This is Alderfen Broad, where we walked just over a week ago. But this last weekend was even more special: Amy’s third birthday.

We arrived at Caddington about noon, to be greeted by two delightful grandchildren. One of the great things about grandchildren is that they’re always so excited to see you. We shall make the most of this before it wears off. Already they seem quite grown up: Oliver a mature five and Amy an enthusiastic three. She got a giant doll’s house for her birthday from her parents, and we bought her a couple of dolls for it. Oliver also bought her a doll. Amy can’t get enough dolls. She also got a CD player; now both of them have one, which makes things quite noisy, as of course one can’t have it on without the other wanting theirs on.

In the evening we watched England lose to South Africa in the rugby world cup final, which wasn’t altogether surprising, but it was a much closer game than might have been anticipated. Added to Lewis Hamilton losing the world championship the following day, and it wasn’t a great British sporting weekend. Norwich and Spurs also lost.

Julia and Dave came over on the Sunday and we had a second party, with the cake making a reappearance, complete with candles. We left early to organise the evening’s Ambient Wonder event, which went surprisingly well, with about 20 people turning up and a variety of things to do.

Yesterday Dot reorganised the garage, and I cleared out my rooom, which was satisfying. Later I lost a chess game, which wasn’t. Today I have been through lots of old papers that have been lying in my room for a long time. Some interesting stuff and a lot of rubbish, now sorted.