Woooooooahhhhh, we're half way there! Countdown to Christmas 2026 (thread 2)

[NoWordForFluffy]

183

Phew, it's a scorcher!

Happy birthday to 70's DD. Best date for a birthday ever!

We're on our third load out today. We potentially have rain at 8, then again overnight, but it'll be on then.

We've had a dune fire this week, but not as many fires as others.

We didn't get the government alert here in Scotland. I only know about it from TikTok! I was working yesterday (yay! after a year out) and everyone was buying bbqs and coals. But today it is very cold here, still sunny though.

131

(Palindromic, 70!)

Morning!

It rained here overnight, but not much, I don't think. It's sunny and warm now, but apparently we're getting more / heavier rain later / overnight.

I had a lie in as it's my Monday off this week and I'm recovering from yesterday's hangover still. So the dog had a bit of a late walk. We had fun though as he saw lots more dogs than usual on our way around the woods!

We’re currently in the queue awaiting our ferry home. I’ve enjoyed having the odd glass of wine in the evening so have bought some duty free bottles to take home.

There was rain here last night and cloud today which has made it humid and not very nice.
Apparently home is grey, cloudy and low 20s for the next few days.
Hopefully it’ll be dry as I’m bringing probably 3 loads of washing home with me (but baskets were empty when I left).

Holiday has been lovely and I’m sad to be going home. Am absolutely dreading work tomorrow - catching up on 2 weeks off plus only have 2 weeks left to the deadline of a massive project that I’m leading (and that has to go to the regulator so I can’t F it up) 😩

Plus we have a few back to school things to get (small school bag and shoes).

I’ll blink, work deadline will be gone, DH will be back in work, LO will have started school (how did that happen 🤯) and I’ll be full speed ahead in Christmas prep!

The small artificial tree I bought for the front turned up today. Apparently it's the first 🎄 the guy has delivered this year! #proud

130

Morning!

Good luck at work today, Meeces.

We had quite a bit of rain last night. My water butt went from 1/3 full to brimming! The plants in the ground will be happy too.

I bought a couple of established hebes yesterday as we're short of things which are still flowering in the garden. The bees were loving them at Dobbies, so I've high hopes. I also got a rudbeckia which is in bud.

I was in the plant section googling...'do slugs eat XXX'. 🙄🤣 Apparently the furry leaves of the rudbeckia are off putting to them. 🤞🤞(We have a big slug problem.)

It poured with rain here last night, I went to the loo about 2am and it was wonderful to hear the rain on the windows. Our buddlia is struggling but we (well my husband) can't decide if it is the heat or if he watered it too much. Hopefully it will recover (as long as I don't touch it 😄).

Buddleia are quite hardy, generally, I think. I'm sure it'll be OK! (Just stay well away!)

We have rain forecast overnight tonight as well. But we're risking washing during the day as it alleged dry and 30mph winds!

Buddleia grow out of brick walls along the railway lines , any tiny bits of missing mortar and whooosh they are in!
Mine is a Black Knight , in a pot at the moment to fill a gap in a low fence , but next year I think it'll need to get planted out .
Some can self seed and have the reputation of being the cockroaches of the plant world (unfair )

The railway buddleia seem to be more lilac-ey coloured "wild ones"

We said that 70. We grew this from a cutting from my parents buddlia before they moved, it took about three attempts mind you. Every day we look at it in bewilderment that it has been such a pain to grow 😆

Butterflies love buddlia!

Butterflies ate bored with mine but I do have loads of CabbageWhites for the nasturtiums .
Loads of bees though which is lovely and as the flowers are high up my lazy cats CBA trying to catch them, which is a mercy as they'd get stung in their throat or face - and I don't think they'd learn from it either

I need to do a proper garden check but I’m pretty sure the majority of my flowers are dead and crispy.
LO did have a wander this morning and handed me 6 red tomatoes and an almost ripe chilli on his return so some things have survived.

I had to good Buddleia as I had no idea which plant it was - we have some along the river walk. Very pretty.

