Welcome to 2009

I hope you all had a good Christmas.We had a very pleasant time with friends and family.Thanks to the wonders of  technoligy we were able to watch our grandchildren opening their presents in Brisbane Australia. We were able to link up with our son in New Zealand at 9.30 our time Christmas Eve which was 10.30 am Christmas morning in Auckland .and 7.30 am in Brisbane Australia which helped to bring us all closer as a family

 

One of our presents from the family was a bird feeding station  

.The weather has been so cold we need to feed the birds and also leave water out as the ponds are frozen over  We have seen a varitey of different species. Lots of blackbirds, pidgeons, bluetits, longtailed tits, robins etc  We have also seen a bullfinch they are so brightly coloured and stand out on the bare branches of the trees.We normally don.t see them until the buds are appearing on the trees.We have spent some happy hours watching all the birds coming and going.

The decorations and lights are now  put away in the loft for another year and we look forward to 2009.

 

 This Winter so far has been the coldest since 1996 and bought chaos on the roads

 Is it all doom and gloom for the coming year. In Dawlish it is sad to see the closing of the Woolworths store. This will leave a large empty space on The Strand. Who will take over these empty premises, and will the staff be able to find jobs.

 

We also hear that Wedgewood and Waterford Chrystal .are closing. Most households have items from Wedgewood some where on a shelf .Marks and Spencer are laying off staff

 

Is our Prime Minister going to help low-paid and part time staff cope with the financial crisis by scrapping tax for people earning less than £10.000 per year, time will tell.There are still half a million workers who are paying more in tax than they were bef