Four Legged Furry Penguins

ceasefire

2011-07-18T15:46:00.002+01:00

I was going to write that the FB has his best friend round right now so the warring camps (FB v the Count) have declared a temporary peace. It hasn't lasted; and Ig has gotten involved.

4 weeks of holiday left, but will anyone still be alive at the end of it?

Ig, a spoon, and some porridge

2011-07-13T21:12:00.002+01:00

Woo-hoo

2011-07-12T19:24:00.003+01:00

Dear Diary
today the sun shone. Yes you read that correctly, the sun shone here in Edinburgh. The rest of the country, well those bits south of here, according to the Met Office, have had a drought and heatwave, whilst we have taken up swimming as our method of transportation. Last Friday, we - MrV, the FB, the Count, Ig and I, had an appointment in Morningside. It started to rain on our way there, and by the time we were ready to leave we had a fully fledged thunderstorm on our hands complete with torrential rain and hail. It was lovely. Especially when we had to go outside and head home. Crossing Morningside Road was not unlike fording a rather fast running river, and bloody cold too. We ran up the road and headed for Waitrose only to find the staff there desperately mopping the floor as the supermarket started to flood.
But today the sun is shining and it is glorious outside.
I'll miss Edinburgh when we leave. It's been a good three years living here. I'll miss my friends and family, the view in Winter accross the Meadows to Arthur's Seat, the Botanics, the Museum, even the tourists wandering about. I won't miss the mice though. Nope, not at all.

back or not?

2011-07-11T19:39:00.002+01:00

I keep thinking about writing this blog again especially now that we are moving again. I have really good memories of writing it daily in Tooting about the trials and tribulations of living in South London - the wall that vanished, the dildo on the way home from nursery and the evil darkness in the livingroom. And of course the readers whose comments I loved. So I'm hoping to restart the blog and see how it gets on.
Things have changed and not since I stopped in 2009. I have a daughter, Ig who is now 16 months old. She was ill for the first nine months of her life and was hell, screaming all day and refusing to sleep. Then one morning MrV sat her up and that was it. She stopped screaming, learned to crawl and is now learning how to walk. The FB has finished Primary 3 with lots of friends. He had a difficult few years working out how to be properly social and he's got it now just before we move. Hopefully he'll be able to keep going at the new school and he'll be ok. The Count is now 4 years old and is as mad as a bucket of frogs. And MrV well, he still works horrible hours and weekends, frequently cancels holidays at the last minute but he's wonderful. As for me, well the fat squatters are still hanging on in there, I still have days and days where everything seems too hard to cope with but I'm still reading and still sewing and getting there.

Knees up Mother Brown

2009-06-18T15:10:00.002+01:00

As part of my on going battle against my fat squatters I've taken up running and am following
the Couch to 5km plan. It's not going well. Week one was ok, then the Count caught chicken pox and the gym went out the window. Once the Count was over the contagious stage and could be dragged screaming and kicking (honestly) back into the gym's creche I started again, and once more it went well, so I moved on to the next week.... and this is where it all went wrong. I've rather knackered my knees. Fortunately they just need a bit of rest and hopefully that will be them mended and I'll be able to go back to running, week one again.

The FB is now on the mend. He had an awful night last night, no sleep again due to itching but as he's bossing his brother about, arguing about doing his school work and leaping onto furniture I'd say he's over the worse.

For those of you who like books, here's something to drool over

A pox

2009-06-17T14:42:00.002+01:00

Round two of chicken pox at present. The Count had it 2 weeks ago which was fun, and now the FB has it. Fortunately my sister has a spare freeview box which she has very kindly lent us so the FB can watch Cbeebies to his heart's content. He's discovering that chickenpox is not the fun, tv watching, chocolate eating heaven he thought it would be. Oh well, it doesn't last. Unfortunately tomorrow is his class' outing to the Botanics for a Teddy Bear's picnic and he can't go. I think we'll have a little picnic at home tomorrow for lunch, just me, his daddy, the Count and any teddies that fancy attending.

Zap

2009-05-20T15:52:00.002+01:00

I wish I knew an electrician who could come round and check out the wiring in this place. Our main lights, the ones that hang from the ceiling, keep blowing. Last night my bedroom light went so now we have no ceiling lights in one bedroom, the livingroom and the kitchen. And they are so a pain to change. Edinburgh ceilings, in old flats (by old I mean over a hundred years old) tend to be pretty high so ladders are needed not chairs when new lightbulbs are required. But this is the second time our bedroom bulb has gone in less than a year which to me is a bit too frequent. Electricity seems to be our curse. In Tooting we had exactly the same problem with lightbulbs, in Wallington it was appliances that kept going on the blink, and here we're back to lightbulbs with the odd flaming shower chucked in.

Was it yesterday I mentioned the mice? Or the day before? Doesn't matter because I was gropping about in the kitchen last night looking for the under cabinet over sink light when I heard skitter skitter skiddddd crash as a mouse shot across the floor, skidded round the corner into the wine cellar and crashed into something. Grrrr!

2009-05-19T20:12:00.002+01:00

day three and things are still going well. Our bathroom has a very old enamelled bath which currently sports a not so pleasant ripple pattern on it. The bath didn't start out with this pattern, it gained it over many years of sloppy cleaning, and I am trying to get rid of it. Unfortunately the blasted stuff seems impervious to all bar one cleaning product and the one exception so far only fades the marks rather than remove them. But we shall continue and maybe one day it will be gone, probably in time for us to move out.

Spent the afternoon with a friend and her children. One is in the FB's class and the other a few years ahead. Was good to sit and talk about books, politics and organic vegetables and not discuss children and the usual stuff for a change.

crash, bang, smash, waaaaaaahh

2009-05-18T20:58:00.003+01:00

such was the theme tune of my day. It's Victoria day today in Edinburgh which means the schools have a day off to give the teachers a break from their little horrors and the parents a few more grey hairs. The FB's school has got inservice days for part of this week as well and MrV has a very well timed (purely coincidental he swears) business trip to London. It therefore seemed like the perfect time to start getting the house under control. I've cleaned, tidied, retidied, further tidied the livingroom, bathroom, hall and both bedrooms but despite the children's best attempts to keep us living in a tumble of brightly coloured plastic debris they have been thwarted and the place is tidy.

As for the mice, well as I type there's a very suspicious rustling sound coming from inside the wall to my left. I'm still finding droppings, but not in the kitchen any more and we're not actually seeing them running about either. I suspect that word of MrV's amazing mouse catching skills are making their way round the rodent population.

beige continued but with a hint of sunshine

2009-05-17T20:28:00.005+01:00

Well after a walk to the playground, a stroll to Blackwells for a book of Burns poetry, and then a trip to Black Medicine for a chocolate milkshake I'm feeling a bit more upbeat. I've got to get this malaise beat otherwise I'm never going to get anything I want done and we'll all end up wearing filthy clothes and living on takeaways. So I decided that I'm going to make myself do one thing a day towards one of my personal goals, and a couple of things for the housework.
We also came up with a few rules for the boys which will be stuck up on the kitchen wall. They're simple rules like only one toy out at a time, no hitting, you know the sort of thing.

So my thing for today was to put my list of books to read onto the excel spreadsheet where I'm currently inventorying the books. Eventually that spreadsheet will go back onto my phone and when I'm in a bookshop or library and pondering whether or not to get something I'll know if I've got it or not. Next step is to go through the pile of magazines and look at their book suggestions.
Housework front? Dishes done, laundry will go on tonight, boys' room tidy as is the hall and livingroom.

beige beige and more beige

2009-05-17T14:05:00.002+01:00

Things are getting on top of me again. The house is a pig sty, the laundry is piling up and I'm getting absolutely nowhere on any of my freetime stuff. When we were in Wallington I had a routine and it worked, and since moving up here I just can't get a routine in place. I try but it just doesn't work and so nothing gets done and I am getting so frustrated by it all. I think that was (apart from the Ikea coffee mornings with MrsT) the only good thing about Wallington, the bad things are too many to list! So any suggestions on how to get over this?

On a daily basis I have to do the following
get myself and the boys up, dressed etc
take the FB to school
do the housework
go to the gym
do laundry
cook dinner
have playtime with the Count
do something of my hobbies

not much huh but none of it (bar getting the FB to school and cooking dinner) actually ever gets done. I have a fantastic book called Time Management for Manic Mums that tells you how to get your life in order and do things not just that you have to do but also stuff that you want to do; and I follow it and make lists of what I want to do and then never actually do it. Its very frustrating and infuriating and many other words meaning exactly the same thing

Any suggestions very welcome!

Smiley days again

2009-03-26T19:18:00.002Z

Much better today. Last night I cleared all the sides in the kitchen so the only things left out were the kettle, breadmaker and microwave, put the Count's highchair in the middle of the floor with nothing around it, and put all the other chairs on top of the table. This morning no poo, and all the mouse poison has gone. We heard a couple of squeaks from the kitchen but there's been no sign that they've crossed the floor or been on the sides at all. Hurrah! Tonight I've done the same thing and put out more poison so hopefully they'll be gone soon.

I had my first pilates class in wow over 6 years today. I've been doing a home class called yogalaties for a few years on and off but as much as I liked it it's not the same as having a proper instructor who can make sure you're doing things correctly. It was good but hard work, might be able to get those fat cells moving.

And then nieceA came round for lunch and a play with the Count. She's 3 & 1/2 (she says she'll be 4 in 5 minutes) and the Count is 22 months, and they are pretty much the same height! But the best bit, was while she was here, the estate agents' maintenance guys came and fitted a new shower. No more trecking off down to the gym for a shower.

Alas since then the Count has started running a temperature and has thrown up, but we have to look on the bright side - we have a shower!

Grrrrr

2009-03-25T19:48:00.003Z

I am not in a good mood today at all.

