Well it's been a bit of a week down here in Devon. On Sunday morning D had her PCR test instead of her first vaccination which she had to cancel. We spent the day quietly getting washing done, pottering in the garden and making some chutney.    

On Monday we received notification that D's test was positive so that ruined her week and she has found it very hard coping with isolation. We also took the decision to cancel our holiday in the Lake District as D didn't feel she could cope with being left but didn't want to come with us and we didn't want to risk another one of us coming down with covid. Luckily, on proof of the positive PCR test we received a full refund. In the afternoon we went into town to get stationary items for school and then K went off to play tennis with a friend and me, L and S went over to Teignmouth for a walk along the seafront with an ice cream for L. It was a bit overcast so not too busy.

Tuesday, as the sun was shining we decided to go to the beach. Teignmouth was so busy it took about 20 minutes to find somewhere to park but the tide was out so plenty of room on the beach. We had a lovely couple of hours, the girls swimming and me reading. When we got back K decided to make some cakes for everyone.

On Wednesday S got formal notification of her degree from University and the classification. She got a 2:1 and was absolutely over the moon. We are very very proud of her - the first person in our families to go to university and get a degree. She is now preparing to start working as a midwife from the 7th September at The Royal United Hospital in Bath. Nobody wanted to go to the beach two days running so we walked down to The Lawns in our village and had coffee and cakes from Crew Coffee. We then pottered in the garden cutting back some shrubs and then sat out enjoyed the sunshine.

 

This morning K woke up saying she had a headache and felt odd. She had a sore throat on Tuesday but a flow test came up negative, however, on doing another test this morning, it was positive. She is distraught. We had several day trips planned for this coming last week of the holidays and now they all have to be rearranged. Me, Hubby and L all had negative tests but it will be Mon/Tues before we are completely in the clear. So we are all feeling a bit fed up to be honest. It's my Birthday next Friday and I just hope to god I don't land up spending it isolating in my bedroom.

 Well life in this house is never dull with so many of us. We came back from Dorset yesterday lunchtime and D, who has been down in Cornwall with her boyfriend and his family, came back Friday. She said to me she thought she had tonsillitis as she had had a sore throat since the beginning of the week and she is prone to it. I suggested she do a flow test just to rule covid out and, of course, it came up positive as did a second one. She has been and had a full PCR test this morning and we are awaiting the results. I don't honestly know if we will make it to the Lake District now - D's mental health is not great at the moment as she is anxious about going back to school and now having to isolate will not help, plus there's the risk that one of us may catch it from her.

 Anyway, back to Wednesday and we got away fairly early for Charmouth and were on our pitch by 11.30. We got ourselves all set up, had some lunch and then went down to the beach for the afternoon. I love Charmouth as it is just a village so unlike Teignmouth, near us, which gets really busy with holidaymakers Charmouth is always less so. We had a barbecue in the evening and played card games.

Thursday we woke up to mizzle so decided to go over to Lyme Regis for a wander. We walked all along the seafront and out to the cob stopping on the way back for coffees and hot chocolates in a lovely new cafe called Swim. We had a mooch around the shops and by then it was dry but overcast. We went back to camp and decided to go back down to the beach. There weren't many people down their as it was pretty blowy but the girls had great fun on their bodyboards with the waves and I sheltered in the beach tent with my book.  Late afternoon we went over to Bridport, had a wander around, and got some dinner. Afterwards we carried on to Westbay for another walk and ice creams so a very full day.

Friday, I had planned on a trip down memory so we up early with a packed lunch made and the beach bag packed. As a child we had several holidays at a little village called Ringstead Bay not far from Weymouth. This was a favourite place of my Dads and I haven't visited for probably 25  years. The village is a few miles off the main road and on the beach. It has about 30 houses which apart from a small handful are all holiday houses and a campsite. Facility wise it has a small toilet block and a small beach shop cum cafe. It was a truly wonderful day, the sun came out and the girls spent hours swimming and just relaxing. I have been wanting to go back there for about the last 5 years so it was great to finally tick it off my list. We came back, had another barbecue, and then had a nice walk down and around Charmouth before coming back for a glass of wine and more card games.

