Our Halcyon Days

Christmas has come and gone and this year seemed a little surreal as first one and then the other of us had a rather unpleasant stomach bug we caught from our little grandson. Yuck. It seemed to put the lid on this year for us, and we are both looking forward to a rather better 2015.

I know that many of you are ardent followers of the series Outlander, so I thought you might be interested in the following which I "lifted" from our local newspaper as we just passed the Winter Solstice on Sunday.

The week before and the week after the Winter Solstice, 21st December, were named "Halcyon days" in the belief that in this fortnight the waves and wind would be calmed so that kingfishers could breed in their watery nests.

Halcyon is Greek for kingfisher.

December 21st is also St Thomas's Day when old women in East Anglia went "a-Thomasing", asking for sixpences. They were optimists because a tanner (6 old pennies) was then quite a lot of money.

The 21st December itself truly stood for optimism, the feeling that things would only get better as the days lengthened.Christmas is a Christian festival tacked on to a much older pagan one that celebrated the turning of the year when the days began to lengthen once again. The people who developed Stonehenge and Avebury were better aware of the true significance of the winter solstice than were the Christians who came long after them.

Neither Christians nor Druids have ever understood the true meaning of Stonehenge and its relations. Although the builders had an inaccurate understanding of the workings of the universe around them, they were at least trying to find out more about them in an honest and straightforward fashion.

In the Western Isles of Scotland are the prehistoric standing stones at Callanish. Facing them are five undisturbed rocks with a "fissure" in the middle rock. These rocks were a sacred spot long before the Callanish standing stones were built 4,000 years ago.

As the sun's path drops lower in the sky towards the winter solstice, the shadow on the five rocks and the light beam between the fissure extends further and further north.

The extreme sliver of sunlight falling on the ground at midwinter would have triggered ritual to nourish the dying sun or sun god. Whilst Stonehenge has always been geared to the sun, Callanish when completed was related to the moon. Although they don't still have their 'lintels' like the stones at Stonehenge, they are every bit as spectacular and unlike Stonehenge are entirely 'open to visitors', so you can go and touch them and walk round them. (Direct flights from Norwich to Stornoway!)

I am now on Book No 5 of Outlander and am completely immersed in the books despite their verbosity. Just wish the TV series would come over the pond!

In the New Year I hope to get back to normal re my blog, and I have several topics I should like to share with you. Although 2014 hasn't been the best of years healthwise, TTWD has continued to draw Dan and I closer together, and often each week brings something new to discover about each other. After all these years, this is nothing short of miraculous and wonderful. 

We are very definitely in our Halcyon Days!

Dan and I would like to wish you all a Very Happy New Year, and hope that 2015 is filled with love, peace and joy.

Different Thoughts - Different Things

I have been flying round for the past week or two like the proverbial blue-arsed fly. So this is really a hotch-potch. Just little bits and pieces.

I met up with Jan from https://dancinroses.blogspot on Wednesday. (She is such a hoot!) The weather was lousy to say the least, but we had a supremely wonderful day. 

Let me tell you, Jan has lost a stone and a half in weight and I didn't recognise her at first. She looks absolutely FABULOUS! I am green with envy!

I had intended to do some Christmas shopping, but just bought myself some clothes and not a single Christmas present. (Yes, of course I bought some new knickers. A girl can never have too many pairs!)

We had a delicious lunch. I had a starter and a main, and Jan had a main and a pudding; and we had a large latte each. 

In one of the stores I encountered a small problem with a lady who decided to ram a pushchair with a toddler in it into the backs of my knees, and then when I turned round in pained surprise she proceeded to have a go at me for not appearing to know which direction I was walking. I was too taken aback to think up a retort. Jan said it was classic "Pushchair rage". LOL!

Another little activity that has been going on in the Starsong household this week has been my "Week of Spankings". A type of challenge in a way. But not what you think.