1. Walked into the kitchen last night to find a mouse on the side. When it escaped it ran across my oven gloves then down the clothes airer through the clean clothes. Prior to me walking in it had visited the Count's highchair (I know this because of the mouse poo I found there)
This morning more poo.

2. The Count has taken to screaming every time he is thwarted in his evil plans. It is not a nice scream but one that sounds like all the demons in hell are trying to sing "These are a few of my favourite things" backwards whilst sucking down hellium.

3. The recession is getting to me, am fed up with worrying if MrV will have a job at the end of the month or not and, and even the news that Fred Goodwin's house was vandalised last night barely brings a happy smile to my face.

Smoke across the water

2009-03-23T19:37:00.002Z

Yesterday was Mother's Day and, to make sure that it was definately one not to forget, MrV had four fire-engines, and crew, pull up outside our main door! At 8am.

Our shower went up in flames. (Electrical fire inside the shower unit, not very big fire, not much smoke damage, horrid smell though - rather glad I've caught a cold really).

Best Friends Forever

2009-02-10T14:08:00.002Z

I have very friendly fat I've decided. Very friendly and very persistant, to the point that you wonder if it has some sort of condition because it continues to stick around even after you've dropped several very pointed hints about why it should leave. And yet there it is, wobbling away happily to itself while I eat salads for lunch, in Scotland, in winter. It is also very good at making friends - if for example I stupidly and absentmindedly look at a bar of chocolate in a shop I can hear all the little fat cells in my body shouting out "hello, welcome, come for a visit" and hey presto their little friends move in. So really I'm being invaded by tiny little friendly squatters.
This would all be fine if I could eat a normal diet without incurring more squatters but in order to stabilise, not lose, my weight I have the following

muesli & skimmed milk for breakfast
salad for lunch
soup or small dinner

argghhhh

Supermice

2009-01-27T12:25:00.002Z

Obviously as well as being able to steal bait from traps without springing them, the damn creatures have learnt to read. Within a few hours of posting last night who should appear scurrying across the livingroom floor? Yup, that's right. And who did I hear scrabbling away in the corner of my bedroom last night?

Mind you last night was freaky weird anyway. At 12.40 I got woken up by the sound of music playing very loudly in our flat and when I got up to investigate I found the radio on in MrV's study and a cd playing in the stereo in the livingroom. Everyone else was in bed. Three hours later and it happened again only this time it was just the radio going on. I figure we must have been having very small powercuts because the FB's clock beside his bed was flashing the wrong time.

I'm not going the change the name of the blog. I like it and it will always remind me of my two little penguins. It was a hard hard decision to make and it was one that I had been putting off for a long time but it was also the right decision to make.

Ode to a mouse

2009-01-26T20:16:00.000Z

go away.

pack your bags.

there's no food for you here so please, just, leave

OK?

We have a mouse (did you guess?) of the free range sort. It appeared a few months ago in the bathroom while I was sitting on the toilet . We saw it a few more times and then it vanished. A few weeks ago it came back and now it's so brave that it runs into and out of the livingroom in broad daylight while someone is sitting in there. We've put traps down, and poison, and the little bugger is still about.

Wait a minute, I hear you say. What about your cats? Well, we had a few weeks apart back in August when we first moved up here, and I noticed that for the first time the Count's nose wasn't running. Within a day of the cats returning his nose was back to being blocked and his eyes had swollen up. So the cats had to go.

Fast forward 2 weeks.....

We put down poison 2 weeks ago, and a mousetrap which is still waiting to be sprung. The original mouse has gone, is probably an ex-mouse now, and has been replaced by its identical twin. The only difference is that mouse a wasn't afraid to run into the livingroom of an evening, and mouse b is and hasn't ventured out of the kitchen. Although, he hasn't been seen recently either.

2009

2009-01-03T14:18:00.002Z

The sun is shining at present, and the building opposite mine is glowing golden. I love sandstone buildings, the way the bricks turn different shades through the day and through the years. It doesn't feel like it will be such a bad year. And yet we have a recession looming (I don't think Britain is officially in one yet), businesses are going bankrupt and massive unemployment seems inevitable. I wonder how this will affect my family, will MrV keep his job through it all? How will it affect our area - there are a lot of little shops around here - will they manage to keep open? And what about the online sellers like Posy gets Cozy? Will they still keep their heads above water? I hope so. There is a feeling of gloom, and understandable worry, but also a bit of excitment as people wonder what will come out of this all. Will there be more equality or will the country be even more financially divided than before?

So, here's to an interesting 2009. May you all come through these times intact.

X marks the spot

2008-12-28T17:30:00.010Z

The FB was given a treasure map of the Museum of Scotland recently as part of their program to get children interested in what they have to offer apart from the robots on the ground floor and the trains on the fifth. We had nothing better to do today and so we thought we'd follow the map...

Scottish wolves (not the ones from the Meadows that eat cheeky little boys, or so MrV tells the FB)

ghostly Roman horses

a claymore fit for a giant

Bonny Prince Charlie's "Wanted" poster. We were looking for one that said "wanted dead or alive" $400.

Freakly little coffins that were found buried on Arthurs Seat. Noone knows who made them, buried them or why.

Silver egg urns with legs?

You were meant to draw each of the things we found but the FB's not that great at drawing so he borrowed my camera instead and I have to say I'm quite impressed.

Walks on a cold day

2008-12-27T18:58:00.009Z

It was a cold day today, and frost covered everything

so we went for a walk

via Germany it seems!

Past waterfalls,

pools of still water,

and under towering bridges until, at last, we found the forest.

Is it me or do you think there should be a grizzly hunting salmon on the banks here?

Were we in Canada, Germany, or the centre of Edinburgh?

Deck the halls meme

2008-12-22T19:56:00.002Z

Nabbed from Meggie

Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate?
Neither really. Can I have a glass of rose please?

Does Santa wrap presents or set them under the tree?
They're wrapped and put under the tree, but they won't go under the tree this year because due to the Count and his exploring fingers the tree has had to be put up behind the tv

Colored lights on tree or white?
Neither, but the tree is covered with lots of multicoloured decorations

When do you put your decorations up?
Is this apart from the tree? Hmm when they are finished being made really. Which they haven't yet...

What is your favourite holiday dish?
Roast chicken, roast potatoes, and stuffing. And don't forget the veg

Favorite Holiday memory as a child?
Making plans with my sister about who should wake up who if they were awake first. Oh yes and we also used to "wash" the bathroom walls on Christmas Eve to make sure they were clean in case Santa needed to use the bathroom. My mother used Santa as a great way to make us clean our bedroom (which was so untidy we would have to cut paths into it in the evening so we could get to the bedroom door) - everything had to be sorted out and tidied up completely incase Santa needed to check if we had a particular toy. We fell for it for years.

When and how did you learn the truth about Santa?
I had my suspicions when one Christmas Eve I heard my rather drunk father stagger into our bedroom (shared a room with my sister) and slur "where shall I put these?" to my mother. My suspicions were confirmed the next year when my sister and I decided to mark the fruit in the fruit bowl to see if any appeared in our stockings.

Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve?
No, not unless you count a bottle of wine as a gift.

How do you decorate your Christmas tree?
Every year we buy the children a tree decoration each so they go up, as well as any that they have made themselves and then assorted tree decorations we've bought or been given. The tree is tack personified.

Snow! Love it or Dread it?
Love it until it turns to slush then freezes. We were deeply disappointed when a few weeks back the rest of the country got masses of snow and we got nothing.

Can you ice skate?
The last time I tried I could. Mind you that was 16 years ago. Is iceskating something you never forget?

Do you remember your favorite gift?
Sadly no I don't.

What's the most important thing about the Holidays for you?
Spending time with MrV and the boys

What is your favorite Holiday Dessert?
Stollen

What is your favorite tradition?
Watching a really bad Christmas film on the eve of the 23rd accompanied by biscuits and cheese from M&S

Which do you prefer, Giving or Receiving?
Giving I think.

What is your favorite Christmas Song?
I spend every Christmas singing the few lines of "Santa baby"that I know over and over

Candy Canes! Yuck or Yum?
I suspect yuk

Ever recycled a Christmas present?
Not as a grownup but it probably happened as a child. I know duplicate birthday presents were recycled.

The stars in the bright sky

2008-12-21T21:33:00.005Z

Two years ago I first talked about making stars for the FB's bedroom, started making them (I think about 15 were cut out and that's all) before the incredible tiredness you get during the first trimester kicked in and I quit. Last year we all had spewmonia (yes it sounds delightful doesn't it) right before Christmas so making stars was again out of the question. But this year? Well I've cut out and decorated 97 stars in either silver or gold glitter - so far 66 in gold, the rest silver. I've another 59 stars waiting to be decorated but have run out of glue, and I've got to draw and cut out another 33 stars to be done in gold. Then they all have to be strung together and hung. By Thursday morning. Cutting it a bit fine amn't it! On top of that I've got a clove orange to make for myself and one that I've promised to make for one of the mums at school. I promise

to take a photo of it all when it's done. But for now I leave you with a photo of another little star.

He's walking

Hippo on the razz

2008-12-20T17:28:00.002Z

Earlier in the year I managed to lose 21lbs (10kg) through the Beck diet plan. By the time we moved up here I had gained some of it back through stress eating. I'm too scared to stand on the scales partly because I dread what they'll say and partly because I think I may break them. Oh well January starts soon and it will be time to stop eating so much chocolate and start going back to the gym again.

Tonight I'm going out with some friends for dinner. Not at Kushis or Ricks fortunately as they burnt down last night. My sister used to go to Kushis regularly and loved the place. And Ricks did a killer Eton Mess.