Saturday, we woke up to torrential rain which thankfully stopped whilst we were packing up but which meant yet again we came home with a lot of soggy kit. Luckily it has been sunny today so it is all now dried out and packed away. We had another really lovely short break away and now we just needs to see what the week ahead holds as far as D is concerned.

 Thursday, I worked as an extra as we had a full seven children booked in. It was a mizzly day which was a bit of a shame as we spent the day at Escot which is all outdoors and is a big woodland area with trails, some animals and adventure play equipment.  We had a good time but a bit of sunshine would have made the day better. The best thing that happened on Thursday was that D finally passed her Maths GCSE after three attempts. She works really hard but maths has always been a real struggle for her, but thank goodness she has now passed.

Friday, we made another trip to the uniform shop and changed the skirts so we are nearly there! We then came back to Teignmouth for a walk all along the seafront and a coffee in the Pavillions which is a lovely cafe - part of the theatre- which overlooks the sea. After lunch I caught up with some jobs, and then the girls wanted to walk down to The Lawns and play tennis which we did for an hour or so in the sunshine.

Saturday we woke up to a cloudy day so first of all I did a couple of loads of washing to put out and cleared the ironing basket. After lunch I decided to tackle the garden and do some cutting back and some weeding. After about an hour the sun suddenly came out and it got very hot so the decision was made to grab the beach bag and head over to Teignmouth for a swim. We had a very nice couple of hours with the girls swimming and then we had a sandcastle competition which, unsurprisingly, Hubby won!

Today, it was back over to Teignmouth first thing as K had decided she wanted her ears pierced for a second time and the lady who does it was in Superdrug today. The town was very quiet for peak holiday season and quite a few shops were closed. We came back to Jacks Patch, our village garden centre, for a look around and K had decided, as she worked an extra paper round this week, that she would like to treat me to coffee which was lovely of her.  This afternoon I have carried on with my weeding and done some packing as Wednesday we are off to Charmouth in Dorset for another 3 night camping trip with K and L. Really looking forward to it as we have been going to the campsite since S was a baby and the facilities are good. It will be tinged with a bit of sadness as it is somewhere my Mum and Dad joined us a lot as, although not campers themselves, the site has motel rooms over reception which they always stayed in. I have to say that I have struggled a lot over the last couple of weeks as on our trips away and just out locally, I see a lot of Grandparents out with children and grandchildren and it makes me very sad that that has finished for us.

Finally, a picture of our only, very small, sunflower which finally flowered this morning and my nasturtiums which have also been very slow to get going.

Well, I imagine it will be next Sunday before I am back here as I am working Tuesday and we will be away relatively early Wednesday.

 Well as it was dry Sunday we soon got everything clean and dry from our camping trip and most of the washing done. In the afternoon, some of us fancied a walk so we went to Dawlish Countryside Park. This is on the far side of Dawlish and relatively new being created in 2017. It is 65 acres of open space with various walks you can do. We did the longer walk making a detour out to the garage shop at Sainsburys for ice creams! 

Monday, I decided to tackle school shoes. We went into Newton Abbot to Clarkes. We used to have a bigger independent shoe shop until covid caused it's closure last summer. This was a real blow as they stocked a bigger selection of school shoes so between the two you could usually find something suitable in the right size. L has had a real growth spurt over the last year so her feet had grown considerably but they are very narrow as she is built like a beanpole. She must of tried on every shoe in the shop before we found a pair that finely fitted properly. K didn't like any of the offerings, which didn't surprise me, so she still needs to be sorted. I also still need to go back to the uniform shop in Torquay to change the school skirts for K again. I can see getting them both fully kitted out is going to take up a lot of the holidays.

Tuesday I worked so Hubby was in charge of holiday entertainment.

Today, it was decided, even though it was a bit cloudy, that it was a beach day so we had an early lunch and went over to Teignmouth for the afternoon. I took my book and we had a pleasant few hours sat on the beach, in my case, and swimming in the sea for them. We finished off with ice creams for them and a coffee for me from our favourite little cafe. Now we are home and I have the treat of S cooking dinner for us all.

 We are back from our second little camping trip, all unpacked and a couple of loads of washing down. It was chucking down with rain this morning so everything very damp and needs drying out and we had our worse journey back from Cornwall ever. A trip that normally takes two hours at the most took four hours due to roadworks and two different incidents of broken down cars. However, all that aside we have had a lovely time.