A week ago I had my birthday. I said to Dan in horror that I couldn't possibly manage all that number of spanks in one go, especially since I only had his spanks on his behalf only a month ago. So it was agreed that I should get ten spanks a day for a week. (There were extras tacked on to the last day to make up the ten, before you say anything!) These spanks were to be of the type that you most definitely feel. No shillying and shallying about with warm ups. No "Is that okay, can you feel it, does it hurt?" type of spanks. I would accept whatever implement was chosen and accept any calibre of spanks that came my way. Ha! Moi? Hmmm....

The first day I was spanked with his hand. It stung, but it wasn't too bad, although I think I had seven all in the same spot on one side and only three the other. I suddenly realised that ten is nothing at all. Good grief. Anyone can take ten spanks. 

The second day I was upended in such a way that I was practically doing a handstand on the floor. This time my sit spots received attention. 

"Ow, ow ow! Golly I hate that spatula." 

"I'm not using the spatula. I'm using my hand." 

"But you used your hand yesterday."

"That was my right hand. I'm using my left today. I'll be using the spatula tomorrow."

See? Men's logic? No, I don't understand either.

The third day, the spatula make its appearance. Hateful, horrible thing. I think I shall send it to Katie! She needs a new one. This one has only had one careful owner! When I suggested how much I hated it I counted several 'extras'. When I happened to mention them, I got several more! 

Men's logic again!

The fifth day got missed as it was "baby minding day" and I have to be up at the crack of dawn and after that it completely slipped Dan's mind. We are both too exhausted and need stiff gins by the time 'mother collects youngster' in the evening!

The sixth day was the Rose paddle. Because he had to make up for the previous day, Dan went berserk with it - or so it seemed to me. I lost count after the first five because it hurt and I couldn't concentrate. I told him that I should just hate it if he made me count my spanks like some people. I should probably still be being spanked now as I just cannot think and say "Ow!" at the same time. 

The final day was today. The salad server, which hasn't made an appearance in centuries, was found and brought out for the grand finale. Sadly I was bent over the footboard (which I hate because it stretches everything) and Dan added lots of extras. He concentrated specifically on my sit spots. After each one or two swats I sprang upright doing my Jack-in-a-box impersonation. In fact I perfected it. How do you all stay down?! I just cannot! It sears the skin! Fries it! Dan started to laugh at me. I thought, "This is where I pout and either join in and laugh, or I start to cry." Luckily I laughed, and Dan stopped, parked the implement in my butt crease (he has a horrid habit of doing that) and then we both fell about laughing. 

We laughed even more when I looked at the two perfectly round bright scarlet patches he had created. When I sat down for breakfast (on a cushion I hasten to add) it wasn't exactly painful, but it felt very 'burny' and itchy. I studied my bottom again when I got out of the shower but there wasn't a single sign of redness. All gone. Just a tingle left for a couple of hours, and then that was gone too.

Dan has commented that I have been on a high all week. Not a sign of my usual attitude. What? Moi? You've got to be joking! 

I think the spankings were the equivalent of "happy pills". They kept my spirits up even when stressed. I can heartily recommend this "week of spankings" tactic next time you have a birthday if you feel you don't want to tackle the whole lot in one go. 

The other thing is that I didn't have to remind Dan once that he had said he would spank me every morning for a week. He remembered just fine, even though initially he was not too sure about it all. In fact by the end of the week the spanks were definitely rather more plentiful that I think they should've been. I wonder if he could've secretly enjoyed them?

Finally, the last thing I want to mention is that tomorrow (Saturday 6th December) is St Knickerless Day on Ana's Advent Calendar. You can find it on https://governingana.wordpress.com and this year I have written a little "ghost story" especially for Christmas! 

It doesn't have a single spank in it, but I do hope it will lift the hairs on the back of your necks a little. I wanted to do something a bit different.

I will be picking a name (from all those who comment) out of a hat (a large mixing bowl) and the lucky winner will be the recipient of a pair of Ami's special knickers

together with a little 'secret something'. Similar to these!

I do hope you will all support me especially as Ana works so hard on the Advent Calendar each year. It would be nice if you might sample a few of the other days. There are recipes, stories, funny incidents. All very enjoyable. You might even read about an elf or two!

See you all tomorrow! 

The Little Things in Life

One of the things which never ceases to amaze me about TTWD is how far we have come with our communication skills.

