The evenings are drawing in

Actually, you know - it really, really irritates me when it gets to the summer solstice and the doom and gloom merchants start muttering in an Eeyore sort of way that the days are now getting shorter and it will be winter before we know it. Strictly speaking, the summer has only just that very minute begun!  And from my point of view for most of June and July it never really goes dark in Derbyshire.  It does, of course. We are not in the Arctic Circle.  But it is light (for most of June and July) when I go to bed - usually between 10 and 10:30. It is indisputably light when I wake up (usually around 5 in the morning; earlier when the sun is very bright and the blackbirds are singing heartily). I don't really notice the few hours of darkness.

It is still light when I wake up in the mornings.  But it was properly dark last night when I went to bed around 10:30. We had turned the lounge room light on around 9 pm. But it is now nearly August. And an evening that stays light outside until 10 pm should be enough for anyone who wishes to sit outside on the warm summer evenings.! And so far we have indeed had a lovely summer.  It's been mostly warm and sunny around our area. We have enjoyed many evenings sat outside.  We have even eaten outside!  There have been some very exciting storms in other bits of the UK (hail storms in Brighton, anyone?) but we seem to have avoided anything in the way of very exciting weather


(Having said all of that, I don't actually mind the darkness of winter evenings.  If it is cold and stormy, or even just cold then it is Right and Proper that it should also be dark and we can all snuggle up in the warm house and drink hot chocolate with the lamps on :-D )

Cally came to stay last weekend,  although I don't think she really wanted to.  Or at least, I don't think she wanted to come on her own.  She wanted her mother to come too.  However, it was the Tramlines Music Festival in Sheffield and Daddy was working eversoeverso hard in the Green Room pub all weekend, and Mummy was out watching some of the bands.  So The Builder and I went to Bishops' House in the morning and picked Cally up at lunch time, despite her protests.  And in fact she was fine when we got to our place.  There were noisy library books to play with and Minions to watch on the television and munchy things to eat and games to play. She woke up sunny and smiling on Sunday. We talked to Grandma Stella and Grandpa Tony on Skype.  We watched the minions several times more. And then Daddy arrived to collect her and to have lunch.

Mind you - it was a bit like having the Very Hungry Caterpillar visiting on Sunday morning.  She had two bowls of cereal, toast and jam, a huge great big banana, not one, not two but THREE pears, two child-friendly biscuits and some chocolate throughout the morning.  And then she had a bowl of rice with a tiny bit of fish and a little titchy bit of curry sauce for lunch.  I was very impressed with her dexterity - we have some training chopsticks which she wanted to use. She did a splendid job of picking up rice with the training chopsticks, especially since she had never used them before.

I have bought Minions 2 and a Monsters Inc DVD.  I think The Builder was going to go stark staring bonkers if he had to watch Minions 1 even one more time!