hot cake and hot hens, err no - hot walk, hot dog, hens and carrot cake !

Himself has just left for work, the boys are still asleep upstairs and I am sitting quietly nursing a mug of coffee while I pick out the interesting bits of news that Radio 4 relentlessly churns out.

It sort of goes like this...

.........rumble...rumble...cricket, a decisive win.......rumble....waffle.......weather, there will be light showers in the north, brightening up later.......rumble...waffle...waffle.....So I said this to the prime minister - but you are not answering my question minister! - If you would give me time to reply!......................rumble rumble.... GOOO-O-A-L.!............

Any hoo -

Yesterday the boys and I had a really lovely 'us' day - all that was missing was our dear Himself :(

As planned we trundled off to the local tea rooms (plus giddy dog, walking boots and camera) where we sat outside in the heavy warm air and slurped cups of tea and scoffed rather large portions of cake (sorry - too busy scoffing and slurping to remember to take a photo!). Fully laden with our morning munchies we sort of struggled up the first hill, I never really fully appreciated the immense gravitational pull of tea and cake before - oof.....

Once up the hill (I make it sound HUGE - but it wasn't!) there was a wonderful cool breeze and a welcome seat - Lee's Bench.

Complete with fresh flowers and music festival tags. Regular notes and single blooms are left here by this young man's friends and family - he is still greatly missed.

We wandered through thigh high grasses and wild flowers as we headed towards the next village. There we dropped down a narrow stone-walled cobbled-path directly into the centre.

Giddy dog knows where the village's original water source is and she trotted off panting and hot. In the cool of the village green we found the 4ish metre wide stone trough with the bubbling spring. Pond weed waved gently in the slow current. There is a small plaque on the wall gently giving the history of the well - I must get a picture and post it, but it was so warm there that my brain had melted to a soft porridge and I forgot.

Once Giddy dog's thirst and hot feet were soothed, we continued down through the village back to the valley bottom, crossed the road and back up the other side.

One of our favourite stops is near the goose green allotments where there are hundreds of hens, geese, ornamental pigeons, turkeys, ducks and other strange and delightful water fowl and they are all free range in rather large pens - happy birds! Youngest had his camera and took one or two (hundred) pictures.  

We L-O-V-E chickens!!

Having torn ourselves away from the allotments we wandered through narrow pathways flanked by sweet peas and fading honeysuckle - in the hazy humid heat the scent was heady and indulgent - delicious.

Down the path to the lane, crossing over towards the school. Walking through the back lanes, seeing houses and folk we know. Despite it being the holidays - the village seems very quiet - may be the world financial difficulties hasn't prevented many of the families from going away.

Round the corner, cross the road and then we are home. Boots off, feet sizzling, dog flat out on the lawn cooling down - lovely lovely..

Later, feeling a bit less lethargic and bit guilty at our cake scoffing while Himself languished at work, I made him a cake - carrot and almond.  Now, I am well known for my inability to master the carrot cake with any degree of success and although this one was one of my better efforts it was still not quite right!

Still it was well appreciated and all my boys sat outside in the garden surrounded by the trappings of woodwork and power tools (big boy toys now) and ate cake as they batted off  our rather curious hens.

I chose to leave off the usual cream cheese topping as Himself had found some double cream on special offer and it just had to be eaten............

Well, been nice chatting to you, the boys are up, eaten their breakfast and are now getting restless - they need exercising! So today's 'big-boy-toys' will be a power hose, brooms and wellies - we're off to get wet and hopefully do a bit of cleaning. 

Have a lovely day coz we certainly plan on having (soggy) fun :)  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx