It was one if those rare days when all the children were out and we had the house to ourselves - it makes cleaning much easier because once cleaned the house stays vaguely presentable for a few hours. I spent an hour or two ironing until I could bear it no longer and I abandoned the ironing board in favour of the garden. I went out armed with the pop up garden bin and Sam's arm extender thingy to spend a couple of hours picking up rubbish in the front garden. We have a hedge and it acts as a trap for litter that blows in from the street, it makes picking up litter very difficult and due to the road layout we suffer more with wind blown litter than most of the other houses. I have thought about taking the hedge out, but we would need something to replace it so it is one of those jobs that I keep putting off.
Once the litter had been removed the next step was to declare war on the weeds and the grass that insists on growing between the paving slabs. By this time I had backache but this wasn't a task I could delegate, Robbie wouldn't recognise a weed if his life depended on it! We have some lovely bluebells and various other wild flowers and I didn't want them to be sacrificed to over zealous weeding. There is a mature philadelphus in the front garden and it will look lovely in a couple of months if I can protect it from Burgess the Butcher - he is a bit of a demon with the secateurs, not to mention the hedge clippers! We also have some very pretty climbing roses, but I am not convinced that he could tell the difference between them and the ivy that trys its luck every year and has to be prised off the wall behind the roses. We have a good arrangement, I will do the front garden (except the hedge) and he will have dominion over the back garden. He will tackle that tomorrow, while I finish off the ironing and then get the containers in the front garden re planted.
As I pottered in the garden I found my brain processing all sorts of junk amassed during the week. One noteworthy incident was a conversation with the children who have recently 'discovered' The Proclaimers, after hearing the Mc Donald Brothers sing one of their songs on Pop Idol. It is odd how things come around again if you wait long enough. I have always rather liked The Proclaimers music but I thought they were designed to be listened to rather than looked at. I am sure their mum loves them, but imagine the trauma; to have one fiercely ugly child is a misfortune but to have twins is a catastrophe! Actually they have mellowed a bit now and I am staggered to find that 20 years have elapsed since their first album. I'm getting old!
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