Changes

No fireplace in the living room - hooray! Costa is very efficient and has the resulting hole plaster-boarded, the room repainted and generally looking as if it was always like that. It took him two days. I think he is marketable. The smell of paint is rather nice. I like change. It shakes out the cobwebs and gives a new perspective to life.

(Well that was all a bit staccato. At the moment I rarely have time to finish a sentence so I make them short and fire them off quickly!)

Changing rooms often involves spending money which is in short supply here just now. So far I have spent about £30 which won't bring in the bailiffs, however the new wall space simply screams for a nice horizontally oblong painting (or weaving, or embroidery... hint hint... Chillside what have you got in store over there?) I can't put back the Thanka I had there because it is oblong in the wrong direction! A nice natural sculpture - drift wood for instance....but I never find them when I want them.. and for the first time I feel as if I need curtains... and so one thing leads to another. The joy is that it alllows for creativity. There's nothing so dead as the house that remains unchanged for 30 years.

In my opinon.

My grandson Finlay is doing his best to remove cobwebs by opening cupboards and emptying drawers. Great fun. Especially at 4.30am. I have had three coffees already this morning. Not sure I'll make it through the day. Fin is obsessed with tractors. Luckily there are plenty around just now as harvest time approaches, also mowers and tractors to pull boats in and out of the water, so whilst his mum and I have sat in coffee shops or outside the Captain's Table by Findhorn Bay in the sunshine, he has found parked tractors to gaze at in admiration. The wheels are much higher than the top of his head but he is in no way afraid of them and would climb aboard if allowed.

I am frequently asked for books about farm machinery. It has a lasting fascination.