Yup...a pretty busy weekend all in all!

It started about 6 weeks ago with a lovely lady called Pammi telling me she was in Pontypridd (pronounced pontypreeth) for a wedding reception for the weekend. This last weekend just gone. So what with us being 20 mins from ponty I invited her up for Sunday lunch. I took the opportunity to invite my lovely friend Saintly68 up too for the lunch.

As you can tell, these are no normal friends...well, actually, some of them might be. These are my friends from Christians Together chat, a chat site and forum for Christians around the world who want to just fellowship together without the innuendos and junk that normally fills a chat room.

Anyway, so then one of us mentioned it to Steve the owner...it may have been me, and as he was down in Devon I suggested he just stopped by on a slight detour (of a couple of hours lol) and saw us all.

Then, as it turned out Bexy, her husband and brother were over from Canada for 28 days seeing her husband's family who are in Manchester. We had originally been waiting for someone else to organise a meet for us to all meet Bexy but that was like waiting for a man to actually organise something. So I suggested she come too and we turn it into a mini meet.

We don't have a giant house so once the number started creeping over about 8 or 9 people it sort of turned into a Sunday afternoon picnic instead in the local park. Milktalk from Ireland popped over. I say popped but actually he spent the best part of two days just getting here!

My BEFF Evey drove many, many hours to come and visit with us (I love her, she's just so beautiful). It was benny's birthday on that particular Sunday too so he came along and we all gave him our card/pressies. Mountain Goat came up from Llanelli (pronounced Claneckhly - ish) along with a pal too.

Overall there was quite a crowd.

Saturday morning Dusband saw Dusband wandering around shirtless with a drill over his shoulder putting up shelves, hanging mirrors etc and getting DIY bits and pieces finished off that he'd not had time to do for a couple of weeks.

Above our oven is a utensil rack that the landlord or past tenant had decided to bodge to the wall (they say potch here but I say bodge). Dus had noticed that there were only screws in the bottom two holes of the rack so unscrewed it to drill the top holes.

He took it off the wall and noticed that there was a third hole but no fourth hole. He put a screw into the hole to see how deep it was and the electrics tripped. Great. So he filled the hole and moved the rack down thinking better to leave well alone.

The weekend started with the gorgeous Saintly68 arriving to help me with the preparations bringing with her a multitude of presents perfect for me (smelly candles, organising baskets & decoupage bits) followed by Milktalk, Bexy, Bexy's husband Chris and Bexy's brother Greg.

Evey, Milktalk & Jackie

The ever dependable Dusband cooked us all a lovely dinner which was served with impeccable timing of about 15 minutes after Evey arrived! Hurrah!

That night, during the night the electric tripped twice, waking me up both times. Fortunately my phone has a flashlight app on it (who would have thought!) so I was able to see my way to the fuse box to reset the electrics. In the morning we came down and noticed that the filler from the top hole had gone, either burnt out or blown out. It was the downstairs sockets circuit which had kept tripping the rest of the electrics.

We went to church with our visitors and they enjoyed our service. I wasn't sure what they'd think of how we did things but some were very touched by the worship and everyone got something from the teaching. They were all pleased to have attended.

Anyway, so then it was home to discover the electrics had tripped again. A quick call to the landlord to find out if they wanted to call an electrician or we should call an emergency one. We ended up calling the emergency one who hacked the plaster off, replaced the dodgy cables and charging us £115 in the process. Fabby.

Picnic all packed up, off to the park we went leaving Dusband to deal with the electrician. We put up the gazebo, set out the food. Thank goodness Saintly had the foresight to bring picnic tables to put the food on!

We played frisbee, some for the first time, and generally just hung around like cool kids in the park. I had worried that it wasn't very nice weather as it was quite overcast but for our Canadian visitors who were used to it getting down to -65 during winter it was actually a bit too warm!

We retired back to the house after a few hours once Dus had joined us at the park, eaten lots of food and decided that the rounders bat was too small for him to hit the ball properly. We all decided that the bat was the right size. I was glad he'd finally made it to the park though as he loves being outdoors.

Sunday evening saw a trip to the local chippy (or chipper as Milktalk calls it). Monday morning it was almost all back to normal. (sad face) However, Bexy, Chris& Greg and Saintly had all stayed over Sunday evening so we got to see them on Monday! (happy face). Saintly had to leave mid morning to get back but I had a good couple of hours with her in the morning. It's amazing how much we have in common and how much she made me laugh!

Bexy, Chris & Greg kept me company Monday morning and helped us finish the last of the weekend's planned meals. We had a great natter (the girls) over the boys attempting to watch Michael McIntyre (fab commedian). Ah well, she's only over for a little while, have to make the most of her while I saw her!

Chris & Bexy

They got the train down to Cardiff to have a wander round mid afternoon and I came home and was super sad that they'd all left. I know I can talk to them any time I like online, but I am glad that I took the opportunity to meet them while they were over in the UK and I'm glad we chatted and spent time getting to know each other 'in real life'.

Anyway, that was my weekend......:)

p.s. I didn't take ANY photos! As soon as some more appear around the web I'll pinch them for you all to see!