I haven't been posted on here for ages because time seems to be at a premium at Chez Yarns from a Barn! The most exciting thing I can happily report is that we have booked our ticket to sail back to the UK on 6th February, just over two weeks from now.  We will be staying for ten days, returning (if I can be persuaded!) on 16th.  We will spend some time in our home town in Hampshire, catching up with my lovely boys and their families (oh, how I have missed the grandchildren), then we will have a few days in my real home town of Weston-super-Mare with my Mum and my sister and her family, then back to Hampshire for the last few days.  I am really looking forward to it, especially seeing the grandchildren.  My grandson had his tenth birthday yesterday. I was able to phone him in the morning before school, which was great.  I can't believe he is ten and I kept thinking about the day he was born.  My daughter-in-law had been in labour for two and a half traumatic days, then, just before we were due to visit her and the new baby in hospital, someone crashed their car at the end of our drive. Fortunately, no-one was hurt but the emergency services blocked the road at both sides of the drive and I was so worried we wouldn't be able to get out in time. Luckily, we did. By then, it was quite late at night but the hospital staff were brilliant and let us in. So, I shall never forget the day he was born and the delicious 'falling in love' feeling I had when I first set eyes on my precious first grandchild.

His sister's birthday is on Saturday. She will be seven. Her birth was almost as traumatic but no car crash this time.  Through their excellent timing, their parents have ensured that their birthdays are three days apart, not long after Christmas, so they start saving up months in advance!  In the year 2021, my grandson will be 21, and my granddaughter will be 18 - what a week that will be!

My youngest granddaughter is five months now, and I haven't seen here - apart from via Skype - since she was ten days old, so I have such a lot to look forward to when we get back to the UK!

We have been working on the house here and I will take some photos later.  We have a new temporary sitting room. It's the room which will eventually be my office so is not very big but we were able to take a sofa and chair out of storage and now have somewhere clean, comfy and, most importantly, dust free to relax in. Trouble is, it's so relaxing we doze off as soon as we sit down!  We have our big TV in there and a little portable in the old sitting room off the kitchen. 

Half the new step at the back door (which we use as the front door!) has been done but we can't finish it until we have sourced some more old French 'tomette' tiles. What has been done so far has made it much safer and we love the look of it. 

We were going to take down a ceiling (this has been threatened for months now and I keep finding excuses to stall it!), but we are leaving that until we have returned from our trip away.  Instead, the front hall is the next area being worked on, and is currently having the ceiling plastered between the beams, and new downlights will be installed at the same time. That will be finished tomorrow, then it can be plastered and painted.

The weather has been a real mixed bag, no more so than yesterday when we woke up to pouring rain then, within no time we had blue skies and brilliant sunshine, then rain again in the afternoon.  Colder temperatures are forecast for next week, so I am really glad we had our central heating oil topped up recently!  Still, I am sure that spring is on the way.

This is a sweet little dress I couldn't resist buying to take back to my new granddaughter.  My old childhood doll is modelling it for me; the photo doesn't do the dress justice, really. It has a bit of smocking at the top, a frill at the bottom and lots of little embellishments.

This photo shows a little more detail. I love the raspberry pink colour and it's typically French, which is what I was looking for.  Of course, I could have spent loads because there was lots to choose from!






Well, I will try and take some photos of the renovation work here later on today and, if I don't get too many interruptions, post them on here!