Farms, Fairs and Face Painting - My 2009

I can not believe that it is New Years Eve again already. The last year seems to have passed in an instant and yet when I think back we have done and experienced so many things.

Friends have had babies, we have become god parents, some of my closest friends have got engaged and are pregnant with their first child together, Snaffles has turned into a proper little boy now and is most definitely not a baby any more.

Here is our 2009 in pictures;

 

 Snaffles second birthday

 

 

Farms, Fairs & Face Painting

Parks & Picnics

Planes, Trains & Automobiles

Seasons & Smiles

I hope you all have a Happy New Year. We will be seeing the New Year in at a friends house party.

readmore »»

Wait Until Your Daddy Gets Home......

Can you remember your BC (before children) days?

I can remember looking in supermarkets, shopping centres and restaurants, watching parents and passing judgment on their parenting decisions. I vowed I would never become like those parents.

I remember while pregnant discussing with Mr C all of the things we were not going to do or say once Snaffles arrived (of course our child would be born an angel!)

One of the things I vowed never to say was “wait until your daddy gets home”. Surely I could cope for a whole day? What could possibly happen in a day that I would have to utter those words?

These six words have now passed my lips.

Now all in all Snaffles is very well behaved. He can be whiney and cheeky and naughty like all children but these days are usually few and far between and a quick spell on the naughty step usually gets the message across. Every so often though he has one of those days from hell.

He has had one of these days recently. Everything I said, did or suggested just was not good enough and was met with “no mummy”, all threats of punishment were met with cheeky comments and Snaffles had a permanent seat on the naughty step. I promised things for good behaviour, threatened to wit hold things for naughty behaviour and still nothing. Even the threat of Santa watching didn’t stop him.

I had Snaffles to look after, meals to cook, a house to clean, chores to do and all day I heard cries of "no Mummy".

Snaffles can you put some toys away please? "No Mummy"
Snaffles can you put your coat on please? "No Mummy"
Snaffles your dinner is ready "No Mummy"

ARRRRGGGGHHHH

 I had had enough. I had been the baddie all day, “wait until your Daddy gets home Snaffles, he will not be very happy that you have been naughty all day”. There, I said it!, oh, wait, what was that? a vague pause in the naughty behaviour, recognition that Daddy might actually find out, Daddy might not read books and play in the bath and do the general silly things that only Daddys are capable of.

Daddy arrived home not long after that to a crying Snaffles doing anther stint on the naughty step and a very frazzled looking mummy.

Daddy: “have you been a good boy for mummy today?”
Snaffles: “No, I have been a whinge bum!”

I guess I should be grateful that knew he had been a terror.

I might have to try remember all the things we agreed we would never do when we had a child. My guess is we have done most of them!

readmore »»

Thrifty Christmas - Union Jack Card Holder

This post was written long ago and was hosted by the lovely Liz over at Violet Posy as I didnt want to reveal any Christmas Secrets in my earlier Thrifty Christmas post.

My inspiration came from the Tesco Christmas magazine for a Union Jack Christmas Card Holder. You may have noticed that Union Jack theamed gifts are in pretty much every shop at the minute. My friend L is loving all things union jack inspired so when I saw the article in the Tesco magazine I knew it would be perfect for her.

I was so excited about this Thrifty Christmas creation that I was desperate to go running to show my friends it. However, I had to restrain myselfuntil Christmas.

All instructions can be found on the Tesco website. It was very quick and simple to make and can be done in any colour combinations.

readmore »»

My Secret Ornaments

My Secret Christmas Ornaments arrived just in the nick of time and managed to make it onto my tree in time for Christmas.

My swap partner was Emma over at Me the Man and the Baby and her ornaments can be seen here.

I found shopping for the ornaments for Emma and waiting to see if she liked them just as exciting as waiting for my ornaments.

The lovely Kelly from A Place of My Own was my partner. As the host of the swap I already knew that my ornaments would be coming from Kelly. Knowing who my partner didn’t make it any less exciting and as soon as Kelly told me she had posted my ornaments I was super excited and almost camping out for the post man.

