Happy Birthday Jemma

Today Ower very own Scanottish teamie is a step nearer to the big 30... ok so she may still be a young thing in her 20s, but she is catching up with me and Jen!!! Now most people get a few nice little pressies for their birthday, maybe something a little bigger if it is a special birthday, but not Ower Jems, oh no... this girly is getting a new house today! A brand spanking new house... how spoilt is that!!!

Well I hope the move goes smoothly, with as few arguements as possible, and hope that by evening you can sit and enjoy a stella shandy or two with your boys:)

I haven't blogged since last Thursday... how bad is that?!?! Well since then I have got my boys back... harry's halo that he wore all week at Mama's house well and truely slipped the moment he got back home! He has tipped the water bowl over, dug soil out of the only plant we have, licked the tv, climbed up everything, had the hamster cage off the shelf... you name it, he has done it!!! Oliver was glad to be back to his PS2 games, so spent most of the weekend shooting various aliens and bugs. Yesterday we went to a soft play centre and met up with Elijah and Reuben... we were hoping that the boys would wear themselves out and sleep well, but oh no... Harry was up at 3:30am, had a bottle, was put back to bed, but at 4:00am decided that he didn't want to be in his cot, and being in mummy's bed was a much better option... meaning that he went soundly to sleep and I stayed awake until the alarm went off!!! Why do I have children that don't sleep through the night!!! Tis not fair!

Anyway, last night I was supposed to be doing some scrapping... but after Lost had finished we watched Primeval, and that was that... no scrapping!!! Hopefully I shall get some done tonight... but we shall see!!! I haven't even played along with HS:MS... must look back to see what I have missed... although to be honest I probably won't get around to catching up! I have however done today's prompt of 'hole'. We have lots of holes in our house... especially in Rob's work t-shirts. I don't know what he does to them, but they look very moth eaten... even the newish ones. I decided to take advantage of the lovely sunny day we are having and took the camera outside.... it may not be the most inspiring of shots, but it is a hole that causes us a few problems. The people at the bottom of the garden have a HUGE German Shepherd dog, which continually jumps up at the fence. It made this hole last summer and even though we have patched it so many times, it keeps making the hole again and again and again. It sticks it's snout through the hole which sends Jaspa nuts, and scares Oliver half to death... we have asked the owners if they can repair the hole from their side but they don't seem bothered.... ggggrrrrrrr!!! I think a new fence panel will be needed this year, and even though it should be a shared cost I suspect it will be down to us to get and paint!!!

Over at Carolinezcraftz the weekly classes have had to be stopped due to lack of interest. This is really sad as so much effort goes into them by Caroline and the rest of the DT. The sprinkle blog gets a lot of visits each day, but hardly anybody finds the time to leave a comment, whic is very disappointing. If you visit there for a spot of inspiration, why not leave a comment to know that the hard work is appreciated... and maybe even pop over to the forum for a chat and to leave some suggestions as to what you would like to see on the forum and on the blog.

Happy Valentines Day

Hope you are all loved and being spoilt by your other halves... or even getting surprise annonymous cards ;) Went on to Google this morning, and love love love this Valentine image... the teacher in me still saves all the different Google designs, in preparation for if I ever get my studens to enter the doodle for Google competition again.

Last night was a really good giggle. It was a little crop as only a handful of people went, but with Paul and Jen there, it was a good one. I even got a LO started, faffed with and finished... then packed away with time left to flick though a magazine... how good am I! I used papers from the December Scarlet Lime kit, I cannot believe how much you get with this kit, and how verstaile it is... loving Scarlet Lime:) The photos are of Harry Bear in his first Halloween costume. He didn't go anywhere, we didn't have a party, but of course he still had to have a costume! He didn't think much to it though and kept pulling the frilly bit off to shove in his mouth! Jems has got her Feb kit already so it shouldn't be too much longer for us UK girls to wait. I feel like it has been an age since I have had new stash... I haven't bought online since before Christmas as I am saving for the Harrogate show on the 23rd. I am planning to have a big spend on patterend papers and alphas... might even get me some lick and sticks ;)

