Wishing you all a Merry Christmas
Posted by contentedsouls on 18/12/2018
After Gill and John left us a lot seemed to happen.
With temperatures forecast for a week of minuses, a bit of panic set in and we decided to hot foot it to Dokkum early to reach the comforts of shore power (getting soft in our old age!).
We were only back a few days before we found out that G had an appointment back in Blighty, to discuss/assess his other knee replacement on the 11th December. I was desperate for a break before he left again, so jumped a train to Amsterdam where I spent some time with Voirrey on her boat and we met up with the lovely Val Poore for lunch; feels like I’ve known her forever but this was the first time we’d met. Way too brief but, nonetheless, sooooo very special.
Not many pictures from Amsterdam as it peed with rain for most of the time but we still managed to get out and about and eat lots of oysters and go to the new Van Gogh museum; stick it on your ‘must do’ list. So nice to have some ‘girl’ time, drink too much wine and put the world to rights.
I arrived back late Saturday and G and I had the Sunday to sort the boat before he left at 7.30 am Monday. As most of you will know by now, I had to say goodbye to Baxter later that day; we won’t dwell on that one but I must say a heartfelt thank you to the friendship of Gary and Jill who quietly took Muttley out of the way and tiptoed around me and made sure Muttley was walked and that I ate something and so many more things besides. I hadn’t realised how stressful our lives had become with his round the clock care; nor how sleep deprived we both were. I slept for 16 hours that night.
The consultant agreed to replace G’s knee in the middle of April so now there are plans afoot to migrate South, after Christmas, and then come back to move the boat out of Dokkum by the end of March before finding somewhere to stay near Oswestry for 8 weeks whilst G has the op done and all the check ups, physio, etc., before returning to the boat again and, possibly, cruising to Germany.
Whilst G was away we had snow, so I’ll leave you with some pretty pictures and wish you all a Happy Christmas and hope 2019 is a good year for all of us. Thank you for staying with us through our ups and downs this year xxx
contentedsouls 
Gill Stollery said
Lovely and interesting as useful!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Kevin TOO said
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and Graham too. 🙂
Here’s to hoping that you both have a better 2019 and that Jill doesn’t have to wander the streets of Amsterdam again in her PJ’s 😉
LikeLike
contentedsouls said
I don’t know – it was the most excitement I’ve had in ages
LikeLike
vallypee said
Oh Jill, it was so very lovely to meet you and I felt awful talking about Baxter with you when I find out afterwards that you knew what you were going home to. Anyway, it was indeed much too short a visit and we shall meet again. Your photos are beautiful as always. Have a very very Happy New Year and we’ll see each other again 2019. XXX
LikeLike
contentedsouls said
You have nothing to apologise for re Baxter – I just knew I wouldn’t be able to hold it together if I said anything. Sorry you couldn’t come out to Spain but i do understand – we’ll sort something out later in the year once we’ve got G’s knee op out of the way.
LikeLike