It was like opening a sneakly early Christmas pressie. A very nice treat to get a nicely wrapped parcel with individually wrapped treats inside and a hand made card ( I will definitely be copying them next year!)

So, I bring you the ornaments.

A beautiful crystal pendant (sorry it was hard to photographs this one)

A traditional felt Christmas tree

 

 

And my favourite is this handmade felt tree made by Kelly herself. I must admit that when I knew that Kelly was my swap partner I secretly hoped that I would receive one of these handmade trees after I saw her blog about making them.

A huge thanks to Kelly and I hope everyone has enjoyed taking part in the swap and look forward to doing it all again next year.

readmore »»

A Magical Christmas Eve - Our Private Audience With Santa!

We have had the most perfect start to our Christmas break, a magical private audience with Santa.

This morning Snaffles and Mr C have enjoyed some father son time while I have been putting my domestic goddess skills to the test.  I have made Jamie Oliver’s roast potatoes, stuffing balls, gingerbread men (a slight oversight of time resulted in these going straight into the bin!) and also some gingerbread house mug toppers which were inspired by Not Martha and which I will blog about at a later date.

The excitement came this afternoon at a little Christmas Eve party hosted by M for the children. As a last minute treat M’s husband B called in a favour from a professional Santa who agreed to come to the party, give out some gifts and read stories.

All of the children were so amazed to see Santa and to have him come to see them at home. They had huge smiles and could not wait to talk to him, ask him questions and get their pressies (all except Snaffles who preferred to admire Santa from afar).

They all promised to go to bed on time and keep their eyes tightly shut until the morning.

It was such a magical start to Christmas.

Snaffles has since been home to the treat of a lush bath his new White Company PJ’s and has prepared a snack for Santa on his beautiful personalised plate which was from icklebabe. 

I hope you all have a magical Christmas with friends and family.

readmore »»

Girls Stink!

Its official, in the eyes of a 2 year old boy, girls stink!

Some of you may know from other nursery related posts that I am not fortunate to be involved in the dropping off or collection from nursery. As such I have no idea who Snaffles plays with at nursery or who his best friend there is other than from the odd party invitation.

I have recently tried to ask him the names of his friends at nursery so that I could leave Christmas cards for them.

I managed to get around 5 boys names from him. We then had the following conversation regarding girls at nursery;

Me: “what are the names of the girls at nursery?”

Snaffles: no response

Me: “which girls do you play with?”

Snaffles: no response

Me: “don’t you play with any girls at nursery?”

Snaffles: “no, girls stink!”

Oh dear!

readmore »»

Wordless Wednesday - Exhaustion

readmore »»

And Then There Was Snow

 It finally came.

After reading several face book and twitter updates over Thursday and Friday it felt like we were the only place in the UK to not have any snow.

We had the odd sprinkling but nothing huge and nothing likely to settle By late on Friday evening there was a light covering of snow and faint hope that we might have more in the morning.

This is what we woke up to on Saturday morning. 

 

Snaffles (and Mr C) were so excited when they looked out the window. Typically Snaffles chose Saturday to have a lay in so me and Mr C were all excited about the snow and sat waiting for Snaffles to get up.

When he finally did I have never seen him get ready so quickly, the promise of snow was obviously too much to resist. 

 

Off we went to the local park where thankfully there was enough of a hill to attempt to sledge down.

We spent the morning playing out in the snow before heading to some friends to warm up again.

 

readmore »»

Looking Back.....

I have been blogging now for 19 weeks and 2 days. This is my 100th post. When I first started my blog I had no idea that I would even get this far. For me, blogging was a way to document some of my life with Mr C and Snaffles. A way for me to have something just for me, a place to just be.

In 100 posts I have found my way onto other peoples blog lists, I have found many exciting, entertaining and on occasions inspirational blogs. I have made it onto the Tots 100 list, I have discovered people that actually want to sit and read what I write and even go to the trouble of leaving comments.

I have learnt about parenting styles, crafting, blog design and HTML codes. Most of all though I have found some wonderful people, people who despite never having met you are willing to go out of their way to help you. Whether that be by leaving a lovely comment when you are having a bad day or lending you a hand with technical issues.

