Tooty fruity...

Carole popped in this morning to give Lola a long overdue trim.  Lola adores Carole but has learned that after cuddles to say hello, Carole will take her to the hall to spruce her up.  Lola does not enjoy the sprucing up!  Especially the combing out of dense undercoat and it involves bribery.  Today we had to go to the top of the bribery tree and give her little nibbles of cheese to complete the process.  Hmmmm....she's not daft!

After a cuppa and a chat I waved Carole off and took Tommy and Tony (the roofers :-) ) their lunchtime cuppa.  They had stared dismantling the scaffolding and Tommy informed me reinforcements would be arriving and it would all be gone today!  Result as we thought it would take two days to dismantle and get off sight.

Sure enough within half an hour a squad arrived and in no time at all, the scaffolding was down, on the back of the van and heading off up the road!  Yay!  

This was our first chance to see the house properly since the roof was replaced, the walls painted and the copes and quoins taken back to stone (as opposed to being painted to match the rest of the house)  It was such a gamble to take the copes and quoins back to stone and I was terrified we would regret it but we don't.  We are delighted with it.  I think it brings back some of the original character to the old place (built 1900)  Now need to get the shrubs that have been growing like wildfire underneath and behind the scaffolding sorted! 

Spent the afternoon in the studio supposedly completing my fruit drawing and a second figure drawing for my course.  I finished the fruit (well I thought I did but on uploading this I realise I haven't shaded the stalk on the grapes!) but gave up on the second figure (it wasn't compulsory) as it wasn't bringing me joy.  I will go back to it at some point as I am happy with what I've done with it so far, but my brushes and watercolour paints were winking at me, so I caved and spent a very enjoyable couple of hours lost in the purples, pinks and greens of a thistle.  

Chilli for dinner, some crochet and some meal planning for Gail and LeeAnne's visit next week, and John and Norma next weekend. 

And that was Thursday.