Jamies dinners

I've been meaning to post about this for a week but kept forgetting. As part of my zero willpower I gave Mark one of his christmas gifts a while back, a copy of Jamies 30 minute meals. He hasnt been cooking much latly as his memorys getting worse but really wanted to get back into it. So we agreed he'd do one meal a week and I'd supervise. :)
Week one - Jules pregnant pasta. Um, might be good in the original recipe but Mark made a little addition. lol. I was distracted at the end and didnt notice him grating orange peel over the pasta rather than cheese. Woops!
Week two - Califlower and macaroni cheese - YUM! Loved this one, will def ask him to make again!
Week 3 - chicken and mushroom pie - Was amazed how quick this one was done (though I did help. lol) Think he's getting in his stride a bit again.
Love the small amount of independance it gives him. Really need to write and thank jamie one day. Think his books are the only thing keep mark sane sometimes. lol.

So tired!

I use that as a title a lot don't I. lol. Well been busy past few days. doing housework, ebaying, parceling and sending bits. boring but there u go. lol.
A hile ago we heard abouteplace a few towns away who recived donations of craft items, toys and other bits. It then costs £10 to join, then everytime you go you pay £15 but can fill a trolly with whatever you want!
Some of it is tat but today we got books for the kids, backpacks, books for me, loads of ribbon, paper, card. :) Well worth the money. Its a heck of a drive though so wont be going too often.
Right off for an early night. No plans for tomorrow except catching up on jobs not yet done. Rock and roll! lol

Wooden spoon dolls

On Sundays Mark takes the kids to a dads group at our local sure start center. They love it here as they get to run about like butters and Mark has help on hand if he finds it a bit too much. Each week they do different activities. This week they were making wooden spoon dolls. I knew Caitlin would love it as shes the creative tyoe. But I had no idea how much! lol. When they came out Cameron handed me his doll as a gift, Caitlin glared at me as though I'd just tried to take away her firstborn child. lol!
Since then shes had it with her constantly, except bedtime which I said no to as it has buttons glued onto it. Shes not the type to swallow random things but better safe than sorry! I tried to get a picture of her with it but she wouldnt look at me long enough. lol
Love how happy she looks. :)

Picture of the doll Caitlin took.

Last night I managed to do a lo with this months Sarahs cards kit. Love this kit but don't have many pictures that go with it unfortunatly.
This one is called 'Why mummy cry?' Its not actually a sad layout as journalling tells about how yesterday me and Caitlin were sitting together when she suddenly turned around and poked me right in the eye! She then looked all concered and gave me a big cuddle asking why I was crying! I swear she's got multiple personalities at times. pmsl.

I inked the journaling tag to tie it in and punched some butterflies. :)

Going cinima with Cameron, Mum and Mollie tomorrow to see 'Dispicable me!' So hopefully that will be good!

Weeks over!

Well the week is OVER! Its been a long week but not all bad really. :) Put a load of stuff on ebay which seems to be going well so hopefully make some pennies there. Going to asda with my mum in the morning to do the weekly shop and hopefully get Cameron an outfit for Halloween. Gonna be a difficult one I think as hes not one for dressing up.
Have a nice week planned next week, going to the cinima Tuesday with cameron mum and Mollie to see Despicable me. Cameron saw the ad an cracked up so think he'll like it. Going to see my gran thursday and hopefully coffee with friends at some point!
have Robin Hood on dvd tonight so short blog. Heres some funny pictures from today.
How cute is this! Caitlin sitting in her baby annabel cot and playing a harmonica. She loves the bloody thing for some reason. Our house always sounds like some old fashioned jail program. lol. Will give her a little tin cup to rattle on the bars of the cot next time.

As part of the clearout Marks sorting some of his starwars stuff. Which includes this darthvader money box. If you press the button he starts breathing and the music starts, then he suddenly raises the light saber which lights up. As you can see this took caitlin by surprise a little!

Hopefully back tomorrow with a halloween outfit!

You just got to laugh.

