The gate clatters....

...and the letterbox opens followed by the loudest rattle of post falling on to the hall floor.  "Oh, Oh Goodness!!"  "Is that my buttons?"  Out of the chair she leaps forgetting it's a whirly one and nearly falls face first onto the floor.  There, there on the floor is a package with her name on it.  A squish and a shake later and it's definitely buttons, definitely those prize winning[s] buttons.

So she willfully rips carefully unwraps the paper to reveal a bounty of beautiful buttons falling out of their packet upon which she shows relief at not having to rip tentatively open and risk spilling the contents all over the floor.  Aah the joy!  The heart skipping delight!  The swell of happiness in her bosom!

Indeed a bounty of beautiful buttons!

She sighed again and again!! 

Once her heart had settled and her brain began to remember the world external to button love, she noticed the rest of her post.  

"A magazine?  Ooh a magazine!  Can't be Country Living........could be Good Food......and PANTS!   I hope it's not Hubby's boring car one, Classic Ford."   

"Wait a minute...wait one minute!", the cogs slowly begin to move, "Jamie? Jamie???"  

"Ooh..OOOOOH!"  A small memory starts to stir, getting bigger and bigger.  "OMG!  Didn't my lovely mother-in-law say on my birthday she was arranging a subscription for me?  She did, aah She did!  

"Yiiiiiippppppeeeeee!!!!!!"

A hop, a skip, a jump and a twirl later she smiles the biggest smile a lady can manage when she nearly killed herself hopping and skipping and jumping and twirling.  "That'll do pig!!" 

And that is the story of a happy Ali who cares not a jot she gave up yesterday's sunshine to clean, a sacrifice all the more considerable as today the sky is the colour of grey old pants, for she has buttons and a magazine.

X

thank you lovely Jade xx