So on to today's HS:MS prompt of 'diligence'. I'm afraid it is another cheat from me... I was looking through all the photos stored on my lappy, and found some taken of my last year 7 group I taught. They were a difficult all boy group, and it took the best part of a year to crack them... but by the summer term we had an understanding with each other, and they were pretty well behaved. This photo shows them working on their designs for a Keith Haring 3D model that they went on to make. It's when I see photos like this that I really think I want to go back to work... I do miss teaching, and will go back one day... I just need to remember that for each piccie of the kids working, I could have taken 20 of them being disruptive and confrontational... there you go, I am more than happy to be a sahm...LOL!!!

We are off to the pictures again later... this time to see Sweeney Todd... and yes, I know itis a musical, but hey it has Johnny depp in, and a girl has to have some eye candy on a day like today:)

Running behind

I seem to be lagging behind everyone else on the A-Zjournal... I did my 'A' page late and my 'B' page is only half done. I have however done my 'C' page. This one is all about cinema visits this year. I trimmed an envelope down so that it is open at the top, and will keep all the cinema tickets in there. All the papers are scraps left over from my Scarlet Lime kits, and the tickets and rub ons are also from the kit. And before anyone comments... YES I KNOW I LEFT THE MIDDLE OF THE A & E IN.... LOL!!! Better hold on to something Jen, don't want you shaking and toppling over ;)I also finished this LO of Oliver digging for a dinosaur. It's one of those LOs that took an age to do, ended up nothing like it was supposed to, and one I'm not too sure about. It doesn't feel finished to me, but I don't know what it is missing... I have put it to one side and will look at it again with fresh eyes in a couple of days, and see if inspiration strikes.Tonight is crop night and I am all prepared and packed... lightly too!!! Looking forward to a bit of a natter with Jen... and a gossip about who we like, who we really like, and who has the laxative effect!!! So if you feel your ears burning, which catagory do you think you'll be in?!?!?

A very late post for HS:MS. Today's virtuous prompt is 'charity'. If this prompt had been yesterday I could have taken a piccie of the 3 charity bags that were posted through the door... 3, all from different charities, wanting clothes etc. We get loads of these bags shoved through the letterbox each week... how many clothes do they think we have to give away...LOL!!! Mind you, there are about 12 boxes of clothes in the loft that Harry has outgrown, most of which are as new!!! Anyway, today I have had a great time listening to loads of music I haven't played in an age. You know when you go through all your CDs and play 1 or 2 songs from each... really loudly, and sing your little heart out. This was prompted by a phone call from an ex flingee (I know this isn't a real word, nut you know what I mean) this morning... we were chatting about this and that, and loads of memories all came flooding back. So my little sing song this afternoon has made me smile for today. I haven't posted all my smiles, but I have been recording them ready to scrap.... and I will share the LO when it is done, and list the smiles then. This CD is fantastic. It's 1Love and is a collection of various artists singing covers, I love the whole album, and am glad I found this again... a percentage of the cost of the CD went to the War Child charity, so good music and a good deed.

Just a quickie

Very quick blog post today whilst Freya is sleeping. We are up to our eyeballs in paint and glitter, making a valentines mobile. I will hopefully be back later with a piccie of the LO I did last night.

But for now here is my HS:MS photo for today's prompt of 'temperance'. I have no will power at all, especially where food stuff is concerned, so I couldn't do a fabby shot like Suzy's. Instead I tormented Jaspa with a doggy treat... and wouldn't let him eat it until I said he could.... how cruel am I!

Pure thoughts

So HS:MS made us take a look at a our dark side last week, and this week we are looking at the more virtuous side to our characters. The first word is 'chastity', which I really struggled to come up with something... when you are TTC and have no kids around... did I mention that I have no children for a whole week;) there isn't a great deal of being chaste in this house!

So I took and easy option and spelt out the word 'chaste' with stamps... poor I know... but flippin eck, I thought Anita's prompts were hard, Andrew and Suzy are well and truly making us think!