I am so pleased to be part of the blogging community and look forward to my next 100 posts.

Looking back on my 100 posts here are some of my favourite;


August: Relaxing baths and small people are not a good combination - Bathtime


September: One of my favourite things to do is to sit and watch Snaffles sleep, so beautiful, so calm, so peaceful -  While you were sleeping

October: A post prompted by Josies's writing workshop gave me the opportunity to let some of my family and friends know what they mean to me - My Circle of Trust

November: I learnt that being a good mummy can be hard and that I need to learn to let go sometimes -  You Want Me To Do What?

December: A gift from my Grandad that made me very emotional -  Journal of a Lifetime

Photo Credit

readmore »»

One Wrinkle, Two Wrinkle, Three Wrinkle, More!

I have recently turned twenty seven. On paper being twenty seven does not sound too bad. However, I can confirm that being 27 so far sucks!

It has been 6 months since I last got asked for ID when buying alcohol, I am officially getting OLD!

Turning twenty six pretty much came and went without any real tell tale signs of even having had a birthday. The only times I struggled with my age were when completing questionnaires etc where you have to tick your age. Twenty six comes under an entirely different age bracket. Its no longer 20-25 but instead 26-34. 

Twenty six was acceptable, Twenty six was still “mid” twenties.

Twenty seven sucks, twenty seven is “late” twenties!

For my twenty seventh birthday I got;

EYE WIINKLES

So, I am now in the search for some miracle eye wrinkle cream that does not break the bank.

Failing that I will sit on a throne of smugness knowing that whatever hangups I have about my age most of my friends are already ahead of me.

I am telling myself that these eye wrinkles are laughter wrinkles. So, K, L and M thank you for being my wiser, funny, OLDER, friends,  and to my funny, wise, younger friend LJ, you have been warned, do not panic though I shall ensure your 27th birthday pressie consists of eye cream!

Photo Credit

readmore »»

Blue Lips and Knocking Knees

I never realised that when you hear people say their lips turned blue that they really do turn blue.

Thanks to the local swimming pool today  I have learnt that lips really can and do turn blue.

We have recently paid for Snaffles to have swimming lessons. He is loving them and tells anyone who will listen that “he has new swimming friends” and that he “did it all by himself”.

The children are lovely, the teachers are great, its just a shame that the water is freezing. Why on earth they designed a leisure centre next to the beach made almost entirely of glass I do not know. In the summer its lovely but in the winter they might as well convert it to an ice rink.

Today’s lesson was cut short. Why? Because poor Snaffles was shivering. Even from were we were sat watching we could see him shivering. The instructor then shouted over that his lips were blue and they were getting out.

As you can imagine I am disgusted, and left a written complaint before I even left the building.

Twenty five minutes in the pool should not leave my poor sons knees knocking together. How on earth they expect the children to learn anything when it is taking all of their efforts to stop shaking is anyone’s guess.

Will wait and see what answers they have. I do know that my complaint was not the only one received today so hopefully they will sit up and take note.

readmore »»

Food, Fun & Laughter

 You know its Christmas when… the little villages start having Christmas markets.

We recently joined our friend M and her family at their local Christmas Market. The promise of cheese,  hot chocolate, bratwurst sausages and sweets were calling us all.

M’s daughter T and Snaffles are the best of friends. The promise of visiting T at the weekend can illicit a whole weeks worth of good behaviour bribery from Snaffles!

They are so cute together. They held hands the whole way to and from the market and even insisted on sharing seats on the rides together.

I cant wait for more lovely days like this over Christmas.

 

readmore »»

Are you Ready? Christmas Shopping

One of the big questions on twitter at the minute is “Have you started your Christmas shopping yet”.

Sally over at Whos the Mummy has even blogged about it. She has not started her shopping yet and thinks that leaving it so late makes for a more festive approach.

I have finished my shopping, purchased the cards, almost finished the wrapping and my Christmas tree is up.

The thought of not having my Christmas shopping done by now would fill me with panic. I remember having a nightmare last year where I dreamt that I had forgotten to do my Christmas shopping and had to do it on Christmas Eve. Busy shops, lack of car parking spaces, hoards of people and out of stock shelves.