Wanted to put a cartoon of a hippo in sparkly evening wear up but can you believe it I couldn't find one. Darn

Cool things about Edinburgh

2008-12-19T20:43:00.003Z

I still can't believe we live in Edinburgh. Every morning I take the FB to school and look out across to see Arthur's Seat. It's an amazing view with the sun rising behind it. On my way home I can see the Castle almost at the end of the road. Still can't believe it though!

We've been bunkered down a lot recently. Partly because we don't know how long MrV's going to have his job for and partly because we seem to be catching every single cold and bug going about. Yesterday my sister called to say that her daughter, the FB's absolute favourite person, has come down with chickenpox... we are on spot watch.

The best thing though is the school playground. I'm not talking from the FB's point of view but from mine. In previous place I was completely ignored while waiting to pick up/drop off the FB but here? Well today after the kids went into school I went to the local coffee shop with a few of the parents for a drink and a natter. It's so so unbelievably nice to be able to do that.

Three Craws

2008-09-24T23:19:00.002+01:00

Obviously "the third craw wisnae there at a"

Bye bye Cbeebies

2008-09-15T15:23:00.004+01:00

Moving house is a bit like New Year in that you take a good look at your life in the run up to the move and decide what you want to keep and what you want to change. For months before we moved MrV and I had the same conversation over and over which would invariably start "when we move up to Edinburgh I want to.." simply because finally after a year that felt like our lives were on hold we had the opportunity to start to live again.
Some of what we decided we've managed to start doing - the FB no longer has access to hours and hours of CBeebies. Apart from his tv addiction noone else in the family really watches that much tv so we're back to five channels again, and really the only thing I miss is the rewatch facility we used to have.
I can't wait to start going to the gym again, to join the library and to finally get my act together and start embroidering again.

Laundry dilemmas

2008-09-10T20:19:00.000+01:00

The FB's school has chosen, with great wisdom and forethought, to use as part of their uniform, white shirts. For four years old. The FB has been at school for 3 weeks, has 3 tops, none of which are unstained. One has a huge mudstain right up the back. It won't come out. Neither will all the tomato stains.

My only solution therefore was to go out and replace them all. Except that the shops have stopped selling school uniforms now.

Pass the valium will you.

(I wanted to post a photo of the FB in his uniform before it was trashed, but the cable for the camera is in one of those boxes over there. You can be assured he looked utterly gorgeous and so so grownup)

Proper Bread

2008-09-07T21:52:00.003+01:00

Thankyou, I think he's pretty cute too. Not however at 1am when he's fighting sleep for all he's worth, but definately at 2am when I rolled over in bed to find him finally fast asleep, bum in the air in that adorable yet surely uncomfortable position that only babies use.

Yesterday evening the FB and I made our very first loaf of bread in our brandnew breadmaking machine my parents gave us as a housewarming present (caused of a bit of an uproar with my sister who was given a potplant when she moved into her new home 5 years ago) and this morning we had it for breakfast with Farmers' Market eggs, and jam. And oh boy it was delicious. The price of bread has skyrocketed here over the last few months and the only bread costing less than £1 is of dubious character. MrV and I are trying to eat by Michael Pollen's rule of eating only what our great grandmothers would recognise as being food which works up until I want a diet coke.

The Count never took to bottles until he found one that was more to his taste

2008-09-06T21:13:00.004+01:00

Was he giving it up? No chance!

I should probably say, incase you're worried, the bottle was unopened and when it was opened he wasn't allowed any. He is after all, still a baby. Currently a grumpy baby with a snotty nose, but a baby nonetheless.

Home, Home on the Grange

2008-09-05T22:32:00.002+01:00

well that was a rather longer break than I meant it to be but there was rather a lot going on in the background which couldn't be written about until now. MrV who is a simply wonderful person, started negotiations with his work to do his job from home, which instead of being in South London would be in Edinburgh. OK they said, but this needs to happen, and this, and this, and this....and so on until at the begining of June they said that we could go ahead. I couldn't write about any of this simply because I didn't want to tempt fate taking it away, in fact we didn't actually start telling people (bar immediate family) about the move until the end of July.

But here we are in rainy Edinburgh (alas not the Grange though) and it's wonderful. The difference between here and Wallington where we used to live is incredible. There are actually things to do here apart from walking round a park. There are shops, museums, art galleries and cafes. There are libraries and gyms. This is civilisation folks.

The FB got into a good school and has a fantastic teacher and he appears to be enjoying himself - well he waves hello to his school which I take as a good sign. My mother takes the Count to a baby and toddler group every week which he loves, and I love because hell, who wouldn't love a few hours peace and quiet from two noisy children every week!

2008-04-04T10:12:00.002+01:00

Well the visitors have left and the FB is missing his cousin dreadfully. They had a great time together charging about the house, arresting their grandfather and attempting to drag him off to jail, and by the end of their time together had declared everlasting love and decided to get married to one another when they are older. Very sweet! The visit did the FB the world of good too, he watched his beloved cousin intently and consequently both his running and his colouring in have improved no end.

The Terracotta Army was good, in that you could get within a meter of the statues which is apparently closer than you get at the official museum in China; but there were only a few statues, understandable I know, but I was rather expecting it to be bigger. The really interesting bit was about the First Emperor's burial mound which has not been excavated and there is a lot of speculation about what will be found in there when it is dug into. Apparently he was trying to build a miniature version of the universe so he could rule forever, and rivers of mercury and stars of pearls are amongst what is thought to be down there. But they don't think it will be excavated any time soon alas. Children behaved reasonably well, by which I mean that they are allowed back to the British Museum but aren't allowed to touch anything again or jump up and down as they kept setting the alarms off.

Night out was fun. It was a very windy, rainy evening so by the time MrV and I reached our destination we were a little windswept and damp. Restaurant wasn't bad and after the meal we did as most normal people do and went for a wander round Ikea.

Oh and yes I got the storage unit hurrah! Now all my art/craft stuff is in one place.

To Ikea and beyond

2008-03-26T21:35:00.002Z

Back to Ikea again. I was there yesterday with MrsT and the LittleMissT (as well as the Count) but the simple storage unit I want was not in stock so back again today to check to see if it is there. And it was. Now, I wonder if it will be by the weekend. My parents are down this weekend because, as my mother puts it, MrV and I need an evening off. Nothing to do with the tickets she has for the Terracota Army at all! This time however it will be a little different as they are bringing a surprise guest with them. My neiceE is coming down for the weekend. She is 3 weeks younger than the FB and they are the bestest of friends. I can't wait to see his face when she walks through the front door.

I'm really glad you all liked the idea of putting a note inside the front of each book. I can't do the one I'm reading at present (Zorro by Isabelle Allende - very good read by the way) because it belongs to our teeny tiny library.

Booknotes

2008-03-19T14:26:00.002Z

I'm considering writing a little note inside each new book I buy, sort of like this -

Bought this book on 21st April 2008 from Bolingbroke Bookshop on North Cote Road. We've taken the FB to get his hair cut at Sally's and while he was there I slipped out to the bookshop. It's a grey day today but as we are about to go to Wandsworth Common, fortunately it hasn't rained.

The idea behind this came about because I recently picked a book (30,000 mornings by Hiag Akmakjian) up off one of my bookshelves and could not remember when I bought it. I could swear that I bought it before MrV and I got together but as it was published after then I couldn't have, and because there is no LRT (Lothian Regional Transport) bus ticket tucked inside used as a bookmark from one of my journeys to and from work.

And I like the idea that in 20 years or so I'll open a book and see the little note and that day will come flooding back.

The downside to rain

2008-03-16T20:33:00.004Z

I was going to write a post about how lovely it was to go for a walk this afternoon with just MrV's ipod for company. It didn't matter that it was to the supermarket , nor did it matter that it was raining until...

some bloody idiots in their cars drove straight through the puddles on the side of the road and soaked me from head to toe.

Now, I realise I am probably in a minority of one here, not owning a car at all, but tell me, is it really that hard to avoid the puddles? I'm sure it isn't because some lovely drivers on my walk home managed it. So please, people, if you see a person stomping through the rain, have a thought for them while you sit in your cosy warm car and don't drive at full speed through the puddles.

Clouds of Rain (and cake)

2008-03-15T20:05:00.004Z

I might have guessed it would rain yesterday even without Louiz's weather forecast. Since moving house 8 months ago I would estimate there have been a mere handful of Fridays without rain and the majority of them fell during the period between my outdoor broom disappearing and MrV replacing it. "Que ¿" you say. One of my chores for Friday, you see, is to sweep the patio and it rarely gets done because it is raining, except when the broom went missing and then we had glorious sunshine.

So instead the FB and I baked a cake. A chocolate cloud cake. And it was delicious, very very delicious. I would offer you a slice, but we ate it all. Sorry.

(recipe from Nigella Bites, but with milk chocolate instead of dark chocolate)

Upon the weighty issues of babies

2008-03-14T12:01:00.004Z

I took the Count to see the Health Visitor yesterday. We missed his 8 month checkup because the doctor was running 40 minutes late and I couldn't wait any longer and had to pick the FB up from nursery. But it doesn't seem to have mattered anyway. He is fine. Weight is a bit on the low side and he's tall for his age but he takes after his mother in that respect (or perhaps I've got that round the wrong way and his mother is on the small side and weight is a bit high...). Actually he weighs less than I thought he would considering how much the boy can put away.
But what the visit highlighted was the difference between the FB's health visitor and the Count's. The health visitor I saw yesterday knew that the charts they use to plot the baby's weight on are based on formula fed babies, that breast fed babies weight gain slows around 4 months and even knew about baby led weaning. In contrast the health visitor in Tooting was as useful as an icecream in the Arctic.
The winds, may I call them zephyrs, have blown themselves out. The sky is no longer full of racing clouds and sudden showers, and is now a gentle shade of blue with puffy white clouds. The tree on the backfield has stopped its dance and has returned to its dignified upright stance; and there is a ladybird climbing up my windowpane again.