Mostly it is how much better Dan has become at reading me. His antennae seem to have doubled their length, and  they've certainly increased their ability to interpret my often complex signals.

Mostly we've been coasting along reasonably in step, with just the occasional high and low to stem the slide into boredom and lethargy. 

I'm usually allowed to choose my own implements when Dan decides it's time to issue reminders, though for the sexier types of spankings I much prefer the Rose Paddle despite the fact that Dan does get a bit carried away when using it. He did remark that I have now managed to perfect my front crawl 

and that he almost sees my bottom pass from right to left across his lap whilst he is busy trying to hit the target. 

I tell him that he is so good at hitting the target these days, ie the same spot for about ten spanks, that it feels like someone has placed a magnifying glass between the sun and my bottom, making it feel as if that spot is about to spontaneously combust. But when I complain, he immediately peppers the entire area with the rapid fire. So now I tend to slither forwards more surreptitiously until his arm brings me to rapid halt.

I wonder if you all wake up in a good mood every morning? Sadly I do not. I have a tendency when feeling the pressure, to wake up around 2.30 in the morning and lie with multitudinous thoughts going through my head till around 4.00 when I either get up and go walk about, or finally manage to drop back off to sleep. 

Dan rarely wakes, and I try not to wake him, but sometimes when he is snoring loud enough to wake the dead, 

I feel obliged to toss and turn, reach for my glass and drink some water, press the little button on my bedside clock to check the time, 

get up to visit the loo, put my bedsocks on if my feet are cold, 

take my bedsocks off if my feet are too hot, get up and adjust the curtains to prevent any moonlight from lighting up the bedroom....you get the picture?

The other night was one such night. I was wakened at around 2.15 by a mouse in clogs galloping about in the wall to the right of our bed. It sounded as if it were moving concrete blocks. No little sounds of pittering and pattering from the mice in our part of the world - they're heavyweights!

So I lay around a bit hoping to drop back to sleep, but eventually, having completed the entire list above and then some, Dan woke up and asked me if I was okay. I snarled a bit, then suggested he go back to sleep and I promised to try to lie still. I was remembering someone (or maybe a couple of someones) who suggested one of you rubbed the other person, but at 3 in the morning I couldn't quite remember the rules, and luckily, just trying to remember sent me off to sleep.

But then comes the bit in the morning when your eyelids feel they have lead weights attached to them, and all you want to do is snuggle back in your pillow, pull the duvet up around your eyebrows, and slumber happily regardless of the day ahead.

This, of course, is the time I feel Dan breathing somewhere in the vicinity of my neck and patting my bottom encouragingly. I make the noise a sleepy squirrel makes 

and burrow down once again. Dan gets more persistent and tweaks a nipple. This time I give a low growl to try to put him off.

Dan is stubborn. He refuses to be put off anything, and before he was startled into becoming more familiar with my bottom, he was one heck of a boob man. Lying half hidden in my bosoms he gives a sigh of contentment and carries on tweaking - both nipples this time.

I do not rise to the bait. I am still trying to sleep. 

Even my body has gone into non-responsive mode. Dan raises his head and mutters something about not even being able to feel the smallest shiver of pleasure. I nod into my pillow in agreement.

But that man is nothing if not persistent, 

and will not be deterred. He grabs me around the middle and launches an all out assault on my person.

This time I squeak a little, so he ups the tempo. 

He spanks first one cheek then the other at a rapid rate - too high as usual - but I start to bounce on the bed like a kettle drum. I am now waking up and feeling rather like a squashed slug getting its bottom spanked.

He will keep spanking the same spot and his hand is so much harder these days. I count ten and shriek at him. He ignores me for a few more spanks then mercifully moves to the other cheek, where naturally, the action is repeated.

Then the strangest thing. My libido returns with a vengeance. The "Me Tarzan, You Jane" syndrome almost takes my cells apart and rebuilds them. 

I can't remember exactly what I was yelling, but I can relate that it led to an extremely vociferous and active session of love-making. 

