Donaghadee done

My trip to Donaghadee was lovely. The picture above is of the beach at Donaghadee. It is so pretty and I would love to have this on my doorstep. 

The plane was a bit delayed flying out on Friday evening due to Storm Amy and the landing was quite hairy. The pilot attempted to land but decided it was too dangerous to do so safely so we did a twenty minute loop and then he had a second go.

Taken before the second landing attempt

It was extremely rollercoastery and the cabin crew had a stack of sick bags at the ready. One woman across the aisle from me was crying and literally clutching her rosary beads. Just as I was starting to feel pretty groggy myself we landed and oh, the relief to be back on the ground!

Goliath, one of the Harland & Wolff cranes

Em and I visited Titanic Belfast on the Saturday which was great. The museum is really good and its final couple of sections made Em and I quite teary. The story of Titanic is such an enduring one and I think it's nigh-on impossible to not be moved by it.

Outside you can go and stand on the slipway where Titanic was built. There's something special about standing on that spot and imagining the men building her all those years ago.

The plaque in the above photo reads 'This plaque was unveiled on 31st March 2009 by John M Andrews, great nephew of Thomas Andrews, chief naval architect, Harland & Wolff, to commemorate the centenary of the keel laying of RMS Titanic, built on this slipway between 1909 & 1911'.

On the Sunday we went to Streamvale Open Farm to say hello to all the animals. If there's a goat or sheep available for a fussing and a feeding, I'm there.

A lot of the weekend was spent with Em's dogs. Sadly, Em's dear little dog Pu-Ki died in July. Trigger has been missing him terribly and Em and Adam felt it was time to find him a companion.

Trigger

They saw that a Pomeranian puppy needed a new home (he'd been rescued from a puppy farm) and now Macho is settling in with them.

Macho and his ball

I'd never been around a puppy before and blimey, what a lot of work! Macho is very sweet, though, and really intelligent.

He reminds me of Noel Edmonds

Trigger's still not sure about Macho but they're making progress and I'm sure they'll be the best of friends soon.

I flew back home on the Monday, no dodgy landing and half an hour ahead of schedule. I've never been much of a holidaymaker or traveller and I've barely been anywhere compared to a lot of people, so a 90 minute plane trip is a big deal to me but now I've done the Northern Ireland trip solo I know it'll be fine in the future.

Back from my travels

I had a wonderful little trip to Northern Ireland to see my sister Emily, her fella Adam and their dogs, Pu-Ki and Trigger, in their new home. Donaghadee is such a beautiful little place. It's on the north-east coast of the Ards Peninsula and it has lovely shops and its own lighthouse.

Emily, me and Sally

The Donaghadee lighthouse

We went for a walk at the nearby Ballywalter Beach which is so very pretty, and we also visited the Ulster Folk Museum which was marvellous. People in period dress doing heritage crafts in actual olden buildings? Right up my cobbled street.

Em, Sal and Pu-Ki at Ballywalter beach

Pu-Ki

Me with Trigger

Now I've remembered how to use an airport I can't wait to go back because I have to go and see Giant's Causeway and the Tayto Castle. Also, I need to sample more of Northern Ireland's delicious baked goods. Never have I seen so many different cakes and buns. We went out for dinner one night at Harbour & Company in Donaghadee and I had the tallest, most fluffy lemon meringue pie I've ever had. So good.

I want to eat it again

I travelled back to Southampton with Sally and my nephew Dylan, and stayed a couple of nights with them.

Enca, Sally's cat

On the way home I called in to see my friend Zeb. We had a lovely few hours chatting and catching up, drinking tea and eating the most incredible banoffee cake that she baked for my visit.

Behold the baked banoffee brilliance!

Since I've been home I've mostly been saying random words in a Northern Irish accent and making more black and white beads. Every day I've added the previous day's beads to a strand and I've been walking about with them in my pocket. I love having a strand of beads to hand like that. They're comforting in a worry beads kind of way.

I'm not done with the black and white beads just yet. I'm enjoying making them too much to stop so please bear with me while I get them out of my system.

I separated the mega-strand above into four smaller strands, each consisting of nineteen beads and at the time of typing I have two strands left.

Each strand is enough to make a bracelet just as they are, or the addition of a few spacers or accent beads will give you a striking monochrome necklace.

The black and white beads can be found in my shop.