I picked this up from our front garden a couple of days ago and thought it’d make a good pic – I think I was right!

Isn’t it funny (or perhaps not) that once a home isn’t inhabited by the people and things you care about it just becomes a dry, brittle place. To me, that’s an immutable fact and one that says to me ‘fill your home with living, breathing things and when or if you lose them fill it with some more’. Whether that’s family or friends, young or old, two legged or four.

I’ve no idea what the fate of this snail was – whether it died of natural causes or was eaten by some sort of predator but anyway this is no longer its home. I wonder how many snails (and indeed other animals) reach the end of their ‘natural’ and just die. We managed to let that happen for Molly before Christmas – I suspect there aren’t all that many chickens that go out of this world that way.

David has just looked over my shoulder and said ‘I saw the shell on the studio table and wondered how on earth you’d manage to get a decent photo out of it but you have….it’s got colour!’

I suppose what this is all about is no matter how knackered and ‘holey’ our new home is, it’s the fact that David, Archie, Rosie, hens and wabbit are here that makes it real. It doesn’t need emollient or any other hydration (although in fact, there is probably a bit too much hydration for my liking really – damp everywhere and broken seal double glazing with condensation inside so you don’t ever get a clear view out from a window) because that’s what they bring me.

Last year I was on day 3 with the infamous wig....doing 'abba' tributes!