Still standing

2008-03-13T16:01:00.002Z

Well despite the strong breezes we've been experiencing over the past few days the house, miraculously, is still standing. The staircase has yet to collapse as I stomp upstairs carrying yet another pile of clean laundry and the front of the house has failed to peel off into the street (suspect that all that rain in the summer and the waterfall down the steps into our backyard undermined the foundations a little) so all well on the domestic front. The landlord still hasn't fixed the livingroom despite promises to have it sorted, and now the estate agents are making the same empty promises. Grr!

That shouldn't really happen should it?

2008-01-29T15:46:00.000Z

Do you remember many months ago, in November, I wrote about how the staircase was coming away from the wall? Well that seems to have halted, possibly because I got freaked out at 3am one night and shifted around 100 books; but now the centre of the shelf that runs along the side of the staircase as it reaches the loft, has sunken in...

If I was a landlord there is no way I'd rent a property to me, not unless it was being flattened afterwards.

(Taxes filed and paid. Hurrah!)

Not sharing with you Mr Darling*

2008-01-25T18:11:00.000Z

I know no man is an island, but could they be a taxhaven I wonder; and if so, how do you claim such a status? It's the end of the tax year here in the sunny UK and I am rapidly losing patience with the Inland Revenue and their complete inability to write their "helpful" notes in anything close to understandable English. As far as I can make out it is a competition between them and us; they want to get as much money from us as they can to spend on little luxuries - starting wars for instance, and we want to keep as much money from them to spend on our little luxuries like electricity, gas and rent. They use babble as their tool to confuse and bewilder the poor layman into paying more, and we lie, I mean claim deductables, to pay less. And so, year after year the battle rages on.

*Alistair Darling is the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Gordon Brown's old job)

2008-01-23T16:51:00.000Z

Our house seems to be full of these little flies at present. They appeared after the ceiling came down and are everywhere. They're like little black versions of greenfly, but I've no idea what they are. Don't seem to bite nor leap so I'm assuming they're not fleas.
Time just seems to be flying past and I'm sure that it was only yesterday that I posted last but I guess not, and it is not like our lives are full of exciting things either. Really the only exciting thing that has happened recently is the constant speculation if the people next door are our new neighbours or builders & decorators. Yup our lives are that dull!

Hello

2008-01-09T15:55:00.000Z

Wow that was almost a sabbatical! My break wasn't meant to be that long but a series of stomach bugs (yup more), the flu which knocked the stuffing out of all of us, and then a leak in our livingroom ceiling over New Year has made it harder than normal to get to a computer. However we are looking at the bright side of all this (is there one you ask?) well the bug and flu caused me to lose weight and keep most of it off over Christmas, and frankly anything that shifts the stubborn fat off me can only be a good thing in my opinion.

What else? Oh oh oh the noisy neighbour with the creepy 12 year old has moved out. Hurrah!

Happy New Year to you all

xx

The End

2007-11-30T20:30:00.000Z

Well we made it through 30 posts and 30 days once again to the end of NaBloPoMo, so, I think, a break is in order.

Back soon.

Tag, you're it.

2007-11-29T21:05:00.000Z

The Count has slept through the past two nights, the FB on the otherhand has not. I feel like I'm in the middle of a tag wresting team. Look at them trying to look innocent and that they weren't discussing strategies until I walked back into the room!
Why, by the way, can I click on and enlarge some of my photos and not others. Is it random?

Learnt a very valuable lesson today. Always make 1oo% sure that there is not a disposable nappy hiding in your dirty laundry just waiting to go into the washing machine. Otherwise it looks like a blizzard has blown up all over your clean, wet clothes.

The Countdown begins

2007-11-28T20:23:00.001Z

Three more posts to go. It has been very hard over the past week to write anything and the temptation to jack the whole thing in, blog and NoBloPoMo has been quite strong. The FB has had yet another cold and the Count is still not sleeping, so by yesterday I was so shattered I could barely string a sentence together. Today, fortunately, things are much better. Still I'm really looking forward to the end of November.
My parents' visit was a great success. The meal out, as I posted briefly was fantastic. MrV's company had ordered him to take me out for a meal to thank him for all his hard work, and he was allowed to spend up to £100. After a great deal of selfsacrifice on our part, having to order course after course as well as rather a lot of booze (including a lovely rosè wine) we managed it.
Of course the best thing was being able to go out for a meal by ourselves and converse. The FB is rather hyper at preset so talking is practically impossible while he is awake.
Monday was the Tutankhamon exhibition at the Dome. The Count slept his way around it, and the FB? He was so happy to be able to wear headphones (we had an audio tour) and listen to someone talking, that he was fabulous the whole way round. Perhaps this is the way forward? Maybe if I need to get him to tidy his toys away I should tape record myself asking him to do, and invest in a walkman.
And yesterday they went home again. My mother has since been on the phone trying to book tickets to the other massive exhibition currently in London - The Terracotta Army, but alas it seems as if all the tickets have gone. Ah well

Day out (with the Egyptians)

2007-11-27T21:34:00.000Z

The reason for yesterday's trip into town was to visit here

The Millenium Dome, or as it is now called The O2.

And the reason for our trip?

Alas no photos from within the Exhibition as understandably considering the age of the exhibits, photography is banned. But wow! Well worth the convoluted trip home.

Back tomorrow

2007-11-26T22:42:00.000Z

Stupid me. I forgot to look at the train times before going into town today and arrived at the trainstation 20 minutes after the last train to the nearest station had left (not that this stopped them from selling me a ticket for it). After a long circular journey round most of South London we got home. Shattered.
Back tomorrow

On the tiles

2007-11-25T21:49:00.000Z

Night out last night to a restaurant in Wimbledon Village. Lovely meal, excellent wine, fabulous company. So nice to be able to have a meal with adult conversation and without having to ensure that a certain little bottom remains on its seat and not slide off under the table.
The Count slept through for the third time in the last 6 weeks but his big brother was up instead with a sore throat.
Today, walks in the park as the weather moves slowly but surely out of autumn and onto winter.

Isabelle's bookmeme

2007-11-24T17:06:00.000Z

Hardcover or paperback, and why?
Paperback – they fit easier into my bag although admittedly this was only a consideration when I was working and needed a book to read during the commute to Canary Wharf. Cookbooks though should always be hardback.

If I were to own a book shop , I would call it….
I don’t want to own a bookshop. I just want people to give me books for free.

My favourite quote from a book (mention the title) is…
Every time a favourite quote question appears in a meme I forget my favourite quote. So this one will have to do “ The sky above the port was the color of television tuned to a dead channel” (Neuromancer, William Gibson).

The author (alive or deceased) I would love to have lunch with would be… Alexander McCall Smith.

If I was going to a deserted island and could only bring one book, except for the SASsurvival guide, it would be…
It would have to be something that would survive rereading over and over so perhaps The Encyclopaedia Britannica in all x volumes. The sections not currently being read could be put to use as some sort of shelter.

I would love someone to invent a bookish gadget that…
would let me read a book while feeding the Count. I suppose growing an extra pair of arms would do the job but that seems like such hard work.

The smell of an old book reminds me of… the cupboard under the window in the spare room at my grandparents’ home. My grandmother had filled it with all sorts of old hardback children’s books and I spent entire weekends at my grandparents as a teenager reading for there was nought else to do there.

The most overestimated book of all times is… I have to go with Isabelle here and say Ulysees, White Teeth and all of DH Lawrence’s scribblings. I hate it when a book … is predictable. When I was recovering from an operation back in March 2006 I went through a bit of a Katie Fforde phase; after reading a few of her novels I realised that they were all the same – girl is single, girl runs into boy, boy and girl disagree on life, argue constantly but really are falling in love with each other……

If I could be the lead character in a book (mention the title), I would be…. Thursday Next in “The Eyre Affair”

Friday

2007-11-23T20:20:00.000Z

It all got done in time. The housework, laundry, etc etc. Parents arrived safely. Father has already examined the livingroom ceiling and agrees with you MrsT that the leakstain is an old one, he's also pointed out the other stains on the ceiling and believes that the room above flooded at one point. Oh and apparently the staircase is coming away from the wall in the loft and this may or may not have been caused by the weight of our bookcases. Bother!

What I should have done today

2007-11-22T20:12:00.000Z

clean and tidy the house as my parents are arriving tomorrow for a long weekend
booked a restaurant for Saturday night - my parents are babysitting the boys so MrV and I can go out for a meal
write a letter to Santa on behalf of the FB emphasising his longing for a marble shoot (series of tunnels you can put together to roll marbles down)
played music with jars and water

What I did do today

did some more of that cross stitch
read my book

Guess how flustered and panicked I'll be tomorrow doing all the housework!

Buses, trams and the tube

2007-11-21T21:13:00.000Z

Doesn't have the same feel about it as "Trains, Planes and Automobiles" but it will have to do.

Took the FB up to Wandsworth Common today; a trip that involves getting a bus to the tramstop, followed by a tram, then walking a mile or so to the Underground, taking the Northern line north to Clapham South and then finally another mile's walk to the Common.

It would be quicker to take the train directly to the Common but I'm rather lacking the courage to get both boys on a train by myself. There is usually quite a large gap between the train and the platform, and the doors don't stay open for long, so understandably (or not, perhaps I'm being a wimp) we haven't taken this route yet. We will, just give me time.

All in all we walked about 5 miles this afternoon. And his energy levels this evening? Still bouncing off the ceiling!

