Spend spend spend.

The weather has turned cold and even though March is finally here after the tedium of January and February we are both still more or less confined to home as its far too cold to think of any outdoor activities, and we are bereft of ideas of what to do indoors. The people at the end of our back garden are putting up a very ugly extension as near to the boundry line as they can so we are desperate to get out and leave the builders to it. 

 The furthest trip however has been to the local butchers to top up our meat supplies in the freezer, and this was our intended destination when, going out the back gate, Martin managed to drop his phone. Even with both screen protector and case, it fell face down and smashed the glass front to tiny cracks and holes. I bundled him into the car and we had a lovely afternoon sat in Three Mobile shop upgrading his phone.

This was the start of a winter blues spending spree. Flushed with the success of buying a phone, we decided to book the Woodee Experience day we had not gone on last year. Martin had attempted to cook a cake in the dutch oven during my Birthday celebration party but had failed dismally so whether he thinks so or not, he really needs the fire management course to learn that open fire and fire pit cooking are a far cry from bbq cooking. 

 

Still with 3 days booked in Hay on Wye and a week in Weymouth in an all singing all dancing barn convertion Martin still kept insisting I was stopping us from going away on holiday (how many does this man want??) so I finally capitualated and told him we could go to Lake Como (having seen the photos of my cousin's daughters wedding). There was little available to book there though so we have settled on a week in Lake Garda. 

 

 

In between all this holiday booking we did get out and took ourselves to see the newly opened converted Battersea powerstation.

  

 

Although it was facinated to see inside the iconic building, and the restoration has been very well done, it does seem a wasted opportunity to witness such an historic and vast building turned into what amounts to a shopping mall. We weren't that impressed with their light installations either 

 and we refused to pay the extortionate price to take the elevator up the chimney tower to spend 7 mins looking at London from up high, especially when compared to the 30 mins you could get on the London Eye for only a fraction more of the cost.  For half the price though we got to take the river taxi back to Canary Wharf, passing many of the buildings that London is famous for lit up in all their night time glory. Very magical. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 The teachers strike meant we also got to look after Beckett for a day. He decided he wanted to go swimming. We didnt realise he is used to going to the pool at Whitstable and booked for Herne Bay. We were dubious as we could not swim in the larger pool (seems lockdown/pandemic rules still apply} but we actually had a really fun time with him, and for the first time every that I have been there, they opened the flumes and he got to go on the large tunnel slide.  Result. 

Half term saw a small break in the freezing temps so Beckett and Finley insisted on taking me to Wingham Wildlife Park. We have yearly tickets but have hardly used them this year around, so it was a pleasant experience exploring all the new parts of the park and discovering all the new animals. Mind it was totally rammed with people, it took over an hour to get served a cheese sandwich each, which meant we were a tad late leaving the park for Becketts swimming lesson, No time to take me home and Beckett had to do the car wiggle to change into his trunks. Even so we still missed 15 mins of a 45 min lesson. He still enjoyed himself though and I got to take a few sneaky photos. 

 

Half term also meant Laura dragged us all out for the obligatory walk. We did insist on having the meal first, and a great meal we did have at the Grove Ferry Pub before walking along the river stour and across some very windswept fields.

 

Once the boys had gone back to school we were again trapped looking at the same four walls with little to occupy ourselves. A Whatsapp chat with Kelly got us up off our backsides though. She dropped into the conversation that she had just purchased a new sofa. You've only just got one I exclaimed, but it seems it was already nine years old. So is ours. We looked at our offering. Maybe it was getting a little tatty. Maybe it could do with sprucing up. Should we just go out and sit on a few sofas? Well it would give us something to do ... except what we did was sit on one, fall in love with it and buy it. 

Spend spend spend!

New Year update

 Christmas has come and gone, and we are now attempting to get through those awful two dreaded months of January and February, where the weather is too horrible to venture out in, and we are sitting around, bored stiff with little to look forward to, and even less to do until Spring arrives. 

