As I have said on many previous occasions. I should take more notice of what other people say to me. “Don’t work too hard.” “Don’t volunteer for things when you’ve already got more than enough on your plate.” “Take more time to enjoy what you have around you.” All of these represent good advice. Good advice that I’m crap at taking. I MUST do better.

Here is a shot, completely symbolic of today. Broken through hard work but typically defiant.

What I’ve done today:

Painted the kitchen lobby area’s woodwork & ceilings (twice), sanded down the walls in the same area and gave them their “finishing filler”, vacuumed up after myself, dug four deep holes in the garden for fence posts then enlisted DMs help to get the posts in, levelled and concreted, watered the veggie garden and tubs and cooked three meals for humans and one for chickens.

The trowel was broken because we can’t dig deep holes here with a shovel – there is shale about 9 inches below the surface and the shovel stops there and can’t cope with anything deeper so I use a combination of my hands and these hand tools (trowel and little spade – dunno what the technical term for them is). You have to get under the stone with a small tool, then wiggle it about until it becomes loose enough to pull it out…..then you scrape away any soil, then do the same process again.

You may think “what’s she doing building fences when she’s got a wedding to sort out” but we NEED the fence for an urgent reason relating to our financially precarious state so it has to be done and done pronto.

I’m being driven by a mix of bloody mindedness, financial desperation and real need to get things sorted out. It’s a toxic mix that’s not much good for my soul.