Happy Birthday to me...!

Happy birthday to me!
Happy birthday dear ****!
Happy birthday to me!

No, I'm not telling you how old I am, but it's somewhere between 30 and 40 and it's not a prime number.

For the last few weeks I've had the usual questions about what I want for a present, and the honest truth is nothing. There's nothing I'm itching to have and nothing particularly I need, and I really don't see the point of people buying me something for the sake of buying me a present.

I had a lovely pre-birthday. Yesterday, as their "present" to me, Father Badger's mum and sister came round and helped me weed a flowerbed. You've not seen the state of my neglected garden, so you don't really get the scale of their generosity! It's gone from three feet high nettles, goose grass, twitch and other assorted weeds to neatly isolated plants surrounded by bare earth. Wow. I say again: wow.

I also had a lovely birthday today. Father Badger took the day off work. He and Baby Badger ran errands this morning, leaving me to lie in until 9:30, I had breakfast cooked for me and then I relaxed in a lovely hot bath to melt away the aches from yesterday's gardening. Once I was up and dressed we went off to a local farm centre to show Baby Badger dexter cattle, geese and alpacas (but mallard ducks waddling past, quacking, were definitely her favourite). We had a lovely lunch at the cafe, with Baby Badger happily scoffing our peas, potatoes and spinach (and a sneaky bit of chocolate pudding). It has truly been a lovely family day together.

As an added bonus to the day, I stepped on the scales this morning to see my change of attitude this past week has paid off: 4lb lighter than last Monday! I've enjoyed a day off with extravagant breakfast and pudding at lunchtime, but I'll knuckle down again tomorrow and see what this week can achieve.

Image: Rawich / FreeDigitalPhotos.net