The rest of half term.

So what else did we get up to over the rest of the week that Martin had off? Well we actually managed to pack quite a bit in.

Sunday

After his usual round of sunday morning golf, Martin and I were going to have a chillaxing afternoon, but the kids phoned to say they were coming up for a cup of tea. Next thing we know we were scrabbling around in the freezer to find food for the bbq! We ate so late that the boys ended up staying for a sleepover. 

Monday

We wanted to start tackling our list of jobs but we found we couldnt even start them before clearing out the shed as we couldn't find any of the tools we needed amongst the tangle. The boys had a great time as we tried to keep them amused with footballs and tents at the same time as sorting rubbish from good.

Once the boys had gone home and we had put everything back tidily, Martin had several trips to the tip to get rid of all the unwanted shed stuff and accumulated junk from the attic. 

Tuesday

The main job we wanted to tackle was to finally properly lay the patio outside the back of the lounge. When we moved in the man selling the house had bought lots of block paving bricks to redo the hard standing for the cars. We had used most of them instead to create a patio on the left hand side of the garden, but we still had quite a number left over.  In removing the decaying decking we had discovered quite a bit of concrete under it, and although we had removed most of it and grassed over, there was still a substantial bit on the right hand side of the garden. We had taken out the built in cupboard in the conservatory to allow access into the garden (who makes a built in cupboard across a conservatory door?) and had temporally put the blocks on top of the concrete but this all needed properly laying. We were also short several bricks to cover the whole area, so it was a trip to travis-perkins to order some more.  

We took the opportunity to also stock up on our weekly groceries before taking ourselves off to the cinema to watch Johnny Depp's next Pirates of the Caribbean adventure which we thoroughly enjoyed.

Wednesday
Martin set to laying the bricks we did have while I spent the day in my craft room sewing up a storm and researching where we were going to go for our Finley and Beckett adventure the next day.

Thursday.
Finley had asked for another garden/picnic adventure and I had toyed with the idea of Hole Place until I discovered they had no picnic areas or facilities. At the last moment I opted for Riverhill Himalayan Gardens. It was a great choice. Lots for the boys to do and plenty of walking and exercise for the grown ups. Little in the way of formal gardens but a wonderful day out all the same.

 

First stop the maze.

Then some tree trunk climbing. You could go into the woods and make your own dens if you wanted too. The boys next choice was the play park though.

Laura did have to use her teacher voice at some particularly obnoxious boys who kept bloking the tunnel slide by climbing up from the bottom instead of using the ladder.

Of course the whole point of the exercise is the picnic. Finley decided he wanted to go 'up' for this, and although it was rather a steep bit of a walk it was worth the effort as the north downs suddenly blossomed out in front of us. 

 

Sorry not the best photo but I was too busy enjoying to snap. 

There was still plenty to fill our afternoon too. 

Wandering paths through the woods to explore, 

The hidden boat swing

The formal garden

 Complete with water feature

And a stick making craft activity which I think Laura got most out of since she made a hedgehog, and a stick..lady. 

As if our day had not been full enough, we had agreed to meet Wayne who had stayed home for a parcel delivery, and go out for a pub meal with the boys. Randomly Laura chose the Royal Oak at Nonington. The weather was still beautiful and so we sat in the huge garden while the boys climbed on the climbing frame and just generally had a brilliant time. The offical time for food was after 6 and since we had forgotten to check this, we turned up a full 2 hours too early! The landlord was fantastic though and agreed to cook ours a tad early as the boys were getting hungry. And tasty food it was too!

Friday
We had to stay in for the block paving bricks to be delivered, so we pootled about and once they did arrive Martin started to lay them.  We were pleasantly surprised when two little boys heads appeared round the garden gate. Before long more fun was being had by all, a lot of water followed by home made pizza teas.

Chelsea - flowers and gardens and all that stuff.

This week has been a busy week. Martin has had a weeks holiday and we have been having lots of fun but at the same time working pretty hard on catching up with all the maintenance house type jobs. But we started the week with a treat I had been looking forward to for some pretty long years - a visit to the Chelsea flower show.

Chelsea
One of the main reasons I joined the RHS (alongside cheap or free entry into gardens) was to get tickets to the Chelsea Flower show. Wayne had bought his mum tickets many years ago for a birthday gift but she hadn't

wanted to go or had been ill or something so he very generously gifted them to us, and we had a brilliant day out. Since then I had been hankering to go back. Finally this was the year.
Sadly for me I chose the year that many gardens had withdrawn through lack of sponsorship but at the time of booking the tickets I wasn't to know that. We had tried to book for the Thursday but all RHS tickets (not public) were sold out so we settled for the Friday - yes as it turned out the hottest day of the year so far, but again I wasn't to know that either.

We packed a huge picnic and set out full of enthusiasm expecting to have another brilliant time. I have to point out that I don't do heat very well and was already flagging by the time we got to Sloan square. We had to walk from there as the local bus service had been suspended for the day. I was surprised that although there was a noticeable increase of police presence as we walked along, once there security (in view of recent events) was not that fierce. Martin was jokingly asked if our picnic knives were for our picnic but that was it.

Unlike the first time we had visited, the trade stalls were all over the place where as before they had been more confined to one trading street.  Alongside the fact of the reduced number of gardens and the increase in plot size for the traders, and the fact that many traders had decorated their trade stalls to look like gardens it became difficult to actually find the designed gardens.

   
 We wanted to buy this but didnt have enough cash, they didnt do credit card and neither did they do shipping. Plus we didnt want to carry it around all day. 

None of the eight show gardens inspired us in the least. There seemed to be a perchance for 'weeds' as they all tried to show us how to encourage green into grey Britain.  

 

On our previous trip and to garden shows and visits to RHS gardens, the viewing gardeners had been very polite but all we seemed to meet were rude and ill mannered impatient members of the public who pushed and shoved to get where they wanted with no thought for any one else. Poor Martin never got to the front to see even one of the gardens. Maybe it was the hot weather but this was not something I had encountered before and I found it very off putting. 

After only an hour we were ready for lunch but finding a shady spot was really hard. Every bit of dim lit space seemed to be taken. Finally we found a small spot behind one of the trading sheds, not a picturesque  place but as least cool.  

Back to the fray and I really wanted to see the much publicised Radio 2 gardens. These were at the other end of the show (well they would be wouldn't they?) and by the time we got to them we were very hot and sweaty.  They were a total disappointment. They had seemed huge on the TV but were not much bigger than the Artisan gardens (which were tiny). Not only that the gap to look into them was no bigger than the average 5 bar gate with 40 or so people trying to squeeze into the space to view them.  And to my mind they honestly were not worth viewing. I have seen better simply walking along our road - which is saying something as they are all old age pensioners who do not garden round near us! 

Mary Berry's edible garden.  I found it very messy and difficult to understand all the vegetables ripe at the same time. I grew up in a time when the whole of the back yard was usually given up to veggies and it always looked far neater and interesting than this.

The sound garden.An interesting concept, speakers under the water made different ripples in the tank depending on the frequency.  Trouble was I had expected sound in the garden. It was silent. I also think 'garden' was pushing it.

 This was the biggest disappointment.Sarah Raven's cut flower garden ... except where were the flowers?  Sarah was actually working in the garden when I got to the front, but came out to go off someplace. She was waylaid by some woman and although she was not actually rude to the lady praising her books, it was obvious she didn't want to stop and talk to the public. 

We took another drinks break. Opting for a half pint from the bar as all our picnic drinks had been warmed up in the 30 degree heat, we tried to find some shade and a seat at the band stand. On our previous visit we had been treated to a rag band and then a jazz band. This time it was an opera singer who was promising us 2 whole (boring) hours of opera and musical songs. She was very good but 

rather a narrow genre for such a big crowd?

 We had to sit in full sun too as there was no shady spots available. NB I did love her gown.

Our final stop was the Pavillion. I had been looking forward to this part best. Sadly it was so humid inside the tent that after only half an hour we had to make our way outside again. It would also seem that all the wonderful displays made from flowers were a thing of the past and it was straightforward tables of samples of flowers/plants lined up. 

Fed up by only 2 oclock we made our way home. I doubt we will be going again.

Start of the celebrations.

As part of starting to celebrate that both Martin and I will reach our 60th year this year, we went with all the family for a meal at the beautiful old pub in the woods, The Rose and Crown. 

Before the family arrived, and since Martin was still having his round of golf before joining us, Laura Wayne and I took the boys up into the woods for a bit of a walk first. They both had a fab time climbing hills covered in roots, shuffling along huge fallen tree trunks and even stepping up into the wide branches of an accommodating low slung tree.

Although the service in the pub was a tad slow the meal was very tasty and there was plenty of food. A great start to all to come.

 











We continued to celebrate Martin's birthday with an overnight stay in London. We chose the Kingsway Hall Hotel in Covent Garden and Kinky Boots from a deal on Groupon. 

Not having used Groupon before we were unsure of how or even if it would work but we had a great experience. We included train travel in the deal so we wouldn't have to worry about parking, our upward journey covered by the high speed rail due to engineering works. We arrived in good shape (even though we had forgotten to bring our Oyster cards) thanks to Laura giving us a ride to the station, and had soon covered the underground transfers and walk to our hotel. Situated between the Strand and Covent Garden the hotel was although a little tired, very comfortable and the staff very pleasant.

After dumping our luggage we decided to walk back to Covent Garden but found (as usual) little going on there and continued walking to the Adelphie theatre to find out where it was for later. As we were standing outside a political protest march organised by the trade unions passed us so we spent some time watching and waiting to be able to cross the road. A little unexpected show for us while we were there. 

We treated ourselves to a meal in TGI Friday (our fav. place to go when in London as we don't have one near us and got the taste when we were in Florida) before wandering over the river and checking out the London Eye as we had booked to have a ride on it the following day. We also  finally find where all the eating places are (in the past I had bemoaned the lack of restaurants around theatre-land). We had always headed to Leicester square and made our way to Covent Garden but it seems all the eateries are on the other side where we had never walked before. Now we know and will be having lots of gastronomic choices next time we are up. I was a bit disappointed that there didn't seem to be anything going on to celebrate May Day. I had thought the place would be full of morris men and may fairs but it may as well not have been a bank holiday. Oh well.

We had no idea what Kinky Boots was about having chosen a musical at random, but it was really good, some fantastic singing and we had a wonderful evening. 

After a Full English the next morning at the hotel, we followed up with a stroll through the sunshine, over Waterloo Bridge back to the London Eye. We walked along the river for a bit and had a drink in a pop up open theatre/bar. 

It was only when we joined the queue for the London Eye that Martin spotted we had booked the tickets for the previous day. I had bought them on the 2for1 railway deal online and had had trouble with the site timing out. At one time I had spotted it had changed our booking time but did not notice it had changed my chosen booking date!!! Martin, who had not been on the Eye before and was looking forward to it, decided we would stay in line and bluff our way on.  Surprisingly our tickets scanned, no one noticed the date and they didn't even check we had rail tickets to confirm the 2for1 deal. So Martin got his ride 

and really enjoyed the views. 

Our trip did not finish there though as we had decided to pop over to Camden Market for a look around there. The contrast between Camden (North London) and the West End was very noticeable and from quiet strolls along the river bank to the vibrant and colourful Camden High Street was an exciting shock to the system. I was fasinated by the decorated shops. 