Work isn’t quite as bad as I expected but it’s still been a very busy morning. Looking forward to logging off today even though that just means washing and unpacking

129

Into the hundred and twenties.
It is very change of season now , the past couple of days have been grey but clammy . I was lucky enough to get towels and sheets dry on Monday.

Loads of Hallowe'en in the shops now ,
It is getting dark before 9pm now .
They're promising another heatwave end August so we'll see how that goes.
There was a farmer on the radio saying he was giving winter feed now as no grass for the livestock which is a huge worry as what'll happen in winter?

After watching Clarksons farm I honestly have no idea how farmers survive tbh. It seems an impossible way to make money.

Agree about the season 70. It’s finally cooling down here now and it’s much needed (for my poor peri suffering body anyway).

Am very pleased to say I just booked our first Christmas outing. Last year we watched Wallace and Gromit with a live brass band and the same theatre have recently added The Snowman with the same brass band so I’ve booked it, and it was the same price for a family of 4 ticket as it was for the 3 of us so I booked it. I figure we’ll either take a niece/nephew/LOs friend or have more room

Ive also been pricing up panto but it seems ridiculous. Almost £50 for the 3 of us is the cheapest I’ve found and it seems a waste when I have no idea if LO will like it.

That sounds lovely, Meeces.

Our two are a funny age re Christmas activities/ growing up generally, especially being autistic which means they often act younger than their ages. We took the decision to remove them from school in June, so we're on a home ed pathway now, which means that we can do something Christmassy in term time when it's quieter. The question is what!

That was a big step for you fluffy. I home ed DS for the last 3 years and it was tough but better than him being in school and the daily battles we were having, not to mention his deterioriating mental health.

He's 16 now and looking for a job.

Thanks Fluffy. I’m trying to squeeze in as much Christmas magic and lovely stuff as I can before he’s too old (he’s getting so big, It’s all going too fast 😩).

Would your dc be more interested in a Christmas market or a cinema trip (cue generally do showings of Christmas classics)?

And yes, a very big step to home ed. Will your DH take the lead with that or will you need to alter your work?
Are the dc happier knowing that’s the way you’re going?

Maybe a cinema trip, actually. Not a market...too peopley!

Re home ed, I've booked some online lessons and we also have workbooks here to use. We'll get out and about a bit too, investigating nature!

DH will be the go to, though I'll be here in the main while they're doing online stuff.

Oh, and yes, they're really happy. It turns out DS can sleep in now he has no school angst.

128

Morning!

Well, it's wet wet wet here today. The rain didn't start as early as forecast, I don't think, but when it came, it made up for it! It was that whoosh rain that's like a tropical rainstorm, then closely followed by thunder! Thankfully it slowed by the time I went out with the dog, though it still rained the whole time (and still is). The whole day is set to be wet. One of the fields was actually starting to get waterlogged as well, so there's been a fair amount of water dumped up here!

Hopefully it's filling the reservoirs nicely.

Hellooooo, we are back from holiday after a mammoth 37 hour journey home thanks to crappy FlyDubai who apparently are the middle east equivalent of Ryanair.
Got home to find Internet not working so that took many days to sort.
So I am playing catch up now with this thread.
Also have rain and hoping it will save the tomatoes which although lots of flowers seem to be dropping off before turning into fruit.
Coincidentally I also bought a rudbeckia at the garden centre yesterday which is lovely plus an agapanthus and a dahlia. Massive slug problem here too but ive started using nematodes which seem to be doing the trick.
I am so impressed with all the Home Ed going on - its a tough path but I think kids can really benefit from it especially as some schools are such toxic environments these days sadly.

Tell me more about nematodes, Magnolia. When do you apply them? I keep reading about them, but have never taken the plunge!

Oh, and welcome home! Quite the epic journey. 😫

I haven't used nematodes but have used lacewings from Dragonfli to deal with the aphid problem. They seem to supply lots of natural predators for our pests.

Good luck with the Home Ed Fluffy. DD1 did a postgraduate course in museum studies that involved designing a museum based resource for Home Ed groups and was pleasantly surprised that most of the attendees seemed to know each other from attending other courses and being part of a network.