Tuesday.

 Sarah  motored over this morning and spent the day with us. She' about to set out on the return journey, so must go and see her off. More probably later.    Lot later now. Sarah 'phoned a while ago to say that she'd got home safely. I'm always glad when they do that --- although it makes me sound like an old worryguts, I know.

Goodnight all.

Tuesday

 

Mother and daughter (Sarah and Ann) in the kitchen. Sarah motored over from Milton Keynes this morning and is spending the day with us. She has already subdued my computer into a state of muttering submission (which is better than its  usual state of  open  rebellion).   

I never seem able to achieve a state of  being able to reproduce a state of agreement with it ( i.e. its reproducing photos to illustrate my blog .)  Still it seems to be trying to please this time. So I suppose I'd better knock off while I'm ahead of the game. 

Tuesday

Snapshot of part of the front garden (tree lined).  

Below - Part of the library - showing 'Jack Horner' - I'm thinking of fitting a second bell, so that he does a sort of 'ding dong'  alarm on two bells of different tones. Will show you yet another picture of him of it works out.  Sarah has motored over and spent the day with us. It's been lovely see her.   In fact she's  about to motor home to Milton Keynes in a min, so must knock off and see her away. More soon (if I can make the machine behave.)

 

Thursday.

 Snapshot of Ann in  kitchen/diner.

Thursday

Mystery  Object. Made of wood. Measures one foot by eleven inches, and is probably about a hundred and fifty years old. Would probably have been referred to as treen in its day  - That is - made  of wood - or   tree en.      Clue - would probably have been supplied as a set of four when new. 

Going to leave this for a day or so now - so that everyone can have a guess (probably a soppy one- mine would have been, only I've seen them before, and happen to know what they are - tee hee !!!)  No guesses allowed by my senior  daughter, as she's having lunch with us today, and I've shown her the item and told her what it is.

Tuesday afternoon/

 More younger goldfinch.

Goldfinch on Tuesday

 Took the photo of the goldfinch on the birdbath a day or so ago. Isn't he a little beauty?

Saturday.

 

Young tree sparrow (I think).  Son  Jonathon has very kindly spent the day with us, terminating it by doing his usual  trick of forcing the computer to return to its duties (by magic of course). I think the above photo is of a young tree sparrow (but don't put any serious bets  on this, because I'm not sure).

Tuesday

 

Four generations of Horner.....plus Clayton/Henshaw/Penny/Hughes!

Posted by SH when Pa wasn't looking.....sorry Pa!!!

Tuesday.

 

Above picture shows  two goldfinches  feeding. 

This one shows a young green finch (left) and a goldfinch.

Tuesday 2

 

Just been clearing out the garage and found the above illustrated  single handed wall clock- got a good deal of character and a ten inch dial, of mid eighteenth date. Some work to be done on it, but could do with the odd job to be done - still, I do like having the odd job in hand.

Tuesday

 Ann, in garden with friend Sue.

Tuesday.

Both these are photographs of the same item - a Mystery Object, made mainly of brass.  Please give the object's purpose, rough date and location of manufacture.

Tuesday.

Tuesday.

Snapshot of part of  back garden. Garden contains largely shrubs and trees. Still, it should be interesting to see what's in it as the year rolls round.

I think most of you will have seen this. It's Ann's English version of a Nuremberg kitchen. It;s becoming rather crowded, but I think this type of toy probably looks better for being a bit squashed. You'll have to embiggen it to see it well.

Friday .

Front Hall of (fairly) new home. The child's windsor chair to the right of the picture, belongs to grand daughter Lucy, and is the first restoration job I did after we moved in here last December. Sarah drove over here this morning and ran Ann into Ipswich Hospital this morning for her eye injection. Sarah has spent the day with us, and just started her long drive home to Milton Keynes. Hope she remembers to phones us when she gets home (she usually does).Been a good day.

Friday.

 
Rainbow over neighbours houses.

Goldfnch feasting. in garden.

Friday.

Ann and meself in our 'new'  back garden.

I think my favourite  clock  .  English, time piece alarm, by George Wood, circa  1700. (and iwth a passing strike AT THE HOUR.

Saturday.

Snapshot of  inlaid gunstock. English, circa 1590/100.

formerly in my gun collection - sold via Sotheby's last December. 