The market was huge and like a rabbit warren, we aimlessly wandered up and down various alleyways, enjoying the sights, sounds and smells. Although we had hoped to find a watch for Martin we eventually only ended up buying a new hat for me! 

I reckon we walked around 8 miles in the two days so exhausted but having had a really good time, we returned home. More celebrations to come.

Ice cream and other ramblings

I have just made a delicious batch of ice cream and stored it safely in the freezer. Is this a big deal? well yes. Back end of last year having done nearly a term of full time and four day weeks of work, I decided to treat myself to a new Kenwood chef mixer and then went a little mad buying all the add-on applications as well. One of these was the ice cream maker attachment, but lack of time, suitable ingredients and then later, inclination has left it all sitting gathering dust (although I had at least put the ice-cream bowl in the freezer).

Well no more. Today, as I browsed Morrison's for my weekly shopping, I had a sudden thought. Why not make some ice-cream rather than buy it? So I scurried back to buy some cream and some vanilla extract. It was brilliant. using this recipe which demands no eggs, and bunging all the ingredients in to mix, the ice-cream was finished by the time I had put all the groceries away. it was so amazingly easy and tastes fantastic. So many more flavours to come me thinks. 

Oh by the way, hello blog reader. i am finally back with my all new singing and dancing laptop so am wasting no time getting my bloggy back up and going (see  previous blog post.). I have been very busy installing all the replacement software and sorting out 10 years worth of photos. Sadly the new laptop refuses to talk to poor old cricut so still that problem to overcome but other than that this is one happy lady as this new monster is soooo  super duper fast and whizzy!

Shock treatment

Shock treatment

A little shock treatment is sending me scurring back to ressurect my blog at long last. A ransom trojan crept in under my very good anti-virus software and locked up all my files. Now as a fairly tech savy person most of everything was backed up onto my external hard drive, but in a miserable turn of fate, that happened to be plugged into my laptop at the time of the attack as I was trying to organise the files on it to free up space for a bit more backing up, and many of the files on that were also zipped up into password protected files with no way to get them out again. LUCKILY most of what I deem important still seems to be there and all my more recent photos are backed up on the internet. 

Some stuff has been lost though so I thought using my blog as another fairly safe place to back up my important and precious memories would be a good idea. So here I am, back writing down my thoughts and recording my life events to bore the internet once again.

Not the best of starts.

So I went off to Hobbycraft to buy some paper to make a new mini album. Happy with my meagre purchases in there (they never have what I want but I always seem to come out with a few bargins) I trundled off to buy a spot of lunch in Greggs. However as I walked down the steps to get there I found myself completely missing the bottom step, sliding on my hands and landing heavily on my hip and knees (to say nothing of my poor boobs :( ). Two lovely ladies paused and asked if I was ok and of course I muttered yes and struggled to my feet so as not to look like a complete idiot, but I was rather sore and buised which put paid to the rest of my shopping expo.

Then first day back at work on Monday it would seem my blood pressure tablets reacted with the one mouthful I took to taste the smoothie I was making for my lunch and I was sent home in excruiciating pain where I was violently sick and spent the rest of the day in bed.

The week can only get better.

Actually it already has as my new strong hold cricut mat arrived in the post and I can not believe the quality of the cuts I have got from it. I hadn't tried out the super hold mats before and they really do seem, on first inspection to be much better than the medium hold ones. I know there are lots of tutorials on line to show how you can lengthen the life of your mats but I think sometimes we hang on to them for too long when really the cost of a new one is not that expensive. So I must remember that the quality of a new mat is well worth forking out a little bit of cash.

Oh Gosh, as I dust off the dust and open up the windows for an airing!!

I cant believe how long it is since I came visit this little place, and how sad I am that I got out of the habit of blogging and recording bits of my life. 
Ha
We have been in the bungalow nearly 3 years now and have finally renovated all the rooms and almost finished the garden. Obviously there are still bits we want to do, and bits that need to be done but in general they are snagging jobs or general maintenance so at long last I can finally start playing with bits of paper in my very own scrap room again.

