After my first decent night’s sleep in quite a few days, this morning dawned with glorious sunshine and blue skies. The sight of an intense, thick frost covering everything was too much to ignore so I jumped out of bed, flung on a few layers of warm things and set off around the new and hugely exciting garden with my macro lens firmly attached to my camera.

I’m still spotting things I’ve not noticed before, including several huge camellias that I’d not seen. I can’t wait for spring to see what coloured flowers emerge from the big fat buds. There are so many mature, established plants here that I’m thrilled to have become their custodian. I’ve never been in the luxurious position of moving to a house with an established garden before. I’ve always had to start from jungle and try to bring it back to life, with mixed success.

Much of what’s here I can’t even identify because it all looks like a bunch of dead twigs at the moment. Some things you can tell from the shape or from an odd leaf clinging on to the branches. I have already identified my spot for a hammock, where a couple of sturdy trees have suitable branches in close enough proximity to utilise. I can’t wait for the summer when I can lay in the shade of the tree on my hammock and dream.

There is a fenced vegetable garden already in situ although it’s well and truly grown over because the last owner of the house wasn’t a gardener. I’ve had Milly, Terri and Sherri in there today, having made the journey from the other house this morning. They’ve started the process of cleaning the weed seeds and the pests from the soil in there while DM, Alan, Erica and I all played roles in moving their henhouse from the garden of the cottage to here in weather that had mutated from glorious sunshine to snow.

While I was mooching about taking photos of plants, I had another wonderful surprise find, this sundial. I love sundials, I’m not quite sure why. I suppose the cynical would say the little quotes on them are cheesy but I love them. This one struck me as really sweet and so in my ‘loved up’ and sentimental mood I decided to get a shot of it all covered in frost.

We’re still working hard to get ourselves straight. I have finally managed to clear the last of the dog poo mountain, much to my intense relief! We’ve got all of the animals here, a nearly functioning sitting room and a similarly close kitchen…..tomorrow DM is tasked with getting my kitchen appliances running and sorting out the bucket under the bathroom sink. I’m hoping(!) to spend my day supervising the last container of our stuff in from Pickfords, though I’ve no concrete proof that they will turn up! If not, then for me it’s an unpacking day.

Last year, we were at WHL with Lara watching the Spurs beat Brighton in the FA Cup 3rd round. As I post this, we're in the FA Cup 3rd round but are away at Leicester this year and as I type, we're 0-1 up. Let's hope we hold on for the win!

BTW we're struggling with a dial-up connection at the moment, hence little/no communications!