So, is my approach less festive?

I would disagree. I have been purchasing presents for a few months now. As and when I see the perfect pressie for a fiend I have bought it. Surely this is easier and less stressful than having to dedicate a day to purchasing your Christmas gifts and pressure to buy something on that day. What if you cant find anything, what if what you want is out of stock. Surely then you are left buying something for the sake of buying it and not because you have put careful thought and considerations into the gift?

The gifts we are giving this year comprise of a mixture of internet purchases, shop purchases and home made gifts. Each one individually chosen or made with love.

Given my approach to Christmas shopping it will not surprise you that I am a “list” person. The same is true of my Christmas shopping. If I have an idea for someone’s pressie I will add it to my little notebook in my handbag for future purchasing. Once I have purchased it the list gets updated.

Starting my shopping so early does not make Christmas any less exciting, quite the opposite in fact, it prolongs the festive feeling. Different days dedicated to different festive things to look forward to. The shopping, the wrapping, the buying and decorating of the tree, the baking of the homemade gifts etc.

Christmas is a time for spending with family and friends, not for shopping. Now that I am all done and dusted I can sit back and relax. Listen to my cheesy Christmas CD’s, snuggle up on the sofa and watch The Snowman with Snaffles and Mr C and enjoy meals out with family and friends.

Where will you be on Christmas Eve? Warm and snugly with your family or elbowing your way through the crowds doing your last minute Christmas shopping?

readmore »»

Secret Christmas Ornament Swap

The final countdown to Christmas is well underway now. Those of us who are well prepared will have trees up, pressies purchased and some of us have even made a start on the wrapping (please don’t hate me for being organised Sally!)

Only one final touch is required for my festive preparations and that is the decoration from my Secret Christmas Ornament Swap.

Mine has not yet arrived but for those of you that have already received your ornament  blog blog blog and link away with McLinky. I will add mine as soon as it arrives.

readmore »»

O Christmas Tree

Yeah, its up. I have wanted to put the tree up since the 1st of December but as we have a real one I thought it best to wait a while. In the meantime I had dedicated a day especially to the purchasing of and putting up of the tree.

Its not quite as easy as just putting up the tree in my house. Unfortunately it also involved a whole lot of furniture moving around to make space for the tree.

So, toy box and general toy area was parcelled up into a black bin bag and deposited in the garage tidied up, tables and sideboards were moved and job done, Lovely space cleared for our tree.
       
Other friends had already bought their tree so going off their recommendations off we went to the local garden centre.

Now, last years tree hunt took at least 30 minutes to find the perfect tree. Unfortunately the perfect tree in the garden centre last year was a little less than perfect when we got it home. We could not close the living room door and had to fight our way past it every time we went upstairs.

Mental note taken of sizes etc before we went tree shopping (you know the measurements, it needs to be as tall as me and as wide as, this - says me holding my arms apart).

By some miracle I bought the third tree we looked at this year. It was the perfect tree. Until we got it home that was. Our tree must have the thinnest stump possible. It is far too thin for our base. Even with all of the screws wound in as far as possible they still do not touch the stump. We have now filled the gaps with door wedges and we have a straight tree again.

Here are a few pictures of our tree. Each decoration is different and individual.

 

(the white love heart decoration is from the lovely icklebabe.com)

If like me you love having a nosey at other peoples Christmas Trees then head over to Violet Posy’s Christmas Tour.

readmore »»

Review - Simplehuman - Deluxe Corner Pedal Bin

 This is a sponsored post.

I was recently given the opportunity to review a product from the Simplehuman website. Off I went to look at their products and eventually chose a deluxe corner pedal bin to test. 

 

The Simplehuman products have apparently appeared in programmes such as Ugly Betty, Heroes, Lost and Desperate Housewives.

Now, despite living in a fairly good size family home, for some reason it was built with the smallest kitchen in history (I am not lying when I say that the floor space is around 2 metres square! Clearly floor space is an issue for me. My current bin is a flip top bin. It takes up a lot of space in my kitchen, Snaffles and other children who visit are forever playing with the lid and my nieces favourite game at the minute is posting things in the bin. Its big, impractical and has unsightly bin bags hanging over the edges. I have tried stainless steel bins before but they soon get covered in grubby finger prints and when you clean them off you only seem to replace the finger prints with smears from the cloth.