Well as you proably read, Tuesday wasn't the best day for me. lol. Yesterday wasn't the best either but at least it had a funny ending!
Yesterday while searching, (and finding I might add!) the registration form proving my car was uk, I found that my MOT had expired in September! Cue more crying, angry cursing at myself and frantic phonecalls to local MOT centers. Managed to get an appointment for today at 1.
So this morning got the bus to nursery with Cam, which he was thrilled about, lol, then came home and did housework. I was putting clothes in the wardrobe and knokced over the folder I keep all our papers in. Well it must have been a divine hand that made me do it as I foud another MOT form which expired April 2011! pmsl. I couldnt belive it. I thought the car had had a full MOT when I bought it but obviously when I found the other one thought I was wrong.
You have to laugh dont you.
Well today I had the fun of playing on this

Hubby bought it after a LOT of saving last week. However I'm not too fond of touch screens and I tend to break things so I've kept my distance. lol. But today I had a go on it and I was really surprised how easy it was. I've not really looked too much into apps or anything yet but Marks thrilled with it so I'm pleased. :) He has trouble reading as his eyesight isn't too good so he's been missing his books and graphic novels (not allowed to call them comics. lol) so now he can magnify them and see them properly. :) He's also been doing brain training and note taking on it so hopeing will help with his memory too.
Now if there was only an app to help with his joints life would be good! lol

WTF have I upset someone or something?!

Seriously I must have annoyed the powers that be or something because its just been a joke latly. After a bad week already I got a letter this morning from tax credits. Who have apprently over paid me by £750 which they want bck. Joy. THEN! and this is a cracker, I phoned the DVLA to find out why I havent got a tax renwal letter yet, to be told my car isnt registered in this country!!!!
I was very calm and collected, pointing out it was registered in my name, at my adress and had a uk tax disc, how the **** is it not in this country. No, apprently someone sent a letter saying it had been exported, I'd been driving it illegally and couldnt legally drive it for another month or so untill this is investigated! Lost it at that point, crying, begging the guy, hearing none of it. Couldnt even tell me if it was my signiture on the form!? Which obviously it flamming well wasn't going to be. Ended up hanging up as wasnt getting anywhere. Hubby then rang back, spoke to a woman who said no problem, heres this email, tell them its in the uk, job done, you can drive! God bless that woman!!
Ok rant over, seriously couldnt belive it though, ;yes it has a uk tax disc and is registered to a uk address but its not in the uk!' begs belief.
To top the day off Cameron decided to go through our wardrobe where we were storing his xmas gifts, and now has an ear infection so is very poorly. :( Dont think the two are connected. lol.
Managed to find the time to finish a few layouts I started at my crop. This is Caitlin putting her doll to bed, doll is under the pile of toys in the cot. Title makes sense now doesnt it. lol

few more random ones. too tired after today to explain. lol.





Hopefully, (poorly cameron depending) going for a coffee with mum tomorrow. Nice to get out without the kids every now and again. :)

Distracting myself

Well whenever something bad happens I do what my family does best. Focus on everything else except the bad thing! So The freezer is full of food, garage been gutted andlots of bits put on ebay.
Also managed to clear out some of my craft stuff so have a few bits to sell/swap.

Sizzlet stuffed lion £3

Sizzlet stuffed bear £3

Stuffed lamb £3

Stuffed bunny £3

Cuttlebug tag die £3

Cuttlebug frames bow embossing folder £3

Dear elsie cody range. all new including fabic and embossed papers. £5
Also up for swaps for other dies/folders, masks, glimmer mists, or anything else. :)

OK I have zero willpower.

And not just with chocolate, though that's true too. lol. At the moment we're skint, it's my own fault, said about 5 times now, NO more for the kids for Christmas, never bloody stuck to it though. lol. Last night I was browsing on ebay for nothing in particular and found these two items.


Both are 'take along' track from the Thomas range, which you all know Cameron has no shortage of! lol. We promised ourselves he was getting no more but the woman just lived down the road from us and was willing to sell them both for £27. Would have been rude to say no!
Also bought Mark Jamie Olivers new book for Christmas, then gave in and gave it to him the next day. lol. Done well though, not gave the kids any of their gifts yet. :)

Rest in peace

Recently a wonderful wife, mother and friend passed away unexpectedly. Amanda had been poorly for a while and went for a 'routine' operation to try to get things sorted. However she developed an infection and passed away. Her husband Alan was with her and she wasn't in any pain which is a comfort. My thoughts are with Alan and their three sons at this time.
Amanda we'll all miss you.

