28th February 2010

 

Wow, I know its a short month but just where did February go??? The good thing is that the nights are really pulling out now and its lovely to leave work most nights and it's still daylight!! The winter seems to have been going on for ever though and Pam and I were so lucky to be able to get away from it for a while this month by visiting Egypt. We had lovely weather with temperatures up to 35 C. We stayed in Sharmel Sheik in the Sinai Peninsula and had a lovely holiday with blue skies and sunshine everyday. The high spots were seeing the pyramids and snorkling on the reefs in the Red Sea and seeing all the remarkable fish. Having breakfast everyday at 7.30am in the sun, it was so easy to forget that in England you were still in the depths of winter!! But all good things come to an end and when we arrived back at Luton at 11.3Opm on 17th February, it was snowing! Now that's a shock to the system. Photos of our holiday are shown above.

 

WE have done some lovely things this last few weeks. Visiting the seals on the beach at Winterton was one of them and despite it being a freezing cold day and very windy we were able to get a good view of many seals and several pups. We have also been to Banham Zoo and trudged through the deep slippery sludge to get these lovely pictures of the two Snow Leopards there. They seemed very at home in the cold, though these pictures were taken before they ventured outside. We have also visited the ski slope at Trowse, several times while the snow was on the ground and it made the slopes there great fun to ski. I took a couple of photos which you can see if you go to the photos section entitled 'photos of Norwich' Our granddaughter Lilly, Amy's daughter, visits the Cafe regularly and above is a picture of our latest special offer to be displayed in the Chiller.

 

The Cafe is going well, though trade has slowed this month. The normal lunchtime period remains busy, so if you are not tied for time, it is always a good idea to come before 12.30 or after 1.30pm. We have heard that there is a trend towards a Coffee called a 'Flat White'. This is a double espresso, in a cup, with full fat milk and topped with a creamy smooth foam served with a smile...So we are now offering this as an addition to our Coffee range. 

Our staff have been busy raising money for charity this month too and a big Thank You to all our customers, who, once again, have generously contributed and helped to raise £82 for the Sunny Days Children's fund, which helps seriously ill children. Also to continue to help this one Charity, Jennette is planning to do a sky dive. She now has the date for this, which is 30th May, which also happens to be the month in which she celebrates her 40th.Birthday.( I know she is excited about this milestone, and will not mind me mentioning it here. So Jennette is busy collecting sponsorship for this and has reached £400 already, a brilliant achievement in itself.

Most of this has come from our loyal and generous customers. (YOU ARE THE BEST!!) Also in this same month of May, Amy should be coming back from maternity leave, on a part time basis. It does not seem possible that time has passed so quickly. Well, that's it for this month. I think we have caught up with the news. Let's hope March is a better month for weather. The daffodils are in bud, so we have those displays to look forward too and the aconites and snow drops look beautiful and cheer up what would otherwise be a really dreary time. But we must always remember how lucky we are in this country and in this area in particular. We have a beautiful city and when we see those terrible images from the rest of the world, Haiti, Madeira and now Chile we must count our blessings, everyday.

Take Care,
Best wishes,
Steven

1st. April.
Hope you have had fun with April fools day!! We are looking forward to a busy Easter though as usual we shall
close on Good Friday and Easter Monday. But the two week school holiday should see the start of our upturn in trade after the winter doldrums.  All is well in the Cafe.

We have two nice things to report: The Shoeboxes lottery we ran just before Christmas raised over £100.00 and the winner Kevin Hamblin came in last week, with his wife Andrea, to claim his prize. They are photographed above. They have been touring Europe hence the delay. This is such a worthwhile venture that saw 13,500 Shoeboxes going from
the warehouse in Spixworth, to children in Serbia. We will be helping again this year and I must say 'Thank You' to the lady who has just bought the knitted snowman which has been on sale since before Christmas. The money will go towards the Shoebox Appeal for this year.

I am in Jennette's good books this month!!! Because,.... in my last blog I mentioned how old she will be on her birthday in May but I managed to take a few years off the actual age.. Now is that called a Freudian slip??
The other marvellous news about her parachute jump is that her sponsorship now stands at over £660.00.All going to the 'Sunny Days Children's Charity.' Soup is still on the menu, but demand has dropped, I will keep it on
at least till May but if it stops selling, then that will be the time I take it off for the summer.

Our Gluten free cakes are attracting more new customers and once in, they then become aware of the other items on the menu which they can eat. We are always willing to discuss dietary problems and will mix and match anything we sell. It is invaluable that we make all our own fillings, all our own cakes and soups etc. So we know for certain what they all contain. If in the event that we are not sure we are all aware that we must say so..
we know how important this whole area of allergies is. As I write this the clocks have gone forward and once again I am getting up in the dark which is horrible. I can't see why we can't just leave the time as Greenwich mean time (GMT) and be done with it. I expect there will be several who disagree with this view!! I mean we can't even agree on what year it is!!! Have you ever checked with the Jews and Muslims not to mention Buddhists and others, we are all in completely different years!! But then Einstein did say that time was relative!! And with that thought I'll sign out.................Till next time??

Steven