This corner pedal bin sounded like it held the answer to a lot of my problems. So, I put it to the test.

Simplehuman claim that their stainless steel is finger print proof. Really? Did they honestly expect me to believe that the grubby fingers of a 3 year old, a 2 year old and 2 babies who frequently visit my house would leave no mark on their bin? I must admit that whilst I secretly hoped their claim was true I did not for one minute think it would be.

So, my bin arrived (upon arrival I learnt that I really do need to get out more, I was far too excited about the delivery of a bin!).  I had barely got it out of the packaging before I was trying my best to disprove the claims of the fingerprint proof stainless steel, and….. nothing, not one single mark. I then proceeded to repeat the test with Snaffles, Mr C, my mum and generally any other people to step foot through the door.

After repeated attempts to prove the claims wrong I am very pleased to report that after 3 weeks use my bin remains fingerprint proof free.

The invisible hinges mean that this corner bin fits perfectly flush to the walls and has saved me a lot of space.

The smart bucket® bag changing system means that there are no bags visible on the outside of the bin.

And the lid, with its patented lid shox technology TM  it is silent. Honestly, listen…. did you hear that? No neither did I. It is not a gentle bang or a quiet thud, it really is silent. The lid shox technology TM also means that the lid closes very slowly so no trapped fingers.

I really can not find any downsides to this product.

The only thing that would possibly prevent me from buying this would be the price. This product retails for £109.99 which for a bin, is on the expensive side. However Simplehuman guarantee this product for 10 years which would help soften the blow of the price a little.

readmore »»

Writing Workshop - Week 8 - My Hot & Steamy Addiction

So, its week 8 of Josies writing prompts. This week its addictions....

I have an addiction. I keep my addiction well hidden, seriously, you would never even realise I have one!

I am addicted to…… yep, you guessed it, Starbucks.

Its been a whole 8 hours since I had my last fix.

Have you ever stood in the queue and listened to someone  order a succession of words that eventually appear at the end of the production line as a drink? Well, that’s me. Me and my “tall skinny caramel macchiato with cream to take away please”. (yes that’s right, I ordered skinny and the asked for cream!) .

The lovely gentleman in Starbucks (yes he recognises me!) tries to convince me that I might as well just have full fat milk as the calories saved is probably the equivalent to half a digestive biscuit. I cant taste the difference though so continue to order a skinny and convince myself that I have “earned” a cake with the saved calories.

Hazelnut Latté
Caramel Latté
Gingerbread Latté
Toffee Nut Latté
Caramel Macchiato

Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Sorry, I got side tracked by the coffee goodness.

I will visit the town centre and pay for parking simply to get my Starbucks fix. I will waste my entire lunch break fighting through the traffic just to get a steaming hot cup of this frothy goodness. I have bribed Snaffles into going by calling it the “glass of milk shop”.

The true extent of my addiction came on red cup day.  I was fairly certain of which week the red cups would start but desperate times called for desperate measures. Google was not my friend that day and my need for a gingerbread latté was growing by the day. I had to take the bull by the horns and called the local Starbuck ahead of my visit for confirmation that a Gingerbread latté would be available!

One day my heaven will arrive , it will come in the guise of a drive through Starbucks.

readmore »»

Wordless Wednesday - My Blue Eyed Boy

readmore »»

Fudge Off!

My Friend M made me some yummy cherry and almond fudge for my birthday last week. She blogged about how her fudge making ordeal lead to a few choice words, not of a polite variety!

She also made a further batch for our recent girls night away (actually I think it was consumed in the car before we even got to our hotel!).

Since then I have been dreaming of fudge. Every nice sweet thing that I eat I am considering whether it would make a good fudge flavour and how it could be incorporated.

I want to make a little something as part of my Grandad’s Christmas present so I thought that fudge would be a nice, low cost option. I mean, how hard could it be to whip up a batch of fudge?