At one point I thought that maybe at my age I shouldn't be making such a racket, but then I thought "Nah.These opportunities should not be ignored."

The bed was trashed and the whole area looked like a hurricane had hit. 

I was heartily glad that our grown offspring have no idea just how much in love and how energetic their parents still are. In my mind, I wish them equally long and happy marriages, and hope they are still as energetic when they get to our age. Snigger!

Dan went and got us hot drinks. I was lying stretched out face down when he went off downstairs, and I was still lying in the same position when he returned.

"Are you alive?" he enquired.

"Mmphm" I replied (in the manner of 'Outlander' - I am now on Book 3!)

"Drink your coffee before it gets cold." Ha! Now he knows how I feel!

I continued to lie there whilst we had a conversation. 

"That was so wonderful. I wish you would spank me more often like that. I would love you to spank more, and harder."

"Your trouble is that you've got the hide of an armadillo."

This makes me sit up in a hurry and I glare at him indignantly to see if he is serious or not. Luckily for him he's not.

"I don't mind, you know, if you grab me and administer a few more 'good  girl' spankings of this calibre."

Dan raises his eyebrows. "I don't want you to accuse me of being abusive."

"Oh for goodness sake. I thought we had laid this one to rest a long time ago."

"You know what I mean. And anyway, isn't this called 'trying to take control'?"

"Nah. Just giving you a few pointers. You know jolly well that you won't do anything you don't want to do."

"Very true." Dan gives me his practised 'evil grin'.

Then we are up and on our way down to have some breakfast before showering. 

As I walk ahead of him along the corridor he starts to stroke my bare bottom making me giggle. Dan knows exactly how to lure me out of my vegetative state of mind. 

(I couldn't find a picture of a man stroking a naked woman's bottom, so I substituted this picture - it's so sweet and it's how he makes me feel. He strokes my bottom every night when he comes to bed!)

It's the little things in life that are important.

Love Our Lurkers Day!

Once upon a time I was a lurker.

I enjoyed reading people's posts, but I was far too nervous to comment.

I remember the very first time I wrote a comment - I pressed 'cancel' about ten times.

Then, luckily for me, 'Love our Lurkers Day' came along 

and I discovered I wasn't alone!

Suddenly life was much more fun.

It's great having friends to play games with

and to get into trouble with

and even to share quiet moments with.

So don't be timid

I JUST LOVE MY LURKERS!

Where the Poppies Blow

We will remember them.

To commemorate the fallen, millions of ceramic poppies are being displayed in the moat around the Tower of London. 

The humble poppy is widely recognised as an international symbol of remembrance. Soldiers first associated the blood-coloured flower with war when they saw it in huge numbers, covering the battle-scarred fields of Flanders and growing on broken ground, which is, of course, where poppies grow best.

IN FLANDERS FIELDS
John McCrae (Inspired by the death of a Canadian officer close to the Advanced Dressing Station which was a concrete bunker on the battlefield.)

On May 2nd, 1915 news reached him that his friend and protege, Lieut Alexis Helmer, had been blasted to pieces by an eight-inch Howitzer shell. It was this experience that prompted McCrae to write these poignant words:

"In Flanders Fields the poppies blow,
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe;
To you from falling hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders Fields."

This simple poem was an almost overnight success after publication in Punch magazine in December 1915.

Towards the end of the war, an American lady called Moira Michael wrote a poem in response, entitled "We Shall Keep the Faith". She exhorted readers to wear a poppy in honour of the dead. The secretary of the French YMCA, Madame Guerin, grasped this idea; she began selling artificial poppies to raise funds for soldiers and their families.

In the UK the concept was taken on by the Earl Haig fund and adopted by the newly formed British Legion as a symbol of remembrance of the dead and the missing, and as a means of raising funds for wounded and hard-pressed soldiers after the war. The first poppy day was held on November 11, 1921.

PEACE
by Private Alexander McKee, Canadian Army B.L.A.