Actually we have been quite busy, first taking the Christmas decs down and putting them all back up in the attic. This is always a major job as the bungalow always looks like an explosion in a tinsel factory in my attempts to create Santa's grotto. The one year I got all sophisticated and went for a subtle winter wonderland the kids all complained and asked where the mismatched colours, glitter and kitch went. So it was back to the mismatched tat. 

Once that was all cleared away I decided I wanted more desk space and better organisation in the craft room, so I dragged Martin off to Ikea to get some desk tops and new Kalex units. It took a while to get my ideas across, but the falling apart Billy bookcase is now no more, the books have had a drastic cull and everything is now stashed away, and I have a work surface twice the size of the old one. Of course I then needed a new computer chair (new upgrade computer next on the list) but I have been much more productive in my new redesigned room and completed 6 layouts in January

I know I created that many because I have taken a totally new approach to my bullet journal which is working much better. Using a B6 size instead of A5 doesnt seem much bigger, but believe me it has made a world of difference. Ive even managed a playlist of songs each week, layout tracking, book reading tracking (9 in Jan) newpaper headlines, steps, dates and highlights!

We went with the boys, Laura and Wayne to Canary Wharf to see the Winter Lights display. In other years this has been a successful evening (apart from the year we went the wrong weekend and wandered around for an hour before finding a sign with the dates on, or the year I fell over the kerb in the dark and cut all my knees and hands). This year, the first year I had persuaded Laura to come, was not so brilliant. I dont think the organisers had taken into account Peter Kaye being live at the O2 just across the way. We certainly hadnt. We always park at the O2 when going into town as its cheaper than catching the train all the way. We usually plan our timings so we can eat there before catching the Jubilee line to where we want to go. This time the place was rammed. We couldnt understand why we couldnt get in anywhere, either massive queues or fully booked. That was until Laura checked her mobile and muttered the comics name at us. 

So despite my misgiving since on previous occasions we had not been fortunate in finding anywhere it was decided to go to Canary Wharf for food. Honestly does no one eat in London. Loads of bars, plenty of very expensive pop up street food vans but the few places we did find were again packed out. I think this was mainly because the organisers had cut the event length to one and a half weeks with two weekends involved. Everyone and his wife (and kids) had come along to see the displays. Most years Martin and I stroll around with hardly a soul in sight. This year we hardly had elbow room. 

Still the few lights we did see and the burger and curly chips we eventually bought from the burger van were good, and I think in the main every one had a good evening.

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Update for 2022 while new rads are installed

 Seems I cant keep pace with my bullet journal where I also diary so its back to dusting off the blog to keep my memory jogged.

Today we are having the radiators replaced so there is little we can get up to apart from playing on screens or reading our kindles so Im sorting photo files on the laptop. 

So what have we been up to since my last post in January?  Mainly jogging on with post covid retirement which is not as exciting as it could be as everyone is still nervous and there is also a cost of living crisis to deal with. So far that is not having much.

 We finished cleaning the bungalow out and put it on the market in March. After only a few viewings we excepted an offer from an older couple moving down from London to be nearer their son.

 We had the boys for a few days (and a sleep over) for the feb half term, taking them up to Eltham Place. 

 

We also took ourselves to Hole park to see the bluebells.

 

We finally ventured up to London for a show, enjoying a really good cast perfoming Only Fools and Horses the Musical

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We booked a 4 week break so that we could go to the Malvern Spring Festival. We had lovely sunny weather and managed to visit a couple of wonderful gardens as well as the show. Sadly the hotel was a tad dissapointing but we coped with it and had a decent time.

Mill Gardens

Stratford

Malvern Spring flower show, 3 Counties ground were we treated ourselves to an heirloom peice from our inheritance money.I think the olds would have been pleased with this purchase.

 The summer bought extremely high temps which I had problems dealing with. We had our annual trip to Westgate, and several more days spent either sitting in a much decreased temp hot tub or on Herne Bay beach trying to cool off.

 

 We also shared a huge converted barn in Suffolk for a week with Laura, Wayne and the boys. We did something exciting every day, river walking, visiting many pub gardens, the races at Newmarket and a day on the river kiyaking|

Finley also started at Barton Court Grammar having passed the 11plus and secured a place at his first choice of school, so he had several trips into Canterbury doing trial runs on the bus. 

September also made a slight change for me as the Drs finally allowed me to have a libre2 scanner system to check my blood glucose levels rather than the 12 odd finger pricks a day I was having to endure.

Nothing!

 Oh how I hate January and February!  Cold weather, nothing to do or look forward to except weeks of staying in and doing nothing.

To be fair there has been some things to do but not exciting ones or even interesting ones. While waiting for probate to come through on the bungalow we have taken a few hours each day to clean one room at a time in the same. We have moved the dining room furniture into the conservatory and take the garden ratten suite out into the garage, turning the dining room back into a third bedroom.  We have scrubbed to within an inch of its life and the place is now clean and sparkly, a great deal lighter and more inviting. 

Of course now my own home is dirty as we have had no time to clean it and a pesky dog messing it all up. Oh well. 

We also had a family trip to the panto to see Alladin. Its not really the same without Dr Lee playing the dame and his famous two stooges making us laugh. This year although the singing and acting was very good the whole thing felt rather flat, with little in the way of jokes and only really rescued by the brilliant Ebananza.

Martin has been off playing golf and has started back on his exersice bike to try and loose a little weight while I have had a cold for a few weeks followed by a cough which I got from looking after Beckett for two days. Wayne and Craig are busy with the new building site so its all hands on deck for child minding duties.

Clearing and cleaning

 We have managed to fill a whole skip! Now with a 3 bed bungalow to clear, plus a garage and a shed that might not sound like too big a feat but since a huge amount of it went to "Metal Mickey" the metal scrap man, I can assure you in the end it probably was. Most of the stuff mum had left or aquired since dad passed really was rubbish, I dont mean just stuff I didnt want or that was too old fashioned to be of use, but mainly things that were chipped, broken, missing a part or covered in rust, mould or spiders webs. Dont get me wrong. There was still a bit of stuff that I have decided to keep, but not much for two lifetimes.

There was also several bits I thought aught to be there that were just plain missing - the glass rabbit shapped jelly mould that had graced many a childhood birthday party table has completely vanished (despite mum making a fuss about it returning to her home when I borrowed it a few years back). What has become of grandads slate based shove halfpenny board (that I know was there 2 years ago when we cleaned out the shed)? And why in the attic is there a box of expensive looking lenses and parts that obviously fitted on dads telescope - but no sign of the actual telescope?

Wayne came over with his dads car and trailer to take the three sets of ladders, 4 plastic chairs and an assortment of tools over to the site, transporting a very heavy concrete wishing well back to ours on the way. He also helped move the repro old fashioned very ugly and very large cabinette out so Martin could finish the job of breaking it up (yes it was held together with a hope and a prayer) and lift it onto the skip too. We still have a3 seater settee behind the garage to get rid of but we run out of room and inclination. We are hoping that once we have sold the place the rest of the furniture can go to charity. 

Our next task is cleaning, so thursday we started on the conservatory. The carpet had a track of solid mud running from the door to the lounge where the dog had been given free range to the garden while mum was bedridden, with no one to wipe off his paws. I honestly thought we would have to resort to mats to disguise this, but the rug doctor we had persuaded mum to invest in two years ago has come into its own and now you cant see a single mark. The carpet looks as good as new, and definately smells much better since I have wiped all the window frames and the furniture with a mixture of bleach and flash! There were a deal of very dirty bowls of water to get it that far though.

On Friday we tackled the lounge which wasnt in a much better state than the conservatory. I took the huge patio door curtains down, bought them home and washed them. Now they are hanging in our bedroom as they fit much better than the ones we have, and leave the lounge in the bungalow much lighter and brighter. 

Tomorrow we intend swapping out the conservatory furniture for the dinning room table so that we can dress the dining room as a double bedroom when we market the place.

