North Wales
I did intend to write this Blog last week, but I don’t know where the week has gone to, its gone that fast I think I must have missed some of it.
Since my last blog, we have been away for 6 nights to North Wales, first night in a Travel Lodge near Wrexham and the other 5 nights in a Caravan at Abergele, vouchers from the paper again.
Had a nice steady trip up to North Wales with one of our stop offs at Tintern Abbey, been a few times before but still lovely there.
We had really great weather except for Thursday, the day I had preBooked tickets to go up to the top of Snowdon on the Mountain Railway..Typical. We got Very wet and Very cold and didn’t hardly see anything, had a nice Mug of tea at the top though, and bought a fridge magnet to say we have actually been to the top !
The following day was  lovely and Sunny again, so we spent the whole day visiting Llandudno and the Great Orme, wonderful day.
During the week we visited Betws-y- Coed, Swallow Falls, Bala Lake and lots of areas of the National Park that we had been to before, but somehow you just don’t seem to notice quite so much when you have three kids with you, they take up all your time and you tend to do things that will interest them more. So it was really lovely just to take in the views and enjoy the North of Wales, we spent all day Tuesday over on Anglesey and here we had totally forgotten how stunningly beautiful it is. We are going to go back maybe next year in the Motorhome and stay longer and also do more exploring in North Wales in general,
Didn’t get an invite for afternoon tea though, but then I expect Wills and Kate were busy.
We had one lovely afternoon also at  Penrhyn Castle (National Trust) a wonderful place to visit, Queen Victoria went there a couple of times, and it was featured in one of the Episodes of Royal Upstairs Downstairs at the end of March on BBC2.
Oh and a funny thing happened when we arrived at the Caravan, we were just getting everything unpacked and I looked out of the kitchen window and amazing a Herring Gull sat on her nest on the roof of next door Caravan, home from home, we called her Susannah, and she and her partner Bert sat on that next all week through all the fierce winds at night, how it stayed there I’ll never know, hope the eggs hatched ok, they were still taking it in turns on the nest when we left on the Saturday.

Have added a few North Wales pictures to My Flikr Photostream, have finally got it up and running, and up to date.There is a link on the right of this page, much easier to put all my pictures on here rather than a page on the Blog.

SKYE
When we got back home on the Saturday, I started looking up some of the newest adverts on the internet for a Border Collie Puppy, we had decided back in March when we went to Cornwall that the time was right, after we had been on our few trips away that we had booked. And on Tuesday lunchtime I saw an advert from a lady in Devon near Dartmoor that had a litter of 7, 4 of them girls which is what we wanted, so made a phone call, booked a campsite for the night and set off the next morning in the Motorhome to choose our new little Friend, Skye we have called her and already we are besotted, another new chapter of our life begins.
We sadly lost our best mate Chelsea in March 2010, she was a Border Collie and was 16 so it has been a very strange year without her, we still miss her, but are looking forward to lots of fun with this new little lady.

Will add some pictures of Skye to the Photostream later in the week.

Recipes
Will just leave you with a couple of Recipes from the 1753 book that are appropriate to this time of the year.

To make Parfley, Sage, Thyme, Savoury or Lemon Thyme Butter
Clarify your Butteer, then mix it with a little chemical Oil of any of the Herbs, till the Butter is ftrong enough to your Tafte or Liking, then mix them well together, this will be a great Rarity, and will make the Butter keep a long Time, this will be much better than the eating the Plants with Bread and Butter.
You may alfo do this without clarifying the Butter, by taking Butter newly made, and working it well from its Water Milk, and wheyifh Parts before you put in the oils.

Sallads
Sallads are commonly made of Lettuces of any Sort, Sage, Sorrel, Parfley, Tarragon, Creffes, the white part of young Onions, or Shalots, all pick’d and wafhed, and in Proportion to different Palates, thefe are eaten commonly with a little Salt, one Part Muftard, two Parts Vinegar, and three Parts Oil, well beaten together and pour’d over the Sallad, or put in the federal Sides of the Difh, that each Perfon may roll his Sallad in as he pleafes.

Still I find this way of writing so strange, but getting more used to it now, I copy everything exactly as written in the Book.

Till next time then……………………….