BACK FROM THE BEACH

We're back!
We decided to take the puppies to Alnmouth beach before going to Amble for lunch and
we've had a great time! Rose was not sure to begin with. I think the sea looked (and sounded) VERY BIG. In fact she had a major fit of the trembles and I had to hold her to begin with. Mind you, it was very cold and extremely windy, so that may have been a shock in itself. Not that any of this affected Lily, who took to the whole thing as if she'd been going to the beach all her life!
We DID meet another dog walker who had two grown up Westies and we had a chat with her. (Lily even managed to get a long cuddle from this lady! How does she do it? One minute she was at our feet. The next she had been picked up and was blissfully enjoying being snuggled!!)
After that, we walked along the footpath next to the beach and both puppies were fine. Then we took them onto the sand and it was like, 'Why haven't you brought us here before? It's fantastic! WE LOVE IT HERE!)
Obviously we're not able to let them off their leads yet, but they ran around and explored as much as possible within the restraints of their leads. Rose was full of confidence by now and loved sniffing the seaweed and barking at the bigger dogs (from a  safe distance of course!)
By now Charles and I were wishing we'd wrapped up better - I'm certainly NOT going back to Alnmouth without a hat, scarf and gloves - so we walked the pups back to the car and popped them in their crate.
They then slept, while we called in at a gorgeous little gift shop in Warkworth. (Actually, it's not THAT little and is absolutely crammed to the ceiling (literally) with wonderful and beautiful gifty type things. If you get a chance, go before Christmas - you'll not be disappointed! The only problem with it is that it is SO full of gorgeous things, you really don't know where to look next and I'm always frightened of missing something, so I could be in there for hours!
After that we headed off to Amble and had fish and chips for lunch. We sat outside (it was about 8 degrees warmer than Alnmouth and wasn't nearly as windy) because I didn't want my mini to smell of fish, but I didn't last that long because the seagulls started circling and that freaked me out, so I left most of my chips and got back in the car - FAST!
We picked up Charles's car and headed back home. Charles stopped off at Sainsbury's where he had instructions to buy a George Foreman (Formby!) grill following Helen's recommendation the other day. Unfortunately he wasn't sure about the size of the one in Sainsburys, then went to Argos and encountered a choice of about twenty different models which made decisiveness impossible, so returned home empty handed! He wants ME to go a choose. (What was wrong with the one you saw first that  holds enough for five? It would be perfect for when we have people to stay and we're having a cooked breakfast - LIKE TOMORROW!!!)