Yes finally I have my craft room back.

Last week Martin was off and we took a day out to go hit up Ikea. I bought a set of Alex drawers so that I could get rid of the two very old bookcases full of boxes housing all my tools. 

I got a couple of Moppe chests and some more wooden magazine racks 

and then we bought a table top to play hack the Ikea furniture and turn my old expidit into a desk and get rid of my big dining room table that was taking up far too much of the space in the small bedroom. 

Finally a shelf to put all my stamps and embelishments and I have enough room to scrap and to sew.

At the moment I am working three days a week in a local school covering until they appoint a full time teacher, and looking after my youngest grandson Beckett for the other two days of the week. He is a totally different barrel of fish to Finley and is in to everything. Last week he went from refusing to letting go of the furniture or even making any attempt at steps, to walking across the whole room in one go, so now everything moves up another level out of his reach.   

Shattered screens

It seems that teachers must be a robust lot as I have only had half a day's supply since the begiining of term and with no decorating to do, and little to do in the garden, I am getting a little bored. Still fun things still come along to make life interesting. We had the pleasure of the boys for a sleep over at the weekend which kept me on my toes, and a trip to B&Q to choose the tiles for the bathroom.

Everything is on track to start that final room at the end of this month. We have now ordered the bath and suite from a local bathroom supplier, the taps and the shower from the internet (a bit of a result there because I completely forgot with the boys visiting to order the shower we had chosen. It was in the sale and I was sure when I woke on Monday morning it would have reverted to its full price now September was over. I was more than pleasantly surprised to discover it had actually been reduced by a further £20). We also chose and ordered our bath screen from a well known catalogue company. On Monday that too arrived ... well a screen didnt arrive but a very bashed box containing a bubble wrap bag of tiny bits of glass arrived. On the phone at once for a return and replacement I waited in all day yesterday for the collection and another half day today for the new one to arrive. It has and I am too scared to open it fully (having peeked enough to check it is a whole screen) in case it collapses on me.

Anyway all this time at home has allowed me to complete another two double layouts and also finally take my hand to attempting to draft up a Lutterloh system sewing pattern.

The pattern is a 1939 top which does have a matching skirt but since the top of me is where I have the most problems with fit I thought I would have a go at that first. I didnt have the special tape measure that should come with the system but I have managed to find one that can be printed off and have afixed it to an ordinary tape. It all seems to have worked quite well, and with only a miniumal full bust adjustment, a tissue fit seems to fit in all the right places. We will see. i hope it does work because I have full pattern books from teh 1930's, '40's, 50's and '70s with a couple of 1960's supplements which could keep me garment making for the rest of my natural!

Its a Craft Room!!!!

Hurray! Finally following the packing into boxes of all my stash, storing it in the attic and returning the craft room to a bedroom to dress the house for the sale, selling, moving and two years plus in renovating the bungalow, last week I finished unpacking the last of my bits and bobs, and moved into my new craft room. Ok its not quite what I envisaged when we moved here as our lovely new addition Beckett came along and the front small bedroom is not big enough for two little grandsons to spend their sleepovers, so I have the smaller room and the boys have nabbed the larger double which was intended for my crafty creations. But hey! Who cares? With a bit of a squeeze and some careful organisation I am in (with the added advantage of a front window looking out on the world).

Already I have completed 2 double layouts and made a name banner for little Beckett. If I can get my laptop to co-operate with the bluetooth software I may even be able to start uploading photos again!

Yesterday was Wayne's birthday, and despite him never wanting much fuss it seems we all had the same thought and supplied him with cake. Not that he is ever one to refuse cake, but 6 cream assorted delights from me, plus a choc gateaux, a cream vicy sponge and a few more cream delights was rather going over the top. A good job we were all there to help him munch them. And we had great fun watching Beckett racing up and down the kitchen in his walker. With only 9 months behind him, the boy has no fear and goes for it hell for leather.

