Saturday and bummed I woke at 7.30am......without an alarm!! Tony was at work so it was just me and the dogs in bed. Got up, had a cuppa tea and hung out the washing I had put on delay to start during the night. Not the bright sunny start to the day I was hoping but maybe the cloud cover will burn off later. The kids start to rise around 8.30am onwards which meant that Lara had gotten the tv controller and I would now be subjected to severe pyschological damage - Death by Hannah Montanna!!!!!!
Tony came home not long after and still looked pretty crook but still he offered to drive us to the watergarden place for some more marginal plants (apparently this helps attracts newts) and some big slate rocks to put behind the pond and then later I will plant some shrubs around it too before the gravel goes down. Lara comes with us and of course she see's all the water features and starts working on Tony to buy a waterfall kit...NOOOO its a wildlife pond NOT an ornamental one. We stop off at Tesco's on the way back to buy dinner and somehow in my strange crazy mixed up "mother nature" affected brain it felt like the two of them were ganging up on me which caused me to strop and just walk off home.
They get home around 15minutes after me and Tony tentatively enquires if I have calmed down yet and would I like some lunch.....I say sorry I was grumpy and tetchy I just can't help it and he should know better by now. All's forgiven and we head into the garden, I help him cut the grass - well holding the hessian sack open for him to deposit the cuttings in is helping in my books and I made him a coffee. We added the white crushed pottery pieces (more eco friendly than buying aggregate and cheaper too) to the bottom of the pond and then put some large pebbles in piles here and there at the bottom...weighted some oxygenating weed between the rocks and put my new marginals in...at this point we noticed a frog, not the frog prince himself (he's back in the old bucket) but a new frog. If only Lara would stop trying to catch the fish by hand the frog might have stayed a little longer!!!
We sat in the sun for a while just chatting and then came in and I pottered about while Tony watched the Grand Prix qualifying.....with his eyes SHUT!! He's really good at that, no matter how quietly I get the controllers he wakes up! PS3 time and Need For Speed is the game of choice while I cook dinner. I had marinated some chicken in 4 cloves of garlic (we love garlic) a little light olive oil and lots of fresh lemon juice and a splash of Worcestershire Sauce. So I toasted some pitta bread, griddled some halloumi and then griddled the chicken until nicely seared. We had a bowl of Rocket Salad, Houmous and Tatziki and a bowl of Lime Dorito's with Gaucamole and Salsa dips. Went down a treat and we followed it with a healthy portion of unhealthy but gorgeous Tiramasu.
It was time to settle down and watch X Factor - which Tony moaned and groaned over the top of his laptop throughout..he loves it really but hasn't reached that place where "real men" admit their love of X Factor. I finished the evening a tad worried, I am getting a sore throat and its chemo week next week
Thought for the day:
Gardening is about enjoying the smell of things growing in the soil, getting dirty without feeling guilty, and generally taking the time to soak up a little peace and serenity.
Lindley Karstens
