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This has been sitting in my drafts since Tuesday, which actually was a fairly pleasant day.

I woke up this morning to a lovely sunny day. The car temperature read 6 degrees and I’m only wearing a short sleeved shirt under my 3 quarter sleeved chunky cardigan. And a vest obviously, always a vest.

It was the sort of morning that reminds you that it’s (supposed) to be spring and that warmer even better weather is (allegedly) coming, and all the exciting things to look forward to. Like feeling well again, the sun warming me up and making me freckly, mini trips away, maybe picnics and walks and wearing shorts. Oh shorts! All those summers in the sunshine where I was just hot and bored and stupid!!

I just keep thinking that last year this time we were here:

Is that sunshine? And I was wearing a sleeveless dress. Imagine! (I miss my fringe). (Pictures from our mini trip to County Fermanagh and Belle Isle)

I'm not going to lie, I've been having a tough few weeks months. I've been cold, down, anxious and feeling pretty damn unwell with bouts of home-sickness thrown in for good measure. I've been functioning on the absolute basics. But now, and I'm scared to jinx it, I think that just maybe I might be starting to come out of it.

And now that I'm starting to feel (kind of) well again, I really am starting to feel more excited about all the things ahead of us. And there's a lot!

A hedgehog in the garden

We popped in to visit Shane and Janette last night. It was just a mini visit, and as we were leaving we noticed a hedgehog in the grass. Of course, I was excited, I've never seen a (living) hedgehog before. I just wanted to stroke his cute little furry nose.

I think I terrified the poor thing.

Nou gaan ons braai!

(or, we're going to barbecue now)

If you looked at the picture below, you'd think it was a lovely warm sunny day, right? 

Wrong! 

The sun was shining, but there was little or no warmth in it. Still, we hadn't christened our back garden with a bbq yet and we figured it might never get any warmer anyway, so today was a good day to braai (what we do in South Africa).

We had home made lamb and mint burgers with yoghurt and beetroot sauce, cheese and tomato toasties and sardines. Delicious! What a perfect afternoon outdoors, wrapped up in a blanket and sitting as close to the fire as I could without risking the blanket going up in flames.

Sometimes, I really miss South Africa. 

I think any South African can relate to this video. I hated going to braais when I was a kid, it'd always end up too late, Yvonne and I would be close to tears, cold, hungry and tired and by the time the food is cooked, we'd lost interest and found a spare room to sleep in*.

*That wasn't just when I was a kid either, that probably carried on in to my twenties.

Lazy days

Today is the last day of our four day weekend. I can't believe it's gone so fast! I barely feel rested at all, and not for lack of trying either. We've done very little these past few days. We spent Saturday and Sunday night in Ballymena for Lee's mom's birthday/Easter. On Sunday we had an enormous roast dinner, there was beef and turkey and a gammon, yorkshire puddings, vegetables and gravy...followed by ice cream, chocolate tart and profiteroles for dessert. Oh my! The family all lazed and napped and watched some telly after that.

We came home yesterday and have done much of the same here...snack, nap, watch telly...

And today I made pancakes :) pancakes like we used to eat. Buttered straight out of the pan with cinnamon and sugar sprinkled over the top and rolled up.

 You can't beat old favourites.

Lately

Lately, life has been pretty upside down. I'm not going to lie, I'll be pretty glad when May comes around, more specifically, the end of May. I might have to rename my blog if this all goes on, it's been anything but 'frivolous'...

...'blank' is more accurate a description I'd say.

But amidst all the unsettled-ness of the routine we've got at the moment, we're making the best of our situation and everything is about to fall in to place. Our house is coming along nicely. Lee and his dad put a fence up the other weekend so we have our own wee private garden now, we have herbs and a bird feeder...and a barbeque and a picnic table for if we ever get another day of good weather. I'm so looking forward to lamb burgers on the bbq with that yoghurt and beetroot sauce we had last summer.

I'm hoping for some sunshine like that again!

Over the weekend

Lee surprised me with an outing to the new Titanic Belfast on Sunday! He'd bought tickets ages ago and just not said anything. And there I was going on about maybe we should wait until some of the crowds die down before we venture out towards that new building! 

We were both thoroughly impressed even though it was pretty packed. We both enjoyed the wee ride through the construction of the ship as well as all the interactive displays and the moving posters. Well done Belfast! I'll definitely be back again (when all the hype and crowds die down).