Happy birthday Wayne, hope you had a great day.

Tomorrow Martin is having a rare Saturday off as it is the autumn golf meeting. I hope to get him along to order our new bathroom, booked to be started at the end of October - the last room! Then the plans are to finish off the garden (including the front this time, clad the attic and then..., we will be done!!

Partial eclipse

Looking forward to the partial eclipse of the sun by our moon today but being in the south, heavy cloud may screen our view. Of course since I am teaching a class of Year 3 children for the duration this might not be a bad thing as I am none too sure all of them are going to be careful enough not to look directly at the source.

First Film

It being January and all there has really not been much to blog about as we are all in hibernation mode. I have been busy sewing chair pads (repurposing Ikea cushions) and painting dining room chairs. Sunday I even commandiered one of the nesting coffee tables and tried my hand at a scrapbook pa(unfinished).

Today has been a bit eventful though. Laura and I along with Finley took baby Beckett along to his first cinema experience. Our (not so local) cinema were holding a babe-in-arms screening of Bug Hero 6. When Finley was around the same age we had taken him to a similar event at Canterbury Odean but it had not been that successful as we were not allowed buggies upstairs where the screening was, they had to be first left in a locked room which we had to wait for a member of staff to open. Then we had to carry baby, baby chair and all his associated paraphanalia up 2 flights of stairs. On top of this they also dimmed the lights making it really difficult to either feed or change our babies.

T oday's experience was totally different. The cinema is independently owned in an historic building with a tiny lobby and only 3 screens. The sound was not on full blast so as to protect small ears and the lights were kept up all through so that toddlers were safe to move around if they couldnt manage the entire film time. Finley had a bit of a melt down at the start as he thought it was going to be too loud but he soon settled down and really enjoyed it. Beckett drank his bottle of milk and then was sound asleep for the rest of the film!

I, of course was rather glad to get out of the house for more than one reason. Martin had started the day by drilling through a perfectly good water pipe, flooding and the newly installed plaser board and having to call for a plumber, Of course our bloke would be on holiday wouldnt he, so another had to be found and pretty fast. Srill by the time we drove home through the oncoming snow blizzard, peace and water had been restored and Martin was busy filling in more holes ready for the plastering.

Into the woods

We went to see Into the Woods on Sunday. Neither of us had seen (or to be honest even heard of) the stage production and so did not have any preconcieved ideas of what it might be like. We were pleasantly surprised mainly because we do enjoy a good stage musical. Lots of people coming out after the film could be heard having a little moan and muttering negative comments but I think that many did not realise there would be quite so much singing and that the lyrics would actually need to be listened to in order to follow the plot. Ipanelf you can cope with that though then I highly recommend the film as it has a great plot and the acting is not too shabby!

I finally got some work, two days in a school in Dover and then a day and a half this week in two different schools. We were on our way to buy wood and skirting board to do a bit more on the dining room when I got the half day call so Martin ended up chasing electric plugs down the wall from where they were placed at shoulder height (eh?) and the wood still needs to be bought.

Yesterday Laura and I had a run out to Sandwich to buy yet more Annie Sloan paint. Honestly I think I am on about the 12th pot for this house. so far I have painted:

skirting boards and dado rails in lounge, hall, kitchen, master bedroom and kitchen
15 panel glass doors  x 5 sides
7 sides paneled doors
a computer table
a tall billy bookcase
a mag rack
set of nesting tables
two double pine wardrobes
2 bedside drawer units
2 standard lamps
a 7 drawer chest of drawers
a jug
3 dining room chairs
glass coffee table
a few picture frames
a couple of doorstops

I'm getting quite good at it now lol

January, sick and tired.

Martin and I had a little debate. Seems although I hate January and February with a passion he actually quite likes the two wintery months after Christmas.