Dear Santa

2007-11-20T21:05:00.000Z

I would really like a tranquiliser gun for my Christmas this year. The FB seems to have a secret stash of energy pills hidden about him and pogos about the house like Zebeedee from Magic Roundabout on speed(until he is asked to help tidy up the mess he's made at which point he collapses on the floor and complains he's run out of energy). It's a bit worrying, not to mention exhausting. This afternoon he was a little out of control as we had guests round. MrsT and the LMT drove the Count and I over to Kingston this morning, then came back for lunch and a natter. The FB, when he was picked up from nursery, thought that this would be a splendid occasion to show off all the fabulous social skills he has been taught. Or perhaps not.

Apologies MrsT. Next time I'll take him on a 5 mile run beforehand and try and tire him out.

Yippee!

2007-11-19T20:49:00.000Z

He slept. He slept. He slept. The.Whole.Night. I on the other hand did not. I kept waking up expecting him to wake up and he didn't. I don't know if it was a fluke, or if it was the massive amount of mashed potato he ate for tea, or the bottle of formula he had last thing at night but whatever it was it worked.
So tonight we're doing the same thing all over again.

(Molly, he's actually named the Count after Dracula purely because of his nocturnal habits - he has yet to turn into a bat and swoop through some unsuspecting lass' bedroomwindow but give him time and possibly a slightly warmer time of year; however, when I am composing blogposts in my head he does tend to get referred to as Count Jim Moriarty Grytpype-Thynne - an amalgamation of both villains from The Goon Show)

The only way is up

2007-11-18T18:46:00.000Z

After yesterday's tale of woe, you'll be happy to hear that things improved today. The Count is still counting sleep in seconds rather than hours but as MrV took the boys this morning while I had a lie in until 10, I feel much better. I'm not sure what is causing the current disturbance in the Count's sleep patterns. The FB was the same at this age and I kept a very detailed daily diary to see if anything would show up but it didn't matter if he had solids or not, and more or less feeds both bottle and breast, some nights he would sleep through, some nights he wouldn't. We ended up having to go through the horrible "letting him cry himself to sleep" as nothing else worked. I hoped that we would avoid this with the Count as he was such a good sleeper, but I guess not.

Nothing to see folks

2007-11-17T20:35:00.000Z

After being up at 2am, 4am, 6am and finally 7.30am I'm absolutely shattered and to compound it, I've sinusitis so haven't been outside at all today. Have instead spent the day sitting shaking and tearful on the couch. The Count has gone from being an excellent sleeper both at night and day to being an insomniac at night and refusing to nap during the day. Please, please just let this be a stage, and a short one at that.

Timewarp

2007-11-16T17:22:00.000Z

The postman arrived and with him came a box of Marguerite Patten's recipe cards dating from 1967 (including amongst the starters such delights as Grapefruit, and Prawn Cocktail, and from International Foods - spagbog. I love it!).
Of course this had to be photograped alongside a trio of Persephone novels, and shot in sepia.

Today I have been mostly

2007-11-15T20:42:00.000Z

*keeping my eyes open with the help of matchsticks

*begging the Count to nap so I could get some sleep or at least some quiet me time

*wondering if this was truly the best time to start weaning the FB off the TV (he would much rather watch tv than do anything else in the world, not good me thinks)

*getting rather peeved that books I ordered on Sunday have still not arrived and I've almost finished my book (Family Roundabout by Richmal Crompton in case you were wondering. Great book. Recommend it strongly.)

*eating like a horse. As has the Count who polished off part of a carrot, a bit of potato and a whole banana for tea.

Just a walk in the park

2007-11-14T20:44:00.001Z

By god it was cold

Roly Poly

2007-11-13T21:05:00.000Z

The Count is on the move. He worked out how to roll from his back to his stomach a while back and has been able, though rather erratically, to roll the other way. Today I walked into the livingroom and found him 2.5m away from where I left him. Eek!

Kitten on a rough wooden fence

2007-11-12T21:14:00.000Z

This is our neighbours' (the other side, not the DJ) kitten. He likes to wander into my backyard and would come into the house if we let him. Unfortunately Frog is more than a little territorial and does not appreciate adorable kittens coming avisiting.

Things that go bump part 2

2007-11-11T16:38:00.000Z

It appears that problems with the postal service was not the only thing that followed us when we moved house. I suspect that our friendly poltergeist MrsS has come too. Things are disappearing and then reappearing in places previously searched thoroughly, and these are not things that could be blamed on the cats and their sticky paws. Last night for example, MrV and the FB wanted to set off the last of the sparklers so the FB was asked to go and get his wellies and put them on. Only one could be found. We all searched the hall where both had been but it could not be found. Three hours later I glanced down as I walked past where we had searched and there it was lying brazen as can be on top of a pile of shoes up against my umbrella. I know it wasn't there before.

Fortunately that thing of black evil on my couch hasn't come too, or perhaps it did and has been scared off by the drum and base from next door.

Good Grief

2007-11-10T19:47:00.000Z

I was supposed to go to the Stitch and Bitch that was being held in Central London today with MrsT but fate conspired against me. Last Tuesday MrV came down with (yet another) stomach bug, and yesterday whilst I got things prepared for our early morning departure, I congratulated myself on avoiding catching his bug. But no, I spoke too soon and today was spent, not strolling around looking at different kinds of yarn and hopefully being taught how to crochet flowers by Yarnstorm, but instead lying in bed feeling very awful and sorry for myself.

I suspect chronic tiredness doesn't help either. The Count is still keeping up his nocturnal activities and now my fabulous neighbour has kicked in. She's a DJ and has decided that 11pm is the perfect time to practise her skills. The noise (a repetative dob dob dob) can be heard in every single room of the house so there is no escape. Grrrrr

By Jove she's got it

2007-11-09T19:40:00.000Z

I had 15 minutes yesterday before I had to shoot off to pick up the FB from nursery when I decided to give this crochet business another go. I found a website that had good step-by-step photos and hey presto. OK there are some dropped stitches, the colour change went a bit wonky (technical term that) and rather than be the square that I meant it to be, it appears to be a pyramid, but well I'm getting there. The bit that is causing the most trouble (apart from lack of time and general exhaustion) is that the stitches seem to be so tight that I struggle to get the hook through when it's time to make the next row.

My Kingdom for a comfy bed and a good night sleep

2007-11-08T16:51:00.000Z

At least someone is getting some sleep round here even if it is the person who is rather responsible for my lack of. You won't need a rucksack to carry your stash home on Saturday MrsT you can use the bags under my eyes!

Aw gee shucks

2007-11-07T19:53:00.000Z

Thankyou! I turned a rather deep shade of red with all your lovely comments. I am so looking forward to finishing it, and if this blog is still going then, I promise to put a photo of it up. To answer your question Isabelle - I sew in the mornings while the FB is at nursery and the Count is asleep, in the afternoon sometimes while the Count is napping and the FB is playing by himself, and in the evening when both boys have fallen asleep. Meggie, if you lived closer I would be on your doorstep begging for help with crocheting.

Children do say the best things sometimes. My mother-in-law thinks we should write down the FB's utterances and perhaps we should because according to him

The First World War took place in Tooting, and the Second in Balham.
On asking his father to tuck his teddies in one night he asked if MrV had trouble doing it when he was a child. MrV said he couldn't remember as that was a long time ago, to which the FB responded "Was that during the War daddy?"
He has just looked down his pyjama top, sighed and said "I'm growing breasts". He didn't realise that it's not just mummies that have nipples but little boys, girls and even daddies.

Ah my daft boy!

WIP

2007-11-06T20:18:00.002Z

My attempts at crocheting are not going well. I can do the starting stitch and the first row of stitches and but when I try anything beyond that my work starts to look less and less like crochet and more like macrame. Which would be great if I was planning on making hanging pot holders for a dolls house but not if I fancy making a ripple blanket.

The photo above is the completed section of the cross stitch that rules my life. I've almost done 10% now! This is the original photo it was taken from.

What happened to the sun?

2007-11-05T19:34:00.000Z

Obviously I spoke too soon. Despite how it looks in this photo, the sky today was slate grey and the temperature felt as if it had dropped 200C. The FB still refused to wear coat and jumper. The kitchen floor was so cold this morning that it hurt to walk on it barefoot (unless you are the FB who also scorns such things as socks) so it is time for these to come out

They are gorgeous knitted slippers from Canada. The inside is fleece which keeps your feet very snug and warm. I have a pair, as does the FB (who refuses to wear them) and the Count has two pairs - a titchy pair and the next size up.

The Great Womble Hunt

2007-11-04T17:20:00.000Z

To make up for the wet summer we had, we've been blessed with the most beautiful autumn. It's still warm enough to go out in sandals, and if you are the FB, without a coat. Mind you he refuses to wear one in the dead of winter, must be his hardy Scottish blood. Because it was such a glorious day today MrV decided not to do any work but instead take us all on a stomp across Wimbledon Common in search of Wombles.

We hunted and we hunted, but no Wombles could we find. Instead this tree caught MrV's eye. I'm going through a bit of a tree thing so I had to get a photo of it. But still we kept on looking for any sign of the elusive womble...

Eventually we reached the Wimbledon Common windmill and gave up hunting. Unfortunately the museum below the windmill was shut for winter and doesn't open again until the end of March which left a certain young man feeling very sorry for himself.

No, not this one. He's looking a bit astonished because today his menu had a new item on it - the vile gunkness that is babyrice. My baby is growing up!

Day Three

2007-11-03T20:34:00.000Z

At 4am (when the Count woke me up) I realised it's not NoBloPoMo but NaBloPoMo. I've been calling it the wrong thing all this time. I thought it stood for November - Blog Posting Month which you have to admit does make sense.

So day three. The FB's been down with one of his headaches today so we've been sitting in a darkened room listening to the radio and reading him stories to try and take his mind off it. Fortunately he feel asleep which seems to be the best cure and is now feeling much better and back to his normal self. This all means though that today's post is very short.

