Thursday – First thing we had arranged to be at Ranger Mike’s for some Midgefest prep. The kids did some papier mache-ing while Ady and I tried to create some playlists from our phone music stash onto Mike’s laptop. We walked home to collect food for the Sheerwater trip and the cake of the day for the teashop. We realised we’d cut it very fine for time so decided to gamble and try and drive back across the river. The gamble paid off and hopefully we will be better prepared for next time as we really missed not having the car on Wednesday. And then off on the Sheerwater. Ronnie was really late arriving and there was quite a crowd of us – us four, Ranger Ranger, Gav & Laura, Jinty’s sister Kirsty and some tourists. It was a perfect day for it though, gloriously sunny and flat as a boating lake.
We saw loads of porpoises and shearwaters but not a lot else. Porpoises are very shy and smaller than dolphins so not worth chasing to try and spot as they are not curious about us like dolphins and even the minke whales are so it was more spotting from a distance than being on sea safari. There are rumours of another superpod in the area with an orca also in tow which would make our summer to see so fingers remain firmly crossed for that. Maybe the next two weeks with company will prove good luck charms – we seem to see more with friends.
Back at home I had a shower and made some bread then the kids stayed here while Ady and I went down to the RCA meeting. It was well attended and an interesting one with talk of hall use and various other things after which Ady went home to the kids and I hooked up with Kate, Fliss, Vikki and Lesley and we went back to Vikki’s for the first Laydees Nite. Apparently years ago they used to have cocktail nights for the women here but it’s been let slip of late. Vikki is very lonely, Fliss told me she thinks no one likes her, Kate really misses her friends and sisters back home and Lesley is a 33 year old woman who lives with her 22 year old boyfriend and clearly misses intelligent conversation so I pushed everyone into getting together. Ady reckons it’s the women who run Rum and sure enough it is all women in positions of power here so it makes sense to me to get together and form friendships. It was a good night, we shared several bottles of wine, ate nibbles, chatted and all got to know each other better. We’re all at Lesley’s later this week for cocktails which I’m really looking forward to. Kate, Vikki and Fliss have all shared how much they enjoyed it and are glad we did it 🙂
It was a long walk home at 1am though – I do live a long way from the village! It was a full moon though and a beautiful night, so low level angst about meeting a red deer along the way aside I enjoyed the walk. I got home to find Davies had waited up awake for me which I am sure is the wrong way round for parent and child! 🙂
Friday – More cake deliveries – I’d made them the night before as Claire wanted two this time so only had to ice them before delivery. Mike called up to check on beanbag making progress and we needed to collect some stuff from Fliss’ freezer. We all went down to deliver cakes and collect food and ended up staying for tea / juice / biscuits with Fliss and Sandy before coming back up for lunch before the ferry came in as Ady was piermaster.
Neil came back on the boat, as did a stallion that has arrived for a short stay to mate with the Rum pony mares – he;s been doing that quite spectacularly infront of the castle, rather an interesting and quite inkeeping spectacle at George Bullochs home! We called in to the castle to collect some DG notes and said our goodbyes to Gav and Laura who I suspect are away to prepare a very strong application for Croft 2.
Back home I finished making midge beanbags, gathered up the mosiguard we’d been sent as prizes for Midgefest and then we all went down for a Midgefest meeting. We ended up having that infront of the shop and then Ian offered to take the kids with him on the canoe for an hour or so, so we stayed behind and had a couple more drinks while they went off with him. It made for a later than planned dinner but they love doing it so much.
Saturday – Midgefest 2012! All up early to meet the first ferry which we did waving flags and handing out programmes. As suspected no one came specifically for Midgefest but this was always our dry run testing time. We had been planning a Ranger walk but with no takers Mike went to do more prep, Ady the kids and I walked down to the otter hide to plant a clue for the treasure hunt and then to the hall to check on progress there. Claire had completed her willow midge so we helped mount that on the speaker stand, Ady got dressed up as the Midgecatcher and the kids did some final touches decorating to their midges. I realised I’d forgotten to put together a pack of incense sticks which I’d promised as a raffle prize so I walked home with Bonnie to collect that. When I got back Vikki invited us for coffee. The kids had already got stuck into the treasure hunt so we left them doing that and had a nice hour in Vikki’s garden while she talked to us about croft business plans, then the kids called round and we realised it was craft activity time so headed down to the village to get involved in that. Kate and Abby had done a fab job of laying on pebble painting and mask making and a lovely couple of hours was had sitting in the sunshine doing that with some fab results.
As we were the only real participants left we took Kate up on her offer of tea in the garden (her and Ian are housesitting for Sean and Ali who are away for a couple of weeks) and decamped up there with the games. We saw a pair of sea eagles fly so close overhead we could actually clearly see their white tails and then had fun with the parachute and the feed the sundew game we’d made. We left there with time to prepare the raffle for 5pm and I spent some time chatting to Mike’s friend who is staying with him and interested in Home Education. She lives in Sheffield so I was able to tell her I know there is a strong network of HE folk in that neck of the woods :).
The raffle went well – we had some great prizes including weekend in a camping cabin, dinner at the castle bistro, lunch at the teashop, a chocolate cake, bottle of wine, various mosiguard products, selection of items from the craft shop, incence pack and membership to the Friends of Rum. Lots of pleased winners 🙂
At that point we came home for a couple of hours to have some food and put Bonnie away, feed the animals etc. The kids had pancakes, Ady had beans and I had leftover cold potatoes and bacon with some salad. Then we headed back down to the discotheque. It was a slow start but by about 9ish we were all dancing away and having a fab time. We had a really good night and several more unlikely members of the community came in and danced too. A great time had by all 🙂
We left just before 1am when Scarlett had had enough – given we’d all been up since 730am I thought she did pretty well 🙂 We walked home with the intention of sleeping til we woke this morning.
For some of us that was earlier than others ;)I certainly caught up on a week of late nights and disturbed sleep from my persistant cough (over 2 weeks now, grr). Ady and I went down to the village with two loads of washing and got that all done. We pottered about and chatted to the various people around in the village – it has a really different vibe on a Sunday somehow.
Back at home I was hanging the washing out when Vikki arrived on the top path as she’d been peak climbing and called in to use us as base camp and report her safe return along with having a cup of tea.
Vikki left and I made some bread and pizza dough (out of white flour so used wholemeal, pizza def not as nice with that). We all had showers (kids have a bath in the deep shower tray) and then dinner. I talked to my parents and Frazer on the phone for a long while and we watched the first 2/3 or so of My Fair Lady but everyone was getting tired so I packed the kids off to bed before it ended to watch the rest tomorrow.
It’s been the sort of week I am coming to get used to – lots of socialising, busy all the time and still with not enough hours in the day. This week is looking like more of the same with added houseguests 🙂