Sunrise, Quiraing,The Crofter’s Lunch and Dogs 1st March

Vince was up well before dawn and off to the Quiraing for some droning of the sunrise.

I stayed in my warm little bed until 6.45am and watched it over Pointy Mountain, then got into the normal chores, plus the weekend housekeeping chores - you know the kind of exciting things - toilets, showers, vacuuming, mopping etc that mean “business” not just a lick and a promise like during the week! I also got a roaring fire going for Vince’s return from the cold and to make the house warm and welcoming for our guest for lunch, Alan the crofter. Being just a small crofters cottage it only took me until about 8.30am and I was all done!

Then twiddling my thumbs a bit for Vince to return I decided to make some shortbread, but not before my “Bunnies for Breaky” - YEP you heard me “Bunnies” - “Rabbits” - the “Easter Bunny” kind. In Feb we had love heart shaped crumpets from the Co op, but yesterday when I did the shopping what did I spy but crumpets shaped like bunny rabbits. No let me be very clear, there was NO other choice, so not only are they keen on their holiday marketing, but they make sure you will engage because there are no normal crumpets on offer! So I had some for breaky and I recommend starting with the ears!

I gave my family back home a video call on WhatsApp but I only managed to get hold of my Mum and Dad, my sister is getting organised for a holiday to NZ soon, so I guess she must be flat out, and my daughter and the Grandies are always busy with their social calendar, and of course with the time difference there are limited convenient times to call.

Back in the kitchen it was time to make a mess in the kitchen I just cleaned - but hey that’s what kitchens are for - so Shortbread here I come! I made three circular rounds this time, last time I experimented with shortbread fingers as well, but this time I just stuck to the rounds. They looked just perfect, all marked with a fork and sectioned, when I put them into the oven, so imagine my surprise when they came out looking like this! Apart for being “a bit touched” (burned) as my father-in-law would have put it, they had spread out and none of my lovely markings were visible. I double checked that I’d used plain and not self raising flour by accident, and I had used the correct ingredients, and followed the same recipe as before but FFS - this is NOT the shortbread I was expecting! Guess Alan’s chooks will have a feast!

Vince got home around 9.30am and he got started on the roast lamb. As he was busy, I decided to have a go at some painting. I have already filled the proper art paper notepad that Ian (the artist) had given me, and the best I could get in Portree was a children’s sketch pad - needless to say I discovered that “Paper Matters” as the cheap stuff just disintegrates with the watercolour. Ian had warned me that good paper was essential, and it’s not that I mistrusted his advice, it was just all that was available in Portree.

Alan arrived at 12.00pm, and to my surprise Darky (his dog who has been at deaths door since we arrived) was there in the sunshine, it was really great to see him again. Pia, Yohan, Cala and Cini were also out and about and are really warming to us, I will so miss them when we go back to Australia.

The three of us had a delicious roast lamb and veggies lunch followed by bread and butter pudding and custard for Alan and I, and Vince had chocolate pudding instead. There was plenty left over for a meal for Alan, as well as scraps for the chickens, dogs, and of course a special treat of lamb for Darky.

Alan shared some yearbooks from his IFYE (International Farm Youth Exchange) conferences he has been going to since his young days - it was very interesting and we really enjoyed seeing pictures of him having fun.

After cleaning up from lunch Vince and I spent time downloading photos and catching up on my blogs before we set out to Duntulum for some more droning and photos before it got dark. But we no sooner headed out than the weather changed and we couldn’t drone, so we hung around Willie McLeod’s and played with Alan’s dogs (Top 3 photos Darky, Alan with Darky, Cala, Yohan and Pia, Bottom 2 photos are Cini (Darky's Mum or Granny Dog) and Cala).

We just had left overs for dinner, as we weren’t very hungry and finally got to play exploding kittens for the first time since we bought the game. Vince won the first two games and I won the third.