Talking of marketing the cheeky estate agent Kristy phoned to say she had a couple that wanted a bungalow but she had literally none to show them and would we sanction a one off veiwing. At first I was going to agree but then I started to think that if this couple wanted it, but we had not agreed to sell through this estate agent where would we stand, and we hadnt discussed fees or prices to say nothing of how long probate might take. And if we went with a different estate agent where would we stand if that particular couple still put in an offer? We turned down the veiwing.

The law firm holding mums original will held us up for a week getting it out of the archives but they finally handed it over on thursday so Friday hopefully Sue our friendly probate agent will get the ball rolling.

The building society have also caused some stress, as having told them we wanted to open a seperate account for all mums estate monies, so could we have a cheque from all her closing acounts, they sent us a cheque and then told us we couldnt open an account in branch because of Covid rules!!! I was dumstruck but we have had to come home, apply on line and once approved have to return to the branch to put the cheque in. Madness!

Goodbye my mummy

 On 4th December my mum finally passed away after a three month fight with heart disease. It has not been an easy fight for any of us, especially as her wish was to spend her last days at home with her beloved dog, and her portal to keep herself in touch with her family and friends. With some tremendous help from both the NHS and Pilgrims Hospice we got through.

On Friday, having got Christmas out of the way, we gathered friends and family together to send her on her final journey. The service was held at Margate Crem, officiated by the wonderful Ashleigh. who gave a beautiful send off and farewell to my mum. There was a good turn out from family and friends and I was especially touched to see my Auntie Jean who suffers severely from Parkinsons arrive with her sister to help her in her wheel chair. 

At the start of December the Omicron version of Corona virus was increasing at a very fast rate so when Martin and I started the arrangements for the wake we were nervous of both the risk of the virus to our guests and ourselves by booking an inside venue, and also the problems that could arise if we arranged a pub "do" only to find ourselves back in lockdown or further restrictions. Jokingly while on messenger to Laura I had quipped we would be having KFC on the beach at this rate. Not KFC, fish n chips she replied, which immediately switched on a light bulb! Why not? Both my mum and dad had regularly (and I mean at least 3 times a month in the summer) taken trips to Deal to sit on the beach munching their fish supper (at lunch time), and there was nothing mum enjoyed more than fish and chips that someone else had cooked instead of her. 

So on a crisp winter morning Martin and I drove a test run from the crem to Deal, parked up and went in search of the chippie they always used. Imagine our surprise and disappointment to discover the chip shop shut and a notice of opening times informing us they no longer opened for lunches. It had seemed such a good idea. We came home very despondent. Unbeknown to me though, Martin phoned the manageress and spoke to her, but she said she would have to get back to him as to if they would open specially. He thought he had done a good thing but I was very displeased. Firstly because he had not told me, and secondly because making any kind of fuss of this kind was not my mum's way. He apologized and politely told the manageress we had changed our minds.

However we couldn't get the idea of fish and chips on the beach out of our minds, and so after a couple more days we approached the Sunset Cafe on our own sea front. Hats off to Sam the manageress there, she couldnt have been more helpful or kind. She was willing to put on extra staff, clean off all their table and chairs that had been shut up for the winter, put the tab on our card for the bar, and charge us takeaway prices as it was cheaper even though we would be getting table service.
Everyone we invited thought it was a terrific idea, and even though it was freezing cold, they all refused to go inside the café because sitting outside would have been 'what my mum would have done'. To be honest I think she would have sat in the car with the heating on, but I was so overwhelmed that everyone toughed it out for the lady. 

So on Friday 7th January  2022, one day before her 86 birthday, we sat on Herne Bay sea front, twenty two of her friends,  neighbours, nephews, nieces  and appropriate spouses sat and enjoying beautifully cooked and served cod and chips in paper in the freezing cold, celebrating the life of both my mum and dad.

Oh and I do have to mention Jane and Neil who, unable to get back from Spain due to the pandemic, watched the live link via Wi-Fi and then found somewhere in Spain selling take away fish and chips, a sandy beach to eat them on (all be it in their shorts and tee shirts as appose to the rest of us wrapped in hats gloves and car blankets) and raised a glass of sherry to my mum!

RIP Pamela Joan.

Can I keep this up?

