Baas and Moos

On Saturday, I visited my friend Isabel's farm in Earlston (about 30 miles south of Edinburgh). Isabel, who works at the client here, is married to a farmer, Colin, and has a little 2 year old daughter, Gemma. At 11:10am, I took a 1 hour 10 minute bus ride down to Lauder where Isabel picked me up. We had a bit of lunch and then went for a walk in the farm.

The working farm raises sheep and cows for meat. It is a nice time of year to visit as there are baby lambs and calves all over the place, although a lot of the sheeps has been let out to graze in the fields. The smell though was not very pleasant!

Isabel, Gemma and I then went to Kelso for a visit. The drive down there gave me car sickness, pretty bad, I threw up a little, and had to be very cautious after that! The village however was very nice. We climbed up a little hill to get a nice view of the nearby castle, and then we got some snacks and sat down in the square. Gemma and I shared a packet of crisps.

At about 4:30pm, we headed back to the farm so we can meet Colin and his friend Scott to go to Melrose for dinner. We went to a little restaurant in a hotel and I had lamb chops... No problem disassociating the animals from the meal!

Gemma and I share the same birthday and we were good friends from the start. She was very shy when I first got in the car, but at home, she showed me round her play house. After lunch she was asking me to do everything for her, like put on her coat and her boots. In the car to and from Kelso, she kept calling my name, and in the end I was calling her name, so it was "Tina", "Gemma", "Tina", "Gemma", on and on!!

At dinner she sat next to me, and chatted and played with me. She was very good and sociable. After dinner, we went back home and she got ready for bed. After her milk, I read her a bedtime story and she kissed us all goodnight and went to bed. She seemed like such an easy child to care for!!

Finally I took the 8:50pm bus back to Edinburgh, arriving just before 10:00pm. It was a lovely day as the weather was bright and warm and I spent it with nice people. I was really tired though as the night before I did not sleep well.