What a weird world we seem to be living in at present. The whole town seems to be something of a 'ghost town ' now. Earler this week, walking across the market place, there was ONE car parked  in the town centre.   Glad we saw it. In  a few years time we shan't believe it.  Must knock off. Ann's calling me from  the kitchen  to lunch.  

Speaking of Ann -must record that yesterday (for the second time since we've all been under house arrest, Ann has cut my hair,  and trimmed my beard- no barbers are open in town, so (all bar the moustache, though) Ann did the job, adding to her wifely skills, and I must stress that she aint at all a bad tonsorial artist !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thursday.

Our Great Grand daughter Astrid who is now five, was helping  her mother Amelia by counting her grey hairs among the chestnut ones. After a while she announced :-  "I've reached eighteen grey ones, and I'm not going to  count any more - I'll be here all day!

Tuesday 14th April

Neither of the above photographs is of a horse. We have now changed the subject (pro tem - might go back to it. We'll see.)  The above photie is of our son, Jonathan.  Ruth who is on her 'phone to me from Sweden, is correcting as we go along. Jon (who will be fifty tomorrow) was about two when this photo was taken. We lived in Ipswich at the time, with a back garden that ran down to the river.

The above photo was taken, I'm told in 1992. We were living  in Burwell (a Cambridgeshire village) at the time.

Saturday 4th April

Another Horner horse.  The elderly gentleman riding him is my late maternal grandfather, Harry Oliver Trower.  We first saw Cloppy in a junk yard at Billingford (Norfolk / Suffolk borders). He was on top of a pile of junk in an open front. ed barn.

All the children instantly fell in love wioth Cloppy. One of the major parts of my fatherly duties was, of course, pointing out difficulties, and one of the major ones here was that two adults, five children, and a large economy sized dog , of the English setter breed and the usual character for this breed (bounding but thoroughly good natured), could be fairly reckoned a carful already. The addition of a Victorian rocking horse into a medium sized family runabout made things very difficult. Ruth tried to help by suggesting that if all the children volunteered to run behind the car to get home, would I then buy the rocking horse?

Being a father who took all fatherly duties seriously, the children eventually won and Cloppy joined the family. A week or two later the Trower Great Grandparents motored over and spent a day with us. Great Grandfather Trower (as you can see) also fell heavily in love with Cloppy (he justified this by explaining that as a boy he'd had a very similar steed).. After tea, he insisted on having a serious chat with me on the subject of the value of a Victorian rocking horse in the sixties, then summoned the younger generation into the conference.

"`I know that your father has bought

Cloppy for you, BUT I know my senior grandson, and I know that when you've all left home, he'll sell this old horse at a vast profit, so bear witness that as senior man present I'm buy

ing the horse for you- and he now belongs in equal parts to all my great grandchildren present, and I get a free ride on him whenever I come and visit you". We settled up - the price I'd payed for the 'oss (£5) he insisted on paying me, and the horse now lives with Elizabeth and her children and grandchild in London, and all the family have access to him, when in London.

Grandfather Trower lived until 1975, and motored over for his annual ride on Cloppy until the summer of the year he died.

Tuesday 31st March

The equine character in this series of photoes was called Twinkle. She came into our lives a few weeks after we'd moved to Hoxne.  I took a 'phone call which complained that a small dapple grey pony was playing in the traffic two or three miles  along the road from us. The game she was playing was called havoc, or that at least was what she was causing. At this time (the late sixties) every east Anglian police officer kept a halter in his garage, so pausing only to pick up my halter I set off on my bike in the direction of Stradbroke (the place of the last recorded sighting of the pony).  I found him at a crossroads (harassing traffic).  I  leapt off my bike, applied the halter,  remounted the bike,  clasping the halter in my righ hand, with the pony trotting along beside me, back towards Hoxne.

I seemed to spend the next few days on the 'phone, trying to find the owner of the pony without much noticable success. No one seemed eager to claim the pony that the girls had now named 'Twinkle'.

Two or three days later I finally took a 'phone call that looked like being  helpful from a lady farmer who lived just the far side of  Stradbroke.  She'd lost a pony who sounded very like the one that Sarah was at that point riding round the front lawn on a halter. The putative owner's parting shot was not reassuring.          "If you have children" she said "Don't let them near that pony. She's vicious.