 I am finding it a bit of a struggle keeping up with my bullet journal mainly because senior moments cause me to forget I am doing it! I am determinded to continue though and have just spent half an hour getting next weeks pages prepped.

So far this week has been quite busy. Those death announcements took us the best part of a morning to hand deliver even though it was bank holiday. It also turns out that even though mum left a will because there is property involved we will also need probate. Martin took a look at the gov website and then decided to hand it all over to a profesional,

The first step apparently is to get three valuations from estate agents so yesterday was taken up waiting for them to arrive and look over the place. Laura (a dab hand at selling properties) gave predictions on the valuations from each agent and although the prices came in at nearly 60,000 adrift she was actually more or less spot on for all of them.

We ordered a skip to help with clearing the bungalow. Laura and I spent tuesday going through stuff while we waited for the NHR to come collect the hospital bed, but found very little of use or value sentimentally or monitary so I think most of it is going to end up in landfill. Some will go to charity, her clothes already have, and the scrap man took quite a bit of metal away with him but there is still going to be lots of stuff. A different generation who kept anything and everything in case it came in useful.

Yet again nothing is ever straightforward for us though and the skip people never arrived. When Martin phoned up to find out what had happened at first the guy answering the phone told him it had already been delivered .. err I think we would have spotted a 6 yard skip sitting outside. But it turns out the driver in charge the day before had crossed out the wrong days work as having been completed, and of course that was our day. They send a skip round soon after that but too late for us to get started on the big clear out job.

 The usual list of calamities are occuring all round, Kelly developed an ulser on her eye, tres painful and requiring drops at 1 hour intervals and lots of hospital visits. She went yesterday and was told that it is slowly healing but she will be left with scaring. In the meantime, I managed to drop a large metal pole on my foot ending up in deep bruising. And the potsy dog we have inherited continues to use my carpets instead of the lawn if he thinks it is too cold to go outside to squat!

New Year and Christmas

As I grow older I am finding it increasingly difficult to remember all of lifes details as they happen to me and mine. Of course a lot of this might be because what with covid lockdowns and a reluctance to actually go do stuff when we are out of lockdown (how many of us have simply got out of the habit of going out doing stuff) there are no details to recall, life just blends into one?

Whatever, even though I dont usually bother with all that new year stuff including resolutions, I have decided I need to open up a new bullet journal and throw some stuff at this blog.

The details for the start of this year arent that brilliant to be remembering though. Yesterday I started the new year with tooth ache. This is on a tooth the dentist took several hours building a half crown on, so I am a tad worried as it covers one of my back chewing teeth. I am hoping its a gum thing and not a tooth thing.

Then I also spent some time  yesterday writing out death announcements to send to all the people who knew my mum that I have not phoned (as many of them I simply dont know} and then some time this morning finding layouts with her in to take to the funeral and wake (I did this for my dad, it seemed I scrapped him a great deal more than mum who hated having her photo taken}.

We took the christmas decorations down yesterday, a bit early as I usually do it on 12th night but with the funeral leaving from our place the day after I thought I may need some time to get them down and clean the house.

Anyway enough of the negative lets do the positive.

Christmas (despite mum not being with us) actually turned out to be really good this year. Kelly and Ollie were spending the day at Ollies sisters so they both popped in to us to open presents before they went there. From them I got a Bothy cross stitch kit and Johanna Basfords Worlds of Wonder book.  They left at 5 to 10 and then we went to Laura and Waynes where we were spending the day and the night. We had a relaxed time just the six of us sitting round opening our gifts from each other, again I did well, another Bothy cross stitch (not the same one), a set of knitting needles and accessories, a bullet journal and a set of stencils, some circle stitched stamps, nail stickers, and the christmas logo game. But by the far the best part of the morning/day/year was when Finley opened his present. He had been promised a PS5 for his efforts in the  Kent Test but getting hold of one had prooved near impossible so he had accepted the fact it was not going to happen,. His reaction when he opened his last christmas present from his  mum and dad reduced all of us to tears, Laura had secretly managed to get one when she was off sick. Finley sat and started at it, held his head and then silently tears of astounded joy and surprised welled up and fell down his face. Priceless!