He's more Blofeld than James Bond really

2007-11-02T15:34:00.000Z

I'm thinking of renting my boys out to the CIA as specialists in information gathering through techniques made illegal by various international laws.

The Count is currently doing a refresher course in sleep deprivation which he has been attending for a couple of weeks now. One of the main points that he has learnt so far that I can see is to keep the person from whom sleep is being kept guessing when they will be woken up.
And the FB?
He has a line in questioning that would get the most hardened criminal or terrorist begging to surrender information within hours.
Mama - ok we'll walk up to the lights and cross there
FB - why?
Mama- why do you think?
FB - so we can cross the road and go home.
Mama (visibly trying to supress a nervous twitch) - if you knew why did you ask?
FB - I wanted to make sure you knew mummy.

Help!

And they're off

2007-11-01T13:40:00.000Z

November 01 2007 a new day, a new month, a new NoBloPoMo. What was I thinking? One month of posting every single day. I doubt that enough happens in a month to cover a week of posts let alone 30 entries. Ah well. Be prepared to be bored ok, and don't say at the end that you weren't warned.
This last year has just zoomed by so quickly. This time last year I was in the first trimester more than slightly concerned that the bump pushing my trousers to their limits was not caused by a baby but more by overindulging in lemon meringue pie. Then there was the whole CVS test and the nervous wait for the results. A year on and the little being at the centre of it all is lying on his babygym grinning at me like a loon. I wonder what the year between this NoBloPoMo and next will bring.
And now I must be off to Asda to buy some soy sauce.

a short hiatus

2007-10-31T15:53:00.000Z

spelt wrong no doubt but I'm being nagged to drink coffee which I don't like, by the FB; and the Count is complaining about the terrible service, so I don't have time to go and do a spell check.

Tomorrow that NoBloPoMo begins which is why I've not written in 2 weeks. That's not to say I'll have much to say everyday for a month but you never know.

see you tomorrow

I can see a rainbow

2007-10-18T17:34:00.000+01:00

The FB and I have been playing with colour a lot this week. We've taken out my shoebox of material squares and laid out lots of quilt patterns. These are the squares that I bought last December and which had to be replaced as the original lot went missing in the post, and they are still waiting to be used. It took laying each one out to see how gorgeously sumptuous some of them are, and conversely how blah others seem, but I suspect that should a quilt ever come into being the dull will definately be lifted by the beautiful.
But no quilt can be made until the marathon cross stitch that is the Wandsworth Common photo is completed and people, that is going to take some time. It is, I calculated, 240,000 stitches in total, and 10 months after starting I have done a mere 17,000..... I think the quilt may have to wait until my next lifetime!
But that brings me to the redecoration that went on here last night. I wanted to find a little tracker so I could monitor how much of the xstitch had been done (7% at the last count) and put it up here as a way of making sure I keep going. I found some out there, but I simply couldn't make them work on my old blog design and well here we are. The html tweaking continues as I try to work out what each bit means by trial and error. The colours are more restrained than I would like but fit in perfectly with the cooling down of the weather as we move slowly but surely into Winter.

Doesn't time fly?

2007-10-15T17:33:00.000+01:00

One year ago MrV bought me "Twelve", a book of Tuscan cooking by Tessa Kiros for a belated birthday present. Some of the recipes have a strange symbol above them but there is nothing in the book to say if it means anything so I googled the author and found PeaSoup's blog. I was hooked instantly. The idea of someone with three boys who had enough time to do all the baking, knitting and creating she does, along side the photos of her home was the impetus I needed to start a blog of my own. And here we are, one year on. A year older, a second son, a new home and lots of new friends from all over the world. I wonder what the next year will bring.

Up, down and bleugh

2007-10-11T17:34:00.001+01:00

We've had a busy week

Wednesday - met MrsT and the adorable LittleMissT for a walk in the park. LittleMissT and the Count appeared to be quite enamoured of each other, and the FB talked MrsT's ear off
Thursday - train to Edinburgh. Was supposed to have dinner with my sis but she, her hubbie and neiceA had a stomachbug
Friday - got haircut, saw a friend for lunch, went to the Museum to see the Millenium Clock (we have to do this at least once per trip to Edin) and had dinner with MrV's family
Saturday - MrV's sister got married
Sunday - nieceE's birthday parties (one with little friends and one at home with the family)
Monday - back to the museum for another round of clock watching and then on to the Meadows to the playground
Tuesday - train to London
Wedneday - I get ill with stomach bug
Thursday - the FB gets ill with the stomach bug and it looks like MrV is coming down with it too now.

service will be resumed when health returns.

Over-the-Shoulder-Boulder-holder

2007-10-01T10:58:00.000+01:00

In short. Am going to a wedding and need an underwired bra to lift and seperate those breasts from the jelly mass that is my abdomen. Got measured by a trained bra lady who told me that my bras are far far too big and got me the correct ones.

This morning I put the new bra on (also bought new nursing bras) only to find that she was wrong, oh so bloody wrong, and I am now in possession of three bras that make me look like I have four squished together breasts....

I love Amazon (the book meme)

2007-09-22T16:19:00.000+01:00

From daysgoby

Total number of books owned
Approximately 2000 but they're not all mine. Some are, some are MrV's and some are books from remainder sales that MrV thought one of us would like to read.

Last book bought
Pippa Longstocking. Oh, you mean for me? Hmmm good question. I think it was "Bend the Rules Sewing" by Amy Carol, but last weekend it was my birthday and I scored a huge amount of Amazon vouchers so will be going on a bookbuying spree shortly

Last book read
I have three books on the go at present. "A Spot of Bother" by Mark Haddon (who wrote "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time)which is in the livingroom. I've only read a little of it but it looks to be a good, easy read; "Storm Front" by Jim Butcher which is in the loft/study. It is very hard to class this book. When MrV told me about it I thought it sounded a bit Douglas Adams, but having read some of it, it's not at all; and "The Story of Art" by EH Gombrich which I dip into occasionally.

Five Books that Mean a Lot to You
"And God Created the Au Pair" by Pascale Smets and Benedicte Newland. I love this book. It is a series of emails between two sisters, one in London, the other in Canada, about their children, husbands, etc etc and is a fantastic antidote to chicklit

"The Kitchen Diaries: A Year in the Kitchen" by Nigel Slater. I have a huge collection of cookbooks as I'm always on the lookout for THE cookbook, the one with mostly veggie recipes that are healthy, easy to cook, don't use a lot of weird ingredients and would appeal to a very picky four year old. OK perhaps the last bit is asking too much.

"The Story of Art" by EH Gombrich. MrV bought it for me shortly after the Count was born. We were in a little bookshop beside Wandsworth Common and I saw it. I've wanted to know more about the history of art for quite a long time, and being me, have done little about it, so MrV knowing me well bought the book. Four months in and I've reached Chapter 5...

"The Windup Bird Chronicles" by Haruki Murakami. First one of his books I read. I had never couldn't heard of him and bought it because I liked the front cover. Then once I had started reading it I stop and had to find more of his work. This was back in the 90s and there wasn't much of his stuff about. I still love his more surreal stuff and mean to host a Murakami dinner party at some point - the menu to be food mentioned in his books and accompanied by music he mentions too. Oh and the book smells fantastic.

"Charlie Brown's Super Book of Questions and Answers" by Charles M. Schulz . My aunt gave this to me for my birthday when I was about 7 or 8 and I loved it. In fact I loved it so much that when the FB was tinier than he currently is, I ordered a copy of the book off Ebay for him.

Five Books That You Just Don't Get
"Ullyses"by James Joyce. I've tried over and over and nope it just doesn't do it for me.

"Sap Rising" by AA Gill. This is probably the worst book I have ever read. I bought it because the Guardian's review was on the front cover "Do not buy this book" and I wanted to see why. I found out pretty fast why.

Shakespeare. We had to study Shakespeare at school, every year a new play apart from a few years when we did "Midsummer Night's Dream" two years in a row. There is nothing that kills a play more than a bunch of 'can't be bothered" children having to read the parts in class. Hamlet to me is a whole class of 16 year olds chanting "tobeornottobethatisthequestionwhetheritisnoblein....." you get the picture.

Chicklit. I read it but it drives me up the wall. Why do all the heroines have to be slim, beautiful but neurotic? It's junkfood for the brain really.

"Effie Briest" by Theodor Storm. Did this in German at uni and loathed it. I couldn't identify with the main protagonist and frankly after a few pages, wanted to slap her and tell her to grow up.

If you fancy doing this meme consider yourself tagged.

Am I being unreasonable?

2007-09-20T21:31:00.000+01:00

There is, within a website called Mumsnet, a section where worldweary mamas can ask if whatever bugbear currently afflicting them is acceptable or if they are being unreasonable. I mean one day to go onto it, but fear that my grumpiness and irrationality would prove too much and crash the website. So instead, dear reader, I shall grump here.

Am I being unreasonable to

1. Expect the postman to deliver MY parcels to me and NOT to my neighbour? Have spotted him wandering away from my frontdoor with a parcel only to have my neighbour bring it round to me later. And while we are on the subject of snail mail, when did first class post start taking 10 days to arrive from Reading (largish town not really that far from London?)

2. Expect the damn moths to bugger off? Have successfully vanquished the little horrors from one cupboard only for them to have moved into the one beside it and I can't find where their pupae are..

3. be a little narked when, after a day of eating a diet that a supermodel would class as austere, I stand on the scales and find I've actually gained weight.

4. to feel a little foolish that I've started a post about being grumpy about so many things and can't actually remember most of what I was grumpy about.

Right I am off to ice a chocolate cake.

A plague upon your house sir!

