What are you all up to

Lost my post last night due to the "essential maintenance " was a bit late posting as we had been out to our local pub to check out all their decorations 🙂

Decorated our tree this week and put up a few outside lights during a short dry spell, it seems to have rained most of the week. ☔️☹️ Lots of wet walks too.

Booked a few days away over New Year, a first for us, we're usually at home. The fireworks scare Polly so hopefully being in the countryside she won't hear them. Just hoping we don't get any snow now.

Dry this morning and a lot less wind than they forecast. Had a good wander and met quite a few of the villagers en route which lengthened the time spent out.

We bumped into one of our friendly near neighbours and told him we were dismantling a decent desk to make way for a new one arriving tomorrow. He took a look and wanted it for his granddaughter. Carried it outside. Didn't fancy having to carry it down the whole cut-de-sac but a very kind Postie came along, said pop it in the back of the van and lo and behold problem sorted. We get great service from our regular Posties.

Chucking down now so off to put a pot of coffee on.

MiL has hearing aids and has no trouble with hearing phone. They were expensive hearing aids though.

We have just been with our nearly 4 year old great grandson to see Father Christmas with his mummy and daddy and a great time was had by all 🎅. It is our annual treat to him. It has rained here most of the week with Wednesday being the only really dry and bright day. It teemed with rain all night last night and all morning but a dry, bright and windy afternoon but not as windy as predicted thankfully. We put our Christmas decorations up this week  including a few outside lights.

I hope Mrs Moulsey's injury is getting better. Our eldest son dislocated and broke his finger a few months ago (trying to stop a ball going out of play at our granfson's football game). It took a while before he got full movement back but all is well now.

We have had a great first night, and full day here in North Wales. Bit damp this morning, but it stopped raining mid morning. Gale force winds though. We decided on a scenic drive via Rhyd Dhu and Beddgelert down to Criccieth, and visited the castle and Cadwaladers ice cream shop. Lucky enough to see WHL steam train on line on way, photo is of Moel Hebog, the mountain that dominates Beddgelert. We last climbed this some 25 years or so ago. Winds nearly took us off our feet at top of Criccieth Castle, so we didn’t linger for long. Drove back up coastal route to Caernarfon, then back to cottage. Fire now lit, lovely and warm, still blowing a howling gale outside. 

Better still I checked out server error thread to post,I keep it open as a tab, as I do this thread, it's been removed 🤐 and I get road signs........ page not found

Well just checked in on my tablet. Server error thread is still there............

Good to read others news.

All mince pies, 5 dozen, made frozen and safely in containers 😀

Early for us but we've been putting our decorations up. Anything to cheer up the days! Christmas cards are coming in - I love them. Good to read sender's news, not generally round robins, but a few lines of news.

Spent several days trying to locate the Christmas tree. Reshuffled the loft cupboard to do so and find the electric plate warmer. Horrified to find the Christmas tree bag empty and neatly folded 😱. More scratching of heads..... OH has been saying is it in the loft? - definitely not I reply we don't use it! Eventually today he says I remember putting it in 2 bin liners as it was. Penny drops!  We opened the loft hatch, he's not steady enough and I DON'T do ladders. So peering in from the landing with a torch 'bingo'. Now have to wait son's visit, should be tomorrow, to retrieve it, as he placed it there last year.

No sign of plate warmer, so last resort, the 4 bed drawers at the head end. Means moving bedside drawers. Double 'bingo' in the first one we looked. All items now sorted for Christmas catering.

I blame moving, 36 years of things have the same storage location........

Managed a dry dog walk. Round the village streets. Lots of water running fast through the ditches (dykes as the natives call them 😉). Tried what's usually a hard off road walk but gave up halfway as I was slipping and sliding everywhere. At least dog got an off lead run. Our dog shower is a fabulous boon. She returns muddy, me too, trots round to the back of the house awaiting nice warm water shower to get the muck off. Must be heavenly on cold wet paws and fur. Good on my wellies too. I rarely wear wellies, preferring supportive walking boots, but they've certainly been very necessary this last week.

Milliehull sounds like a fabulous day. We have our grandson tomorrow while mummy and daddy go to make door wreaths. Then I'm feeding us all. 🤣🤣 can I still cope with an inquistive almost 3 year old and prepare a meal? IF it stops raining I'm aiming at a dusk walk to see lights in the village. We have a house covered with illuminations which raises money for local air ambulance and the rest of the village puts on quite a show.

Right must wrap present from NZ for grandson as their package arrived  with various things for distribution including labels. She orders online for delivery here. I return the favour 😉 by sending labels and send her out shopping 🤣🤣. Now getting to the age that things will probably be noticed....... this year its a nice box 😊

Better still I checked out server error thread to post,I keep it open as a tab, as I do this thread, it's been removed 🤐 and I get road signs........ page not found

our Internet went out, so I changed devices. I'm on my phone now and the server errors again thread still gives page not found. But my tablet has the thread. Both Samsung devices! Its beyond my Ken. But that's not hard with tech 😳.

Reading all the posts on BT etc and digital phones. We have digital phones, given them by BT when we signed up on moving in 18 months ago.  Both upstairs and downstairs bases and handsets are just plugged into a socket. My complaint, they don't ring very loud, even on the highest setting. Impossible to hear through a closed door and often room to room with no closed doors. And if you move away from the base, the handset bleats that its too distant from its base. I'm talking one side of the double bed to the other! Our old phones could be taken into the garden and still be connected..... They call it progress 😡. We don't get a great mobile signal in the house and I prefer the handset rather than a mobile phone.

We noticed a couple of nights ago the typeface layout and colours had slightly changed on the TV guide. It now says EE not BT in the top left hand corner and the set top box on light has changed from pink/purple, my favourite colours, to green. We did have a letter to say it was changing but with general life we'd forgotten.

micky, if you don't mind me asking, which mobile router did you get? We are at present on a phone link with Plusnet, but only for wifi as we have no land line phone, and as we are away for about 2/3 rds of the year it is rather a luxury. We have a "dongle" with 3 for using in the caravan but suspect we wouldn't be able to use off at home for the TV as well as our kindles.

Missed all of yesterday's posts on here because of the dreaded Essential Maintenance so have a lot of catching up to do. Nice to read all the updates from B2, H&T, Millie and wish Moulesy all the best with cooking the Xmas dinner, rather him than I. Hope Mrs M's finger is not too painful and that she soon has full use of it. I know from experience how painful and backward broken/dislocated fingers and thumbs can be.

Good to hear that the WNs and the tdas met up, and that the latter made it to cottage and has also had a good day out today.

We have been fortunate by having our visit to Windermere cancelled by the C&CC because we would just have been stuck in the van as we have had horrible, wet & windy weather for most of yesterday and today, and tomorrow doesn't look to be any better.

Hope you manage to get away soon Nellie.

We are just enjoying being together and being able to do some of the things we love. We both have lots of happy childhood memories of North Wales, as well as shared ones. Dropped on lovely with our cottage, I could live in this one permanently. It’s nice being out and about, despite the not great weather and the short daylight hours. Enjoying the Christmas lights around and about, and we came across some fantastic knit bombing in Criccieth, lots of knitted/crotcheted Xmas trees and toppers on post boxes and bollards. Best Xmas lights so far? Caernarfon Castle all lit up. Hard to beat that🤣 When the sea mist cleared, we could see the Irish coast this morning. Sea is a bit rough mind🤢