Mother’s Day

Most of the day was taken up in transporting Jackie’s garden. We had a surfeit of sisters offering lodgings for the contents described yesterday. We considered ourselves fortunate to be moving the vast number of plants that had survived the mild winter, and even more so that they were only starting to flourish and therefore not bushing out all over the place. Even so, four car loads were required to complete the task.
Our options for a place to store the portable garden whilst getting our new home in shape, were Helen’s in Poulner, Shelly’s in Walkford, or Elizabeth’s in West End. Helen and Shelly are each already sheltering various precious objects.
Given that by the time we take the plants to Downton, they will most certainly be bushing a bit, and that Walkford is the nearest sibling’s abode, that is what we plumped for. With flattened back seats and loading the car to the gills, in two return trips we had cleared a little more than half the items. Coinciding with our arrival back at Castle Malwood Lodge, Becky and Ian arrived to help. We had a plentiful lunch provided by Becky, then decided that two cars could probably finish the job in one last push. We filled Becky’s and Jackie’s vehicles and still had a few items over. I then had the brilliant idea that if one person stayed behind we could use a passenger seat for these.
That was it. Becky remained behind and continued packing kitchen items whilst the rest of us unloaded the cars at Shelly and Ron’s.
This evening we all dined at The Family House in Totton. The staff were their usual friendly selves, and the meal excellent. We chose M3 set meal. This has a range of starters; shredded duck; a wonderful special rice; juicy vegetables with crunchy water chestnuts; shredded beef; and chicken in black bean sauce. Becky drank Diet Coke. The rest of us imbibed T’Sing Tao beer.
Jackie sported her Mother’s Day badge. This had been given by Becky in addition to a card. Because of tomorrow’s move she realised Jackie would not really be able properly to display the card for a while so she supplemented it with a badge that could be worn.