This time of year

Autumn trees on the digue

A dog feeding trick we learned and the dogs love - put their biscuits in a bottle. They eat more slowly and enjoy kicking it about to get the food out.

Ruth named this plant Mr Cabbage :-)

Rain on the pansies

The new fridge. No more ice floes in the milk.

The petrol prices :-(

Weather arriving from the north.

When it rains the hills vanish

Grey day, pretty anyway

Tommy : "No comment"

Grey day and burning bush. Proof that we do get dull weather as well as the pretty stuff. I love the autumn colours. Hectic week - when I'd set it up to be calm cos of the new pain relief doses. New fridge - at last. Ruth took off the doors and turned them the right way round - with a little help from me holding and fetching things. New helper this week too - another lovely lady, just yet more explanations. Joanna had low level asthma and so forgot to take some pain and night meds - in a pickle this morning. However much stuff we avoid eating we're still putting on weight - but exercise makes the pain worse. Not sure where we're going on this one :-(

White leaf

Tree melting into a golden puddle.

Plenty of water in the river. After the big rain we could hear it from the flat :-)

Yellow leaf

Bones and Views

Daft dog ! Daft owners :-)

Constantly new areas of problem solving. Working through Joanna's bone pain. Think it's from a combination of being off her feet, light sensitive so avoiding sun, use of Pregablin for nerve pain, then the final straw was taking oral cortisone this spring for the asthma. She was already on vit D supplements, now taking calcium which helps within the day. Amazing how our bodies work normally as fast as our bones are worn away they're being rebuilt !

Today's helper loves taking things to pieces to clean them. I hurtle to get the instruction books out and we manage to get them back together again. Today she has attacked, with unbridled enthusiasm, the washing machine and the dish washer. She ran her finger behind the door seal of the latter and produced something ghastly with the pleasure of a child fishing in it's nose to see what it can find !

Had a lovely time sat with Joanna on the balcony yesterday eating Marmite toast in the late evening sun.

Then Ruth called us through and we watched a wonderful aerobatic display by the starlings from her bedroom window. Being well off the ground we get particularly good and uninterrupted views of things like that, and the town annual firework display at Easter on the bridge over the river. 
 

 Back and front we've got lovely full spread display of autumn colours by the river bank and on the hill sides.

There's water in the river now we've had rain

friends on the prom

here's a poem i wrote for a friend remembering eating fish and chips on cleethorpes promenade together (parody of one of those nice but slushy poems you get in emails)

friends on the prom

if i could throw a chip to land it on the beach
a gull would come and snatch it up before it could reach

if i could take a brush and run it through my hair
the salty wind would whip it up and tangle every whe

re

i cannot make your knees less sore, i've no success with mine,
i cannot make the path of life, less rough with passing time

but i can pray for you my friend, as you have prayed for me
and thank you for the kindness you have shown so faithfully.

EF

New Helpers part 2

New helpers going well. Hot meal every day at lunch ! Plan to try to catch up with pain relief now. Have needed to increase for a while but cos it makes me groggy at first didn't feel safe to leave things to roll. Will try from Weds once I've done the shopping list on Tues. Am relapsing now but enjoyed my remission this summer. Leaves me more hopeful for the future now I know it can happen. Could wish that had had enough help so that could have used my energies for doing other things than just coping here. Well, at least I've been able to sew. That's been lovely. I think I'm pretty burnt out. Just have to chill and get on with the next stage. I'll be able to rest better once the new MP3 player arrives on Thurs. I do love listening to the podcasts of Radio 4 programmes, History Extra and Stuff You Should Know.

Also Our Social Worker made a speech last Tuesday. She went to the new helper and announced that she was to make sure to be thoughtful with me, that I may not look it but I am very poorly and to look after us ! I was all choked up and weepy and that made her weepy too. She said - I never cry. What a difference it makes when some one is nice. Like I said to someone else today, it doesn't cost anything but it's worth diamonds. As it happens this particular helper confided in me after she has 2 sisters both disabled following Hepatitis B jabs like Ruth and Joanna too. !!

New Helpers

The marathon continues here. Said sad goodbyes to the helpers from the other agency. Several of them were lovely. Wish I could have said the same about their management. Now meeting the helpers from the new agency. First one really nice. Much better timetable - just every morning 9 to 12. and one afternoon for the shopping - the supermarket stocks it's fresh fruit and veg on Tuesday mornings. And they're doing the dog walks. Whew !!