 

Later Waynes parents joined us for a fun christmas lunch. Laura had got silly face maskes to start the entertainment, the obligatory crackers, a silly parce the santa, 

 

lots of forfiets and lots of laughs with a very tasty lunch. 

 

Of course the disasters which make our christmases struck as usual, this time the microwave deciding to pack up half way through warming our christmas pud!

 

After lunch we exchanged pressies with Di and Gra then I was treated to a lesson from Laura in making tea and coffee for all (LOL)

Unfortunatly all the excitement prooved a little too much for Graham and they had to cut their day short but as they left Waynes brother wife and daughter arrived so the boys and Chloe spent some time playing with the NURF guns the boys had had for christmas, or reindeer toss, which had us all giggling. We also got the kids doing tongue twisters which resulting in Beckett coming out with a rude word when he attempted peter pipper picked, and Craig nearly having heart failure from laughing.

 More food as Laura layed up the tradition cold meat salad and  pickle tea, and then everyone left. We had a game of reindeer stack which again left us in hysterics. 

 

By this time it was getting on for ten and although not that late for christmas day everyone had either had early mornings or broken nights sleep so it was off to bed with no board games. Yet it had been fun, we had laughed, eaten drunk and shared it all with family. What more did we need? 

We needed more of the same, so in the morning we went home, tidied up, baked a ham and welcomed Laura Wayne and the boys back to ours for late tea and board games until late, when we tucked them up in our spare beds, tired but feeling all warm and fuzzy having had time together- a fantastic improvement on our lockdown zoom christmas of the year before.

Winter wreath

 2020 and 2021 bought three lockdowns. We were confined to our homes unless we were key workers, shopping or on medical business. All down to a world wide pendant which with flu like symptoms caused many many deaths. Most vunerable were the elderly, and those with underlying health issues. This meant that I was virtually housebound as my diabetes was classed now as type 1. All essential shops and services were shut down, shopping was online or by phone and delivery. 

Once we had spent a year decorating the house, exercising, baking, gardening, doing jigsaws, lego models and reading books January bought a new kind of lethargy and with the heavens on  permanent downpour even those of us who could

go out for a daily walk or bike ride didn't fancy it. 

Fed up with dressmaking, cross stitch and paper crafting I turned to crochet and using a few patterns from  Attic 24 produced a winter wreath to brighten our front door.January's lockdown crochet project. Patterns and idea from Attic24, crochet and knit 101 flowers book and a free robin pattern found on line.

Blog revival and Croatia

I am regretting not keeping my blog alive.

Croatia 24th September 2019

Both Martin and I were awake well before the alarm, so we got up early and finished the last minute packing. After a cup of tea we loaded everything into the car and were off on the first flying holiday since America (2017). It was raining hard so we had to grab our wet weather coats at the last moment. The M25 was down by one lane due to an accident so we were half an hour late, and when we did get to Gatwick Martin told me the wrong address for the carpark so sat nav lady led us to a set of offices and not a car park. Searching for the correct place to leave the car set us back another half an hour. This meant we only had time to grab a coffee and a croissant before heading for the departure gate.

We were first on to the plane but this didn't mater because the bad weather had slowed everything down and we sat on the tarmac for another half an hour before we could take off. The flight only lasted 1hr and 38 mins as it was TUI's dream line, but while the flight was quick, loading the coach for the transfer to Poreč seemed to take an age to leave Pula airport.

Our coach took us to Poreč bus station and we had to collect our luggage and put it onto the mini van, then follow the TUI rep across the road to the harbor where we waited for the ferry boat to take us across to the island of St Nicholas and the Valamar island resort Isabella Hotel.

                                                                      Our TUI rep Sue

                                                Walking from the coach station to the harbour

                                                       View across to the island
                                                         

                                                                    Ferry

Registration was very quick and in a minute we were looking out of our balcony at a beautiful sea view, the town of Porec and the swimming pool below us. 

