Lovely weather

When is the worst possible week to have your roof reslated? Oh, I know, I know, is it this week with it's gale force winds, and horizontal rain? I haven't slept since last Friday night, because I'm lying awake listening for tell tale signs of leaks, holding my breath everyime there is a big gust, incase it decides to relocate the top of my house elsewhere, or worrying that burglars are shimmying up the scaffolding to steal my Christmas presents!

I must take a big breath and possibly a Nytol, anyway on a lighter note, Katie came up with a cracker this week ( no not a Christmas Cracker, a funny haha type of cracker) "Mum", she said "I know what a psychic is". "Oh yes" I replied. " It has two meanings" she said, "Number 1, it means you have dreams about what is happening in the future, and number 2, if Daddy was a SuperHero, I'd be his psychic!". This had me in tears, aah, she's only 5 and at that age it must be difficult to tell the difference between a psychic and a sidekick!

Gone with the wind?

I was driving home from swimming today, and listening to Steve Wright on Radio 2. His factoids section came on, and one of the factoids was,"the average person breaks wind 14 1/2 times a day. Tom (age 7) was listening to this and said "I've only done 2 today, so I have 12 1/2 left" and Katie (5) said " I' ve only done 1 , but it was a big one!"

I created a Slide Show! Check it out!

Well, I have 5 minutes to myself.....

Hello, it's been ages since I blogged anything, but where does the time go? School has been hectic since Term started, and it doesn't look like it will be quietening down before half term. Well what's happened since I last blogged.
Oh, I know, we went on holiday with the bl@@dy passports. They didn't check them on the way out, but they did check them twice on the way back, so I'm very glad that I got the new ones. (I won't mention the cockup with the ferry, or you will think me a complete nincompoop). France was wonderful, and I'll try to load some piccies in a minute. I bought some lovely ribbon in a little French shop in Boulogne, and some unusual buttons in one of their hypermarches, oh I'm easily pleased.
We bought a new car ( no it doesn't have leather seats Chrissie!) and yes it does have a big boot for all my stash. The kiddies are chuffed because this car has drinks holders in the back for them, oh they are easily pleased. I wonder where they get it from?


Me, making a fool of myself.


Katie, looking more French than the French. Tout mi mi!




Tom, sampling the local cuisine.

Ma famille sur la plage (red, white and blue, geddit?)

Well there's good news and bad news.......

The good news is that we go on holiday a week tomorrow. The bad news is that I've just discovered the kiddies passports ran out today. So next Thursday I will be in the Newport Passport Office with my fingers crossed, hoping that I have filled the forms in correctly, and that Tom and Katie don't look like terrorists in their new passport photos. ( They couldn't work out why I always tell them to smile when I take their photos, but today I was outside the photo booth telling them 'don't smile this is costing me £3.50 a go!') Are there are scrapbooking shops in Newport? I may as well turn this to my advantage if I can! Oh no, I can't 'cos I won't have any money 'cos the passports are going to cost me £166.00. I am so annoyed with myself for cocking this up.

Some day my 'prints' will come!

Last week I ordered some prints from Snapfish.co.uk. It is the first time I have used them, and I'm still waiting for my photos. I e-mailed their customer service dept, and received an automatic e-mail telling me they would get back to me in 1 to 2 days! I expected them to come back to me immediately, this is not good enough, and so I thought I would have a moan about them here. There, I feel better already. Moan over.

Happiness is.....

when you have found a new craft shop, that is within walking distance. Admittedly it has been there a couple of months, but today is the first time I have actually been inside. It's called something like Beads and Crafts, or is it Crafts and Beads, well it doesn't matter, what does matter is that I went in and I was very restrained and only bought a clear embossing pad. The shop doesn't stock much but is very handy for the basics such as Papermania stuff, inks and stamps. It is no where as lovely as Crafty Pastimes ( Hi Linz) and therefore I only spent £2.00, as opposed to the £50+ I spend in Linz's shop (good thing she's so far away).

Jumpin Jaks

A couple of weeks ago I went on a hen night, we had to dress up like pink ladies, with pink t-shirts, black scarves, and matching pink handbags. The hen arrived in a shocking pink limo. Now I don't drink very often, and when I do I drink lager, so that I have a nice time without any after effects, now 6 of us had started the evening with a meal in ASK, and they all ordered wine, and I didn't want to be the odd one out, so I had wine too. Unfortunately there was something blue in my meal ( i think it was a bit of plaster eeugh!) so to compensate they give me a free glass of wine. We then went onto Yates where we met the Hen, now I was pretty merry by this time, and had a further glass of wine. For all of you who weren't counting that's just 3 glasses of wine, not much, but I decided it was enough, we went onto Jumpin Jaks and I went onto the water from then on. Well I thought I had done quite well, and would have classed myself as merry but capable, that was until I mistook the Fire Exit door for the door to the toilets, I was wandering through the bowels of the nightclub, and had to be escorted back to the dance floor by three very nice bouncers. hmmm. Next time I will definately have lager!!!!!

Katieisms and Bionicles

You know the cute things that kiddies say, well my two have said loads of things that make you want to go ' Aaaaah!'. We call these things Tommyisms and Katieisms. Please indulge me if I use my blog as a way of recording these 'isms' before I forget them.
Katie and I were watching the telly yesterday when they were showing pictures of the thousands of people running a mile for sports relief. Katie turned to me and said " Mum, is that the human race?" Aaaaaah!!!

