I have just bought a chapel!
Well with my husband ...at auction a run-down Baptist Chapel which we hope to restore to its former glory..complete with pews, graveyard ( but the bathing chamber will remain below stairs!).
I bid at auction...nervously caressing my drink as I tried to look blase in my wellies and hat.
When I finally outbid the only other serious bidder he came over to congratulate me. "You do know its falling down and needs steels put in place don't you " I said to the guy who wanted to turn it into a gym/judo centre. He looked so relieved that he hadn't brought it himself and landed himself with major structural works that I wanted to buy him a drink to recover from this news! Good luck he said to me and I knew he meant it.
We have had to put a steel rod over the interior inside wall to stop it bowing and fix some major lack of guttering and falling down brickwork but the job has been straightforward and relatively simple..All we need to do now is decide what to do with it once it has been finished!
I went for a ride with my sunday girls on top of the Begwyns this morning... the mushrooms are coming up all over the high ground and I really wish someone could tell me which ones I can eat!! it's frustrating knowing we have such a wealth of foraged foods right on our doorstep...if only we know what we could cook without fear of poisoning ourselves.
Onto another form of possible side effects not natural though-Sucralose is an additive that has question marks over its long term safety - especially for children ( see http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/sep/06/lifeandhealth.health)
Before my daughter changed schools she would come home with a "definitely-aimed-at-kids" drink she had bought at school with this in it. This surely goes against guidelines that the School Foods Trust have put in place that says that additives and artificial sweeteners should not be added to drinks in schools
(http://www.schoolfoodtrust.org.uk/the-standards/the-food-based-standards/voluntary-code-of-practice-for-drinks-provided-in-schools)...Something worth following up on I think - this goes against everything that Jamie Oliver has been trying to do - no wonder he felt he was banging his head against a brick wall. Why do kids need artificial sweeteners?
Anyway back to the dark drawn in night of the first sunday of the official start of winter....its freezing but the sky is crisp and I await the early by one hour full moon tonight with anticipation.