I really hate it when

People txt you a question, then when you try to ring them seconds later to answer them they don't answer the phone! Random maybe but just trying to get through to my mum. lol. Had a nice weekend. Went to my crop on Saturday and managed a few layouts. Also went down to a local shop which sold the BEST home made cupcakes and other bits and bobs. Love shops like that.
Yesterday was a weird day. i woke up with loads of motivation to get lots done. Which promptly disappeared. lol. We managed to lie some new carpet in the hall and the outhouse, which looks like a proper room now rather than the dumping ground it was before, lol. Other than that was a bit of a pottering about day. Still been doing scrapbooking. quite pleased as mojos usually gone missing by now. lol.
This was for a challenge on uks. Rules were:
use a grid 10 points - done
use first 10 points - First time I baked with the kids.
use circles - 10 points - circle in the middle

This one is SO not me but I really like it! Normally can't stand white space as just looks like I haven't bothered but think this one works for some reason. lol

Loved the frame around the edge of this paper so tried to work with it.

This is from when we went to the fair with my mum and dad. They tend to say yes where I would say no, such as giving Caitlin a Fab ice lolly which is covered in chocolate/cream/red ice lolly. As you can see she made a brilliant mess, so that's the last one she'll be having for a while!

This layout shows the first and last time I used my 'Sew easy' from QVC. Decided to treat myself and dip into my 'nec' fund when this was a TSV. It's now winging its way BACK to QVC. It was RUBBISH! Most of the heads didn't pierce the paper, and the two that did you need to press so hard it dents the paper. Wasn't pleased. But live and learn! lol.

Another planish one which I like. :) Would love this photo more if I didn't have a big pregnant lady double chin. lol

LOVE the flower on this. The papers on here and the 'My boy' were the basic grey lemonade range. Bought it ages ago but didn't touch it. Loving using up old stash!

Well I've waffled on a bit, lol. Plan for tomorrow is to drop off some bits I've sold and do a few jobs up town. Also have my second training day for homestart so looking forward to that. :) Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Crop day.

Well i did mean to come on last night, but then I started watching season 5 of house. :) Quite addicted to that latly, have seaosn 6 to start tonight. lol.
As promised more layouts. :) This is of Cameorn playing in the garden. I love the colours and the lace along the middle of this one. :)

Kids at the fair. Heard a lot of 'Again, again, again!' when there so thought it was a good title. lol

Finally a simple one. Had NO idea how to use this paper so thought I'd use it to show how different each member of my family reacted to being on the swing. lol. the kids with glee, mum with fear and dad with evil glee at scaring mum!

OPff to watch house and eat cake. :) Will be more chatty tomorrow. lol

I feel great!

It's amazing what pounding the 'to do' list can do. :) Managed to get a lot of HW done over the past few days and get some crafting jobs done too. Today we took Caitlin dancing then shopping and bought her some new shoes too which I'm thrilled with. Saw a pair I liked for £26 but obviously way too much, but in asda found a similar pair for £8! She loves them too which is always a bonus.
On the subject of money, this new benefits thing is causing an uproar isn't it! To be honest it really annoys me that people assume because we're on benefits we're loaded. Made me laugh today as a girl I 'kinda know' asked how much we would lose when the benefits are capped at £500 a week. Um, none! God I'd LOVE to get over £500 a week, not a chance. lol. I'm still not sure about the whole thing though. I completely agree people on benefits shouldn't have more children and expect the government to pay for them. There's always a grey area, what about families who have a big family while working and able to pay for them, then lose their jobs, or the father/mother does a runner. Suppose you'll never keep everyone happy. I think it would be a good idea if those on benefits (and able) either get jobs or do voluntary work. Obviously those with babies or disabilities wouldn't be able to, but those who can't get jobs or have kids in school could do plenty. Work for charities, clean hospitals, simple civil services. Jobs get done, work ethic is improved and people still get benefits. Win, win. If people whinge, they can get jobs.
Ok I'll get off my soap box now, lol. These are some of the layouts I've done over the past few days.
This is of Cameron riding his bike for the first time. He took to it really well.

For a little while anyway. I couldn't believe it, pretty much the whole flaming playground was that spongy stuff except a small patch of concrete by the benches. Guess where Cameron fell off his bike! lol. God we heard about that scrape for weeks!

Last ones a simple one. This is probably one of the oldest photos I've not scrapped yet. Caitlin was playing in her ring with Cameron, who promptly started yelling at me when I tried to take a photo. lol

Have messy play tomorrow morning and more DIY in the afternoon. Will try not to have such a rant tomorrow.

