Is that the phone?

Some things,

large or small,

can instantly make you feel happy.

Jog memories.

But how about an old fashioned phone box?
Probably just me on this one but let me tell you anyway...

Now there used to be one of these right outside my house!

I've mentioned before that this is my Grandma's old house,
(would it spoil your illusion if I tell you it's ex-council hee hee
not the thatch farmhouse I would love you to believe)

But the lovely
bright red box
has gone,
gone to telephone heaven

~and where is this telephone heaven?

Well I'm not sure, but I do know there is one in the local demolition yard and I want it!

I want to put it back in my garden!

Imagine the fun the boys could have with it.

Now my Grandparents didn't have a telephone,

they used the red phone box of course,

my Mum would even ring it to speak to them!

Yes you could hear it ringing from inside the house.

My brill Dad

'AKA Grando' 

worked all his life for BT,

but would my Grandma have a phone line fitted?

Nope, not she!

(nor would she have central heating, double glazing, a fitted kitchen

 or any form of hot water that didn't come from the coal fire!)

 Bless her!

I wish she could see the house now,

I'm sure she'd like it!

When I was a girl,

I used to go out with my Dad on 'call-outs'

in his little yellow van.

To remote farms or phone boxes to fix faults.

He would get a phone call and give me a whistle,

we'd jump in the yellow van and off we'd go,

visiting many lovely remote places

and sometimes quite unusual folk!

I was his little mate in that van on those wintery weekends,

or balmy Summer evenings.

All this is leading to a little story BF

pointed out that I may like.

About a village near him

who adopted their phone box and gave it a new lease of life!

As a book exchange!

It's a lovely story,

read about it here!

So???

How about it?

A Red phone box in my garden,

as a hen house maybe?

Tardis?

Den?

Endless possibilities.

Bet they don't come cheap though!

Love Claire. x

P.S.  I'm helping my pal Emma at

Em's shabby shack

to do a swop,

we thought it would be good to share it,

as we haven't done one before.

We have a brill theme organised

so...

watch this space!

I want to take you there.......

Well a few of you last week posted about lovely trips

to the beach,

and seeing as I was down yonder in lovely Somerset,

visiting BF I made a request.

'One wishes to visit the beach!'

Announces Lady Me!

Well, it has poured down ALL weekend.
(except today whilst I was driving back!)

ONE WAS NOT HAPPY!

But BF being the fabbytastic chap he is said

'The lady wants, the lady gets!'

So off we went.

To Lyme Regis.

Stopping off on the way to visit

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

well, not him in person but to his

cafe in Axminster for lunch.

Delicious!

Next stop, a very wet but still lovely Lyme Regis.

It was VERY misty and grey day but in true

Claire and BF style, we had lots of fun and laughter along the way.

Now although it was wet and windy it was still lovely.

I know it to be a lovely place to visit in the sun and now the rain. 

And now on to a gorgeous little Aladdin's Cave called

'A touch of vintage'

Maybe some of you have found this little beauty before

but it was new to me!

As I walked in to this delightful little shop

all I could think of was you!

The lovely lady behind the counter smiled and said it was

OK for me to take photos, and my usual shyness

with my camera was soon forgotten.

Almost everything in this magical place it seemed was

Cath Kidston!

With a good mix of vintage goodies

thrown in for good measure.

The helpful lady told me that the shop

used to belong to a children's author, he ran a book shop there.

He had crocodiles carved out of wood for the beams,

trees growing up through the counter,

twisted wooden handrails to help you creep up the staircase...

To magical doorways.

The present owner has now painted  the shop

in lovely 'ice-cream' colours, with splashes of

red and blue, giving us Cath Kidston fans an irresistable colour scheme.

Making it, of course,

so tricky to leave empty handed!

Of course I didn't,

leave empty handed that is!

But more of that later this week,

along with this weekends thrifted goodies too.

Right now, I have tea, toast and this months 'Coast' magazine

to console myself with,

after leaving the my BF in Somerset and

driving the long haul journey back to normallity in Cheshire.

Can't wait to show you what I brought back with me though.

See you soon girls.

Love Claire. xxx

A Grand Day Out.

Last week I mentioned I was off out to visit Niki here.

Now I am not sure whether I was more excited at BF being willing to come with me, or what I was about to find at Niki's delightful shop, Nostalgia at No.1.  I wasn't disappointed with either.

It was a lovely spring like day for our journey through the lovely Somerset countryside that I am falling in love with, we laughed and joked along the way, but thats nothing new with us. 

One thing that always makes me smile with him whilst were out on our travels is his ability to park the car in the most unusual places! 

Todays 'spot' was a SUB STATION

Quite handy really!

He works for the electric board so we can usually get a good 'spot' in the centre of anywhere on his patch, even if a bit of an unattractive buzzing/humming totally non-girlie place.  For FREE!!!  All this whilst laughing away, cracking jokes, and him threatening me if I use the photo I took of him doing the gates.

Hee hee!

             

A short walk through Shepton mallet, up to the market place, and there I saw something familiar.

A little blue shop.

A gleaming window, filled with delightful goodies, thoughtfully pieced together.

Slowly opening the door, gave the lady a little smile, and never shut up for the next 40 minutes!

Poor Niki!  Gosh I can talk!  I had to look at every single item in this Aladdin's cave. 

I wanted to buy EVERYTHING!

  My head was filled with lots of ideas of how to display things.

Old photos, glass, fabrics, china and trinkets.

Determined not to leave empty handed the BF helped reach down a picture from the wall, I held it, stroked it, ans decided it would look fab in my bedroom.

Poor thing hasn't made it to my room yet.  I'm far too disorganised at the moment, besides, I love to hold it, stroke it, walk past it several times a day in my kitchen, so I can steal myself away to a beautiful day out, complete with super company, the meeting of new friends and enjoying gorgeous deepest Somerset.

Love C. x

Confessions of a dieter...

Well my friends, I have no news to tell of my visit to my Slimming World class yesterday.  That being because i didn't go!  I do have a good enough excuse though,

I am here.

Portishead

This is the view from my Boyfriends flat!

I am sat here right now, after he has gone off to work, drinking fresh coffee made by his 'Boy-Gadget' fancy coffee machine, eating my porridge and banana whilst watching the swans gliding along on the marina.

I could get used to this!!!

Hopefully we are going to 'Wells' tomorrow, one of my favourite places,

When we first got together we watched this film

which is filmed in and around Wells.

So being a little bit like sad movie buffs, he took me to this gorgeous place (the smallest city apparently) and we found the differant places used in the film. 

I remember going when I was a little girl, a memory I have quite clearly as in the footpath there is a marked out area of the world record breaking long jump that Mary Rand did in the 1964 olympics.  She was from Wells and to commemorate this event, they marked it into the footpath. 

I won't be the only kid that tried to match it and failed, but I have the memory of doing so all those years ago, and doing cartwheels on the lawns of the catheadral too. 

I doubt I shall be doing either tomorrow!

We hope to eat in our 'maybe not so secret' place Goodfellows,

and he has promised to squeeze a visit in to Niki's gorgeous shop,

which is in Shepton Mallet, just down the road.

You can have a peep at it Here

So, I had better get out and about today, in this lovely spring like day and go and investigate the beautiful town of Portishead. 

Not that I haven't already before, but minus BF I can rumage in charity shops and drink yet more coffee in the coffee shop without someone checking the time or football scores.  Bless him.

Love C. x