   
Later that afternoon the pony owner drove over to identify Twinkle, which she did; and I could see within minutes what the problem was.    She was afraid of him.  She stretched her right hand out to full length and patted his neck with three trembling fingers .He replied by laying his ears back and baring his teeth at her. The owner said she didn't know how she was going to get him home. She didn't have access to a horse box, and anyway he always tried to bite or kick her, if she went near him. I suggested a return trip by the same  method I'd used to get him to Hoxne, and all went without a hitch.  I think I must cut this story short by saying that in the end I taught our two oldest girls to ride, and also the horse owner's  daughter who was about Sarah's age (and who wasn't afraid of the pony).
                                                                             

Monday 30th March

Above is meself and the Duchess/

  

Above is again the Duchess, with me father  in attendance (he loved horses) .  

Again, the Duchess, with meself in attendance, and my  sister Margaret mounted.

Sunday evening

Sunday afternoon 29th March 2020

Sunday 29th March

Monday 23rd March

Snapshot is of  a corner of the new home, in a corner of the garden.

Friday.

Do any (or indeed - All) my google friends, or at least the ones who have retired, have difficulty in remembering what day of  the week it is?  It's not as much of a nuisance as you'd expect in that it doesn't matter too much  (and I think I'm getting used to it, anyway..)
I've developed  a habit of saying to Ann "Have we anything on tomorrow ?" as we get into bed ; and she'll run through anything important booked for the morrow, and on a good day, I'll wake remembering what I'm  supposed to be doing that day (well - sometimes I do).   I  must stress that during the majority of our fifty seven year marriage, mine has been much the most reliable of our memorys. Now, though, I have to consciously remind meself who this very  pleasant lady beside me in the morning is.  I exaggerate, of course, but (just to be on the safe side) I'm trying to develop a habit of addressing her as m'dear first thing ack emma ,  which seems to be working.  I am, of course, exaggerating my memory problems, but if any of you with the same problems have any tips for improvement, they would be gratefully received. 

I've just read this out to Ann, and she's gone off in a fit of the giggles, so that's alright.


Goodnight All.

Tuesday.

Few snapshots of
 the new home:-

Above is a photo of  the central hall, giving onto the door into the drawing room.

Library door (contents of library shaking down nicely). You'll probably have to 'embiggen'  the above two photies to make much sense of them.  Point is that the place is beginning to look like home, we think.

Tuesday.

         

                                        Mystery Object.
                                       ______________


Photo is of  one corner of 'the Library' (not a book in sight, you'll notice).  The small clock in the centre of the photo is running, and continues to keep quite good time.

 Mystery object is to the right of the picture. It is of an unusual size for its type (just over  three and a half inches long which you may find a bit offputting) but give it a try.

Monday Afternoon.

Still life in new kitchen. 

Monday.

Above photo is of  a farmhouse, with an oast house attached. Taken just this side of Sudbury. Rare in East Anglia,  although we must have needed oast houses as much as in other areas????? for making beer.

Above half timbered farm house, on outskirts of Long Melford. Lovely looking old place, but wonky in all directions.  Has never been known to actually fall down, though, as far as I'm aware.

Friday.

House    of  pre- tudor ( circa 1480 ish) brick work about a hundred and fifty yards from here.  Lovely looking old place, but told by a friend that it's not in the least convenient inside (?????). Very convenient for town centre though, I should think. 

Not got itchy feet though, I assure all my readers.  Still very much enjoying the convenience  of modern bungalow living.

Thursday.

Snapshot of interior of library, a small room, but ideal for the purpose allotted to it (text books - on guns,  clocks, metalware, treen, etc. ).

Books for reading, and relaxation, i.e. fiction, are in the second bedroom, but await being put in order (can't do it all at once - but will get there, eventually).

Sarah drove over and spent a day with us earlier this week. Yesterday we motored over to near Wisbech to see an old friend (in both senses) then met up with Roy, an old school friend and Janet, his wife. Had a pub lunch and swapped all the family gossip (always easy to pick up the threads with people you've known for a lifetime).

Must go - presence being demanded to help sort books.

P.s.  Roy always asks to be remembered to Carl (i.e. Crowbard.)

Still Tuesday (bit later, though,)

Glorious old house about a hundred yards from here.  Huge old chimney. Probably mid Tudor.

We're spoilt for  them in this town.