Blog Posts

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

30/12/2021

Hello all our friends.

We do hope you all had a very happy Christmas. We certainly did here at St Mary’s, as you can see from our photo, we joined in the festivities as best we could

We - Trudi, Elia and I - would like to thank everyone for all the presents. Sr Jennifer says she won’t have to buy us any treats for months!!

We have been walking in the park as usual in the early mornings, not so many friends around at that time, I suppose some have gone away. The after lunch walks are more friendly, lots of children like to stop and talk to us. Trudi is in her buggy some of the way now. I like to talk because they usually say ‘how handsome’ I am!! Well, I know everyone loves me.

Banjo, our gardener, caught me the other day for a bath ☹, I know it has to happen but honestly I could do without it – still, I looked quite clean for Christmas, and apparently I smelt better (cheek!).

We are hoping we might get away for a break during the spring, as it quite hard work being on duty all day every day, but sometimes we sneak off and have a sleep on the sofa.

Hope you all had a lovely time and we wish you a very Happy New Year!

Summer 2021

15/9/2021

Well that was rather a wash out of a summer – a few nice days here and there – but generally dull weather-wise.

However, we have done our best to keep everyone cheery in the gloomy days, and we have enjoyed walks in Chiswick House grounds, BBQs in the garden, the summer Sale – and when it’s a sunny day we always help everyone with tea in the garden, after all, it’s not good for the squirrels to be eating the leftover cake, and we need to save them from themselves.

Now that our mini-lockdown has finished, we’ve been out for long walks again in Richmond Park, I think we’ve got a little out of shape during the past 18 months, as when we got home, all we could do was sleep…..

St Margaret's Day

21/7/2021

My favourite day in the calendar - because after mass we all go out into the garden for a BBQ!

This year Trudi, our friend Red and I were all out in the garden hoovering up any tasty morsel that might have fallen from a residents plate. It was hot work!

I'm not sure I really like this very hot weather, but I can cool off - and surprise the ducks - in the lake in Chiswick House Grounds during our walks.

Enjoy this nice weather - before the thunderstorms come back!!

Easter Greetings!

25/3/2021

The human who types this for me is away next week, so I am sending out my Easter Greetings early.

I hope you all have a lovely Easter, and enjoy the break. Looking forward to a spring and summer of easing of restrictions and hopefully allowing us to all socialise again come July.

Trudi and I have been enjoying the slightly milder weather and have been relishing our outings to Richmond, and across the road in Chiswick House grounds. There are lots of new smells and sounds to investigate, and we’ve been busy checking them all out.

I was slightly surprised by the heron – but we’re keeping a close eye on him and I hope he stays away from the ducklings and chicks that should be making an appearance soon.

The magnolia tree on the corner of Corney Road is looking wonderful. I hope you enjoy it when you come in to visit us.

The garden is blooming too, which is very welcome, and once the weather warms up a bit, we’ll begin doing activities in the garden for the residents again. We’ve all been shut up long enough.

Today we’ve been celebrating two anniversaries – the 50th Anniversary of Sr Cynthia’s profession (she celebrated by doing an extra KM on the bike!) and one of those 0 birthdays for our chef (and our great friend) Chris. The nice thing about days like this is that there is lots of cake!

Happy Easter everyone – and I hope your Easter egg hunts are successful. This is a picture from our Easter egg hunt last year.

Happy New (Lockdown) Year!

26/1/2021

Well, Happy New Year! We are all fervently praying that 2021 will be an improvement on 2020.
I haven’t updated this for a while. Sadly, with the lack of opposable thumbs, my typing is not very good, so a kind human in the Office types these out for me. She has been really rather busy for the past 8 weeks or so, and I haven’t liked to bother her (here I am peering in her office to see if she’s free), but we felt that we should get something down before January was gone.

With the Lockdown that started just before Christmas, it meant that our Residents couldn’t go out to visit their families, and families couldn’t come in and join in the fun and games we usually have going on here. However, Christmas Day was passed in merriment with plentiful food and some beverages that didn’t look like tea….. We also had a lovely family come to us on Christmas morning and sing carols for the Residents from the garden. Some of us braved the elements to listen and other from the safety and warmth of indoors.

I’m pleased to say I didn’t notice any lack in treats and titbits over the festive period; my friends in the kitchen and the various offices and bungalow I visit were all very generous.
With the restrictions on travel, I haven’t had as many trips to Richmond Park as I normally have. Trudi says she’s grateful for that, as she’s not as limber as she was, and gets tired. But I just know that those rabbits and foxes are up to no good with out me to keep them in order!
We’ve enjoyed meeting our friends in Chiswick House grounds – both human and four footed. Although I nearly gave Sr Jennifer heart failure the other day, as I was accosted by a very cheeky fox across from Burlington Road, and in a moment of distraction I raced across the A316, without waiting for the green man to appear on the pelican crossing. I was thoroughly told off – and I fear I deserved it.

Elia is doing her usual winter trick of pretending to be very pious, and spending her time stretched out across the shelf in Chapel, which just happens to be above a radiator, or else snuggled in Trudi’s bed. She says her eyes are closed in prayer…. she doesn’t fool me!

We enjoyed the brief snow on Sunday. The garden was looking very pretty – but brrrrrrr – it was so cold the following morning, we didn’t go for our early morning walk. We felt it wouldn’t be fair on Sr Jennifer and Liz to drag them out in the freezing, icy conditions.
I hope you are keeping safe and staying indoors. We all want to get back to normal as soon as we can.

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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Summer 2021

St Margaret's Day

Easter Greetings!

Happy New (Lockdown) Year!

Ted

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