Warm and sunny greetings

Saturday 6 April’13 Good day to you all, family and friends, We are rejoicing, singing, dancing with great enthusiasm and thankfulness as the wind stopped blowing, the S U N is shining for the last 4 days, and we are at last reaching out to S P R I N G! Morning temperatures still below freezing but by 1pm we are well into the 8’s and 9’s! Absolutely glorious! We did a bit of travelling and the green, green grass that is so familiar to Ireland has turned into brown fields. In this morning’s agricultural talk they explained that usually during the month of Feb the ground temperature starts to rise and growth is present in the grass and blossoms are forming B U T not 2013 it had to be different! It was the coldest MARCH ever and nothing grew- the grass in fact half died because it was so dry and cold! Where- ever you look you see only brown fields and we travelled quite a distance yesterday as well as today and we were amazed that the dullness of nature, there is no shine in the trees and the cherry blossom that usually loses its flowers with the April winds,l has not even blossomed yet! I plan to enter the dark domain of my poor frost bitten garden this afternoon just to see what can be saved and what will have to be taken out! The daisies which was at the point of flowering there beginning February is gone I will have to cut them right back! There not a bud on anything and the leaves that tries to come out on the fruit trees are all shrivelled up! Very sad! I worked last week and part of this week 8 days out of 11 and suddenly it came to a standstill We are being evaluated by the Northern Ireland Health trusts to see if they are going to continue with a 4 yr contract to send the overflow of patient to us. We did do +/- 900 patients during, just longer that 2 months and it took its toll! So many nurses became sick - it was difficult the cover shifts! This weekend the hospital will be open for 4 patients where we have had more than 30 on a Saturday night for the last 2 months! Barry cut the grass on Thursday and it looks good with brown patches every- where but they did forecast rain for the week to come, then we will be able to start planting- the ground temperature is still too low and late frost might do more damage! Jet , the baby cat has been a great joy until we noticed another black cat 2 nights ago- very wild and looks the same as baby Jet, we think it might be the mother she has got the gait of a female cat! Blackie is no more, I have a lovely photo of him where he was ‘titivating’ grooming himself a week before his disappearance. The birds are getting less and with the notice in the paper that the swallows actually died on their way to Ireland this year because of the cold we anxiously awaiting the arrival of our own swallows that has been coming to us now for the last 7 years. On the political front –the story goes on- corruption is at the order of the day- if you were here the President of the Medical Association in Ireland or whatever you were assured of a pension of 250 Million per year! What on earth do you do with so much money! I cannot understand it and where has been coming from? House tax, water charges, septic tank charges and inspection are all on the cards- Ireland is the country on earth with surely the most water available for use B U T they have water restrictions in place in some suburbs of Dublin where they ran out of water!!!! Also above my comprehension! Our church minister is away on school holidays and we have a guest preacher – unfortunately there is a personality clash between him and me –going on for years now- and when I heard that he was going to preach I told Stephen I will not be playing! He knows about it- Joy is out of the country also on holiday and in spite of the fact that I was not going to entertain this man tomorrow I would not leave the parishioners in the lurch and will have to be there to play – at least I will be playing to the glory of God and not to please this man he reminds me very much of the N T Pharisees. It is all about himself ........... I will say nothing further! Birthdays: I did send congratulations to the lot who had their birthdays on the 4th Kayla, Devlin, Florrie, Marika. Yesterday was Gerda Fosrter and Nine Paula. Die 10de is Gerda in Zambia, the 12th Paul of Haya. Belated and new wishes for a good year ahead! Thank you to Sam for the lovely photos of Evie having her bath! Precious! To those who had operations- Jaco I believe has had an appendisectomy- hope you are feeling much better- other had more serious problems Brandon and Nanette, and we hope that Joy in Brisbane will soon be well again best wishes for recovery soon! Those who are going to travel have a safe journey by bus, car or aeroplane! Please keep security a priority and be careful on the roads Thankful, sunny greetings from Cranleymore- Barry and Christina