Laurieston Hall. Friday 3rd Sept

Woke at 6am, had promised to phone Douglas to make sure he was awake. I had to wander out of the building down the track a little as the house has a lead lined roof!

The morning was beautiful, mist still hanging around, the end of the Dawn chorus, and a bat busy having breakfast in and out of the trees. D was already awake but it was nice to have a chat.

Breakfast here starts at 8. I had no problem getting some more shuteye until then.. It must be the country air!

Breakfast itself was good.. Home made bread, milk and yoghurt from lauieston cows, fruit, and museli. I did my first duty.. Washing up and cleaning the kitchen- it's great to be able to help!

Doing our warmups before singing

We sang till 1pm, having a break to sit in the sun in the garden. It was so nice out that having collected my lunch ( leftover pizza, jacket pot, leftover carrot salad) I went out and ate at a grockel bench and chatted to a resident who has lived here 30 years.. People truly love this place and life style.

Morning Break

I had a rest then we set off on a singing walk, stopping to sing woody songs to the forest, babbling brook and watery songs to the stream, then laky songs to- and then IN the Loch!!



I was very brave.. After a few other girls had stripped off and got in, I followed. It took me quite a while to pluck up the courage to fully immerse myself swim as it was so cold, but was very pleased I did!

One or two women got up onto a platform floating a little way out in the Loch, and after a bit of sunbathing more women joined in, and soon there were about seven of them, naked as the day they were born, all doing a circle dance on the tiny raft. It was very funny!

I didn't stay in the water long, not wanting my extremities to freeze, but i stayed in long enough to swim round the platform and find a bit of slightly warmer water that had the sun on it. Having got dressed again we walked back to the house and warmed up.

Tea was stir fry veg and rice with a delicious peanut sauce. Even though I don't like peanut butter, I do like Satay sauce, so it was another enjoyable meal. Pudding was a rough but tasty blackberry and apple crumble with custard. Nom!

I wasn't feeling well ( tummy was playing up) so I went to bed after tea. I set my alarm for 9pm to catch a bit of circle dancing which was lovely. We then spent an hour or so doing a "show and tell" I took a lollipop stick Martha gave me years ago.. She had decorated it and written 'friendship stick' on it :-) I enjoyed hearing about the lovely objects other people had brought.

After we had shown/shared our objects, singing started again. I stayed for a while before Heading back to bed. I went to sleep with tunes going round my head, it was lovely.