29th  January 2017

Dear All,

We were pleased to welcome Esther for the early part of the week as she was on leave. It was a dual mission to check on her aged parents and finish a curtain which had been in construction for many months. She accompanied us to “Just Vegetating” – “Brassicas” this week and a NIAB Wrinklies lunch in the Old Crown at Girton.

Finished Article

On Wednesday shopping in Cambridge was followed by a visit to Anglesey Abbey. We joined a guided tour of the Winter Garden and snowdrop collection. The Winter Garden is excellent with displays of coloured barks and they currently boast 350 snowdrop varieties. They are late this year and will look better in a couple of weeks.

 

 

Our Thursday jaunt was very local this week beginning at Oakington and taking in Longstanton, Rampton and Westwick. The temperature was bearable when you were walking but decidedly chilly when you stopped and the sun declined to shine. There are not many walks when you spot not one but two thatched churches.

St Michael’s Longstanton

All Saints, Rampton

The subject of “Biographies” was “Nikolaus Pevsner” an expert on art and architecture most famous for his 46 volume, county by county guides “The Buildings of England”. He was born in Germany in 1902 and initially praised some of the early Hitlerite policies but being Jewish soon fell foul of the Nazi race laws and had to escape to England. One of his pieces of wisdom was:

"A bicycle shed is a building; Lincoln Cathedral is a piece of architecture. Nearly everything that encloses space on a scale sufficient for a human being to move in is a building; the term architecture applies only to buildings designed with a view to aesthetic appeal."

Mary-Ann sent a clip of Albert taking his first steps yesterday, so he is now officially a “toddler”!

Love

Mike & Kate