Yesterday I decided to have a trial run at making fudge so that I did not end up in a mad panic on Christmas Eve.

I googled some recipes, researched methods and flavours etc and was pleasantly surprised to find that all it takes is milk, butter and sugar so I did not even need to leave the house to purchase ingredients. A quick tweet about the impending fudge making and off I went.

I melted, dissolved, boiled, simmered and measured temperatures. My mixture had good colour, good texture and smelt fantastic. I lovingly lined my baking tin with baking paper and poured my fudge mixture in praying for a delicious outcome.

My recipe then said to allow the mixture to cool. There was no mention of how or for how long so I put my mixture in the fridge. This now appears to have been one of many mistakes in my fudge making disaster!

So, several hours later I returned to check on my fudge and it remained a sugary mess. In no shape or form did it resemble anything which could ever be classed as “solid”.

More tweets about my fudge failure lead to recommendations from fellow bloggers on twitter to either give up or to purchase ready made fudge.

I tried, I really did try to walk away from the fudge disaster, but it was taunting me. If you listen quietly you can still hear it. As I sat in my living room trying to ignore it I could hear it teasing me from the kitchen “you failed, I beat you, you cant make fudge”.

I could not be beaten by these 3 every day ingredients. My craving for that smooth creamy fudge was growing by the minute.

More research, more recipes and a quick trip to the shops for more ingredients.

A further hour spent slaving over a hot stove and my end result was…….a bloody solid block of god only knows what. I couldn’t even cut the damn thing so it definitely was not creamy smooth fudge as hoped for.

The other batch whilst not solid was still not as I hoped. The colour and flavour were ok but the texture. Arrrrrrrggggghhhh which part of creamy and smooth involves hard and grainy????

Grandad - I love you dearly and I would happily slave over a hot stove for you, however my fudge making skills are clearly way off the mark. My hopes of a cheap little present are unlikely to come to anything when it takes me 3 plus attempts to succeed. Even at Thorntons prices it will still be cheaper to buy some!

I am so close to admitting defeat, if only the fudge would stop taunting me. Maybe one last hunt for a new recipe....

Photo Credit

readmore »»

Journal Of A Lifetime - My Grandads Gift To Me

Grandparents birthdays, I am sure I am not alone in my annual hunt for presents for my Grandad for his birthday. If I ask him he will either say not to bother or will ask for slippers. He doesn’t manage to get through the slippers he has yet alone need another pair. He always has a spare pair in his wardrobe for when his current ones wear out!

This year I found a lovely present for him in a surprising location, Pennels! I bought him A Journal of a Lifetime. You can buy them for various members of the family including Grandad, Grandma, Mother, Father etc.

The book has various writing prompts on each page such as “What games did you play as a child?” and “What advice would you give me for the future?”

The theory is that I buy this gift for my Grandad, he enjoys filling the pages in and eventually gives it back to me to read and find out more about him.

Grandads birthday was in June. My Birthday was last week and guess what I got back. (ok, so it wasn’t quite a surprise, especially because Grandad sent my present with my mum and Snaffles who quickly declared “it’s a book mummy”)

Without a doubt this is my favourite Birthday present. I am trying to make it last so am only reading a few pages at a time. I have learnt so much about him, his family and his life growing up etc. There are some very happy moments to read about but also a lot of pages which I have needed a tissue for or which I have had to stop reading and come back to as they are so sad such as when my Aunt and Grandma passed away from cancer.

I have also learnt things about my Grandad’s family which I did not know for instance I have learnt that my Great Grandad died when my Grandad was only 7 years old, I obviously never got to meet my Great Grandad but the thought of my 7 year old Grandad being without a father made me very sad.

My Grandad has also shared with me very special moments such as meeting, dating and marrying my Grandma, the birth of his own Children, Grand Children and Great Grand Children.

These are photos of my Grandma and my Grandad (he is the one on the right) which my Grandad has included in the journal.

I am so so grateful to my Grandad for taking the time to complete this book for me and share some very personal moments with me. I will treasure my book forever and will no doubt pass the memories contained within the book to Snaffles when he is older.

readmore »»