ABC WEDNESDAY - R

R is for REMEMBRANCE

Many of my regular visitors will remember my posts about the building of a garden in remembrance of one of the teacher's at our local primary school. Last week the garden was officially opened. I was so pleased to see blue skies as the crowds gathered.....and it was fitting that many ex pupils like one of my grandaughters, who owe much of their primary education to Mrs. Wimms, attended.....The local Mayor and members of Mrs. Wimm's family also came......Father Jamie dedicated the garden and the whole ceremony was very moving.....The garden is a Friendship Garden.......
Chidren who are feeling lonely can sit on this bench and other children will realise that they need someone to play with.........
I wish you could hear the children singing this........it was beautiful....
Inside the school were many photos of us all in the process of building and planting the garden...And then we all had a cuppa and cake!!!

ABC WEDNESDAY BLOGROLL

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GREEN THUMB SUNDAY GOES TO SCHOOL

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GREEN THUMB SUNDAY BLOGROLL

Earlier this year I went to the local school to help dig over the Memorial Garden...you may remember these photos............................

well yesterday the "much more fun" job of planting and spreading the chip bark had to be done. there were far more willing victims volunteers this time and it only took a couple of hoursto transform it to this...........................

Won't the children be surprised when they go to school on Monday!!!!!

OUR WEDNESDAY WANDERINGS AND WONDERINGS

We all had a real fun day on Wednesday; after a good cooked breakfast to set us up for the day we walked down the Quay for a boat trip. These are run by the River Stour Trust (this web site is well worth a visit) who are doing such a marvellous job maintaining and upkeeping the river.

We walked back home via the river bank and waved to the Rosette as it passed us on it's next trip. After a quick snack and a sit down we were back on our feet for a walk up to the Big Apple Bowling Alley

Phil keeping a tight hold on his little sister's hand....sweet

Leanne in motion

Kirstyand Mel

Mel was so thrilled when she got her first STRIKE! and did a celebratory dancePhil didn't actually play though he was quite happy to watch....secretly I think he was worried that one of us girls might beat him!!!!! As it was I won the first game and Mel won the second.....so it turned out the oldest and youngest were both winners!Some of you probably read my "Ghost Clusters Post"....Leanne had never visited the church and after seeing my photos of the orbs was quite keen to go there. It was dark by now so after a quick visit to MacDonalds (well we had to pass it...tee hee) and with it being such a lovely warm evening we thought we'd walk home that way......once again I took loads of photos (don't panic I'm not posting them all!) and although we saw nothing with the naked eye....... the camera saw all!!!!
again once the photos were lightened so many more orbs could be seen.........a copped close up of the orb by the small window from the photo aboveI also tried to take a photo of the beautiful full moon...this is the best of a bad bunch..It was funny because I took this photo of Leanne and we all thought that it was the moon at the top....until we realised the moon was shining in completely the opposite direction!!!!
this is a cropped close-up of that orb.....and in this photo of Phil there appears to be an orb hovering over his stomach.....

Finally I must show you Mel's favourite photo...this is a crop from a larger photo.....Mel's pretty sure this is a Fairy...possibly the Tooth Fairy who often visits her at the moment and leaves her £1 for a tooth!

Leanne & co are back home now and time for me to get the house ready for tomorrow as Lynn is coming to stay. Then I'll be able to show you what I bought her for her birthday!

GHOST CLUSTERS!

David - Authorblog asked the question on his post recently "Do you believe in ghosts"......I find it difficult to give a definitive answer....since Mick passed away many things have happened that have brought us comfort that he is still with us.....coincidence?...maybe...but these are private moments that I'm not inclined to share at the moment.

What I will post about are a few strange occurrences that have happened during my life.

I don't remember a lot of my childhood but one event still stays with me to this day. I must have been about 6 or 7 and we lived in Singapore. One night I awoke to see a tall man in black standing by my bed. In my memory his face was kindly and he had long hair but I must have been frightened as a child as I threw my favourite cuddly toy (a boxer dog) at him and screamed. My parents rushed in but the man had gone...they swore that no one had been there, that all the doors were locked and that it must have been a dream. My boxer dog was over the other side of the room where I'd thrown it though and to this day I KNOW I was awake.

The next occurrence of anything strange was when I was I the house of my first mother in law in Broadstairs. I used to help her with the cleaning and cooking as she ran a B&B. On the stairs leading up to the attic room I often believed I saw a young boy dressed in the style of Gainsborough's Blue Boy...it never worried me...he looked quite happy and I never mentioned it to my mother in law as I knew she was of a nervous disposition. I also thought it must be a trick of the light as it was always out of the corner of my eye and as soon as I turned to look straight at him there was nobody there. The surprise came when Leanne and Manda (young children then) came into her kitchen one day when we were visiting and when I asked them what they'd been doing they said "Playing with the little boy on the stairs".........at the time there were no guests staying or any other people in the house save mother in law, myself and the girls! To this day Manda and Leanne still remember the little boy.