Tuesday we spent washing clothes and towels from the last trip and repacking making sure we included beach stuff and swimsuits.  We got away just before 10 on Wednesday and had a leisurely drive down to our campsite knowing we wouldn't be able to get on our pitch till 1pm. We stayed on a site we haven't used before called Parbola. I only booked about 10 days before we went and finding a pitch with electric and a swimming pool, as requested by L, was quite a tall order. We like the area around Portreath and Porthtowan as it's not far from where we once lived and so we know the area well. This site was a few miles from Hayle and although rather tired and old fashioned suited us fine for our few days. Our pitch was in woodland and as a consequence was serviced by a very elderly shower block, whereas the two more open camping fields were near the swimming pool and a newer block. There was no bar or anything on the site which we prefer as it makes for quieter evenings. It did, however ,have a games room for children with various 2p machines etc where the girls spent every evening , and a swimming pool which they spent a couple of hours in each afternoon once we got back from our trips out.

Wednesday started drizzly so we packed up a picnic and decided to visit some National Trust gardens we hadn't been to before called Trengwainton Gardens. We spent a lovely couple of hours there, finishing off with drinks in the cafe. From there we went onto Helston for a walk around and a poke around a couple of charity shops.We then came back to the site and the swimming pool.

Thursday, we again packed up a picnic planning to spend the day on the beach. We made our way to Porthtowan and had a lovely coffee sat outside The Unicorn Inn, which was derelict until a couple of years ago, but is now a lovely beachside pub serving great food. The only problem was that it was a very windy day and when we got down on the beach the red flags were up which meant no swimming much to K's disppointment. We still spent a couple of hours pottering on the beach and having our picnic before again coming back to the swimming pool at camp.

We awoke this morning to torrential rain so it wasn't much fun packing up and we have a lot of stuff to wipe down and dry out but that is part and parcel of camping in the UK. We had a great few days and we are just trying to see if we can squeeze another 3 night trip in before we go the Lake District at the end of August. 

Well we got home lunchtime from our first little camping trip and now we are preparing to leave on our next one Wednesday morning!

The campsite we stayed on near my Dads was called Fairwood Lakes in Dilton Marsh which is about 3 miles from my Dad. We had never stayed here before as it is a relatively new campsite and it was brilliant. There are fishing lakes you can walk around and as well as camping pitches there are some shepherd style huts and lodges you can rent. They have a cafe and a lovely seating area with a grass area for ball games etc and a play area at the bottom. We arrived on Friday and as we couldn't check in till 2pm we went to my Dads first and had lunch with him and my sister. We then went off to the campsite and got ourselves all set up then later on collected my Dad and took him out for dinner. We went to a local pub we like and had a lovely meal and a good catch up.

On Saturday morning we took my Dad to The Rowdey Cow Cafe and Ice Cream Parlour. This is somewhere we only discovered last summer and the girls love it as there are animals to look at and the ice cream is amazing. We sat outside in the nice garden area they have and unlike all our other visits we finally were able to have proper cups and saucers instead of take away ones. We had a very pleasant hour sat in the sunshine. After lunch back at my Dads we left him to his sport and went to visit Hubby's Mum. The only trouble with both coming from the same town is that when we visit we have a lot of people to visit!. Also there were my Sister in Law and Brother in Law and their three children so quite a houseful. After leaving there we collected fish and chips to take back to camp to eat and after dinner had a lovely walk all around the lakes.

Sunday was very damp in the morning and as our pitch was getting a tad muddy we decided to go over to my Dads house for a coffee. We had a table booked for lunch at his local Prezzo for 1pm, meeting my Sister and Brother in law there, so until then the girls and I had a couple of games of scrabble. The girls love playing but it does get a bit heated! We had a lovely lunch and then went back to my Dads where my Sister joined us for a couple more games of scrabble, which she won both times. We said goodbye to all of them and went back to camp. By about 6pm the sun had come out so Hubby's family all came over with their dog and we had a lovely couple of hours walking around the lakes and sat out on the patio area chatting.

Today, we packed up and came home and got busy unloading the car to repack tomorrow, doing a few loads of washing, and a food shop this evening so that we, and the older two girls, who are staying at home, have supplies.

Now I am going to sit and have a couple of glasses of wine and relax before a busy day tomorrow of packing again.