WOYWW

Wow two posts in one week. Well I'm a step up from last week! lol.
On my desk tonight is a Kaisercraft kit I bought ages ago. Yes I finally used all the AC everyday kit! Loved the papers with that but was getting a bit bored of it tbh. lol. Love this kit as its so bright and the colours are brill. Its a bit of a challenge as for some reason I bought the 6x6 pad to go with it. I think it's because there wern't many 12x12 papers. So I'm trying to be imaginative and make my own embellishments or finding other ways to use the smaller papers up. Quite enjoying it so far. Managed to do 11 layouts in the past couple of days so think my mojos back!

Had my first training day tuesday. I'm training to be a volunteer with homestart where I will visit struggling mums and help out. I'm SO excited about this as I miss working but obviously with Mark and the kids it just isnt possible. However for 2 hours a week I can get a sitter for the kids and Mark can behave himself. I hope. lol.
Thought I'd include this picture of Cameron and Bella. He's not had a very good tummy latly so been feeling very sorry for himself.

Will take some pictures of layouts tomorrow. Will stagger them a bit incase I lose mojo again and have nothing interesting to say! lol

Whats going on!

Over a week since my last post! Worst part is I haven't even done anything that interesting! lol.
When i was sorting out the wardrobe to make room to hide christmas gifts, I found an old bag of cross stitching. I used to do it before I had Cameron and never got back to it. There was a half finished Eeyore one I started when I fell pregnant with the intention of putting it in the nursery. Well that didn't work out did it! So been working on that in the evenings and catching up on my V+.
Managed to do a bit of scrapbooking. Nearly finished with the AC kit now. lol. I found some old cyber crop classes on uks and liked this frame one so gave it a go. this is a photo of Cameron his second christmas. We took him to see Santa at Gullivers. After you see him you go into the 'grotto' where theres loads of toys hanging on the wall to choose as your gift. There were cras, trains, planes. Cameron picked these pom poms. lol. LOVED them!

Simple one of Cameron playing with a football.

Another simple one of the kids icing cakes. Love the big letters on this. Got them at the NEC last year. Should put them on my list for this year too. :)

Did this from a sketch on UKS. The sketch called fro prima like swirls but I don't have any (MUCH too pricy for me!) So I drew soem swirls with a template and used stickles. :) Think it could have done with a bit more swirls for intrest but overal pleased with it. :)

Love this photo. Mark took it when my mum came over. She does NOT like animals and wasn't impressed to turn around to find Bella licking her hair.

Been doing loads of housework latly. Washing and ironing is a never ending job in this house. But somehow managed to get the ironing basket amost empty! Hubby taking kids to surestart center tomorrow. Really looking forward to it as he doesnt take them out often as can't have them alone (illness, nothing sinister) but because theres lots of staff there who know us well they help out and it gives him some nice one on one time and give me some me time. :)

Next sale!!

And what does that mean? 6am start! lol. I used to say that people who got up that early and queued in the cold were mad. Then I had kids and every penny counted!
Was really pleased his morning as got lots of really nice bits for Caitlin and also some bits for me which NEVER happens. lol. Wasn't much for boys or men at all so Cameron got a jumper and Mark a t-shirt. Mum wasn't too pleased as she got some new cushions for her living room. I got a txt later that day saying 'Your dads broke the cushions, I'm sending him to live with you.' Woops! So think dads in the dog house now. lol
So onto layouts. This one is actually called 'lets go crabbing' but the C doesn't show up too well. Theres a funny story behind this one. On our first holiday together I suggested to Mark we go looking for crabs at the beach. When we get there though its all that sludgy stuff, not proper sand. Now I've got new trainers on so Mark kindly gave me a piggy back so as not to ruin them. He ended up knee deep in the stuff. Then the coast guard drove past, shouted 'You are in danger! Get out off the beach!' And drove off! Thanks! lol. Well we managed to get back to the edge, I was spotless, Mark filthy and we had to throw his shoes away and get a new pair. lol

This one was for a challenge on UKS. Rules were:
Use several different fonts - Done
Take inspiration from nature - Flowers, rain, and nature colours (blues and greens)
Make your own embellishment - The flowers.
This is a photo taken in Greece years ago. Mark is terrified of heights, and theres a huge fortress on a VERY high hill I wanted to visit. I think theres something like 800 steps to get to the top. Bless him he tried to do it but was a bit much. Not surprising really as there was no hand rail and just a sheer drop!

