Sarah valiantly struggled on, sitting her exams in a sweltering tropical heat, though we did find time for a bit of a break during the week to go for a bike ride which she thoroughly enjoyed and promised to go on more when her exams are finished.

Sue is much better now, the antibiotics have kicked in and she is just as busy as ever, managing to work every day this week, except one. She is planning to go to Tenbury Wells at the weekend to see a family friend, the break should do her good.

Jamie, during this scorching hot weather, has been enjoying the swimming pool most days with his friends. Yesterday he and I drove to Nan’s with the parts for her walk-in wardrobe. I have to admit I left him to it, only helping when called. I weeded the garden, made cups of tea and occasionally held bits of wood. What he had finished, everything fitted perfectly and it looked good. There are just three small panels left to make and fit, he will do that next week. On our way back to Harborough, we called to see Charlotte, she had forgotten to take some vegetable plants that had grown for her the last time she called, so I delivered them. Lucas loves playing with Jamie, he constantly calls his name and follows him everywhere (I am not so sure that Jamie is such a good role model!) We arrived home very late, after a fish and chip supper with the family.

Charlotte and her family came to stay at the weekend. They were keen to visit Argos in Corby hoping to buy a new TV, but disappointingly there weren’t any 42″ ones. Later, I took Suraj to Roger Woolnough’s in Braybrooke as he had built him a computer and he installed it for him. When we returned to Willow Bank Suraj decided that my two PCs were running slow so he installed larger memory cards in them and they did work faster. Before they drove home to Newark we had a family BBQ, though I am afraid I spent much of the afternoon watching the Lions beat a South African side, followed by an England side losing to the Barbarians.

The weather has been gorgeous so naturally, I have been busy in the garden. My step-brother David and his wife Genya had flown to the UK from Bulgaria during the week, but I didn’t find out until the day they were leaving.  However, I am flying out to stay with them for a week, with Roger Woolnough on the 10th of June. They live three hours’ drive away from Sofia airport so I have booked a hire car to get us to Ritya. Having already driven in Bulgaria on past holidays I know the signposts will be in Cyrillic and quite undecipherable to British eyes. I have half the country to drive across in the dark! It should be an interesting journey.

Friends Jim and Bridget Hankers flew to Brussels for the weekend, and we volunteered to look after their dog, Sacha. She is 12+ years old and not very agile. We had no trouble looking after her as she slept most of the time, usually on the sofa in my study. As the weather was extremely hot, I think it contributed to her lethargy.

Nan continues to look as fit as a fiddle and was very pleased with her new walk-in wardrobe that Jamie built for her. She still watches every sporting event on the TV possible and usually has three channels on the go at the same time (it would send me mad). She recently returned from attending a family wedding in Wales with lots of tales about relatives who I can never remember.