2007-09-09T11:58:00.000+01:00

I'm feeling very old-testamont right now. First we had the floods back in July and now a plague of moths. The cute, dinky ones I wrote about back in May have followed us across council borders, are infesting one kitchen cupboard and have claimed squatters' rights. When I googled them I found out that they are flour moths and like to eat practically anything they can get their larva jaws into, like my herb & spice collection for example which has had, in the most, to be binned.
Last Saturday I had enough and cleared out all the food cupboards in the kitchen one by one, going through each shelf and binning anything that looked suspect or had cocoons on. Then each cupboard in turn was sprayed in bleach and closed up with what I thought was moth free foodstuff inside. Next day two of the three cupboards had moths in. So did the whole thing again and put things into plastic and glass containers to quarantine them. Next day two of the three cupboards clear of moths! But the third? Still infested! I went through the herbs and spices which are all in their little glass jars. The larva had gotten into them so into the bin went my massive collection. And the cupboard was rebleached and everything left out. This morning I put a few things back in and guess what. A few hours later, there's a moth, and on inspection of the things in the shelfs, I found some cocoons...
I am starting to take this personnally. It feels like there's a war going on between me and the moths and I have to confess, the moths are winning. So now everything is sitting out on the kitchen counters again having being inspected yet again for cocoons and the cupboard is once again seeped in bleach.
So any suggestions? I suspect I have two choices - either to bin everything in the cupboard, firebomb the shelves (or put them through the dishwasher) and hope that that clears the little buggers out, or put things back one at a time and see how it goes.

XYZZY

2007-09-04T15:22:00.000+01:00

Well here we are at the end of the alphabet. We've successfully navigated the twisty little maze of passages, avoided any dwarfs with axes, treasure stealing pirates, and scared off the giant snake in the Hall of the Mountain King.*

Normal service will resume shortly with daring tales of moth-fights; and "Singer, or how I learned to love the sewing machine".

*No, I've not gone mad, it's from Collossal Adventure

U, V and W

2007-08-31T09:20:00.000+01:00

U is for

I have a rather gorgeous blue umbrella with white polka dots scattered across it, and it never gets used. Why? Because

a. it is very hard to hold an umbrella in one hand, push a pushchair with the other and hold the FB's hand in my freakishly missing third hand.
b. umbrellas hate me as much as I hate them, and at the slightest breeze any umbrella I have stupidly tried to use, turns itself inside out. Thus becoming more a raincatcher than a rain protector.

Underwear. Why, when we can send a man to the Moon, can we not invent an underwired nursing bra that doesn't up the risk of developing mastitis? One is desperately in need of something to divide and lift as the whole breast-belly caboodle has slumped together in one squelchy mess. Oh that sounds so appealing doesn't it!

V is for

Volcanoes - the FB's current interest. We are on our second watching of a National Geo programme about predicting volcanic eruptions. I am being bombared with questions on pyroclasic flows, lava types, and why those people (the volcanologists) are wearing funny clothes (so they can go near the volcano without getting burnt)

Voluptuous
which leads us nicely to

W is for

Weight for it...it's not coming off! Help! I have a wedding to attend in just over a month and am pretty much still the same weight as I was after the Count was born. Exercise doesn't work, dieting doesn't work. So much for that rubbish spouted that breastfeeding helps you lose weight fast. Pah! I feel that I look like a young Ann Widdecombe (but without the henious blonde hair or Tory beliefs)

Turtle Power

2007-08-29T19:51:00.000+01:00

My only pet as a child was a tortoise a friend of my parents gave us when I was 4 and my sister was 2. We named it Jip after my grandfather's gun dog. Like all tortoises Jip was very laid back and slow moving, until she wandered into the livingroom. Unfortunately the carpet there was very similar in colour to her shell so there were a few occasions when she was accidentally kicked across the floor. She also had a bad habit of peeing on people when they picked her up to say hello. Possibly a defence mechanism in case she was used as a football who knows, but the smell of tortoise pee is something you don't forget. It's not eyewatering like skunk but just odd.
Then one night my mother awoke to hear a bumping noise coming from under the bed. She thought Jip had wandered off and gotten stuck under there, but curiously everytime she moved the noise stopped. Then to her horror a rat shot out from under the bed. It disappeared out through the bedroom door into the bathroom and down the toilet. So the next day my parents called the National Pest Control who came round and put down rat poison in the drains and the back garden. That evening my parents were having a dinner party. My mother was in the kitchen preparing when the grate in the middle of the kitchen floor (for swishing the dirty water down after washing the floor) popped open and a half dead rat crawled out and started towards my mother who screamed and my father appeared brandishing a broom. Possibly the only time in his life he's actually held one!
The original rat had come in after the tortoise who had been safely asleep in her box. Her feet had been gnawed on by the rat but she was still alive. She became very vocal but refused to eat after the attack and died a few weeks later.

Queen, Royalty and School

2007-08-27T14:41:00.000+01:00

Cheating I know, but I'm also very aware that the end of the month is looming and I've still rather a lot of posts still to go.

So in days of yore when knights were bold and women did....I wrote about studying Latin at school and mentioned having lunch with Brenda. It was the 125 anniversary of that school on the hill in Crieff and so to celebrate 125 years of getting successive generations of parents to part with their money the school invited the Queen and co to visit. A lottery was had to determine who would attend the luncheon held in the Fecky (Refectory which had been repainted especially for the occasion) and I was one of the lucky winners. Only three things stand out about the meal - firstly we had cutlery that you couldn't do a Uri Geller on, we had actual crockery - instead of the plastic molded trays sort of like the ones you find on aircraft, and thirdly, the food was actually edible. I'm sure there were speeches and so on but they have slid into one of the many holes in the sieve of my memory and have yet to work their way back out.

Somewhere amongst my stuff I have still got the offical menu and my invitation to dine. When I find them, I'll put them up here.

Penguins, Four Legged Furry

2007-08-24T18:45:00.000+01:00

Ten years ago I shared a flat in Edinburgh with my sister and a large number of mice. The mice weren't our idea of ideal flatmates and after a mouse ran up my dressing gown and then down my bare leg we decided to get some kittens. One for my sister

(Froggy)

and one for me

(Velcro)

As I've posted before they turned out to be completely useless at catching mice (but rather good at dismembering giant spiders) but the smell of them kept the mice at bay in that flat. As kittens they loved water. It was not uncommon to go into the bathroom and find at least one of them sitting in the bath under the shower (and on one occasion, in the fish tank). And so they were christened the Four Legged Furry Penguins. Froggy will do anything for food - she worked out how to open the fridge in the flat in Edinburgh, and a few weeks back worked out how to get into our rubbish bin. Velcro is quieter, more reserved and very fond of cuddles.

P is also for Peace (and Quiet to follow) of which there is not much in this house. Isabelle to answer your question on how I have time to blog having 2 small children about - the Count sleeps through the night from around midnight till 11am which gives me time to do the housework and things with the FB in the morning, and then in the afternoon while the Count naps (big one for sleeping that boy) and the FB is playing I can blog, sew, read or gaze adoringly at ultraexpensive bags online.

Oil

2007-08-19T18:55:00.001+01:00

When I grow up.... I want to learn to paint using oils. I had a lesson, once, a long long time ago when I was just a wee lassie of 12. My grandfather (not the one who bought the monkey) is an artist in his spare time (as was his wife and as was my other grandmother) and decided to teach me by coping a photo of a flower, I think called an Indian Paintbrush. He kept the finished painting up on the wall in his kitchen for over 20 years and then last year gave it to me.

So here on public display for the very first time I give you...

Nonsense

2007-08-16T20:29:00.000+01:00

We do talk a lot of nonsense to our children, or is that just me? My parents tried to convince me that icecream vans only play their jingle when they've run out of icecream; I'm trying to convince the FB that they don't sell icecreams but cucumbers. Probably with as much success as my parents had with their little tale.
The idea for this post came about after I spent a while this morning trying, but not succeeding, to get the FB to believe me that the crashing sound he had heard while out on a walk was not, as he thought, the sound of someone doing some DIY, but was instead the footstep of an invisible giant who, being shy, had hidden from us. The FB was not having any of it, and said that no, giants are only found in stories.

Missed a few days (Aunty spider mentions below)

2007-08-16T09:48:00.000+01:00

M is for

Mother. Of which I am one (if you haven't guess this then where have you been?).

Massive Spiders. My house isn't exactly infested with them but does have slightly more than I would like residing under my roof AND they aren't paying rent. I thought I was ok around spiders but apparently not if they are a certain size; little spiders are fine, tarantulas are fine, giant house spiders that snarl and drip foam from their fangs are not. Fortunately the Penguins think spiders are little toys for them to chase and then their basic dissection procedures on. Now our kitchen floor is littered with abandoned legs. I dread to find the torso.

Monkeys. My grandfather was in the Merchant Navy during and post WWII. On one of his trips away he purchased a monkey and brought it back to Britain with him. Alas it had to be given away to a zoo because it kept escaping from the house and stealing the neighbours' laundry off the washing lines.

Music. Drum and Base, Techno and R&B are NOT music but a form of aural torture.

Living

2007-08-12T20:52:00.000+01:00

I've mentioned before that I've lived in a fair number of places over the years. Since MrV and I got together we have lived in 7 homes in 3 countries over 8 years. And everytime we've moved I've hated the new place until just before we move (again) when I realise that things weren't half as bad as I thought, and then I go on to miss the old place like mad once we have moved and regret moving in the first place. Part of the problem is that I am looking for somewhere where I will fit in, and not be so damn awkward around people. You see I am incredibly shy which has the downside of making me appear to be aloof, and rather stupid as I get very tonguetied with nerves.
My ideal place would be a mixture of Edinburgh (for friends, family and the city itself) and the Netherlands (for its liberal yet grownup society) with the weather of the tropics but without the hurricanes of course. Is that too much to ask?

Kismet

2007-08-11T20:52:00.000+01:00

Is it my fate to have problems with the letter K? After all it is the first letter of my name and MrV's too but still it's a hard one to come up with.

