Full of surprises

Well what a week this has been. First I had an email on Wednesday to say our house sale, the ongoing one from September, would probably complete by the weekend and being a holiday weekend I was thinking "No way!" (for my American friends the Europeans often have Good Friday off). Well by Thursday it was completed, a minor problem with bank details means we won't get the money until next week but at least it is done and dusted. So we have now severed our connection to the place we lived in for 15 years, not sure if that fact has sunk in yet, it was a lovely place to live for 15 years but God has moved us on and it seems right to have severed that connection now.

The other surprise was from our hypochondriac son who was sure he had stomach ulcers earlier this week, and I said not surprising as he stresses too much. Well as the week went on he got worse and he went first to a walk in clinic (a clinic you can go to when you can't get to your own doctors or in the case of a minor emergency - I think that is what they are, they are kind of new) and the nurse told him to see his doctor as he probably has appendicitis. A visit to his girlfriend's parents' doctor because he wasn't at home near his own doctor, saw him off to A&E (ER) the following night (Thursday) where he was admitted. The following morning (Good Friday) the surgical consultant confirmed he would be going for an operation but it wasn't until the early hours of Saturday that he was operated on as unfortunately there were three more urgent cases than his. Turns out it was actually quite a severe case but at least he is now back at his girlfriend's parents' house recuperating. I know he will be well looked after there, so I am not worried. I decided not to post the picture of his appendix which he sent me - good job I wasn't eating at the time hehe!

The last big event of the week is the fact that Mark, our middle child, and his girlfriend got engaged on Easter Sunday here in Ergli, Latvia. We celebrated with a meal out as you do. Kerry is lovely and it has been nice getting to know her over the last week and a bit. I also thought it was rather romantic of Mark to propose on Easter Sunday. 

The other bit of news this week is the snow has just about gone now, after over 4 months on the ground. Spring seems to be well and truly on its way, as you can see in the pictures, from the bulbs coming through and the lambs being born at a nearby farm. Even the locals are starting to appear now and get out to look around their gardens and towards the end of the week the ground seems to be drying out enough to be able to actually start gardening. We have already bought our seeds ages ago as last year there were hardly any left in the shops by the time we found out we had a garden to use, so as soon as they appeared on the shelves this year we were buying packets of seeds. Home grown veg here we come!

One local custom at this time of year is to tap the silver birch trees to get the sap to drink, it is supposed to be very healthy and good for your kidneys, but I also hear that it is often allowed to ferment and make a rather strong drink by the end of the year too - I don't think that version is quite so healthy but it might get folks through the long winters. Ian had a go at tapping a tree and we now have about 5 litres of the stuff - it tastes really like water but a bit astringent too which is a bit weird but drinkable anyway and not sweet like we thought it would be.