Winter walks .....or ' Back to the Thermals, Part 2' !

Traditionally we have usually spent Christmas with our extended family and New Year has always been for friends. This year was no different and 10 of us had a jolly pleasant night at our house seeing in the New Year, singing 'Auld Lang Syne' (badly, in my case!) with the wonderful Pete being dispatched outside with a lump of coal to do the 'first-footing' as the bells stopped ringing!

Tradition also has it that we go for a walk on New Year's Day to blow the cobwebs away ...so off we went!

It was a very cold day and was threatening rain and snow so we went to the nearby Linacre Woods. It's owned by the local Water Authority and is a series of 3 small reservoirs in a valley surrounded by trees (no....really!)

The ground was rock solid underfoot but some icy remnants of the recent snow made walking a little precarious at times - especially downhill. We started from the top car park, but what goes up in Derbyshire must inevitably come down...and back up again!

We circled the top resi', staying up high ........

before dropping down and round to the retaining dam wall to look down on the middle resi'.

Quite a lot of the reservoir was frozen, causing mayhem for the birds and amusement for us!

Himself and Pete inspecting one of the overflow channels!

Fascinating eh?!

Looking down the middle resi' from the overflow channel.

The bottom resi' with the plughole just visible

I had a lovely photo of most of the semi-circle of the plughole but Blogger kept turning the photo through 90* and made it look really weird, so I eventually gave up in disgust ...so you'll have to settle for a bit of the plughole instead!!!

Saturday was grim - cold, sleet, snow - NOT the day for going out, but Sunday dawned with glorious clear blue skies and crispy snow - just the day to go out to the Dark Peaks for a decent walk! Curiously enough, the Gnomelets didn't want to come, so me and Himself donned our thermals yet again for a trek on our own- but first we had to get off the drive!

Ceefer cat was not impressed by our desertion of him!

We drove up to the Curbar Gap car park, with the road being like this most of the way ....oh I can get smug about having a Land Rover some days!

Leaving the car park we had to choose ....left for Baslow Edge or right for Curbar Edge? (or straight down the salt road to the village pub?!)

We went up onto Baslow Edge first and gazed longingly at the pub in Curbar village in the valley (well I did anyway!)

snow dunes up on the top

It was bitterly cold at minus several, plus the wind chill factor made it minus even more, so we did a circuit that took us back to and across the road, up onto Curbar Edge ......

...where the sheep knew where the sheltered spots were.

Both Baslow and Curbar Edges, along with Froggat Edge, form a horseshoe shaped gritstone outcrop that is famous for its climbing. Many Everest expeditions trained here - and as a young child I loved our Sunday family trips out here to go weasling and bouldering. Later, as a teenager, I spent many a happy hour climbing on here - never to Everest standards, but I wasn't bad...especially considering I'm only 5ft2 and my climbing partners were all around 6ft!!!

We followed on with family trips here and both Gnomelets have bouldered here many a time. I swear First-Born has glue on her feet - or is part spider!

The gritstone used to be used to make millstones and there are many incomplete or broken ones dotted around up here as you can see in this photo. The perfect ones were taken back to Curbar Gap, then down the salt road to Curbar and Calver villages down in the valley or across into Cheshire to the mills there.

Having finally gotten cold enough in the minus lots wind, we headed back to the car park

....and home for some mulled wine!

What a lovely way to end a glorious day!

Happy New Year and may all your days be as wonderful as this was :)

I'm dreamin' of a white Christmas ........etc!

At last ....we've had snow! Only a couple of inches, but perfect crispy snow! It made me very happy. I love the muffled silence that descends along with the snow, I love seeing the number of animal tracks across the lawn, I love the birds flocking onto the feeders in search of food, I love having to squint against the brightness of the snow and I love the sound of laughter as people play..............!
(I didn't much love the taxi driver who slid into me on an icy road yesterday though! Good job I was in the Land Rover - BIG dint in his bumper, not a scratch on the Landy and just a bit of whiplash for me but First-Born was fine. Would have been much worse in an ordinary car!)

If you look very carefully you might just be able to make out the rose on the bush by the front door - it has kept flowering for months and hadn't cottoned on to the fact that it is winter!

Acer x Conspicuum 'Red Flamingo'

A tantilising glimpse of the tea house roof......

....and another!

Ceefer cat walks on water - well, okay, the iced up pond.

I suspect the woodpile will have to wait a bit longer to get chopped up now.

Cornus Albus.