Many years later the girls and I lived at Gestingthorpe Hall;the former home of Captain Oates (many of you will know his name as being one of Scott's party on his journey to the Antartic...Captain Oates' immortal words "I am just going outside and may be some time" are well known). We had the rooms at the top of the house and there were many bumps in the night and whisperings heard despite the fact that the rest of the household were in bed. On one occasion the girls remember clearly a shadow of an unknown person flitting across the light coming in through the doorway from the hall outside their bedroom. Fanny and George who owned Gestingthorpe Hall at the time were quite old and never ventured to the upper landing so we know it couldn't have been them. Leanne remembers another time that really spooked her; she'd woken in the night and gone down to one of the bathrooms two floors below...when she left the bathroom she felt the urge to turn and look behind...there as clear as day was the figure of an elderly woman shrouded in a grey coloured mist...this was when Leanne found she really was capable of running a 4 minute mile.

When I first moved in with Mick (where I live now) I often saw a fleeting shadow of a dog in the hall. I asked Mick about it and he admitted that he used to have a Black Labrador who he loved dearly but had to have put down when she became very ill. He seemed pleased that I seen it (and not been frightened off) as he thought his mind had been playing him tricks whenever he saw her! For a few months there was many a time when we sat in the living room and opened a packet of baskets...the door would mysteriously open and Mick said that his dog always used to hear the rustle of a biscuit wrapper from anywhere in the house when she was alive...and we were convinced it was her. After a while we never saw her again and the door didn't open itself anymore.....Mick always reckoned she was keeping an eye on him to make sure he was OK and that she could tell he was happy now that he'd found me and so had gone wherever good dogs go.

Now to the orbs and St Mary's Church....some of you will have seen the photo I posted a while ago......here are some more.....I promise you that these are untouched unless stated......
this is the above photo cropped to show a better view of one of the orbs......this is another crop to get a close up view of an orb................
On the following photo a few orbs can be seen ............but when I lightened it with the aid of Picasa so many more appear........
I showed this photo in another post........I didn't use a flash at all although it was really dark and have no explanation of the light emanating from the doorway................

Finally this is a photograph I took of Manda....again I was trying to take photos in the dark without a flash and my unsteady hand meant the photos were really blurred....I'd put this double image of a face down to that until I looked at it closely.......Manda was posing head turned to the side....how come there is also a face facing forward????

Also it wasn't until we put the photo on the computer and had a closer look at it that we noticed the shape of a person beyond her right shoulder..........yet there was no other living soul around.

Make of this post what you will......maybe there are scientific or rational reasons behind all of these happenings...but whatever your beliefs

DON'T HAVE NIGHTMARES!

BILLS, BILLS AND MORE BILLS!!

Don't worry the postman didn't leave any nasty surprises in my mail...the bills are all duck BILLS! Yesterday I went to the Duck Race and Fun Day in aid of St Andrew's Church . There was plenty to do and see especially for the children.....you could decorate your own duck hat, sponsor a duck in the race, have a go on the rides and even buy candyfloss and popcorn!

I'm not a church goer anymore (long story) but the new vicar and his wife certainly seemed to have put the ZING into the Christian population...they are not at all the staid vicar and wife of the days of my youth when I was choir girl, Sunday school teacher etc. They are really hands on and thoroughly modern.....the Vicar's wife even has dreadlocks!....and Father Jamie himself seems to be quite a hit with the local community
The weather was lovely and it was nice to lounge around on the grassThere was a beer tent....and somewhere for those who had drunk a little too much to lie down....LOLI managed to win a rabbit and teapot on the soft toy stall and the tombola..........There was a Karate display...both adults and children took part...and I know who to call if I ever need some bricks broken!!!!!!!Chris had a kick about with one of his nephews...limbering up for the Tug O' WarIn the first Tug o' war the teams were rather unbalanced....little kids versus big kids after the first round Father Jamie and a couple of Dad's helped out and the little kids won!!!!

Then it was the turn of Chris and his mates..........they lost came second which I think quite pleased them as they won a case of beer rather than a silver cup!

Now it was time for the major attraction...the DUCK RACE! ..on your marks, ready, get set, go!and 3000...yes 3 THOUSAND...small rubber ducks started to float down the river.....despite the efforts of the canoeists who did their best to free them...a few got caught in the rushes............

and there was a slight problem when some of the Boat trips needed to get across the finishing net....
but slowly the ducks made their way..............the first one neared the the finish...... and we have a WINNER! The nearest we can get to a "claim to fame" with our ducks is that Chris's cousin's duck came 9th.It was a really enjoyable day and the weather was perfect...not too hot and not too cold...Divine Intervention????..................and Manda made a new friend.....I'm not sure what flower this moth thought Manda's legs were!Today Leanne and co are coming to stay for a few days so I won't have much chance for blogvisiting.......Hmmmmm...I wonder if I can drag them out to the bowling alley................