This is for the Twilight challenge. Rules were:
3 or more different manufacturers papers - Pretty sure I've done this. I THINK the shiny pink one is DCWV, the circle is some random rubbish one, bazzil cardstock. :)
Black and White - Black and white dotty flower
Edges - Ive got crinkly cut edges on my title, and sanded the edges of the photo.
This is a scraplift from a LO on uks but cant for the life of me find it again. Its about snow though so thanks to whoever did it. :)

And this, ah this is whats taking over my life at the moment. :) I love mission games, and games where you can hack the heads of things all the better! I played the first when I was pregnant with Cameron and killing hundreds of zombies is a brill way of dealing with pregnancy hormones. Now its a brill way of dealing with the stresses of 'but mum I want it!!!!' lol

Hubby hopefully getting my computer fixed tomorrow, so hopefully will be blogging from a pc rather than a VERY slow laptop!

WOYWW

A great big cup of coffee! Thats whats on my desk today. lol. SO tired! Been doing lots of day trips with the kids latly, making the most of whats left of summer. Then dismantaling Camerons room and putting it all back together has killed me off almost. lol. The lo on the desk has been there since monday waiting for a title but not done it. WILL do it tonight!

On a good note Cameron adores his room. :) Have a hard time getting him out of it, its great really as he liked his own space and now has enough room to build his track and play properly. Will try and get a picture tomorrow. Not been tidy enough to photograph since he came home and saw it all done!
Sunday we went to a local farm and picked berries. Caitlin loves the farm though isn't too fond of animals touching her. lol She loves the park, digging in mud and it all. Not so girly my girl.

See, this goat came too close, shes squealing here and smacking her hands together. lol

Cameron loved the berry picking. Caitlin is sat on a bale of hay behind us eating a bag of berries, lol. Going to take them again soon as didnt realise they would enjoy it that much.

So berry picking, rabbits, park. good day out really!

Made the berries into jam. Was very pleased with myself as turned out really well! Kids and hubby like it so thats good. :)
Will share some layouts tomorrow after dancing, town, nursery and shopping. I dont know how working mums do it!

I thought I got a cat?

Rather than a dog/elephant/parrot? Bella is So strange, lol. She runs about the house running into things/falling off things/chasing her tail! She makes such a loud noise running too, lol, sounds like an elephant. Also her favourite place to be right now is also curled up on ether my or marks shoulder. See, strange.
Well on Friday we did a sponsored walk called 'The big toddle' in aid of Bernardo's. The kids did really well and it was so much fun. We walked around a Park then they were given a medal and a cupcake. :) This is them relaxing after their hard work.

They also had a magician afterwards and Cameron loved it! Was really surprised as hes not usually the show off one (that's Caitlins job, lol) but he took part in all the tricks and did really well. Caitlin was more content to just play in the park. lol

Well as I said before I've been doing more scrapping lately. Did a few challenges which I'm SO behind on. This is Amanda marys challenge on uks
Use a photo/s that represents someone/thing or how something has changed - From me playing 2p machines as a child, to playing them with my child!
Use journalling - across the bottom
Stripes to represent the fetes of childhood tents, any of the ice cream shades - in the background
I loved this one as made me have a different take on this photo than I probably would have otherwise. Journalling reads about how I don't see it when people say Cameron looks like me, but in this picture we have the exact same smile. And we also both love 2p machines! The $ in the corner is actually the first keyring he won while playing. Dread to think what it cost me. lol

This is the SAS scrappers weekly challenge. Rules being
Guilty pleasure/Obsession – hubby obsessed with star wars, guilty pleasure, holidays!
Chocolate brown – done
Circle - done
The title so much love has lots of meanings. The obvious being the father and son love, then my husbands LOVE of star wars (seriously, he used to recite the script to my stomach when I was pregnant) and our love of family holidays.

This wasn't done for a challenge. I just love the photo. lol

Well we went berry picking today. The kids were covered in blackberry juice and I now have a bowl full of blackberries and sloes I've been ordered to make into jam. Think my son actually expects it for his breakfast tomorrow. Oh well, he can have strawberry and see if he notices. lol