And it was all going so well........

I've been absent again - sorry! The week has been interesting, since we purchased the new car. The YFG in particular is desperate to know what it looks like and when we are going to actually get it! When we have been out and about with her in the car, she has been constantly asking, "Is it like that one?" whenever she sees anything that is either an estate or looks like it might be a Volvo. It gets a bit tedious so I hope it won't be too long before we get our hands on it for real. Unfortunately, the insurance certificate hasn't arrived yet, so I don't think that it will be tomorrow as we need that to get the tax.

Friday night and Saturday saw the YFG and I at gym, then shopping Saturday afternoon. I was so tired last night that I decided not to set the alarm early for church, so the FH and EFG went on our behalf. They came home with a wedding invitation from our friends who are getting married in the church on the 14th February. The wedding will take place in the church service that morning, which we knew about, but we have also been invited to the restaurant next door for a meal afterwards, which will be lovely.

Today started with some bad news as the FH's cousin's wife phoned to say that the cousin, J, is in hospital in King's Lynn. He has had diabetes for years, and has had part of one leg amputated a few years ago. He is 85 and has gone downhill recently and now his heart is straining to keep up and his chest is badly congested with fluid.

Yesterday the EFG and I managed to get all the chickens back into the proper runs so that they lay in the proper nestboxes and stop having a free run of the garden. A few made a break for freedom this afternoon when a little girl came round to see them and inadvertently left a gate open, but luckily only about 8 got out; it still took the EFG and I nearly half an hour to round them up, but I got so filthy that I decided to stay out and get all the other outside jobs done too. We cleaned out another two hutches of rabbits - 6 rabbits make a heap of poop - and found over two dozen eggs in the process; 15 laid in the bales of straw at the side of the rabbit hutches and about 11 or 12 were under a chicken house. I have washed them all and tested them for freshness in water and they are all fine and usable - so many eggs all of a sudden - a baking day tomorrow is on the agenda and it couldn't have come at a better time as there is another Coffee Morning on Friday for the chapel so I'll get some buns in the freezer.

At 3.30pm, my dad's travelling companion and friend, MB, phoned from the Caribbean - they are on the Oriana, and unfortunately Dad has been taken ill with a bad chest infection so he has been taken into the medical centre on the boat and is being treated with a drip and IV antibiotics. MB said they have a lovely Norwegian doctor and all the equipment they need so he is in safe hands. The other side of the coin is that they had mentioned putting him ashore into the hospital in Jamaica, and she really didn't want that - I can imagine her panic and distress at being abandoned in Jamaica, far from home and far from anyone that she knows. She thinks that they will be fine as long as they are able to stay on the boat - and I hope that that is true. Hopefully the antibiotics will clear the infection and he'll be fine to go back to his cabin and continue on the holiday. They have nearly two weeks left before they get home on the 13th. He is 80 and she is 70, so they opt for cruise holidays because they get to see the world from a floating hotel, and rarely do many of the excursions off the boat - when they do get off, they usually just have a little trip around the local area but they don't do lengthy bus trips or anything strenuous. If anyone is minded to pray for them and the cousin, I'd be grateful.

The week ahead is looking busy - the piano tuner is coming tomorrow and the FH has his art club, then after school there is band practice for the EFG; Tuesday has a church council meeting and then gym, Wednesday is the lunch club for the FH and an extra Governors' meeting at school about finance, Thursday will be work for me, and then Friday is the chapel Coffee Morning and gym. Saturday we are holding another Songs of Praise for the chapel as it is the Anniversary weekend - must find the CDs of the hymns!!