Snow on an old tree root in the yard - found on a beach and carried about a mile to 'safety' by the 4 of us. It was flippin' heavy, but lovely! I have yet to find the perfect spot for it - but I will.

Looking up the back garden to the 6ft high snowman me, Himself and the Gnomelets built in the dark last night after a snowball fight :)

We only went out to take the nets off the fruit cage and the brassica cage, but things sort of developed from there really!!!

Colour in the snow.

Whilst all was white and wonderful outside, Christmas colour was developing in the house.

This is our 'Danish branch' in the kitchen. We nicked this tradition years ago after spending Christmas with our Danish friends and it's now an integral part of Christmas for us - and reminds us of our friends.

Even the piano has a bit of Christmas cheer...

Everyone is expected to join in!

Himself always asks me to buy a small tree ..... and I really do mean to but somehow the big ones always call out to me - so what's a girl to do?!

Danish candles

Ceefer cat was singularly unimpressed by Christmas preparations!

Meanwhile, back out in the garden;

Regular readers of my blog are well used to seeing me attempt to win the 'the worst dressed gardener' award ....... I think I was on a full set of thermals, 5 other layers, 2 pairs of socks and hot packs in my gloves at this point!!!!

with Himself trying to get an honorable mention....even HE had thermals on that day!

However, in the interest of proving that we don't always look like complete slobs, this is us on our way to Himself's company Christmas 'do' last week........ it was a Bond themed evening and great fun, but proved that I am rubbish at Blackjack and Roulette!

...we scrub up quite well really!

and I'm trying to match the Bond girl siloutte - almost!

and on that note ........a Merry Christmas to everyone and a happy, healthy, prosperous New Year!

The frame goes up at last!

Thank you to everyone for your concern about David following his recent surgery. I am very pleased and relieved to announce that all danger has passed, he is well on the way to recovery, had his first short, chilly walk around the garden yesterday and is thoroughly bored - always a good sign!

Given all the above progress, I thought it was time for the promised post on the day David came up to help us build the tea house frame on site - because, as Himself commented, David was absolutely the best person for the job! As a surgeon, David has had to be thorough, meticulous, precise, not panic when things go wrong and not rush things (sound familiar?!), all of which suited Himself down to the ground for putting the frame together!

First though, I had yet more painting of the 3 coat sealant to do!

The dry beams and posts were carried onto site - about 100 yeards up the garden!

Himself had earlier removed the posts that he, I and the Gnomelets had previously erected twice (*sigh*) then he and David began to lay out the pieces like a 3D puzzle.

Daring to glue the first joint!

Of course, being Himself and David, a few screws went in too ..... just to be on the safe side you understand - can't be too careful!

Checking the diagonals to ensure the corner angles were all even.

The long side of the frame in place, levels being checked - and, oh look, I'm balanced on a wobbly plank over water again! I am convinced that Himself thinks that if he puts me on a plank across the pond often enough, at some point I WILL fall in - and that'll be his payback for all his hard work. Mwahhaahaaa!

Some joints needed a bit of persuasion to go together after glueing, so we brought out our trusty strop and hand ratchet (originally used for pulling me - well, the Land Rover actually, out of muddy holes in off road driving competitions!). It works just as well for pulling chunks of wood together though!

Guess who got to walk the plank again?

Squatting down to put the strop round the bottom beam didn't make me fall in even when Himself 'accidentally' kicked the other end of the plank, so he then had me up on my tiptoes to shove the strop as high up as I could reach - ostensibly to pull the top posts together, but I knew his cunning little plan.........!

David meanwhile happily carried on glueing the next set of joints, seemingly oblivious to his son's nefarious tricks to dunk me in the drink!


Don't be fooled by that innocent expression of concentration as he tightens up the ratchet, he was really planning his next move!

Having failed to get me wet, Himself resorted to putting up the back wall frame and muttering to himself about "....her improved balance.... chunter, chunter"! David happily carried on holding posts in position.


Moving swiftly on to erect the long side wall against our boundary.

Got to keep checking those diagonals boys!

The strop was used for fine-ish adjustment.

Bracing was put in place to provide some short-term stability and rigidity to the structure whilst the concrete went off.........

Each upright post had a stainless steel 'foot' which was concreted into a post hole. Of course plain simple concrete wasn't considered strong enough(!), so stainless steel wall ties were threaded through the foot and angled into the concrete - just to make sure!!!

As Technician, Third Class still working on my promotion prospects, I was allowed to pour and shape the cement - making sure that it sloped away from the foot for drainage.

As Gordon Ramsey might say........."Framework -Done"!


and I still hadn't fallen in!