A Very Unusual Race

Sue tells us she had a small visitor last week called Flat Susan.  She has been travelling around the world over the last few months experiencing different ways of life and now it’s my turn to show her my little corner of England.  She arrived just before I was going on my annual girly scrapbooking retreat to Olney (famous for its annual pancake race) so was thrown in at the deep ending meeting all my friends.

The pancake race has been going since the 1400s and is the oldest in the world - only ladies who live in Olney are allowed to take part.  There are some wicker ladies carrying pancakes in one of the gardens in the market place where the race starts and Susan wanted to have her photo taken here.

Here she is outside the house we stayed in.

 The house is quite quirky – two sets of stairs, a shower in the laundry room and two bathrooms half way up the stairs.  Half the time Flat Susan ended up going in to the crockery cupboard instead of going up the stairs as there are two doors next to each other and it was very easy to get confused.  She enjoyed the garden with all the lovely spring flowers and one day I found her hiding beneath some pretty primulas.

An enormous amount of chocolate is consumed on our retreat and Flat Susan certainly took a shine to some Cadbury Creme Eggs.

I had to keep my eye on her as she always seemed to be up to some mischief - I found her in one of my bags 

on the top of my water bottle

and playing on a tractor which was waiting to go on a scrapbook layout.

She enjoyed the company of Tuppenny Wee, my little dog who goes everywhere with me.

We don't tend to venture very far while we are away but we did take a trip to Milton Keynes and had a cup of coffee in Costas

before going in to Hobbycraft to replenish our supplies and here I handed Flat Susan over to my friend Sue, who was going to be her host for the next few days.