May Meanderings in Scottish Meanderings

I can't believe we're almost half way through the year already - where does the time go??

Healthwise, this month has been much the same as last - ups and downs - lots of frustration but occasionally seeing flashes of my old self now and again. Very occasionally. I've maybe reached a plateau in which case I'll have to find a way of living like this - of accepting the limitations and making peace with that. That is definitely going to be hard.

The highlight of May was our family get together on the 14th to celebrate what would have been Mam's birthday on the 15th. My sister and niece organised it between them and we had afternoon tea in an hotel in a little Scottish village called Blairgowrie around an hour and a half's drive south of here.

Most of the family had opted to stay the night at the hotel but I hadn't been too impressed with the reviews of the place - as well as the fact I didn't know if I'd be fit enough to make the drive down, far less stay the night. I could have got down with Nikki & the kids but then would have definitely had to stay overnight and wanted the option of coming home the same night if necessary. The result was when I finally decided just to bite the bullet and book a room, there were none left but I managed to get one in a guest house about 12 minutes' drive away in a little village called Alyth.

It was a great success all round! (Overall - on a personal level not so much but I’ll talk about that later). We were really lucky with the weather - there were a few showers but mainly sunshine and there was a park along the riverside within walking distance from the hotel so we made good use of that with all the kids! There was also a lovely swimming pool in the hotel and we were able to book it out so that we had it all to ourselves which was a big hit.

Here we are ready to tuck in :)


A much depleted number than the original 30 of us who were going unfortunately. My brother, Ian, managed to get Covid 2 days before he was due to come so that put paid to both him and my sister-in-law, Margaret, coming, then his daughter, Catriona, caught a sickness bug a couple of days before they were due to come as well so that put paid to her family coming. My niece, Caroline, has fallen out with all her family and refused to come but also refused to let her two boys come (Lorna would have easily taken them) and my nephew Ali, was offshore that week and couldn't get it changed so his family weren't able to be there either.

However my cousin, Jane, put in a surprise appearance as did my other brother, Mike, who had driven up from London the day before! So that was lovely.

So just to let you know who everyone is - my brothers are Ian & Mike and my sister is Lorna.

Ian and Margaret's kids are Catriona and Craig.
Mike's kids are Arran and Malcolm.
Lorna's kids are Alistair, Marina, Jenny and Caroline.

Here are the boys - Kevin (Jenny's husband), Mike, Stephen (Marina's husband) and Craig.


And the girls - Marina, Jane (my cousin), Lorna, me (with Ruari), Jenny and Nikki.


And the kids - Zander & Jessie (Marina & Stephen's kids); Ruari; Robin & Roseanna (Jenny & Kev's kids) and Lily & Lilah.


Sorry some of the resolutions of the photos aren’t too sharp - the hotel hadn't done a group afternoon tea before so asked if they could take a photo of us for their website so I was kind of relying on them for a good pic of us all at the tea and my sister for some of the group photos but I wish I'd taken more on my own phone because their phones were crap!

Lorna had gone down 2 days before on the Thursday in her campervan and on one of her explorations was delighted to come across Jessie Street (Jessie was Mam's name :) so, given we were there to celebrate her would be birthday, on the Sunday those of us who were left (some had already gone home by then) walked there to get a photo in front of it! (The little girl in purple was the first born girl after Mum died and was named after her). So maybe she was there in spirit with us after all :)


And how’s this for a family team effort in self-confidence? Poor Roseanna got stuck trying to pluck up courage to come down the fireman's pole at the park so Auntie Marina very patiently coached her (with some useless male support :) into finally getting there! This is actually the second half of the video - it had been going on a good five minutes before this hence the big cheer at the end :)

I didn't go into the pool so was put in charge of photos and videos when the rest were in so this is just one of many to show the fun element and the size of the pool. On my right at the end of the pool there was a spa hot tub and also a sauna room and steam room and there were a couple of comfortable chairs to sit in for spectators. I was quite impressed. And as you can see Ruari's favourite bit was the hydro jet massage which he took great delight in operating as much as he could!

