Decisions

Struggling to find a good place for these stunning portraits of my beautiful boys. It always takes me a long while to decide where to hang pictures as it seems so final putting a hole in the wall!! These are VERY special so it has to be just right and is proving harder because of it.

Mike got these done by an old school friend. He sent her two photos and she worked from those to create these. I'm amazed how, having never met them, she seems to have captured the very essence of them both - I can see their personalities shining through.

I've reframed them today in simple black frames as the frames sent by the artist were not quite right. I have to say looking at them again tonight has caused me a few tears. It's been eight years since I lost Jack (on the left) but I still miss him so much. He was part of our family for so long (17 years) and was such a character -very stubborn and not always very easy but I loved him. The drawing of him almost seems more real than the photos I have of him if that makes any sense at all!! I have lovely memories of the way he used to whicker to me as my car pulled up outside his stable. And how he used to let me kiss his velvety soft nose. Lime just head butts me if I try to kiss him. He is definitely not a cuddly horse, but Jack was. I could "talk" to him by softly blowing up his nostril and he would softly blow back exactly the same. Such vivid memories.

She has managed to capture Limes cheekiness- the little glint in his eye. The more I look at them, the more I think "wow". I need to get them on the wall.

I had new customers to meet today in Loughborough so I took Tobes to his tennis lesson, then went to those straight after. Pottered about a bit and visited Lime then we went to see a lady who does home from home boarding for dogs with Nell. Sadly the meet up didn't go well and Nell had a go at one of their dogs. It was a bit disappointing as after spending about quarter of an hour explaining how we had to be careful how we introduce her to other dogs (since she was attacked by a neighbours dog) that the lady's husband just opened the door and let their two dogs come bounding in. We weren't able to control the meeting as Nell had gone into the other room to see what was going on and we hadn't expected him to just open the door so we weren't even in the room to supervise her. One of the dogs was straight in her face which she HATES so she snarled and then they had a bit of a brawl. Neither of them were hurt. The meet up would have been so much better if it had been outdoors in a more neutral space with all dogs on leads so we could avoid the face to face thing. Anyway it's not to be so we went to have a look at a local kennels which seems very well run and also has a hydrotherapy pool so we could pay a bit extra for her to go in that and wear herself out. They do get very booked up though so we need to decide where and when we are going away this year.

Toby and Eva had gone to Henry and Martha's while we did that so we collected them and had a nose at the loft conversion which is nearly there. Then I persuaded Mike to go to IKEA. He was very cross about it!