Well that was a very pleasant long weekend. I did almost absolutely nothing!

Both The Builder and I worked on Saturday.

Sunday we pottered about, went to Beeley to the Devonshire Arms for a rather magnificent lunch, pottered about the Chatsworth farm shop, ambled into Bakewell (where we were a bit surprised by the crowds – we continue to think of Bakewell as one of our shopping places, not as a tourist destination which is how the rest of the world sees it!) and trundled home again. Lovely, restful day.

On Monday we decided to take ourselves to the Dunstan Hall garden centre in search of some new garden shears. They didn’t have any (though they did have some interesting carrot seeds and one or two other nice things). We struck out, across country, intending to go to Chatsworth garden centre. Nice drive. Lovely road. Magnificent views. Then we got down to the main road – and the traffic was at a standstill heading towards Chatsworth as far as the eye could see. We changed our minds, headed back into Chesterfield and went to B&Q instead!

Tabitha and Gareth have been at the Leeds Festival this weekend. We’ve been babysitting the rabbits. It’s a high anxiety activity, looking after someone else’s rabbits! I fretted all the time lest they chew their way out of the hutch (which they’ve been trying to do with varying degrees of success since they arrived) and escape! They did look somewhat bored, incarcerated as they were in their hutch. The Builder made them a temporary run, using the former pea-support wiring. The bunnies thought this was great – they jumped in and out of their hutch and rampaged around and ate the weeds and the pea stalks and things. Happy bunnies. Taffa and Gaz came back from the festival on Monday night and we ate, drank and made merry until quite late. They left again on Tuesday lunchtime, taking the bunnies with them. The garden seems strangely empty without them! Marlo had been quite enjoying lying on the outside table watching them bounce about – and had showed no interest at all in eating them or chasing them. Thank goodness! It is a good example, mind, of the need to have the Spare Bed ready for visitors at all times - you never know when people may decide to drop by, eat, drink and make merry - and unexpectedly stay overnight!

I had a happy Tuesday doing absolutely nothing. Nothing at all – apart from cooking brunch for Taffa, Gaz and me. There were many things I had intended to do; none of them were done. Not one. I did make some bread, but that wasn’t on my list of things to do. Was nice bread, though! It was quite nice having a day in which I did nothing at all – I did feel ever so slightly guilty about it though. Something along the lines of it being a waste of a free day!

The Builder’s van is very, very poorly sick. It quite spectacularly failed its MOT (annual road worthiness test) and is going to cost a small mortgage to get fixed. That van has been swallowing up money since it arrived. We have decided that enough is enough. It needs replacing. We have been keeping our eyes peeled. The more interesting question is what to do with the dying van. Scrap it, trade it in? Trading in is the better option ,but that requires the “new” van to come from a dealer. And that’s expensive. The Builder continues to hunt, ponder and muse.

Freyja and Mark have gone to York. They’ve been playing with the Vikings and the dungeon