Kismet - the Arabic for fate.

Jam

2007-08-10T21:02:00.000+01:00

When I was young I used to go raspberry picking with my grandfather so my grandmother could make raspberry jam. She was an absolutely hopeless cook. In fact one of my father's siblings bought her a sign as a Christmas present that read "Dinner is served at the sound of the smoke alarm". My uncle blamed my aunt and she in turn blamed my uncle for the present but the sentiment was true, my gran could burn water. Her sausages were legendary, and were nicknamed Granny's Rusty Sausages for she would grill them, put them in the fridge, and then fry them when she wanted to eat them; so their skins were incredibly tough and well, rusty.

But she could make the most delicious jam.

Impossible

2007-08-09T21:27:00.000+01:00

I is proving a little hard to write about. Sure there are numerous words out there that begin with the right letter but the blog muse seems to have wandered off for the evening, perhaps for an icecream? Who knows!

Tomorrow Ikea is coming to deliver some furniture including a shelving rack for the under-the-stairs-cupboard where everything cleaning related is stored on one tiny, overfilled and leaning at an unsafe angle shelf. Is it sad that I am so looking forward to putting up that shelfing rack? Or just natural since an iron has missed hitting me on the head several times as it toppled off the leaning shelf.

Happiness

2007-08-08T21:00:00.001+01:00

We all have our own idea of what makes us happy. For some it's a pair of Manolo Blahniks, for others it's doing something nice for a stranger.

For the Count it's a clean nappy, a full tummy, a convenient thumb and his snuggly blanket.

Gorgeous and Green

2007-08-07T22:01:00.000+01:00

To prevent a reoccurence of yesterday, the FB, the Count and I went for a walk through the parks to a fantastic playground about 2 miles away. Usually at this time of the year the grass is brown and dry, and everything has a sort of brittle, dried out quality to it; but because we've had so much rain, the grass and everything is still lush and green.

This photo was taken about 5 minutes walk from my home; another 2 minutes walk, and the view would have been of a burnt out abandoned car.

We spent 3 hours in the playground while the FB checked out all the climbing frames and slides but as we took a picnic with us, and it was such a beautiful day it didn't matter.

On the way home as we searched for an icecream van we walked through the grounds of this house. I couldn't tell you what it is called just that it is set in one of the parks we walk through and the gardens are lovely.

Then, beside the church where Sir Walter Raleigh's head some believe is buried, we finally found an icecream van.

F is for ...

2007-08-06T20:05:00.001+01:00

Folk of the Faraway Tree - I'm reading that to the FB at present and he seems to love it. We've got an old version from 1972 and the vocab is so completely different ie "queer" gets used a lot

First Born - My plan was to upload a few photos of the FB from birth to present but I can't find any from his 2nd birthday. I suspect they are upstairs on a computer somewhere. Ach I'll put a baby photo up instead..or as Blogger is playing funny buggers, perhaps I won't.

Filofax - the pinnacle of stationary. Is there anything better than the smell of a new leather filofax, its pages pristine and ready for use?

Friends? - The question mark is there because today the preteen was trying to get 2 of his little chums (aged 5 and 7) to fight the FB for his (the FB's) water pistol. After it was pointed out that this was not on they proceeded to send my son to Coventry for the rest of the day. I wish I knew why they had taken against him so and if it could be mended.

E is for Embroidery

2007-08-05T20:40:00.000+01:00

I started to learn how to embroider yesterday with help from a children's website. Kids' websites are much better for these sort of things because their diagrams and instructions are far clear than those written for adults. I read a lot of craft blogs and am always very envious of their skills and the beautiful things they produce. Plus I have loads of thread to use in so many fantastic bright colours

D is for dead languages, dunces and dropping names

2007-08-04T20:51:00.000+01:00

Latin's a dead language
It's as dead as can be.
It killed off the Romans,
and now it's killing me.

Did you have to study Latin in school? I did it for a year when I was 12 and was so bad at it that I was put into the class for pupils too stupid to study Latin. A shame really as I seem to recall rather enjoying it. All I can remember of it now is "amo, amas, amat" and "Ecce, in pictura est puella nomine Falvia" (please excuse my spelling, 12 was a long long time ago). Actually the year that I failed so badly at Latin was also the year in which I had lunch with the Queen, but that's another story and one that may fall under the letter Q if I'm stuck, which I probably will be.

The ABCs

2007-08-03T09:21:00.001+01:00

I feel that my writing has lost a little bit of something recently. This is probably because my life revolves around family, cleaning and the West Wing which is rather limiting for blog entries. So when I read on domesticali that there is a new meme doing the rounds called Encyclopedia of Me which requires a post a day for the month of August I was hopeful that this might get me going again.

A is for Abroad

I've promised this a few times before - where I've lived..

I was born in the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh. My mother worked there as a nurse before I was born so knew the staff and was helping out making beds a few days after I was born.

Middle East

We moved to Doha, Qatar before I started school. Water came to your house in a tanker, minor road were just tracks in the sand, electricity cuts were the norm, rats were everywhere, and then there were (Aunty do NOT look) these.

As well as Qatar, I've lived in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia and Tel Aviv in Israel

North America

When I was 18 I moved to the US (against the expressed wishes of my parents) to Kalamazoo in Michigan and boy was it cold! A few months later I moved across the state to Detroit and within days I left and went up to Ottawa to stay with family in Canada.

Europe

OK let's see, I've lived in Epstein and Bönstadt near Frankfurt am Main, working as an aupair firstly with 18 month old twins, and then with 2 young children; and Maastricht in the Netherlands.

The UK

Apart from those well known centres of culture Edinburgh, Crieff and London, I spent 3 years in Northampton studying at Uni.

B is for Babies Crying and Cooing

The Count has the most adorable cry. He's still got a sort of newborn cry which doesn't have the same lungpower as an older baby and when he's very tired he doesn't bother crying, instead he just lies there saying "mwahhh" which frankly is too cute for words.

When the FB was four months old he stopped sleeping through the night and started waking up every few hours for no discernable reason. We tried everything from moving him into his own room, to taking notes of how often and much he fed, and even, to the disgust of the health visitor, tried Gina Ford but the FB refused to cooperate and nap at the appropriate time. Eventually we had to go the hard way which was to leave him to cry at night. It took a couple of nights of lying in bed listening to him scream himself to sleep (which were horribly hard) but he got over his nightwaking.

Both of them (well the FB doesn't any more but he did when he was a baby) coo, smile and laugh at something that no one else can see.

C is for Cleaning Ovens

When I lived in Tel Aviv I had a job as pot wash in a very popular bar in Tel Aviv port. As jobs go it wasn't bad, the pay was good and the only dangers came from broken glasses the waitresses would put in with the dishes and the unwelcome attention from Benny the greasy cook. He had a weird obsession with wanting to cook me a "white meat" meal. So anyway, one day the bar got a notice saying that they were getting inspected by Environmental Health so the whole kitchen had to be cleaned. A lot of the food served up was fried and the walls above the fryers were caked in grease which meant a special alkelai cleaner needed to be used. I was given rubber gloves to do this but as I was cleaning the walls the stuff was running down my gloves onto my arms, and as I watched little pocks were being burnt/melted into my arms. I remember the weird tingling feeling and looking down as they appeared. I also had a big one burnt into the joint of my thumb where a hole had let the cleaner through.

So oven cleaning??? Well today's Motivated Mum's list had oven cleaning on it, and as it is the first time I've done it since we moved, and I'm still speculating as to whether the house was cleaned before we moved in, I used a seriously strong cleaner on it. As I cleaned I felt a tingling feeling down my right arm but fortunately this time there wasn't anything there. Phew!

Not thrice but five times unlucky

2007-08-01T16:53:00.000+01:00

The landlord must despair of us. Within the first month of us moving into the house we have:

lost one set of keys and had to call him out to let us in, just as a thunderstorm arrived
locked ourselves out a few days later when the frontdoor was pushed closed with the keys still in it, unfortunately on the inside (the door locks automatically). We had to call a locksmith to come and jimmy the door open
had to call out an electrician when we noticed the shaving plug in the bathroom nextdoor to the FB's bedroom was buzzing and getting rather warm.
had to have the landlord and two of his workers, come round to sort out the patio not once but twice. First time before the floods and then yesterday they were back taking up the stones and refilling and levelling the ground that was devastated by the waterfall.
And now we need a plumber to take a look at the dishwasher which isn't behaving itself.

This is getting ridiculous!

But, the patio is finished, the washingline is back up (just in time as the Count is now in cloth nappies) and the sun is shining (said as the dark clouds begin to roll in....)

(and thank you to all of you who left your commiserations on Monday's news.)

2007-07-30T09:55:00.001+01:00

I've been thinking a lot about a friend recently. There are a lot of things around my home that remind me of her including a wicker basket with a teddybear on the front which she gave me for my birthday; and a copy of karma sutra that she gave me just after she found out that MrV and I were a couple.
I've been thinking about the time she visited us in Maastricht and we sat in a cafe having breakfast and she collapsed with the giggles because trying discarded pieces of wax on as pieces of jewelry was very funny.
I've been thinking about how every Friday after work she would drive us back in to the centre of Edinburgh because a bar we would go to had a free buffet and hell it was cheap way to eat.

She died on Saturday night after a long fight with cancer. RIP my friend.

Did I tell you I'm a rain god?

2007-07-26T17:05:00.000+01:00

What did we do to anger nature and get all this rain Meggie? Well, we moved house that's all. For 4 1/2 years we lived in a flat with no garden, and for 4 1/2 years we've had beautiful summers. This summer we move to a house with a garden and as I put the key into the lock for the first time the raindrops begin to fall.

I'm thinking of advertising our services to drought regions. They just need to provide us with a house and garden.....