where we've been

That was an uncharacteristically long blogging gap for me, by 2014 standards anyway.  We've been busy hanging out with my parents/Dulcie's grandparents.  First of all they were staying with us to do a spot of house-hunting.  (Don't know if I've mentioned they're planning on moving closer to us?  Yay!  Amazing what the lure of one super-cute girl will do to a grandparent...)  After that, Dulcie and I went up to stay with them in Elgin for a bit.  I was meant to be clearing out what remains of my stuff in preparation for their move, but that didn't really happen.  We were far too busy doing nice things and going on outings.

 The beach at Lossiemouth was FREEZING but good fun.  Dulcie met a friendly baby and was sat on by a friendly pug.  Sandcastles were built and instantly destroyed, ad nauseum.  Rock pools (well, puddles) were searched and treasure found - a shiny 10p piece that looked surprisingly similar to the one that went missing from my pocket at around the same time.

Dulcie LOVED having the garden to play in.  Here she is digging for wriggly worms with my dad.  She'd been going on about wriggly worms for weeks prior to this (she made an imaginary compost heap from a cardboard box following an inspirational episode of Peppa Pig) but seems to have gone quiet on the subject since getting up close and personal with the real deal!  She was rarely without her spade, watering can and plastic secateurs over the week.

 Here, she's shouting "Yee ha!"  She did this so much (always waving a plastic golf club round her head while she did) that the ladybird came to be known as Yee Ha.  Yee ha!

 And here she is sitting in a fancy dining chair eating porridge and generally looking like Goldilocks... minus the locks.  It's much easier to get a nice photo of Dulcie when she's in a nice house as opposed to our dung heap.  Everything was much calmer too, even when Dulcie was afflicted by a giant new tooth and screamed for about two days.

Will we ever be sorted?  Work continues behind the scenes (Graham has been snatching spare half hours to strip wallpaper and I am to phone the gas man today) but I'm perilously close to doing a TMI photographic post so you can all see what we're living amongst.  The cats, Puky and Hairy, are not helping matters in the least.  If Graham and I were married, I think he'd be using the threat of divorce as a bargaining tool to get rid of them.  As it is, he's powerless!  Ha!  (If he liked it then he should have put a ring on it etc.)  Anyway, back to the original subject...

Too cute!

As well as all these activities, we went charity shopping a couple of times (Dulcie got a few bits and bobs and I got an amazing vintage baby item for my friend's forthcoming offspring, but I can't share it until the baby is born for fear of ruining surprises), had giant pancakes at Baxters and visited the GIANT rabbits who live in the nearby garden centre.  Everything is bigger up north!  Ha!  Honestly, these rabbits were huge, easily as big as Dulcie, and were dragging their handlers around at the end of their leads.  Dulcie managed to get a quick cuddle with one of them, to her great delight.

Anyway, we're back now and I have a few blog posts lined up in my head, I'm just struggling to find my old rhythm and can't quite remember how I got things done while looking after Dulcie on my own.  I'll be back on top of (er, underneath) things soon!