Saturday this and that . . .

I love this time of year. The sun is already up when I awake in the morning,  and it's still light out when I go to bed at night . . . and I am an early to bed, early riser too!  I'm always up about 5 am and in bed by 9:30 most nights.

Last night as I lay in bed I could hear the birds chattering in the hedgerow which runs along our back garden.  It was like they were calling their children in . . . telling them it was time to come in and get ready for bed . . . come in now . . . come in now . . . time to settle down.  It is such a comforting sound . . .

It reminded me of my childhood.  I have a particularly vivid memory of a summer evening when I was a child.  I could not have been more than five or six years old.  I know that for sure because we were living in the two bedroom house that my parents first had when we moved out West to Gimli, Manitoba.  We lived in that house for two years before we were moved into a three bedroom house and I was seven when that happened. (My father was in the airforce.)

On this one particular evening my parents had gone out to a dance on the base, and we had a babysitter.  I remember I was wearing my button baby doll shortie pajamas.  I called them that because the fabric that they were made of had colourful buttons printed all over them.  They were teal green and turquoise and pink and I can see them in my mind as clearly as if it were just yesterday.

I remember hearing the sounds of other children still at play outdoors.  Our inside front door was open.  We had two front and back doors.  An inside one and an outside one.  The outside ones were fitted with glass windows in the winter and when spring came, the glass windows were removed and replaced by screen windows.  I remember going over to the front door and stretching up as far as I could on my tippie toes to see out the screen window . . .

I could just barely manage to reach up enough to be able to see out of the screen window.  I can remember standing there, raised up on tippie toes . . . my nose pressed against the screen as I watched what I felt I was missing outside.  I can still smell that familiar metallic smell of the window screen against my hose . . . and see the golden sky as the sun was lowering down against the horizon, coming on to dush.  I can still hear the children's laughter and voices . . . and I can still remember how I felt . . . a feeling of tender longing . . . wanting to be out there and having fun along with them . . . as if life was passing me by . . .

It's a funny thing is the memory . . . how a sight or a sound . . . or a smell can trigger it, and you can find yourself instantly transported to another time and place.  So it was last evening as I lay in bed listening to the birds call out their goodnight messages to each other . . . for a few moments I was five years old again . . . and that was a pretty wonderful feeling.

When the house is quiet with the coming of night . . . 
wrapped about in rosy veils of softly fading light.
The Bird of Dreams on silent wings comes to my windowsill.
The clock chimes out the sunset hour, but Time itself stands still.
Years are moments.
In a flash I live the past again.
I hear a voice, I see a face.
I feel the joy and pain, as if it were but yesterday.
What is this magic power . . .
that calls up ghosts out of the shadows of the evening hour?
I light the lamp, and in the dazzle of the sudden glare . . .
the vision goes.
I look around, and there is noone there.
But through the window in the dark,
Beyond the lamp's bright ray . . . 
I see the Bird of Dreams spread out it's wings
and fly away . . . 
~Patience Strong, The Bird of Dreams 

 

Its raining bucketloads out there this morning.  Thankfully it is a bit cooler.  Yesterday was stinking hot and humid.  My friend Tina came over for a little while in the afternoon, bearing cakes.  What can a gal do.  I imbibed.  Friends, cakes, and conversation are a lovely combination.  We hadn't been able to spend a lot of time together over the past few months, so it was really nice just to havd a lovely catch-up with each other.  Todd was busy mowing the grass.   

 

We started watching a new program on Netflix.  Its pretty good.  I don't know why we never watched it when it was on the television.  Another one we are enjoying at the moment is The Royal House of Windsor.  

 

Look what my sister found in her bananas.  (This is after she killed it.)  EEK!  I would have been freaking out.  I have often heard stories of people finding poisonous spiders in their bananas and thought people were making them up. Now I know it actually happens!  I think they would have heard my screams down in London, lol.

We are thinking we might have to look for somewhere else to live. Our landlord has cancer (so does his sister) and we are thinking if the worst happens and his nephew takes over the houses, he will be wanting to put the rent up quite a bit.  If our rent goes up anymore than it is now, we won't be able to cope.  I think its time we make the move to a smaller place anyways, as Todd is finding the garden harder to cope with and neither one of us could cope with this place on our own.  So I am really going to have to downsize. Its not going to be easy, but we have to do what we have to do and just not think about it.  God willing we will be able to find a place without too many problems.  We also are thinking we may have to give up the car once and for all. Its just getting too expensive to run a car.

Enough doom and gloom!  A thought to carry with you  . . . 

° * 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ •
•。★★ 。* 。
° 。 ° ˛˚˛ * _Π_____*。*˚
˚ ˛ •˛•˚ */______/~＼。˚ ˚ ˛
˚ ˛ •˛• ˚ ｜ 田田 ｜門 ★
 *.˛.A bird doesn't sing because
it has an answer.  It sings
because it has a song.
~Maya Angelou  •。★★ 。* 。

I am listening to:  He Loved Them To The End, Jeffrey R Holland.  

 

Cooking in The English Kitchen today . . . Grandmother's Glazed Donuts. A once-in-a-blue-moon treat!


 Have a wonderful Satuday. Don't forget!

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And I do too!