While I'm here I'm going to post a picture that Tom drew of a Bionicle. He's really into them at the moment, he had two of them for his birthday, and Mum got him a bucket of bionicle bits so that he can make his own creations.

Squelch!

Remind me never to go into my garden in the dark wearing flipflops........ I just went to my shed to lock it, and caught up a slug with the front of my flipflop, and squashed it under my toes. (it was a BIG slug). Bearing in mind it was dark, I didn't know what the hell it was until I hopped back to the kitchen door and into the light. I was very brave and didn't scream. Although I promptly threw the flipflops in the bin, and stuck my foot in the sink and run it under hot water and washing up liquid. It's making me squirm, just writing about it.

Above and beyond the call of duty

Last week I had to get some forms signed by various people, soI rang them all to check if it was O.K. to call round. I spoke to one chaps wife who said they would be in all evening and it was O.K. to drop in. Well when I got there, she opened the door, called me in and I followed her to the kitchen where I found her husband in his underpants!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. " I forgot to tell you Kim was coming" she said to her Husband. I therefore had to make small talk while he signed the forms, and avert my eyes from his 'you know whats'. At least they were boxers and not Y-fronts!

Layouts

As I'm posting layouts (see previous blog) I thought I would share a few of my favourite ones .
This first one is of Tom, it was done for a challenge on the Scrappers Unlimited retreat in Brecon this year. The challenge was to do a layout on your favourite artist. Tom loves drawing, his favourite subjects are monsters, robots and Yu-Gi-Oh characters.



This next one is from a trip to Dan yr Ogof Showcaves near Swansea. We went there last summer, and took Tom's friend with us. I think the font I have used for the title is a bit like the one for the film Jurassic Park. We have just been to the Dinosaur Park near Tenby, so I can see a sequel coming soon " Dinosaur Park 2".



This last layout (for now) has a pirate theme (no, really!) The photo was taken in Florida a couple of years ago, and it includes a piece of sea glass in the top right hand corner. Collecting sea glass is a little thing I like to do, and as I live 5 mins from the sea, I have plenty of opportunities to do so.

Challenge

Another bank holiday, and another challenge by Chrissie. This time we had to create a layout based on an item of clothing. I chose my daughters bather, because I think she looks really cute in it.
I recreated the stripes on the bather with strips of cardstock, and hand cut the hibiscus flower.

hee hee

Found this cartoon in my local paper, I thought it summed up my love of snacks.

Butter Fingers

Ooops! I had just finished Beavers, and went to unlock my car, and had both my car keys and the Scout Hut keys in my hand. I unlocked the car, the Scout Hut Keys fell out of my hand, right into the drain, where they sank into the murky depths. I had been thinking of giving up Beavers - perhaps this is a sign;)

Oooh, I'm all a quiver (geddit?)

Another weekend, another day out, this time we went and did Archery. My husband, in his youth spent a lot of his time shooting at defenceless cuddly toys with bows and arrows. So he dusted off his bits and bobs (tee hee), and we went to the local scout camp site. Tom and Katie took to it straight away, and even I had a go. Ooh the way the photos have loaded, makes it look like I am shooting at my children, but i'm not. I am 'right eyed' and everyone else is 'left eyed'.

Sunny Day

Oh what a wonderful day, we have had a lovely time down at Blackpill, the paddling pool isn't filled yet, but the children ran around and played on everything. We had a picnic, and then went to the beach to look for sea glass. Here are a couple of piccies of the children enjoying the day.

It ASDA be a bargain

I normally have my groceries delivered by Tesco, but being the cheapskate that I am, I noticed that ASDA would deliver free if you spent over £75.00 ( in the end they didn't but that's another story) Anyway I spent a good hour placing the order, because I didn't recognise the piccies, and had to guess some weights. (Tesco has a list of my favourites and I just tick what I want). When the delivery came I got a few things wrong, the main one being the broccoli. I had guessed 1 kg of broccoli, and that equates to three huge heads of it. Needless to say we had/will be having broccoli yesterday, today and tomorrow!

1,2,3.....

When Katie (aged 5) was telling me about her day today she said " We were going to count from 1 to infinity, but we didn't have enough time, so we didn't". I wonder how much time the teacher would have to set aside for that?

Up for the challenge

Chrissie set a scrapbook challenge over the bank holiday. You had to design a layout with a picture of yourself as a teenager. Here is my effort. It only took me 4 days! Well I am pleased as punch because I came third:). Can't wait for the next bank holiday and the next challenge.

Up in Court

Well, the children(and I) are off on our easter hols, and instead of relaxing, and taking it easy, I have been really nervous about a court case. Last year my mum, my sisters and I went for a meal, and witnessed an assault. Well it finally came to court this week. The worst part of it all was waiting in the witness room. We waited all day Tuesday, and half of Wednesday before we were called. Then it was all over in 10 mins. I was so shattered when I got home yesterday. I wanted to go to bed, but couldn't because of the children, so I lay down on the sofa and closed my eyes. Only to keep on opening them to check the children hadn't killed each other, or were playing with matches etc...

Dipping my toe

Hello, well here I am dipping my toe in the world of blogs. I only signed up so that I can leave comments on Chrissie's blog.