For me personally it was a mixed bag experience. I started to feel unwell on the drive down and took a wrong turning extending my journey by a good 40 minutes and by the time I got to the hotel I was really feeling dodgy. After an hour I went and sat in Nikki's room to see if that would help but it didn't - however as the sun was still shining after the tea we went and sat outside on the patio and the fresh air seemed to help a bit. My main worry was the fact I knew I couldn't drive any further once I got there but I still had to get to the guesthouse somehow! I could have got a lift but that would have meant someone coming back to pick me up in the morning and I didn't know what I'd be like the next day.

However after sitting outside for a bit I felt like I could make the drive and although it was a bit of a white knuckle one, I finally called it a night at 8 p.m. and made it to Alyth! And what a lovely guesthouse!

This is my room - really cute with a large bathroom and spa bath. For half the price of the rooms at the Angus Hotel as well (where the rest were staying).



The view from the window looks much nicer than in the photo - beyond that bit of roof it actually looked onto a large beautiful garden.

This is one of the sitting rooms exclusively for guests.


And this was the other one.


The breakfast conservatory - and that's only half the garden you can see there.


The owners (who are lovely) actually live in an annexe behind the house so the whole house is totally given over to guests and they just appear at given times to cook breakfast, do checkouts and for dinner. So you've got the freedom of the house but the security of knowing the owners are on hand if need be.

The whole place is decorated impeccably with fantastic taste and lots of quirky touches - definitely a 5 star! It was such a shame I couldn't really appreciate it fully because I felt so rubbish but I would definitely stay there again.

Mike went back home on Saturday night and Jane was flying to Iceland on Sunday so she went off on Saturday night too. On Sunday the rest of us took walks, went to the park with the kids, had lunch in a delightful little café we found and then said our goodbyes and went off home tired but happy. I hadn't slept very well even though the bed was super comfy and woke at 5 a.m. feeling sick so I didn't get off to a good start but by around lunchtime I was starting to feel a bit better and I had a much better journey home than the one there and felt well enough to meander off the beaten track and have a walk along a beach in a nearby village before going home.

And we're all set to make it an annual event - not sure if we're going back to the same place - we're just seeing what the consensus is (some of the rooms in the Angus were pretty noisy) but if not, we'll go somewhere in that general area as it's a good meeting point for all of us.

I'm so glad it was such a success - the kids all had a ball and got on really well together - it was just a shame illness prevented some of us from being together. Hopefully everyone will be ok for next year though.


Some of the Italian class went on holiday to Italy at the start of the month - I've mentioned before that the Italian teacher, Enrica, organises these holidays to her home town of Vasto and also does other trips to Sicily. She arranges every part of the trip - transport from the airport, accommodation, Italian lessons in the mornings and authentic Italian experiences in the afternoons and evenings. I had really hoped I would be well enough by now to go and swithered whether to book because of course we had to give her numbers months in advance for her to book things up. I couldn't take the risk though but then had to endure all the excitement of the others going and the chat about it in class each week and then they used our usual WhatsApp group to message each other and post photos of the trip when they were over there so that was kinda hard to see.

However I was almost glad I didn't go in the end because Enrica caught Covid about half through the week and had to isolate! Thankfully she had organised everything so well that they could continue to go to the planned places by themselves so it wasn't too disruptive but by the time they got home, several others who had been there had caught it too. Knowing my luck I would have been one of them and remembering how hard it hit me when I got it, I would have hated to have been that unwell in a completely different country and still have to get home somehow! So maybe I dodged a bullet there.

But that’s why I was a bit depressed after the trip to Balgownie - just being ill for half of it was difficult to get through and I kept thinking what if this means I can never go on holiday again? The inheritance money from my Uncle Tommy’s estate has now come through and it’s horrible to think I might not be able to use any of it for a holiday when I’ve waited so long to be able to go on one.

I really wish I had a manual for this body so that I could learn to live with it somehow!


Otherwise things have been much the same - I see the kids pretty regularly and they’re all fine. We’re celebrating the Queen’s Jubilee on Sunday with afternoon tea - if it’s a nice day we’ll make it into a picnic somewhere - if not we’ll have it indoors :)

The back garden project trundles on. I managed out to a company to see summerhouses/garden rooms but just got more confused than ever about what would work in the back garden! I think I’m just going to have to make a decision and go with it otherwise it’ll never get done. I’m thinking I might contact a charity or somewhere that does house/room clearances to see if they’ll clear the old shed although I don’t know if they’ll need to have it a bit more organised than it is now.

Anyway I’m plodding on - that’s about the size of it :)