All peopled out

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The beginning of our week (Monday to Friday) was very similar to our previous two or three weeks. Nicky has continued planting in the back  garden with native flax, grasses and saplings. I have started digging out the trench for a retaining wall. The weather has been mainly hot and sunny, so we have been forced to spend midday time reading, and having after-dinner pots of tea watching the sun go down over the river, in the shade.



To add a little variety I have done some MacOnSite work. On Wednesday morning we walked down to Fiona’s for morning tea and a good natter, much enjoyed by all three of us.

We have finished the week (Friday to Sunday) in a much more manic fashion. We began Friday with a trip into town to buy some very nice beef from a wholesaler, nip into Mitre 10 to give the credit card a workout, hospital for a regular blood test for Nicky, and some supermarket shopping. On our return home Nicky continued planting while I cooked the beef and started preparing six pork pies. It turned out to be a long day.


We had a disrupted night’s sleep. Nicky gave up not getting back to sleep and got up very early to make a sizeable fruit cake and a trial run of some strawberry and peanut butter ice cream, inspired by Florean Fortescue, of Diagon Alley. On Saturday morning I continued cooking, preparing a large plum pie, and a spud and bacon salad. We started cleaning the house and getting organised for our first guests - James and Wendy. They were having a weekend away from Auckland and came to Whanganui to see us. James and Wendy usually come down for the Whanganui Vintage Weekend. Due to Covid that has been cancelled this year. We had a great evening with them catching up on Deep and Meaningful news and how we had settled into our new home. Last time they came there was still much to be done and we didn’t have any furniture.


Today we were hosting lunch for the church congregation, so we started getting the furniture and house organised before Nicky went to church, and I continued in her absence and made a spicy fruit punch. People started arriving just a few minutes after Nicky got home, and we had about 24 guests in the end. As with the other Sunday lunches it was a sociable and enjoyable affair, and from our perspective we were very pleased that it went so well. 


Brenda, who is wheelchair bound, and her husband Graeme stayed at the end to have a look at our house and assess the provisions we had made for wheel chair access. We were pleased with Brenda’s comments, as it confirmed to us what we had already suspected. Wheelchair users can’t access the front door due the the large coir mat we use for brushing our feet, but all the ranch sliders provide easy access.


After getting most of the clearing up done from lunch, re-arranging the living room furniture again and washing two loads of laundry, our final batch of nine visitors arrived for tea - neighbours. Nicky got out the gorgeous fruit cake which she had made, some lunchtime l.o.b.s, and the coffee tables were soon packed with more goodies brought by our guests.


We had an enjoyable couple of hours chatting to one another, before our neighbours departed.  This evening Nicky and I had our final weekend session of clearing up and tidying. We finally sat down for a bite and a cup of tea at 8.45p.m. jaded, but having had a busy and enjoyable weekend.


Take care, Rick and Nicky.

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