"Here on the slope of the hillside, lying
In the field here the corn waved, proud and free;
Here on the hill where manhood, dying,
Lost the sun, and the power to see,
They lost the years and the light and laughter,
And gained a peace we shall not know,
They lost the tears that shall come after,
And all the storms that yet shall blow.
And who shall say at the end of the day,
With the sunset shining clear,
That those who fell by the winding way,
In the peace and the quiet here,
Gained greater gifts than peace shall give,
Where only the soft winds blow,
And a better fate than those who live?
They have found peace where poppies grow."

THE SEND-OFF
Wilfred Owen 1893-1918

"Down the close, darkening lanes they sang their way
To the siding shed,
And lined the train with faces grimly gay.

Their breasts were struck all white with wreath and spray
As men's are, dead.

Dull porters watched them, and a casual tramp
Stood staring hard,
Sorry to miss them from the upland camp.
Then, unmoved, signals nodded, and a lamp
Winked to the guard.

So secretly, like wrongs hushed-up, they went.
They were not ours:
We never heard to which front these were sent.

Nor there if they yet mock what women meant
Who gave them flowers.

Shall they return to beatings of great bells
In wild train-loads?
A few, a few, too few for drums and yells,
May creep back, silent, to still village wells
Up half-known roads."

"At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, we will remember them."

Communication Skills

Communicate: to make known; to give information unreservedly.

You would think after 37 years of marriage I would be an expert. That I would know every trick in the book.

Not so.

I think this last couple of weeks I have been spanked for my difficulties with communication skills more times than I would care to own up to. I most assuredly have been guilty of not making known or giving information unreservedly.

Nearly every spanking has resulted in tears, or very wet eyes, plus a searingly hot bottom.

I had previously been warned, and spanked, for my negativity. I had thought all was well. 

I tried and tried to keep it in, bottle it up, tamp it down - ignore ignore ignore.

After tossing and turning in bed for hours, I ended up retreating to the spare room where I read my Kindle for most of the night, and hence both looked and felt like something that had crawled out from under a stone the next morning. 

Dan was not amused. Even though I arrived first thing with a cup of tea and not one but two Gingernuts for him.

I was sent for the Rose paddle and severely spanked. Dan didn't say much at all until afterwards. Having narrowly avoided having his front teeth knocked out, he asked me if I had had enough. At that point I couldn't even breathe let alone reply. I was just yelping "Sorry" over and over again. Never have I been so glad that Dan did actually stop, and sat quietly stroking my hot cheeks. The word 'subspace' doesn't exist in my vocabulary.

When I eventually managed to control myself, Dan told me in no uncertain words that if I don't communicate my thoughts and worries to him, he cannot do anything to help. He asked me how I would feel if I knew something was worrying him and he wouldn't tell me what it was. He told me that in future he will be watching for signs of pressure building up, and will vigorously use every possible means to release that pressure. (Every possible means = as many of our implements as it takes.) Not a happy thought. 

When you are married to a man like my Dan, deception is not wise. I now know that for a fact. Far better to own up to my feelings of stress and knots in my neck, and brave the wolf's lair, than end up having my bottom massaged liberally with one or more implements. Where has the gentle, careful, consideration of my bottom gone?

His hand is now so hard and sure, that I twisted my neck around in horror thinking he was using the paddle from the start. These days I don't seem to get a warm-up so much as a sample of things to come.

Dan rarely spanks for long. He prefers the short, sharp, painful imparting of a principle to long drawn out conversations. Hence my bottom often feeling like a vibrating drum, but without the vibration. All I can say is that my skin is soft, clear and supple due to the changes in beat!

I would also like to impart that I have been out and purchased several brightly coloured cushions to dot along our pine settle and benches around our kitchen table, because most mornings I am no longer able to sit comfortably before midday! I am extremely grateful that Dan has not yet arrived at the point of issuing spankings out of the blue at all hours, as I really don't think I would be able to survive them. I applaud those of you who do.

And just to end on a more Ami-like note - on Friday morning at 8.30am I was downstairs vacuuming the drawing room carpet, minus knickers. I had previously laughed at a friend who admitted she found wearing her pretty, lacy knickers very uncomfortable after a spanking. Believe me, it was so much more soothing to let the air caress my burning backside, than to struggle into a previously snazzy little number.