Me, I think they drag by with little to look forward to and not much to do. Sunday Martin had to work the second of his two sundays over the Christmas period. Since he has already had to work New Years Day as an extra, and New Years eve as it was his turn, I am getting pretty fed up of being alone. Left to my own devises and completely out of interesting films to watch on Sky Demand I attacked the floor tiles in the 'soon to be dining room'. It is looking a real mess now with no floor, badly plastered walls with umteen holes in it, and a gap in the ceiling. Keeping an image of how I want it to look is spuring me on though.

Yesterday I ventured out to Tesco, not because we needed anything but because schools were back, I had not been called into work, and I simply couldnt face another day staring at the four walls. Laura came over with the boys in the afternoon and we listened to Beckett continually grunting (never known a baby to do this but we couldnt find anything wrong with him and concluded he is just finding his voice) while playing pirate playmobile with Finley.

Strike one for me then, January dragging on with not much to do.

Martin on the other hand insists that January and February are all downhill to summer, showing the end of winter with longer daylight hours. Mmmm, We will see.

Montage

Photo montages of the last 18 months

 

• Putting house on the market
• Looking after Finley two days a week
• Kids move in with us for 10 months
• Building a garden
• Mum and Dad move to bungalow
• Watching Olympic Torch arrive in Canterbury
• Baby Beckett (Finley's brother) is born

 

• Moving in

• Decking removed to start new garden 
• Zoe visits and we take her on Romney Hythe railway
• Sheds removed for new garden
• Weekend in London and a visit to Harrods (as well as to watch Wicked and Spamalot
• Kids living with us
• Holiday to cottage in Norfolk
• Halloween
• Finley's second birthday party at Graham and Di's

Sewing and films

Saturday was not a great day as the tooth/ear ache continued all day, but on the plus side a duvet day allowed me to watch a few movies I had not managed to catch in 2014. 

Noah was an interesting take on the tale in the bible and I loved that it did actually adress some of the questions I had wondered about. On the other hand it did introduce some very strange concepts far outside the original source and I would also suggest that if they are going to film most of the picture inside a dark ark they find some better way of lighting because for half the movie I couldn't actually see what was going on.

The Lego Movie came highly recommended by my eldest but to be honest half the time I didn't really understand what the Lego characters were saying to each other and that made the plot a little hard to follow. I think I will stick with Wreck it Ralph LOL

I finished the day with Frozen. I had watched it on my phone before although the songs had been scrambled in the youtube version I caught so I was pleased when Sky Demand allowed me to watch a full version. The songs are irritating after a while but I dont think its actually too bad a film. 

Yesterday Martin was off (because he has to work today Boo) so Christmas went in the box, a few more tiles came off the walls and then we had a lovely lunch at the local Marsden's eatery with Ollie and Kelly. Great to catch up as we hadnt really seen them since Boxing day. They are busy painting their study so we spent a while swapping DIY experiences. 
We hadnt been home long when Laura and Wayne plus the boys turned up. They had been out to a family do on Waynes side and had turned up for a cuppa to round off their day. Not many jobs got done but we did have a lovely day with both our girlies. xx

As I cant get to my craftie stuff yet (most is still boxed up in the attic even though we have been here nearly 18 months) I am resorting to other crafts. At the moment I have a xstitch on the go, last years christmas present

 and some hooky, a full size blanket done in a vintage fan zigzag.

Hello good old blogger. There you are, still sitting waiting in the background for me to update you.
The trouble is so much has happened over the last two years its impossible to update properly and so I keep ignoring you as the task becomes more and more daunting.

No longer!

Lets just not bother updating and start all over afresh!

So second day of a new year and here I am, sitting awake at an obscure time in the morning, with an  ear-ache, not a particularly good start to the ear.  I  refuse to allow negativity onto this blog though so lets focus on the positive things that have started the year off.