Sorry I didn't get round to blogs yesterday, I scrapped, watched Lost, and even did some painting... something I haven't done for soooooo long! I will get round to you all later.

So I shall leave you with the LO I did last night... decided to finally have a go at using PSE to better effect, rather than just to add text to photos. I quite like the final result, I am loving the Blonde Moments orange embossing powder... I have had this for well over a year and never used it... now I think there is a danger of getting carried away with it!!!

Catch up!

I didn't get round to doing yesterday's HS:MS prompt as I had a REALLY lazy day... just because I could! I spent all morning in bed.... bliss, then caught up with a view programmes we had stored on Sky+ (thanks Annie... Rob loves his new toy). I played on the PS2, something I hardly ever do. Then we had a lazy evening which included pizza, wine and the Bourne Ultimatum.

I did manage to get a LO done in the evening... it is a for a team challenge that Jen set for us. We had to use the word 'difference' in our title. I actually cheated a little as I extended the word to 'differences'. I can't show you all of the LO just yet as I used the kit from Carolinezcraftz March class.... which is a lovely kit, and would be perfect for any Valentine photos you need to scrap.

Yesterday's prompt was 'envy'. I wouldn't say I am a jealous person, apart from when TTC and then I am jealous of everyone who is pregnant! I thought about what makes me envy people the most... and one of the main things is people who are slim. I decided not to use this as the basis of my photo as I am trying to do something about this. So for my interpretation of the prompt I turn to one of my scrapping idols.... Celine Navarro. This girl is just so darned talented, everything she does is amazing, which in itself is enough to be envious about... but let's add in the fact that her amazing talent lets her travel the world teaching classes.... and yes, I have to say, I am a little envious. Seriously though... how cool would it be to be so good at scrapping that you travel the world teaching and taking part in scrap events?For today's prompt it would have been so easy to take a piccie of Thing 1 and Thing 2, of which I am so proud. But as they aren't here... did I mention I am childless for a whole week?!?!? So I had a scout round to see what else I am proud of. I could have taken a piccie of the shelf Rob put up in the cupboard under the stairs this morning... it has stuff on it and it is still up!!! I could have taken a piccie of me in my gym gear having just done an exercise dvd... but that would be too shocking for Sunday viewing. So instead I took a piccie of Oliver's Teddy Bear 2 swimming badge. He has been having swimming lessons for less than a year, and he is doing so well. Considering he would cling to you like a limpet the moment you got him in water and would cry if he got splashed in the face, he now swims with 1 disc on each arm, but can swim without any for a short distance, he jumps in on his own and can do all of the moves they have to do each week. He is proud of his badges and we are proud of him:)OK so I am not going to waste today... I am going to go and do my 'C' page for the A-Z journal.

Back later with piccie pics.

Quiet and Tidy

We have a quiet and tidy house, and it seems really weird!!! I can walk wherever I want and not go slip sliding on toys... I can put things down and know that they are safe from little hands... the dog is flaked out and looks dead chilled safe in the knowledge that he isn't going to get poked, prodded or have a toy dropped on his head!!!

So that's it for a whole week, loads of us time... which we fully intend to take full advantage of ;)

Yesterday's smile came last night when Harry wouldn't settle until I took him to be with me... I know people say you shouldn't do that, but the way I see it is they are only little for such a short time, what harm is it going to do in the long run. It was rather lovely to have him pressed into me all night, even though he could have had half a double bed to himself.... oh no, had to be on mummy's side :)

The prompt over at HS:MS today is 'wrath'. There are a few things that make me angry.... quite often they are small things that I shouldn't let bother me, but I do. I admit that I do have quite a temper, and woe betide anyone who makes me cross... it's not a great personality trait, and I do try and keep a lid on things, but when I blow, I blow big time!!!

Harry bear has inherited my temper. He knows what he wants and if he doesn't get it... watch out!!! These photos show Harry tryong to get his hands on Oliver's Power Rangers game. Oliver wouldn't let him have it, and in the third picture you can see Harry scratching Oliver's face. This was the last photo in the series as I had to put the camera down to rescue my poor big boy from my wild little one!