Big world

Early start this morning, and I spotted our neighbour's dog outside the kitchen window - with three gorgeous bouncy yapping puppies. She ran off with the puppies in hot pursuit as soon as she saw me. Lucky escape that the kids didn't see them or we'd have been pestered for a puppy for sure...

After some frantic lunch packing and swimming gear finding, we headed off to the water company and - in a gratifying show of customer service - they said they'd be round later this morning to connect our water. Then off to drop the kids at their kids' club. They seemed nervous but ok, though obviously Mr B had to drag me away as I was so worried about them.

The site brought its usual litany of joy. It took what felt like ages (but was probably 5 minutes) to get the circular saw working (who knew it could have quite so many safety clips) then Mr B was off sawing wood to make furniture for all our sinks and wash-basins to sit on. A call in the morning alerted us that our neighbour had lost two puppies... I told him what I'd seen and presumed they would be found.

The water folk arrived, we chatted, they were pragmatic and helpful and we found a logical solution to our problem. If only EDF could be like that... More calls with them and ERDF today, but I finally, after something fairly close to crossness, persuaded them to do what I've been asking for for two weeks: just send someone out to have a look and tell us what to do. Two week wait for that, but at least it's moving in the right direction now.

Off to pick up the kids, hearts in mouths hoping that they would like it (it's no good having them with us at the site - distracting and dangerous). We arrived to have a number of little boys point out Conor who was having a whale of a time on stilts. Katherine, meanwhile, was wrestling some boy to the ground for possession of a ball. They had both made new best friends (Tess and 'that boy in the blue top' - Conor's not big on names) and had a wonderful time. Conor went swimming and apparently starting swimming a bit (which he won't do for me) and Katherine said lunch was "mussels and yellow couscous - it was delicious" - not a chance she would eat that kind of stuff at home, of course.

Home for dinner and a visit from our landlord. Still no puppies. The mum came home with only one of the puppies that had been for the early morning trip to our house. He thinks that because he has given away three puppies already from the litter, she's trying to hide the rest to stop him giving them away. But she didn't seem keen to let on where they were. It's a big world out there for little puppies. This is taken from just above my top garden, looking east over towards Roquevidal and then on down the valley to the Black Mountains.