• I started my walking program. So far I covered the day before New Year's eve, tromping rounf the cemetry opposite on a cold breezy morning for 12 mins.  (Yes I know I am so unfit but a start is better than no start), and then New Year's eve a brisker walk with Martin to see if we could discover our nearest BT green box as we were being converted to Infinity Broadband. We didnt find it but keeping up with Martin is a very good workout. 
• New Year's Eve Martin had to work so I spent the day chipping tiles and two layers of painted anaglypta paper off the walls in the "ex kitchen soon to be a dining room" room.  I guess that was in leui of a work-out too as the previous tiler has used a pot of adhesive for every tile.
• Yesterday I spent the day taking christmas down ready to go in the box. It took the whole day as we have 7 (yes 7) whole boxes of decorations including 3 christmas trees and umpteen strings of lights. To be fair I did used to have to decorate a classroom as well as a house which is where many of the decs have come from (including 1 of the trees), and one box is just christmas teddies the girls acumilated over the years. Last year I fell in love with a winter wonderland I saw in the garden centre and so spent for ever making and buying white decorations, only to be told by the family they prefered the mish mash of christmas colours (they didnt actually notice that across the years there had been themes, oh well) so it was back to finding all the red, gold, silver and green. Have you noticed how difficult it is to find traditional green decorations in the shops? oh not the lime/light green that is all the rage but dark Kelly/forest green. Anyway all down and finished with for another year :(.

Project Life

Its all over the internet again, Becky Higgins has released this year's kit and everyone is taking up the craze. Everyone is jumping on the band wagon of quick yet creative scrapbooking and even Hobbycraft are in on the act, devoting a whole section to PL goodies. It seems it is the next best thing to sliced bread in the scrapping world. Every year I get a little swept up in the hype too but  my take on it is a little different.

When I was little one of the great things I enjoyed was when my mum/dad got out the Roses tin full of all the family black and white photos and go through them with my brother and I, telling us the story behind each one as we went (even though we had heard them many times). The one of my dad during his National Service in Singapore, stripped to the waist in his army issue shorts, walking up the trunk of a leaning palm tree; the one of my mum wearing her 1950's one piece swim suit (a la Ester Williams) clinging onto a road sign, taken on the day she nearly called off her engagement because after 4 years courting my dad still hadn't set a date for the wedding; oh the stories were endless and going through the pile of scattered photos was magical. 

Along with the loose photos came a couple of old fashioned photo albums. They had ornate padded and  decorated covers, silk tassels to mark your page, and on opening each black thick card mounting page was separated by the most amazing frosted glass paper to protect the photographs which were held in place by beautiful little gold paper photo corners. Each photo (those that had not fallen out) was provided with its own little caption telling its own special story, and carefully dated in neat handwriting completed in a lovely clean white ink. Before we were allowed to open them we had to ensure our hands were clean and were admonished to be very gentle and careful.

The memory of those photo albums haunts me every time I pick up a pack of Project Life divided page protectors, because to me they seem to be a poor relation or bad echo of those earlier beautiful books so I end up taking the pages out of my basket and scurrying off home to do a PL look-alike scrap page using traditional scrap-booking methods on a 12x12 card-stock page, trying to use all my creative talents, making all my own embellishments and attempting to make my page do justice to those early scrapbooks.Then because it took so much time and effort and didn't meet my style of scrapbooking, I usually tailed off doing it by March.

This year though, I have finally surcome because my photos are simply loitering inside my hard drive and going no where as it seems my craft room is still a faint glimmer in the future, I am desperate to do some scrapping so I have finally bought a set of PL pages, downloaded some freebies and set to work on last year's photos. The biggest thing that altered my mind though is that I have discovered that since I can change my Dell notebook into a tablet, I can load up a picture and then use the pen to scribble all over it to my hearts desire. At last I am not just bunging photo's into pockets, I am being creative!

I don't take enough pictures to fill a double spead a week but I am more than happy with a page a month, so here is my first attempt and hopefully I can complete the whole year this time.