Now Wearing Purple

M is heading to the Reading Festival with her boyfriend and buddies and has spent the last two days making her festival dreads.  Luckily her cousin's a hairdresser and put them in for her.                                                         Of course she had to have pretty nails too! As I waved her off, my heart was tinged with sadness. She will only be returning home for two days after the Festival,  then she's off to start a new life with her boyfriend in Corby, some three hours away.  She has worked abroad for six months of each of the last two years and I've always loved her return, but it is time for her to fly the nest. It helps that she has found such a fantastic partner who loves her as much as I do, but she's my only child, so there will be a few tears.

We planned to go to Ikea on Friday, but then I discovered this little fellow in the garden. I went out to the dustbin and Elsie followed me, saw it and decided it was lunchtime. I bellowed at her, which stopped her in her tracks and I was able to haul her inside. This poor little bird looked so bedraggled and I wasn’t sure if it was a fledgling or not. It flew low over the gravel, so it’s wings were ok. I spent the day  checking on the bird and having to take the dogs into the garden on leads for toilet breaks.  Of course Pearl saw it straight away on her toilet break and after that haunted me, her eyes boring into me ‘Please let me into the garden Mum, I won’t hurt it, honest’.   I checked the garden mid-afternoon, no bird to be found.   I assumed it had managed to fly off, so we went to Ikea as planned. Man had his meatball fix and we bought two bags back for the freezer plus other much needed items. M informed me the next day that Elsie had a go at a bird i