              Views from our window

Once we had claimed our luggage and unpacked we quickly changed into our shorts for a bit of an explore, in search of food and a drink. We had a toasted cheese and ham sandwich in the pool grill not realizing they were huge sandwiches complete with salad and chips.

At five oclock we went to have welcome drinks with the TUI rep. We dont normally do this as we know their main theme is not to give out information but to sell the expensive excursions. However the receptionist had gabbled so fast we had no clue about meals and facilities so had little choice. As it turned out Sue was pretty good and didn't ram the excursions down our throats too much, and gave out some good info about other things we could do/go,

Our next port of call was the local Spa shop in the town to stock up on munchies and tea/coffee (not available in our room despite it being 4 star). We also needed to get some more Kona from the ATM as the cheese sandwiches and drinks had been a tad expensive. Sadly the hoards had got there before us and there was no tea or coffee to be had, so we settled for beer, lemonade and crisps.

One of the beaches (the only sandy one) 
on the island.





                                                                                                                                        


Going back across on the ferry.

One of the many crafty stalls on the harbour

Finally we ended the day back in the main dining room for a buffet style 4 course meal and then forgoing the evening entertainment collapsing into a huge king double bed.

Snowy days and time to blog

So once again I have been away from my blog for quite some time, despite wanting to get down to some serious regular posting. The reason is that I have been very poorly.

In a final bit of celebrating for our joint 60th's we had booked a fantastic trip to San Diago ending in a week in Las Vegas with Laura, Wayne and the boys. We arrived to find a fantastic villa complete with swimming pool, water fall, hot tub, mini golf, climbing wall, slides outdoor kitchen, telly and bbq!  I enjoyed it for four days before falling seriously ill and having to be blue lighted to the hospital. 

It turns out I had pancreatitis caused by gall stones blocking the pancreatic duct. The pancreatitis had attacked practically every bit of my body including my lungs and in total I spent 4 days in ICU, another 17 days in the hospital and had to have my gall bladder removed whilst in the USA (thank goodness for good travel insurance). It took a while to be allowed back to England and then it turns out I still have a very large cyst on my pancreas but the NHS moves very slowly and I am still waiting to hear about my referral and although I have managed 2 days back at work, am still in pain and not any where near recovered. 

So blogging has really been the last thing on my mind.

However with all the snow we are having at the moment there is little else to do than spend time in my craft room.  Kelly and I have been having mini crops together and joining in the virtual kits and classes run by ATDML. As we were unsure what the kits would be like we had contrived to do the classes sharing the kits but I think next month we are going to have whole kits to ourselves, as although we have managed, it has taken some thinking through and we have maybe lost a little in the attempt. 

Here are my efforts from both January and February. 

January class 2 Ann.



I didn't have a kit for this one so used whatever was to hand. Me at my husband's 25 year service award dinner.

January Class 3 Debbie Jewell. 

Because Kelly and I shared a kit it took some time to work out how to cut the paper so we both got enough each for the class. Unfortunately we didn't take into account the directionality of the print on the blue tree paper so I ended up doing my LO mirror image. I still like it though. 

My mum throwing snowballs at Laura and the dog after taking Laura to physio for her back injury (I bet a snowball fight really helped lol)

February Class 1 with Mel

 I loved both these classes, but again cutting the paper proved a challenge and because I wanted the flowers to show but discovered my triangles were cut back to front again the LO was mirror imaged. I also put my photo in the middle as I felt it caught the eye better there. I also threw in a few of my own chipboard letters and stickers.

My dad and Finley enjoying a joke together.
Finley playing cars, both photos taken during the time that he and his parents lived at our house.

February Class 2 Tricia 

I loved the look of both these classes,  but realise I do really dislike fussy cutting. Those swirly flowers took forever. All my LO's seem to be of Finley this time round but that is because I am working on my 2013 album before we were graced with Beckett so this time its a sleepy Finley and then a girly picture to fit in with the pink and flowers of my big girlie and a new born Finley. 

Not a class

This one isn't a class from ATDML but a pagemap sketch with some papers in my scraps drawer, and yes another Finley photo for that '13 album.