michaelmas, a Quarter Day when farm rents were due, annual employment terms ended, local courts were held and children would finally go back to school after helping with the  harvests. In some places it was called Pack Rag Day because the poorest farm labourers would be packing their few possessions to move to a new job.

 From my book Cattern Cakes and Lace by Barbara Deer and Julia Jones

In one of my books it says that Michaelmas day is the last day that blackberries should be picked. It is said that when St Michael threw Lucifer, the devil, from heaven, he fell from the skies and landed in a blackberry bush making the fruit useless. 

BUT in another book this story is given for October 10th, this difference will be due to the change of calendar when 12 days were lost. In reality it probably depends on the weather and how damp it's been to make the blackberries mouldy.

This year the blackberries here were poor due to the drought and heat of summer and have been finished for several weeks already.

There are several other posts for Michaelmas HERE

The September Food Shopping Photos...............

 ...............for food shopping photo fans and  to fill a blog post again.

First shop on the 2nd was a quick pop into Aldi for a few basics.

Mini pears were on the 'Special 6' offers at 69p; 2 peanuts £1.18; 400g extra strong cheddar £2.45; penne pasta 41p; 4 pints milk £1.65; 2 ground coffee  @ £2.59 = £5.18 (still no decaf); 2 x dried prunes  @ £2.79 =£5.58.

Total £17.14 + half a dozen eggs from a car boot sale £1.50. = £18.64

I'm not a fan of Lidl, they are the wrong side of the town and always seem in a muddle, with long check-out queues but I tried them for decaf ground coffee - they had plenty, same price as Aldi who haven't had decaf for weeks, so I got 2 = £5.18. I noticed they also had plenty of wholemeal bread flour and the wholegrain crackers that Aldi haven't had for weeks. So now I know what to do about Aldi's missing items!......Turn left at the traffic lights instead of right and go home the other way via Lidl.

£18.64 + £5.18 = £23.82

Then a big '4 supermarket shopping trip'.

I've never been to all 4 supermarkets in Stowmarket on the same day before but  decided to do just that three weeks ago, due to Lidl having nectarines on the special 6 fruit/veg offers and Tesco being the only supermarket that had the canned meat I was putting in the cupboard for the zombie apocalypse - or just bad weather! 

It took an age - won't do that again.

£37.75 spent

£18.64 + £5.18 + £37.75 = £61.57

 I forgot to take photo of a quick pop into Tesco when I was over by the coast, when I got a few things to see me through the week around getting the car tyres fixed. Spent £8.29.

£61.57 + £8.29 = £69.86

Then finally after tyres were sorted I had to go into town so went to Aldi (still lots of gaps including   de-caff coffee, tins of sardines, tins of salmon, multi grain biscuits, mini cheese bake biscuits) and Asda(to spend £5 to get £1 parking fee back) which together turned into a big spend because I didn't want to go shopping again....ever! .................well not really ever, but sometimes it feels that would be a good idea.

2 bags of pears, head of calabrese, mini cucs, tin mackerel fillets, 6 eggs, extra mature cheddar, feta, mayo, bacon bits, 4 pints milk, peanuts and cashews, cheese and onion rolls, 'hola' hoops and tortilla chip snacks, bread rolls, naan breads, tin fruit salad. 

Totaled £27.69. Making Septembers food spending £97.55.  

Although I must have missed something because in my accounts book food spending added up to just over £111. Oh well, still not too bad.

Saturday 26th

 The guys at the car repair place put new valves on two of my car tyres so I'm hopeful that will solve the problem and will stop the tyre pressure warning light coming on every few weeks.

Someone asked about the hand-held compressor that I can use for pumping up tyres at home. It' shaped like a electric drill and  has a re-chargeable battery or will also run off the car cigarette lighter thingy and  works well. For many many years we had a huge electric compressor - needed for the tractor and when miles from a garage forecourt  - but after the plug on it got bent and the gauge stopped working it went to BiL's for parts a few years back. It was also incredibly heavy and very LOUD which didn't matter at the smallholding but got the neighbours here all out at their doors wondering what was happening!

After more clearing there's not much left in the greenhouse now and I have enough chopped peppers in the freezer to last months. I'm hoping that BiL will get here soon to do the yew hedge, if not I need to make a start on the Buddleias while the garden waste bin is empty.. I'll probably need to cut the grass again too. It's amazing how quickly it's growing after the summer drought.

Other than going to a solicitors to update stuff to do with YD's house and my will, I've not been far at all this week, but hope to get to the car-boot sales this weekend. It will soon be the end of them for the year so best go while the weather is fine.

Have a good weekend, I'll be back Monday.